The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1914-07-09
The Euening Story
(By Catherine COOpe.)

Robina wept long and copiously
when, upon coming down to her little
drawing room, she discovered that her
brown leather bag had been stolen.
She had remembered, az S4fe AWAKEN
ed that she had not thought to take
it upstairs with her when she had re-
tired the night before. and now--it
was gone. Some one had taken it
from the center table upon which she
had placed it after coming in from a
shopping trip.
The girl did not regret the loss Of
some $40 or more, nor the stealing of
her bunch of keys. but she did mind,
and she wept over, the theft of her
note book. In it were all the plots
and suggestions for stories that she
had collected since beginning her lit
erary career.
The room in which 2he had left her
bag was a. front one and opened on to
a small balcony that ran along the
entire row of boarding houses. Either
thief had entered by that means
during the night Or? Robina re-
belled at the suspicion that one of the
three men who had been calling on
her the evening before had. taken it.
1t was quite true that she knew
nothing whatever OF the character of
any of the three visitors. Robina had
been introduced to them while at the
boarding house next door, and they
had stepped over the low balcony rail-
ing and into her own drawing room.
She had enjoyed laughing with them
and regretted the enforced suspicion
under which she must hold them
However, her note book was gone,
and there seemed little use crying over
1t. She must try to remember all the
plots she had written down, though
she realized that 1t would be difficult.
A few weeks ago she had been in
uvHyv> f1~v
stories and they, of course, were put
down for future reference. In vain
did Robina search her tired mind for
the peculiarly interesting thoughts
that had come to her brain, but they
seemed not to be registered there as
they had been jotted down hurriedly
in her note book.
that a literary person does not get
look at my notes or my perfectly
good ideas will be stolen
1t was that very thing. however, that
apparently did happen.
After a much needed rest to her
overworked brain Robina returned
from a short trip into the Maine
woods. 1t was, perhaps, eight months
since the theft OF her bag and never a
trace OF 1t had she found. She had
left the apartment in which she had
been robbed and had not retained the
friendship Of any Of the three men
who had been in her drawing room on
the night the bag had mysteriously
disappeared.
! She was looking interestedly
through q current magazine for ia
miliar names and those who were
springing into fame. A page Of ad-
:vertisements In the center of the mag
axine claimed her attention, for q new
writer was being exploited on that
page.
As Robina read the lines it seemed
as " her heart would stop beating &C
great was the sudden feeling that the
series Of stories advertised were hers
/ Surely no two persons could think
Of 30 unique q character" she argued
with herself ''It came to me in q
moment OF inspiration. and the person
who stole my pockctbook and thia
4 person"-she glanced at the heraldet
!name-''are one and the same. Gerald
Thorne! Evidently he knows how t
WELD the pen or this magazine would.
int advertise him SO largely. Anyone
could write with an idea such a. my
Tiny to work ON.
4 RObina came to q sudden Decision
She would not let 0erA1d ThOfne stea
her ideas. write them and get BID
check for them without hearing from
i her. She went out while her anger
lwas hottest and called Mp the editor Of
1.-THE Era 0a9axine-s