Miss Banks's appointment came through the agency of the district's
congressman, in whose home she had acted as governess for a period.
Moreover, she answered the description in that she was young, pretty,
and refined. Anderson Crow felt that he was on the right track; he was
now engaged in as pretty a piece of detective business as had ever
fallen to his lot, and he was not going to spoil it by haste and
overconfidence.
Just why Anderson Crow should "shadow" the schoolhouse instead of the
teacher's temporary place of abode no one could possibly have known but
himself--and it is doubtful if _he_ knew. He resolved not to answer the
Chicago letter until he was quite ready to produce the girl and the
proof desired.
"I'd be a gol-swiggled fool to put 'em onter my s'picions an' then have
'em cheat me out of the reward," he reflected keenly. "You cain't trust
them Chicago lawyers an inch an' a half. Doggone it, I'll never fergit
that feller who got my pockit-book out to Central Park that time. He
tole me positively he was a lawyer from Chicago, an' had an office in
the Y.M.C.A. Building. An' the idee of him tellin' me he wanted to see
if my pockit-book had better leather in it than hisn!"
The fact that the school children, big and little, loved Miss Banks
possessed no point of influence over their elders of the feminine
persuasion.
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