As we crossed the city Hastings, remembering the sudden attack that
had been made on him on the occasion of his last visit, looked about
nervously in the crowds.
Sometimes I wondered whether the lawyer had been frank with us and told
all he knew. However, no one seemed to be following him and we lost no
time in hustling from the railroad terminal to the office of Maddox
Munitions.
The office was on the top floor of the new Maddox Building, I knew, one
of the recent tower skyscrapers down-town.
As we turned into the building and were passing down the corridor to
the express elevator a man stepped out from behind a pillar. Hastings
drew back nervously. But it was Burke that the man wanted to see. He
dropped back and we halted, catching only the first whispered sentence.
“We’ve been watching Randall, sir,” I overheard the man say, “but he
hasn’t done anything――yet.”
There was a hasty conference between the man and Burke, who rejoined
us in a few seconds, while the man went back to his post of watching,
apparently, every face of the crowd that thronged forward to the
elevators or bustled away from them.
“My men have been at work ever since I was called in on the case,”
explained Burke to Kennedy. “You see, I had only time to map out a
first campaign for them, and then I decided to hurry off to find you
and later to look over the ground at Westport. Randall is the cashier.
I can’t say that I had anything on him――really――but then you never can
tell, you know.”
We rode up in the elevator and entered the imposing offices of the
great munitions corporation, where the executive business was conducted
for the score or more plants owned or controlled by the company in
various parts of the country.
Hastings led the way familiarly past the girl sitting at a desk in the
outside office and we soon found ourselves in the section that was set
apart for the accounting department, over which Randall had charge.
It seemed that the lawyer was well acquainted with the cashier as he
introduced him to us, and we noted that Randall was a man approaching
middle age, at least outwardly, with that solid appearance that seems
to come to men who deal with numbers and handle large sums of money.
While we talked I looked about curiously. Randall had an inner office,
though in the outer office stood the huge safe which was evidently the
one which had been rifled.
The cashier himself seemed to have lost, for the time, some of his
customary poise. Trying to make him out, I fancied that he was nearly
frantic with fear lest he might be suspected, not so much, perhaps, of
having had anything to do with the loss of the telautomaton as of being
remiss in his duties, which included the guardianship of the safe.
The very anxiety of the man seemed to be a pretty good guarantee of his
honesty. There could be no doubt of how deeply he felt the loss, not
only because it was of such vital importance, but from the mere fact
that it might reflect on his own management of his department.
“It seems almost incredible,” Randall exclaimed as we stood talking.
“The most careful search has failed to reveal any clue that would
show even how access to the office was gained. Not a lock on any of
the doors has been tampered with, not a scratch indicates the use of
a jimmy on them or on the windows. In fact, entrance by the windows
at such a height above the surrounding buildings is almost beyond the
range of possibility as well as probability. How could it have been
accomplished? I am forced to come back to the explanation that the
outer office doors had been opened by a key!”
“There were keys――in the hands of several people, I suppose?” inquired
Kennedy.
“Oh yes! There are in every large office like this,” hastened Randall.
“Mr. Maddox had a key, of course?”
“Yes.”
“And you?”
“Certainly.”
“Who else?”
“The agent of the building.”
“I mean who else in the office?”
“My assistant――oh, several. Still, I am sure that no one had a key
except those whom we could trust.”
“Did Shelby Maddox ever have a key?” cut in Hastings.
The cashier nodded in the negative, for the moment surprised,
apparently, at the very idea that Shelby would ever have had interest
enough in business to have such a thing.
I saw Burke looking in covert surprise at Hastings as he asked the
question. For the moment I wondered why he asked it. Had he really
thought that Shelby might have a key? Or was he trying hard to make a
case? What was his own connection with the affair? Kennedy had been
looking keenly about.
“Is that the safe over there?” he indicated. “I should like to examine
it.”
“Yes, that’s it, and that’s the strangest part of it,” hastened
Randall, as though eager to satisfy us on all points, leading the way
to a modern chrome-steel strong-box of a size almost to suggest a
miniature bank vault surely a most formidable thing to tackle.
“You see,” he went on, nervously, as though eager to convince us,
“there is not a mark on it to show that it has been tampered with.
Yet the telautomaton is gone. I know that it was there last night,
all right, for I looked in the compartment where we keep the little
model, as well as the papers relating to it. It is a small model, and
of course was not charged with explosive. But it is quite sufficient
for its purpose, and if its war-head were actually filled with a high
explosive it would be sufficiently deadly against any ordinary ship in
spite of its miniature size.”
Kennedy had already begun his examination, first of all assuring
himself that it was useless to try to look for finger-prints, inasmuch
as nearly everybody had touched the safe since the robbery and any such
clue, had it once existed, must have been rendered valueless.
“How did you discover the loss?” I ventured as Craig bent to his work.
“Did anything excite your suspicion?”
“N-no,” returned the cashier. “Only I have been very methodical about
the safe. The model was kept in that compartment at the bottom. I make
it a practice in opening and closing the safe to see that that and
several other valuable things we keep in it are there. This morning
nothing about the office and certainly nothing about the safe suggested
that there was anything wrong until I worked the combination. The door
swung open and I looked through it. I could scarcely believe my own
eyes when I saw that that model was gone. I couldn’t have been more
astonished if I had come in and found the door open. I am the only one
who knows the combination――except for a copy kept in a safety deposit
box known only to Marshall Maddox and Mr. Hastings.”
Before any of us could say a word Kennedy had completed his first
examination and was facing us. “I can’t find a mark on it,” he
confessed. “No ‘soup’ has been used to blow it. Nitroglycerin enough
might have wrecked the building. The old ‘can-opener’ is of course out
of the question with a safe like this. No instrument could possibly
rip a plate off this safe unless you gave the ripper unlimited time.
There’s not a hint that thermit or the oxy-acetylene blowpipe have been
used. Not a spot on the safe indicates the presence of anything that
can produce those high temperatures.”
“Yet the telautomaton is gone!” persisted Hastings.
Kennedy was looking about, making a quick search of the office.
As his eye traveled over the floor he took a step or two forward and
bent down. Under a sanitary desk, near a window, he picked up what
looked like a small piece of rubber tubing. He looked at it with
interest, though it conveyed no idea to me. It was simply a piece of
rubber tubing. Then he took another step to the window and raised it,
looking out. Far below, some hundred or more feet, was the roof of the
next building, itself no mean structure for height.
“Have you searched the roof below?” he asked, turning to Burke.
Burke shook his head. “How could any one get in that way?” he
negatived.
“Well――search the roof below,” repeated Kennedy.
Even though he did not understand what good might come of such a
strange request, Burke had known Kennedy long enough not to question
his actions. He moved away, seeking one of his men whom he could send
on the errand.
While we waited Kennedy continued to question Randall.
“Mr. Maddox was very careful of his key, I suppose?” he ventured.
“Yes, sir, very careful. So we all were of the combination, too. Not
even my assistant knows that. If I should drop dead, there would be
only one way to get it――to open that safety deposit box, and that
must be done by some one with the proper authority. It has all been
carefully safeguarded.”
“You know of no one intimate with Mr. Maddox――who might have obtained
the key――or the combination?”
I wondered at what Kennedy was driving. Had he the little dancer,
Paquita, in mind? Did he suspect that she might have wormed from Maddox
the secret? Or was he, too, thinking of Shelby?
Randall shook his head, and Kennedy continued his quick examination of
the office, questioning the assistant, who was unable to add anything
of value.
So far there had been nothing to show that the robbery might not have
been an inside job. As Kennedy was still pondering on the new mystery
that confronted us Burke approached with the man whom he had sent to
make the search.
His face indicated that he was puzzled. In his hand he was holding a
disk that was something like the flat telephone receivers one sees
often on interior office telephones. To it was attached a rubber tube
like that which Kennedy had picked up in the office a few minutes
before.
“My man found this thing on the roof below,” explained Burke, with a
look of inquiry. “What do you suppose it is? How did it get there?”
Kennedy took the disk and began examining it carefully, fitting on the
other rubber tube.
“Perhaps it had served its purpose――was no longer of use,” he
meditated. “At any rate, if some one had to get away with that
telautomaton he would not want to burden himself with anything else
that was unnecessary. He might very well have discarded this.”
What the thing was I could not imagine. We all crowded about, examining
it, not even Burke offering an explanation.
Suddenly Craig’s face lightened up. He thrust the tubes into his ears
and walked over to a smaller safe that was still locked. As he turned
the combination handle he held the black disk up close to the safe. The
intent look on his face caused us all to watch without a word. Around
and around he turned the handle slowly. Finally he stopped. Then, with
a few quick turns, he gave the door a pull and it swung open on its
oiled hinges.
We fairly gasped. “What is it?” I demanded. “Magic?”
Kennedy smiled. “Not magic, but black science,” he replied. “This is a
burglar’s microphone.”
“A burglar’s microphone?” I repeated. “What’s that?”
“Well,” he explained, “the microphone is now used by burglars for
picking combination locks. When you turn the lock a slight sound is
made when the proper number comes opposite the working part. It can
be heard by a sensitive ear, sometimes, I am told. However, it is
imperceptible to most persons. But by using a microphone it is an easy
matter to hear the sounds. Having listened to the fall of the tumblers,
the expert can determine what are the real numbers of the combination
and open the safe. That is what happened in this case.”
We followed Kennedy, speechless. What was there to say? We had already
seen him open a safe with it himself.
Though we were thus far on our way, we had not even a clue as to the
identity of the criminal or criminals.
I recalled Burke’s own theory as he had expressed it. Could it be that
some one had betrayed to a foreign government agent the priceless
secret of the telautomaton?
V