Part 24 (1/2)

”No! Again we have the impossibility or seeming impossibility. I examined that library, both before and after the murder. No shot could have been fired from the outside so that a bullet would reach the old man. If that were the case there would have been an opening in the walls or at the windows or the ventilators. Besides, we have the powder burns on the millionaire's head. We are squarely confronted with a paradox. Riddle me that paradox and we will go a long ways toward finding the man who murdered Stockbridge.”

Fosd.i.c.k frowned. ”I can't see it at all,” he confessed. ”I still hold to the theory that we should third degree all of the servants. I've got some of them. If they don't squeal, I'll get the others!”

Drew glanced at his watch. ”Personally,” he said, ”I'm of the opinion that you will not get anything out of them. I think it was a mistake to arrest them. It would have been far better to trail the butler and the doorman and see if they connected with anybody.”

”I'm doing this!” exclaimed Fosd.i.c.k with asperity. ”I've got charge of this case, Drew. I got charge and I don't want any meddling. I've my own methods.”

”All right,” said the detective. ”All right! I want a check-up on the finger prints and then I'll be going. I had to come to you for this.

You have such an interesting collection.”

”Here's your answer!” said the commissioner, rising and striding around the desk. ”Take this bullet and look it over. Put it in your pocket.

And----”

Drew turned swiftly. The messenger stood in the doorway. He came forward as Fosd.i.c.k nodded. He pa.s.sed over the hastily developed prints which Drew had taken. The commissioner glanced at them, frowned, held them to the light, then said:

”We'll try these on the Man Who Can't Be Beat! He's the best in the world. He'll know in three minutes who made these prints if the fellow is on our records.”

The fingerprint expert nodded to Drew as they entered a huge room which was lined with mahogany cabinets in the manner of a filing system in a mail-order house. Fosd.i.c.k pa.s.sed the five photos into this man's hand.

He smiled as the expert adjusted his gla.s.ses, pulled out a pocket magnifying-gla.s.s, and leaned close up to the prints.

”We're infallible!” exclaimed the Commissioner with superiority. ”Watch Pope get your man. He'll hound him out in no time. Eh, Pope?”

The expert was not of a sanguine disposition in the minute which ensued as he ran over the prints, studied them, held them to the light then laid them down on a table and shook his head.

”We have no record of this fellow,” he said coldly. ”It looks like a man's print. Here's the thumb and here is the middle finger of the right hand, I think. Hard to tell, sometimes. I'd say, as a pretty sure thing, that we have no duplicates in our collection. Shall I look?”

”Yes! Look!” said Fosd.i.c.k.

Drew felt that the case was slipping from him as Pope fluttered from cabinet to cabinet, pulled out drawers, replaced them and tried still others.

”No go?” he asked as the expert shot back the last cross-index cabinet and turned with shaking head. ”No go? Try again.”

”Absolutely no record of the maker of these prints,” said Pope, holding out the photos. ”He hasn't registered with us yet. Whoever made these prints has never been arrested in the United States for a felony.”

”How about a misdemeanor?” asked Drew.

”No! They're all in this cabinet. Even if he was picked up on suspicion or for auto speeding or beating his wife,--if he has one,--he would be here. I'm sorry, inspector.”

Drew pulled down the lapels of his black coat and turned toward Fosd.i.c.k.

”Have you got a print of Finklestein?” he asked. ”You remember the fellow who was arrested in the Morphy case. He was afterwards released for lack of evidence or else he claimed exemption. I've forgotten how he got off. He's supposed to be in Florida or somewhere in the South. I had a man out to Morristown who reports along those lines. I wish you'd compare these prints with Finklestein's.”

”Go ahead,” said the commissioner. ”Go as far as you like. I don't think that there is anything in these prints. You got the wrong ones--that's all.”

”What's Finkle--Finklestein's initials?” asked the expert.

”J. B.,” said Drew quickly. ”Julius B.!”

A quick search through an alphabet-index, a consultation of two drawers, out of which the expert pulled some tiny squares of cardboard, and then a slow shaking of his head, brought Drew back to where he had started from before taking the prints in the booth.