Perhaps she had heard of how he had been fooled by the stranger yesterday. Perhaps she felt contempt for him because he had been so easily outwitted. This was one of his wild surmises, but he rejected it because it was not like Callie to be angry about anything unless there was good reason for her displeasure. At last he gave it up and tried to dismiss the matter from his mind, but several times during the morning he cast covert glances in her direction.
But Callie was plainly worried and downcast. She seldom raised her eyes from her books, she answered the teacher’s questions in a most abstracted manner, and altogether it appeared that there was something on her mind beyond schoolwork.
When recess came she walked slowly out of the room, not mingling with the other girls. Frank saw her go outside toward the campus, where she sat down on the grass by herself, watching an impromptu basketball game and declining all requests to join in the fun.
He went over to her and flung himself down on the grass beside the girl.
“What’s the matter, Callie?”
She looked up at him and smiled faintly.
“Hello, Frank, where did you drop from?”
“I’ve been sitting right across from you in school all morning and this is the first time you’ve noticed that I’m alive.”
“I’m sorry, Frank. I didn’t mean to be rude. I’ve got something on my mind this morning, that’s all.”
“Trouble?”
She nodded.
“What about?”
“Money.”
He was puzzled by this remark. Callie lived with her cousin, Miss Pollie Shaw, the proprietor of a beauty parlor in the city, and although Miss Shaw was not rich, she made a comfortable living. Therefore, when Frank heard Callie say that she was worried about money he was naturally puzzled. Callie’s parents lived in the country, but they sent their daughter frequent remittances to pay the expenses of her education in Bayport.
“What’s the matter?” he asked. “Didn’t your allowance come?”
“No, it isn’t that. I’m all right. It’s Pollie. She lost some money. More than she could afford.”
“Lost some? How was that?”
“She lost fifty dollars last night.”
Frank whistled.
“Whew! That’s a lot of money.”
“It certainly is. The worst of it is that Pollie had just made the final payment on some new electrical fixtures in the shop and it had left her pretty short of cash. I feel bad about it for her sake.”
“How did it happen?”
“A woman came into the store last night and bought some beauty preparations, quite a large order. It amounted to about twelve dollars and she had nothing less than a fifty dollar bill in her purse. Pollie had that much money in the till, for it was near the end of the day, and she didn’t like to lose the order, so she changed the bill.”
Frank nodded soberly. He knew now what had happened.
“And the money was counterfeit,” he said.
“Why, how did you know?” exclaimed Callie.
“I was fooled yesterday myself.” Frank then went on to tell Callie how he and Joe had been victimized by the stranger on the station platform. “Dad says there is a lot of this counterfeit money being circulated,” he said. “They certainly aren’t losing much time in getting rid of it around Bayport. Gee, first a five and now a fifty! I’m sure sorry that Pollie is out that much money.”
“Yes, it’s a big amount,” declared Callie. “Of course, she’ll get along, but no one likes to lose that much.”
“Did she know the woman?”
“Oh, no. She was a total stranger. She was rather handsome and was well dressed. Pollie didn’t suspect anything wrong. As a matter of fact, it wasn’t until she picked up the paper after work last night and read that the banks had issued a warning about counterfeit money that she began to think about it. So she called up Mr. Wilkins, who works in one of the banks, and he came over and took a look at the bill. He said right away that it was no good, although he admitted it was so cleverly done that anyone might be fooled by it.”
“Just what they said about my five. Did Pollie tell the police?”
“I suppose she has told them by now. But she gave me the bill and asked me to turn it over to your father.”
“Good! Dad happens to be working along those lines just now. Have you got the bill with you now?”
“It’s in my purse in the cloakroom. I’ll let you have it at lunch hour.”
So when school was dismissed at noon Callie gave Frank the counterfeit fifty dollar bill. Frank examined it closely. Like the five dollar bill he and Joe had changed for the plausible stranger the previous day, it was crisp and new. Frank had seen very few fifty dollar bills in his life, either genuine or otherwise, but he realized that this specimen was a very good imitation. The mere fact that such bills are not often seen by the average person no doubt rendered it easier to pass without being readily detected.
“I’ll show this to my father,” he promised Callie. “I’m afraid it won’t do much good. Pollie will have to stand her loss, unless she can trace the woman who passed the bad bill on her, but perhaps this will help dad find the source of all this counterfeit money.”
“Goodness knows how many poor people are being victimized just as Pollie was,” said the girl. “I hope they catch the people who are at the bottom of it.”
When Joe joined Frank on the school steps Frank told him about the incident at the beauty parlor and of how Pollie Shaw had lost fifty dollars in goods and money to the strange woman.
“Of course,” said Frank, “she may have been perfectly innocent
