CHAPTER XXIII. PARTNER-DETECTIVES
It was five-thirty when the partner-detectives left the quiet park, wherelong shadows were lying on the grass and where birds were calling softlyfrom one rustling tree to another.
"It seems like a different world, doesn't it?" Bobs said, as she smiledin her friendliest way at the lad at the wheel. She had felt a realtenderness for her companion since he had told her about Desmond, and shewas glad that an old friend of hers had been a comfort to him.
"It does, indeed," he declared with a last glance back at the park. "Ilike trees better than I do many people. We have some wonderful old elmsaround our summer home in the Orange Hills. When my mother returns Ishall ask her to invite you four girls to one of her week-ends, or to onethat she will plan just for me, after Dick comes."
Then, as they were again on the thronged East Side, the lad said:
"Seventy-sixth Street, beyond Second, you said, didn't you?"
"Yes. There is the Boys' Club House just ahead," Roberta exclaimed. Thenas they drew up at the curb, she added: "Good! The door is open and soMr. Hardinian probably is here."
The young man whom they sought was still there, and as they entered thelow wooden temporary structure which covered a vacant lot between tworickety old tenements, they saw him smiling down at a group of excitednewsies, who were evidently relating to him some occurrence of their day.
He at once recognized Roberta and made his way toward her, while the boysto whom he had spoken a few words of dismissal departed through a sidedoor, leaving the big room empty.
Bobs held out her hand as she said: "Mr. Hardinian, this is my friend,Mr. Caldwaller-Cory, and we have come, I do believe, on a wild goosechase."
Ralph at once liked the young man with the lithe, wiry build and the darkface that was so wonderfully expressive.
He looked to be about twenty-four years of age, although he might havebeen even a year or two older. An amused smile accompanied his question:"Miss Vandergrift, am I the wild goose?"
The girl laughed. "That wasn't a very graceful way of stating ourerrand," she said, "so I will begin again. The truth of the matter isthat Mr. Cory and I are amateur detectives."
Again Mr. Hardinian smiled, and, with a swinging gesture that seemed toinclude the entire place, he said: "Search where you will, but I doubt ifyou will detect here a hidden wild goose." Then, more seriously, headded: "Come, let us be seated in the library corner, for I am sure thatyour visit has some real purpose."
Mr. Hardinian listened to the story of the Pensinger mystery, which, aslittle was really known about it, took but a brief moment to tell. At itsconclusion he said: "Did you think. Miss Vandergrift, that I might knowsomething about all this? I truly do not. Although I was born in Hungary,while I was still an infant my parents went to England, where I waseducated, and only last year the need of my own people brought me herewhere so many of them come, believing that they are to find freedom andfortune. But how soon they are disillusioned, for they find poverty,suffering and conditions to which they are unused and with which theyknow not how to cope. Many of the older ones lose out and their childrenare left waifs all alone in this great city. I found when I reached herethat they needed me most, the homeless boys who, many of them, slepthuddled over some grating through which heat came, or in hallways crowdedtogether for warmth, until they were told to move on. And so the firstthing that I did was to rent this vacant lot and build a temporary woodenstructure. Now with these walls lined with bunks, as you see, I can makemany of the boys fairly comfortable at night."
"I say, Mr. Hardinian," Ralph exclaimed, "this is a splendid work thatyou are doing! I'm coming over some night soon, if I may. I want to seethe place in full swing."
"Come whenever you wish," was the reply. And then, as Roberta had risen,the young men did also.
The girl smiled as she said: "Honestly, Mr. Hardinian, I knew in my bonesthat you would not be able to help us solve the mystery, but you were theonly Hungarian with whom I had even the slightest speaking acquaintance,and so we thought that we would tell you the story and, if you ever hearanything that might be a clue, let us know, won't you?"
"Indeed I will, and gladly. Good-bye! Come over Sunday afternoon at four,if you have no other plans. We have a little service then and the boysconduct it entirely."
When they were again in the small car, Ralph was enthusiastic. "I likethat chap!" he exclaimed. "I wish detectives could plan to have thingsturn out the way an author can. If I had the say of it, I'd make Mr.Hardinian into a descendant of Marilyn Pensinger and then he couldinherit all of that fortune and use it for his homeless waifs."
It was after six when the small car stopped in front of the Pensingermansion, and Ralph declared that since he had a date with his dad, hecould not stop to meet the other Vandergrift girls, as he greatlydesired.
That night, when Ralph returned from an evening affair which he hadattended with his father, he did not retire at once. Instead, he seatedhimself at his desk and for half an hour his pen scratched rapidly over alarge sheet of white paper. He was writing a letter to Dick De Laney, hisclose-as-a-brother friend, telling him that at last the only girl in theworld had appeared in his life.
"I always told you, old pal, that I'd know the girl who was meant for methe minute that I met her. But I do believe that she is going to be hardto win."