The Jasper news., 1918-05-16


so that he invited me to his house.
| dined there several times, was invited
to call often, and-I enjoyed It. You
see, had few friends In the city out
! side my journalistic acquaintances, and
| / suppose l was fattered by Mr.. War
ren's kindness and the fancy he SEEM
ed to have taken to me. And l liked
Miss Warren--no one could help that
and believed she liked me-"
"She does like you," interrupted his
companion, with surprise. "Caroline's
y good girl"
"Yes; she is. However, she isn't In
this story except as a side issue. At
t;is time my ambitions were for
newspaper career, and l thought
was succeeding. And her fathers
marked interest and the things he said
to me promised more than an ordinary
success. He was a well known man
on the street and influential. So my
head began to swell, and dreamed
lot of foolishness. And them
He paused, put down his empty pipe
and sighed.
"Welb them he continued. "came
| IuS Upset. JuuBtu llOh "hub yOu
said at your previous conversation,
captain, that you were well enough ac-
quainted with Wall street to know that
queer operations take place there. Did
you read about the south shore trolley
businessT
Captain Elisha considered. "Why,
yes" he said slowly; seems If l did;
one of those consultations with hold.
in companies and franchises and ex-
tensions and water by the hogshead
Want that 1t? | remember now. The
Boston papers had considerable about
II, and presume likely the New York
ones had more. One Of those all &C.
cordin' to law swindles that sprout
same as toadstools In a dark place, but
die out If the lights turned on too sud-
den. This one didn't come to nothin'
but bad smell, If | remember right"
"You do. And l suppose I'm respon-
sible for the smell l got wind of the
thing, investigated. found out some
thing Of what was going on and print
ed a preliminary story In the Planet
1t caused a sensation"
He paused once more. Captain ELL
sha for the sake of saying something
observed. 81 shouldn't wonder"
ut certainly did. And the morning
on which It appeared Mr.. Rodgers
Warren phoned me. He wished to see
me at once. went down to his office.
Captain. dislike to tell you this. Mr..
Warren was your brother"
y know he was. And I'm his execu.
Co. Both those reasons make me spe.
<'ally anxious to have you tell me the
ruth. Heave ahead now to oblige me-"
well, found him very polite and
cordial at first, He said that ridicu-
lous and sensational story concerning
Ghe trolley combine had appeared in
the Planet, and he would like to have
me contradict 1t and suppress further
falsehoods Of the kind. / told him
couldn't do that, because the story was
true. had written 1t myself. He WINS
angry, and | could see that he was
holding himself in by main strength.
/ went on to explain that 1t was the
duty of an honest paper, as l saw 1t,
to expose such trespass upon the peo-
pies rights. He asked me II l knew
who was behind the scheme. l said
knew some of the hackers. They were
pretty big men too. Then he informed
me that he himself was deeply inter.
ested.
~ was knocked of my feet by that,
you can imagine. And, to be frank,
Captain, If ! had known 1t at first I'm
not sure that I, personally, would have
, taken the matter up. Yet l might, |
| can't tell. But now that had done II
and discovered what had 1 couldn'i
give 1t up. ] must 60 on and learn
t more. And I knew enough already to
!, be certain that the more / learned the
p more should write and have publish
j ed. 1t was one of those things which
! had to be made public-if fellow had
conscience about him and pride ir
3 the decency of his profession.
g "All this was going through my head
8 as sat there in his private office. AND
he took my surprise and hesitation al
Q symptoms of wagering and went at me
hard. OF course knew, he said. thai
:, the operation. was absolutely within
e the law. 1 did, but that didn't MAKE
l it more honest or moral and just al
t went-on to say that In large financia
}. deals of this nature petty scruplel
8 must be lost sight of. Good Of thu
|, business, rights Of stockholders, all tina
= sort Of stuff, he rang the changes
All the papers care for was sensation
o To imperil the fortune Of widows ant
g orphans whose savings were inyestet
+. In the South Shore stock for the SAX
d of sensation was crime. He SHOULD
\. have known halter than RI RaV that "a