Jack Winters Gridiron Chums | Page 9

you. Tell me what you did, please, Jack?"
"I'm sorry to say I couldn't learn much at the post-office," the other
hastened to say, determined not to keep Bob in suspense any longer
than could be helped.
"But you did ask about the foreign letters, didn't you, Jack?"
"Yes, I worked that part of it pretty well, and managed to get into a talk
about the great difficulty which most foreigners here in this country
found in communicating with their old folks abroad. Mr. Dickerson
said there was a time when every day he had quite a batch of letters
going out to different countries; because you know there are many
foreign workers in our mills here, and they were constantly sending
money home to their poor folks. But as the war went on, he said, they
began to write less and less, because they feared the letters were being
held up by the British, or the vessels being sunk with all the mail
aboard by the German subs. So he said it was a rare event nowadays for
him to cancel the stamps on a foreign letter, though he had one
yesterday, he remembered."
"Yesterday, Jack? Oh! what do you mean?"
"But it was to Italy the letter was going," Jack hastened to explain. "Mr.
Dickerson said he took particular pains to notice it, because the stamp
was put on the wrong end of the envelope. He remembered that Luigi,
the bootblack at the railroad station, always insisted on doing this. He
also read the address, which was to Luigi's parents in Genoa."
Big Bob's face darkened again.
"Too bad!" he muttered, disconsolately; "why couldn't that letter he
chanced to notice have been my lost one? Hard luck, I must say, all
around."
"Then you didn't meet with anything this morning, I take it, Bob?"
continued Jack, hardly knowing what to say in order to raise the
drooping spirits of his friend.
Big Bob shook his head in the negative.

"Not a thing, Jack," he went on to admit, "though I was really out, and
walking up and down that path at peep of day. I couldn't tell you how
many times I went over the ground without finding anything. Why, I
even remembered which way the breeze was blowing yesterday, and
spent most of my time on that particular side of the path. Think of that,
will you, Jack; and yet for the life of me I can't positively recollect
whether I did drop that letter into the slot along with the rest. I must be
getting looney, that's what."
"Well, you've just got to brace up, Bob, and believe it's all right," Jack
told him, slapping the other heartily on the shoulder, boy fashion. "As
time goes on you'll sort of get used to it; and then some fine day your
father will speak of having heard from his correspondent abroad."
"Thank you for trying to bolster up my nerve, Jack It's mighty nice of
you in the bargain. I'll need your counsel more than a few times from
now on, and I'm right glad I can have some one to go to when I feel so
sick with the suspense, All the while I'm waiting and hoping I've got to
tremble every time my father speaks to me That's the result of having a
guilty conscience you know. I've read about such things before, but this
is the first time I've actually had the experience myself."
"Besides," continued Jack, "even if you did mail the letter, that's no
assurance it would ever reach the party he wrote to. Many a vessel has
gone down before arriving at its destination, a victim to the terrible
policy of the Germans with their U-boats. And of course the mail sinks
when the boat goes down in the war zone. If your father were wise he
would duplicate that letter several times, and in that way make sure one
of them had a chance to reach the party abroad."
"Do you know I thought of that myself, Jack!" exclaimed Bob, quickly;
"but you see it would never do for me to mention it to him. Why, he'd
suspect something lay back of it at once, and ask me the question that I
shall be dreading to hear--'Did you positively mail that letter I gave
you?' Jack, sometimes I can see just those words in fiery letters a foot
high facing me, even when I close my eyes. It makes me think of the
handwriting on the wall that appeared before the eyes of that old
worthy, a victorious general, I believe it was, or an ancient king, but
which spelled his doom."
"If I knew of anything else I could do to help you, Bob, I'd be happy to
try. Now,