"Mr. Smith, it was you took our cash-box last night."
The clerk was colorless, but he only faltered an instant. "What nonsense
is this?" he demanded angrily. "I never heard of your cash-box. What do
you mean by--"
"Well then, I'll tell you just how you did it," said Jack determinedly.
"While you were in Mr. Black's office yesterday afternoon he stepped out
and left you alone for a moment. The cash-box was on the table. You
immediately saw the opportunity (perhaps Hansen had done the same thing,
and put you onto it?)--you saw the opportunity, and threw over the box a
newspaper you had in your hand. As you had hoped, not seeing the box, Mr.
Black forgot it, and left at six o'clock without returning it to the
safe. You made sure of that by remaining about the outer office until he
left. And then, after midnight you came down to the office here, forced
an entrance into our cellar, and went up-stairs and secured the box.
"I'm sorry--but isn't that so?"
The clerk laughed drily. "The great Mr. Sherlock Holmes, junior!" he
remarked sarcastically. "Rubbish. Run away and don't bother me with your
silly detective theories," and turned back to his desk.
Jack stood, baffled and surprised.
[Illustration: THE CLERK WAS COLORLESS, BUT ONLY FALTERED AN INSTANT.]
"Look here, Orr!" As Smith again spun about a hard look came into his
face. "Look here, how do you come to know so much about this business,
yourself? Eh?"
Jack uttered an exclamation, and a sudden fear of the clerk came over
him. Was Smith thinking of trying to place the blame upon him?
However, further discussion was clearly useless, and he turned away.
The following morning brought quick proof that Jack's suddenly inspired
fear of Smith was too well founded. As he entered the telegraph office
Mr. Black called him and handed him a note. "Now what have you to say?"
he demanded solemnly.
In a lead-pencil scrawl Jack read:
"Mr. Black: Your yung operatur Orr can tell you sumthin about thet
cash box, he was showin the key of the box to sumone yesteday and i
saw him. Mebee you will finde the key in his offis cote.
"Yours, a frend."
"It is the key," said the manager, producing a small key on a ring. "I
recall having left it in the lock."
Jack stood pale and speechless. Despite the disguised writing and poor
spelling, the letter was from Smith, he had not a doubt. But how could he
prove it? Truly matters were beginning to look serious for him.
Quickly, however, Jack's natural spirit of fight-to-the-end returned to
him, and handing the letter back, he said, respectfully but determinedly,
"Mr. Black, I still hold you to your promise to give me a week in which
to prove my innocence. And I'll prove, too, sir, that this key was placed
in my pocket by someone else, probably by the one who really took the
box. I believe I know who it is, but I'll prove it first."
Reluctantly the manager consented, for he now firmly believed at least in
Jack's complicity; and leaving him, Jack sought the operating-room, to
spend every spare moment in turning the matter over in his mind.
What next could he do? If only he could find the box! What would Smith
probably have done with it? For it seemed unlikely he would have taken it
away with him. Might he not, after removing the money, have hidden it in
the cellar? Jack determined to search there; and accordingly, at noon,
hastening through his lunch, he descended and began a systematic hunt
amid the odds and ends filling the basement.
The first noon-hour's search brought no result. The second day, returning
to the task somewhat dispiritedly, Jack began overhauling a pile of old
cross-pieces. There was a squeak, and a rat shot out.
In a moment Jack was in hot pursuit with a stick. The rat ran toward the
old furnace, and disappeared. At the spot an instant after, Jack found a
hole in the brick foundation, and thrust the stick into it. The stick
caught, he pulled, and several bricks fell out.
Dropping to his knees, Jack peered into the opening. A cry broke from
him, and thrusting in a hand he grasped something, and drew it forth.
It was the lost cash-box!
Uttering a shout of triumph, Jack leaped to his feet and started on a run
for the stair. But suddenly he halted. After all, was he absolutely sure
it was Smith who had placed it there? Would the producing of the box
prove it?
The question, which had not before occurred to Jack, startled him.
As he stood thinking, half consciously he tried the cover of the box. To
his surprise it gave. He opened it. And the box almost fell from his
hands.
It still contained the money! And apparently untouched!
But in a moment Jack thought he understood. Smith, or whoever it was, had
left it as a clever means of saving themselves from the worst in the
event of being found out, intending to return for it if the excitement
blew safely over.
Then why not wait and catch them at it?
Good. But how?
Jack's inventive genius soon furnished the answer. "That's it! Great!" he
said to himself delightedly. "I'll get down and do it early in the
morning. And now I'll stick this back in the hole and fix the bricks up
again."
Seven o'clock the following morning found Jack carrying out his plan.
First conveying to the cellar from the battery room two gravity-jars, he
placed them in a dark corner behind the furnace. Next, finding an old
lightning-arrester, he opened up the hiding-place, and arranged the
arrester beneath the cash-box in such a way that on the box being moved
the arrester arm would be released, fly back, and make a contact. Then,
having carefully closed the opening, he procured some fine insulated
wire, and proceeded to make up his circuit: From the arrester, out
beneath the bricks, around the furnace, to the battery; up the wall, and
through the floor by the steam-pipes into the business office; and,
running up-stairs and procuring a step-ladder, on up the office wall,
through the next floor, into the operating room. And there a few minutes
later he had connected the wires to a call-bell on a ledge immediately
behind the table at which he worked. And the alarm was complete.
Although Jack knew that the clerk next door returned from his dinner a
half hour earlier than the others in the express office, he had little
expectation of Smith visiting the cash-box at that time. Nevertheless, as
the noon-hour drew near he found himself watching the alarm-bell with
growing excitement.
"There might be just a chance of Smith visiting the box," he told
himself, "just to learn whether I had--"
From behind him came a sharp "zip, zip," then a whirr. With a bound Jack
was on his feet and rushing for the door. Down the stairs he went, three
steps at a time, and into the manager's private office.
[Illustration: "THERE!" SAID JACK, POINTING IN TRIUMPH.]
"Mr. Black," he cried, "I've got the man who took the box! Down the
cellar! Quick!
"I found the box, with the money still in it, and fixed up an alarm-bell
circuit to go off when he came for it," he explained hurriedly, as the
manager stared. In a moment Mr. Black was on his feet and hastening after
Jack toward the cellar stairway.
Quietly they tiptoed down. They reached the bottom.
"There!" Jack said, pointing in triumph. And looking, the manager beheld
Smith, the express clerk, on his knees beside the furnace, before him on
the floor the missing cash-box.
Ten minutes later the manager of the express company, who had been called
in, passed out of Mr. Black's office with his clerk in charge, and the
telegraph manager, turning to Jack, warmly shook his hand.
"I am more sorry than I can say to have placed the blame upon you, my
boy," he said sincerely. "And I am very thankful for the clever way you
cleared the mystery up.
"You are quite a detective--sort of 'electrical detective'--aren't you?"
he added, smiling.
And for some time, about the office, and even over the wires, Jack went
by that name--the "Electrical Detective."