Part 17 (2/2)

”No! Except by name!”

”Then, Chief, I don't see any use trying that lead. It begins and ends in air.”

”It most certainly does! We'll cross it out. The next call for our investigation----”

”Which was?” asked Delaney, waking up.

”Which was the one notifying Stockbridge that he had about reached his span of life on this earth. I was there in that library when the call came in. Again, from the millionaire's description, this time, we have the thin, whispering voice on the wire. The man was probably the same.

He mentioned the cemetery letter which would establish that fact.”

”I'm following you, Chief. Go on!”

Drew picked out a second sheet of paper from his pile. ”We went after this call at the time, or soon after the time it was sent in,” he said, tapping the sheet with his fingers. ”I called the office here and had Harrigan get in touch with George Westlake, third vice-president of the telephone company. Westlake got busy.”

Delaney eyed his unpolished shoes with a sage wink.

”Westlake turned things over,” continued the detective. ”He made a most thorough investigation. We have his word that there is no record of this call! The wire-chief at Gramercy Hill Exchange declares that it never went through the switchboard. That the connection had been made on the outside.”

”From the air?”

”Looks that way. They tried everything and questioned everybody. No one talked with Stockbridge through the switchboard at Gramercy Hill, at or near that hour. Therefore, we must conclude, that, insomuch as I know somebody _did_ talk with him at that hour, the connection was made, either in the junction-box in the alley or behind the switchboard at Gramercy Hill Exchange.”

”How about underground, Chief?”

”Impossible! That is--almost impossible. The cables are in conduit and sheathed with lead. It would be a poor place to tap in on a line. I'm going to presume that the man who tapped in knew his business. The junction-box in the alley is under suspicion. I think it was done there, in this manner.” Drew paused and picked up a third sheet of hurriedly-written notes.

”A junction-box,” he said, ”is merely a small switchboard where the conduit ends and the house connections begin. It would have been easy for an expert to disconnect the two leads which led into Stockbridge's library, ring up with a low tension magneto, and then cut in with a testing set and a battery current and do the talking. That is what the trouble-man told us might have been done. He found no signs of tampering. He saw a tall man escaping down the alley. It would seem, Delaney, that this tall man is the one we're after. Perhaps, as you said, he left footprints. But footprints, like fingerprints, are not much use until you get the man who made them.”

”What d'ye deduct in this second call--Chief?”

”That we've run squarely up against a blind wall. We'll drop it for a time and go to the third call.”

”When was that?”

”Stockbridge was murdered at four minutes and eighteen seconds past twelve, by his own watch, Delaney. It was a very good watch! Now allowing for a movement of the hands on account of the fall, how are we to account for a telephone call sent into Gramercy Hill 9763--the library 'phone--at exactly five minutes past twelve from a slot-telephone booth at the east end of the Grand Central Railroad Station on Forty-second Street?”

”How did you get that, Chief?”

Drew chuckled and wheeled in his chair. ”I got it,” he said, ”by simple arithmetic plus the vice-president's pull. Here's how it was found, Delaney. Easy as two and two. You remember the howler?”

”I'll never forget it, Chief! Not as long as I live!”

”The howler established considerable in this case. The chief operator remembers putting it on. She remembers the time. She looked back, after being jogged by George Westlake, and found that some one had called up Stockbridge a few minutes after twelve. It was probably this call to the old man that caused him to be near enough to the telephone to knock it over when he was shot. The operator did not hear the shot, but she remembers a thin, piping voice asking for Gramercy Hill 9763.”

”The same guy, every time!” declared the operative, mopping his brow with his sleeve. ”I'd like to have that fellow for five minutes, Chief!”

”We'll get him! We've got the time established twice. Stockbridge's watch fixes the murder at twelve-four-eighteen. The telephone call at five minutes past twelve, and the howler put on soon afterward, checks up. The old man was alive during the telephone call from the Grand Central, and dead when the howler was put on for the first time. Do you see that?”

Delaney frowned. ”I see it and I don't,” he said. ”I'm all balled up, Chief. What with the magpie and the howler and a man shot in a locked room and the spot of soot on your neck--I'm all twisted into a knot. I think I'll go out and get a drink!”

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