Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1913-03-23
BY PAUL WEST

Ortiz the receipt, which she handed to her niece
about ten o'clock the next morning the ladies
came down dressed for going away. Previously
their trunks had gone, and Sonora Ortiz had sent
for her bill. She had breakfast, and then
to the office, where she paid her bill and asked
for her necklace with some little pleasantly about
supposing that we would be glad to get rid of her
and her nuisance of baube.
"The same clerk who had taken the case from
her on the previous day on duty and the
same cashier who had locked it in the safe AS
Sonora Ortiz passed her receipt to the clerk she
let a crumpled bill drop into his hand. 1t was
hundred dollar note.
"For you Senor for your kindness in caring
for my necklace she said.
Thanking her, the clerk turned to the cashier
who had already taken the case from the safe,
and passed it to Sonora Ortiz
"'Wil you open it, please? she asked him. /
think shall the necklace.
"rhe clerk did as asked. Then he gasped
Sonora Ortiz screamed, not loudly but with a
suppressed, unbeeving terror. The necklace zrds
not in the bOr!'
MANAGER HILLEGAS delivered the finish
ing words of his story with intense dramatic
force and fixed his eyes on the listener to note
their effect But the other man could scarcely
have been less excited, apparently, if he had been
listening to the story of Jack and Jill. The man
ager wondered what sort of dumb-wt this other
man was, this insignificant little creature, sent
to him by the leading investigation bureau of the
city as its best man. The little merely sat
silent putting at his cigarette, with his small gray
eyes half closed The hotel manager continued
unasked.
"The rest is short he said. "Skfuly and
quietly the astounded lady was escorted to my
office here, and sank into a chair half faintng,
while the clerk told me the story. Immediately
| sent for Mr.. Habermann, the proprietor and,
after he had learned the facts told by the house
staff, backed up by such confederation as could
give he directed me to pay Sonora Ortiz twenty
thousand dollars Immediately, which l did |
gave her check, Hennessy escorted her to tie
bank, and thence she hurried away in a taxi to
the steamer, still only half awake apparently, to
what had occurred"
The other man continued 81 ent; but there was
peculiar interpretive look in his eyes, as though
he was searching himself, rather than Manager
Hillegas for information several points. Hill
1egas misunderstood that gaze; for he went on
apologetically:
a know what YOU think, that we made fools of
ourselves in paying the money without investiga-
ton. You won't when you understand. There
are two hotels in this city between which the
rivalry is deadly, the Midas and the ST. Mammon
The ST. Mammon is little the newer and natu-
rally has taken away some of our exclusive patron
age; but are holding own through our past
record 1t is nip and tuck between US; but the
least little accident might the tide away from
the Midas The ST. Mammon watches every
chance to prove its superiority and gain any adj
vantage. If we had hesitated about paying Sonora
Ortiz the money, she would have been delayed
from her trip. She would, of course, have notified
the police. There couldn't have been any way of
keeping the scandal out of the papers, and the
publicity department of the St. Mammon would
have made all that possible out of the affair.
we had the story through rivals, in its worst
been ruinous. Attention would have been drawn
the ST. Mammon had never been robbed. Guests
r care would desert us as rats leave sinking ship
we'd that Sonora Ortiz had robbed us by some trick
ould have cost us thousands of dollars patronage
" his fortune but his heart in the Midas. Twenty