Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1929-12-01
SEVENTEENTH INsrALLMENr.

EW4LDERED by the sudden
* ness Of Forster's question
Ehoda could only echo ir
Eyes. And. for that mat.
ter" he went on, "how old are youi
Eighteen, you say. Sure you weren't
1s six years ago? Thought you'd cook
ed up something good, did you, when
you got together and snapped stories
with a discharged employe of mine
faxed up the red hair, and came here
pretending to be Rhoda Mcfarland"
II am Rhoda Mcfarland" she told
him. Il don't know who you think
am. I don't know what you're talk
ing about"
81 don't mind telling you what I'm
talking about. I'm talking about what
happened to Prof. Mcfarland six years
ago, when he got on a train here In
Chicago to 60 back to the coast. He'd
been East to read a paper before the
OIL Chemists Institute, and he found
q young girl on the train across the
aisle from him crying because shed
had her pocketbook stolen after she'd
got on the train.
He was sorry for her and paid her
fare, Pullman and all, so they wouldn't
put her of the train. And she prom
1Sed him that her friends would send
the money as soon as she got to the
Coast. But what she did was to make
q complaint before the district attor-
ney out there that he'd taken advan-
tage Of her.
"He claimed it was a frame-up, and
when it went to trial. the jury ac-
Quilted him. although he couldn't
show any reason why any one should
want to frame him that way and nc
one else could either. And the scandal
OF the trial cost him his job at the
university.
so he came back here and told me
his story, and believed him and gave
him Q job. He felt disgraced about
1t. He was like a man hiding from
the police; didn't want anybody "a
know who he was or what he was do
ing. Well, I could see how he felt 50
I never told soul anything about It,
l even paid him bis wages in cash
every week.
claire Cleveland couldn't have found
out anything about him, even II she
tried TO. He never came near my once
nor where I lived. He worked at q
place hxed up for him, and I used to
go around there once a week to see how
he was getting on and to pay him his
money. I'm dead sure he never told
his daughter anything about that Cali
fornia mess. She was nothing but q
kid. He'd have kept it from her, If he'd
been telling everybody else In sight
$50 when you said that Claire CIeve-
land was talking to you about what
happened to Mcfarland out in Cali
fornia I'd have known you were lying
even II you hadn't given yourself away
by other things. And II you want 10
know who think you really are, ]
don't mind telling you that, either. ]
believe you're the one person alive to-
day who really knows whether Walter
Mcfarland was telling the truth or not "
Until he'd finished, she hadn't seen
what he was driving at. And, when she
did. she could do nothing but stare at
him, COMPOUNDED by the mere mon
strousness Of his mistake. To complete
her discontinue she found she was be-
ginning to cry. Silly unwanted tears
were yelling up in her eyes, anyhow,
and blurring her sight Of him.
you can cry, can you? Well, 1t
worked with him, but it won't with me.
SO you may as well
He broke on there as the telephone
bell rang. He seemed rather startled
though, by the message he was getting
Whats that?" he barked. Who does
he say he is?" He shot q sharp look at
her when he got the answer to the
question, as though he suspected her OF
having had something to do with that
call. can right" he said, after listen
ing for minute, I'm see him, but not
in here. Have him shown up to the
library. I'll see him there. And fnd
DeGraw and tell him want him.
He put the telephone back and pressed
an electric button.
I'm going to leave you for a while, u
he said to Rhoda, ito think things
over, and you'd better think straight, Il
you can. I'm going to get this Cleve-
lana woman. But I've got nothing
against you. And, If you can make up
your mind TO come through clean and
tell me the whole conspiracy, I'll let you
60. Meanwhile, 1t won't do you any
good TO try TO get away. You could
holler your head OF, and nobody would
pay any attention to you"
He left and Rhoda sank back In her
chair, too limp TO obey her rather weak
impulse to dart out Of that room be-
fore they should have time to lock hel
up in 1t.
What possessed her mind was the
story Forster had been telling her about
the girl he'd preposterously taken her tc
be- Did he really believe that? Was
there q scrap Of doubt in his mind that
she was Walter McFarland'S daughter
Wasn't the whole thing a bluff to put
her on the defensive and frighten hel
into doing, eventually, whatever 1t wal
that he wanted her to do? It woule
have been a rather satisfactory expla'
nation, II she could have adopted 1t, fol
no other reason than that it brought
him out in a clearer, less ambiguous
light.
But she found she couldn't adopt it
He wasn't any more of an actor than sh'
was. His manner, while he had beer
trying to convince her that he had beer
led by nothing but disinterested be
nevolence In trying TO ind her, haC
been utterly unconvincing. Three time
during their talk she had startled hin
into explosions of uncontrolled fright o.
anger: when she had mentioned TIT
theft Of the trunk, when she had Spoken
Claire C1eveland'S name; and, finally
when she had referred TO what haC
happened to her father in California.
The first two times he had seemed
more frightened than angry. But tn
last time he hadn't been frightened q
all. Indeed, his anger had seemed h
carry with 1t a relief from his for
n1er fear. as II she'd given her
self away, and he'd perceived q
last that what he'd been frightened
about wasn't true. And that must NEAR
that he didn't believe it possible tina
Claire Cleveland could have known any
thing about the California episode.
She found herself accepting whA
he'd told her about that as the truth
Some Of the other things he'd told he
she knew to be true. Her father hat
been paid In cash through the fou
years they'd lived at the hotel. Forste
wouldn't have known that unless he''
paid him himself, or it wasn't hkel
that he would. What he'd said abou
her fathers feeling disgraced and havin
lived practically in hiding was con
firmed. too, by innumerable rnenorie
of his having cautioned her not to tai