"What's any of them little haythen been coin' to scare ye, missy?" she demanded belligerently. "Don't you think I'm afraid of them! Comes any of them around me and I'll take my mopstick over the heads of them.""And you'll break a perfectly good mopstick and not hurt the Jap when you do it," said Linda. "There's an undercurrent of something deep and subtle going on in this country right now, Katy. When Japan sends college professors to work in our kitchens and relatives of her greatest statesmen to serve our tables, you can depend on it she is not doing it for the money that is paid them. If California does not wake up very shortly and very thoroughly she is going to pay an awful price for the luxury she is experiencing while she pampers herself with the service of the Japanese, just as the South has pampered herself for generations with the service of the Negroes. When the Negroes learn what there is to know, then the day of retribution will be at hand. And this is not croaking, Katy. It is the truest gospel that was ever preached. Keep your eyes wide open for Japs. Keep your doors locked, and if you see one prowling around the garage and don't know what he is after, go to the telephone and call the police."Linda climbed the stairs to her workroom, plumped down at the table, set her chin in her palms, and lost herself in thought.
For half an hour she sat immovable, staring at her caricature of Eileen through narrowed lids. Then she opened the typewriter, inserted a sheet and wrote:
MY DEAR Mr. SNOW:
I am writing as the most intimate woman friend of Marian Thorne.
As such, I have spent much thought trying to figure out exactly the reason for the decision in your recent architectural competition; why a man should think of such a number of very personal, intimate touches that, from familiarity with them, Iknow that Miss Thorne had incorporated in her plans, and why his winning house should be her winning house, merely reversed.
Today I have found the answer, which I am forwarding to you, knowing that you will understand exactly what should be done.
Enclosed you will find one of the first rough s};etches Marian made of her plans. In some mysterious manner it was lost on a night when your prize-winning architect had dinner at our house where Miss Thorne was also a guest. Before retiring she showed to me and explained the plans with which she hoped to win your competition. In the morning I packed her suitcase and handed it to the porter of her train. When she arrived at San Francisco she found that the enclosed sheet was missing.
This afternoon tidying a garage in which Mr. Peter Morrison, the author, is living while Henry Anderson completes a residence he is building for him near my home, I reversed a coat belonging to Henry Anderson to dislodge from its pocket the nest of a field mouse. In so doing I emptied all the pockets, and in gathering up their contents I found this lost sheet from Marian's plans.
I think nothing more need be said on my part save that Iunderstood the winning plan was to become the property of Nicholson and Snow. Without waiting to see whether these plans would win or not, Henry Anderson has them three fourths of the way materialized in Mr. Morrison's residence in Lilac Valley which is a northwestern suburb of Los Angeles.
You probably have heard Marian speak of me, and from her you may obtain any information you might care to have concerning my responsibility.
I am mailing the sketch to you rather than to Marian because Ifeel that you are the party most deeply interested in a business way, and I hope, too, that you will be interested in protecting my very dear friend from the disagreeable parts of this very disagreeable situation.
Very truly yours,LINDA STRONG.
