'But no
murder,' says he; 'and I won't wear pink pants at a cotillon.'
"'I wouldn't ask you to,' says I. 'This is honorable, stylish and
uneffeminate. Tell the waiter to bring a demi tasse and some other
beans, and I will disclose to you the opus moderandi.'
"We closed the deal an hour later in the rococo rouge et noise room. I
telegraphed that night to Miss Artemisia in Salina. She took a couple
of photographs and an autograph letter to an elder in the Fourth
Presbyterian Church in the morning, and got some transportation and $80.
She stopped in Topeka long enough to trade a flashlight interior and a
valentine to the vice-president of a trust company for a mileage book
and a package of five-dollar notes with $250 scrawled on the band.
"The fifth evening after she got my wire she was waiting, all decolletee
and dressed up, for me and Vaucross to take her to dinner in one of
these New York feminine apartment houses where a man can't get in unless
he plays bezique and smokes depilatory powder cigarettes.
"'She's a stunner,' says Vaucross when he saw her. 'They'll give her a
two-column cut sure.'
"This was the scheme the three of us concocted. It was business straight
through.
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