Rock Island Argus. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1893-1920, 1908-06-02
8he Hrgus Daily Short Story
'Sinclair's Strategy" BY Henry Haven.
Copyrighted 1905 by Associated Literary Press

Our dance, l believe, Miss Trent"
Dick Underby whisked Myra away, |
and to Fred Sinclair. with a declara
ton of love trembling upon his tongue,
1t seemed that Myra went with i'll |
omened eagerness. Underby hurried |
Myra off to the dancing floor. but Sin |
clair remained in the conservatory and |
made rude remarks to the tiny foun- |
tain playing In the fern lined basin.
All the season it had been race be-
tween himself and Underby for Myra's
favor. and now the season was closing
with the Dagmar dance, yet neither of
the two men had been skillful enough
to evade Myra's innocent stratagems
and make his avowal of love.
= Both had come to the dance deter
mined to put his fate to the test. for
on the morrow Myra was to leave town
for long visit to distant relatives.
Perhaps had there been but one sutton
his persistence might have been re-
warded by opportunity. but Underby
and Sinclair unconsciously aided Myra
In her evasions 10y interrupting the 9th
er at crucial moments. When the last
dance had been played and the guests
were departing Sinclair realized. with
sinking heart, that his opportunity was
lost.
| Underby, too, was heart heavy with
disappointment. and chagrin still show
ed in his face when he came to the
| station the following afternoon to see
Myra Trent off Sinclair was there,
| but upon his face was n smile of such
| satisfaction as made Underby wonder
If perhaps Sinclair had found his OPP
pertunity. after all.
There was a stir as the train pulled
in. and under cover of the confusion
Sinclair handed a package to Miss
| Trent.
| Its the newest detective story" he
| explained. Il know that you like all
| sorts of mystery stories. have taken
the liberty of adding n homemade puz-
gle in case you find the book too short"
Myra smiled approximately. She pre-
ferred cryptograms to chocolates. rid
dies to roses. She had won many mag
azine contests of this sort in her youth.
She found Sinclair's present more ac-
1
as soon as she had settled herself In
her Pullman section she unwrapped
| the book.
AS she ran over the pages an envel-
ope dropped out. 1t contained a single
sheet of note paper. and In Sinclair's
copperplate handwriting was this note:
i Kara Myra-Eble, ech kun heipo de
tin-chi shlosilo. vi trovos ION da mall
facileco kompreni la sencon de tin-chi
| senditajho. sed mi scias Ike vi shatas
labori je enigmoj kay pro ito mi sendas
n al vi tuin chi letercton. Chi sciigos al vi
fion kion vi ne permesas Ike mi sciiju al
y 81 persone. Mi vim amas, karulino. kaj
vi igos min la pletS felicia viro en- la
monde per la unu vorto ''Jes."
sMyra smiled as she studied the odd
tumble of words. Many of them looked
familiar. There was no installing
"enig1noj." Monde" was clearly the
"world." and ''labori' was labor"
Other words were of familiar aspect.
and then there were some that were
totally strange
It might be combination of the
hog Latin of childhood days and the
real Latin or the college course. but an
hours study showed many words not
to be accounted for on any such n.y.
pothesis. The more she studied the
more firmly convinced was Myra that
this was some new form of cryptogram
invented ~ Sinclair to divert her on
her two dag trip. "
She was still studyfn the slip of pa
per when TIE porter came around to
make up heb 18th, and in the troubled
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