Detective Fiction Weekly. Vol. 118, No. 6, April 16, 1938

Fragile! Use No Hooks!—

And be careful how you handle this case of homicide, for it may explode in your face

What Has Happened—

Employed by a private detective agency, Stanley James Baxter is making good money until he meets Selma Elmore, debutante. He studies law nights and in a few years is admitted to the Bar. As a young lawyer his social standing is much improved but he is rapidly going broke for lack of clients when he has a peculiar caller, Joseph Callum.

Callum, it appears, is a racketeer in that he makes a practice of buying a small amount of stock in some corporation, acquiring legal rights as a minority stockholder, and then threatening a lawsuit. It is a form of legal blackmail, or at least so says Judge Horace Elmore, Selma’s father, who is attorney for the Randt Camera Company and to whom Baxter goes after talking with Callum. Elmore advises young Baxter to drop the case.

“I’ll think it over,” says Baxter.

Selma, he learns, is about to be married to John Harne, general manager of the Randt company.

Baxter goes to Callum’s home to investigate further. He finds Callum shot to death in the doorway — and in the house is Selma Elmore. She was there, she says, as a guest of Lois Callum, niece of the murdered man. The two girls tell conflicting stories. Some mysterious caller is supposed to have killed Callum.

Callum had mistreated his niece, and she, as Suspect Number One, is jailed. Stan Baxter becomes her attorney at the urging of Selma Elmore. Later he returns to the Callum home. In a dark hallway he is attacked by a mysterious assailant, and recovers consciousness to find that he had interrupted safebreakers.

The trail leads him to the home of Julius Randt, and there he find that Randt also has been murdered. On the scene are Harne and Judge Elmore, both of whom deny complicity. Elmore says that Randt’s bitterest enemy is Frank Kendall, rival camera manufacturer.

At Kendall’s home Baxter gets an intimation that Lois Callum might be Kendall’s daughter, and that Kendall is not aware of the fact because his wife had left him before the child was born. But Kendall admits having been a party to the Callum housebreaking.

In an argument, Baxter shoots a finger off Kendall’s ex-con servant, Wolan.

“I’ll kill you for this!” says Wolan.

Chapter XI Second Warning

Stan stopped off at his office on Bay Street. A light glowed behind the frosted glass door of the dentist’s office across the hall. As he fumbled with his keys, that door opened.

“Mr. Baxter!”

He turned to see Miss Delevan. Her face, under its vivid mop of red hair, looked queerly pale. She held out a ragged bit of brown paper. Her voice sounded shaky:

“I found this under your door a little while ago.”

“Come in — let’s see it.” Stan threw open his office and snapped on the light. He took the brown paper. It looked identical to the one he had found in the same place that morning. This time the crudely penciled message ran:

“I worked late tonight, getting out the monthly statements,” the redheaded girl said. “I heard someone come along the hall, stop, and then go away. So I opened the door and looked out. Whoever it was, had gone. Then I saw this paper under your door. Mr. Baxter, what does it mean?”

Stan was unlocking the inner office door. “I’d like to know, myself.”

The girl followed him into the inner office. “I tried to telephone you. I happened to know your apartment address, and I tried that. Then I called the Randt place.”

“Randt? Why?”

“Because I had the radio turned on in the office. I heard the news broadcast.”

“Oh.”

She said, “I talked to a police officer there. He said you’d gone. Then another man took the phone. He told me to try Judge Elmore’s home. I tried that, too.” Miss Delevan grinned. “The girl there seemed quite upset. Is she the one, Mr. Baxter?”

Stan mumbled, “What one?” from the depths of a cabinet across the room.

“The Lycinth Hill one,” the redhead said. “The one you wanted to be a lawyer on account of.”

Stan brought a pair of metal boxes to the desk “If you mean Selma Elmore, I’ve only met her half a dozen times. Several years ago about a jewel robbery, and then twice — three times — lately.”

Miss Delevan laughed. “Love at first sight!... What are you doing with that talcum powder?”

“It isn’t talc. Fingerprint dope.”

Presently he looked up and shook his head. “The only prints here are yours, I guess.”

He drew a low-powered microscope from the other box. Among the papers in his pocket was one which purported to be Leslie Kendall’s birth certificate. Stan focused the lens on the physician’s signature.

“Look here, Red. See these broken lines?”

She squinted. “Ch-huh. What do they mean?”

“It’s a forgery,” Stan said. “A tracing, probably. The easiest sort of fake to detect.”

He thought silently for a moment, staring at the safe in the corner of his office. It was a good deal more modern than Callum’s, but was it really burglar-proof?

“Delevan,” he asked, “has your boss a good strong-box in his office?”

“We’ve something better than that. A key to the night depository of the Trans-Continental Bank.”

“Fine,” said Stan, thrusting the papers into a manila envelope. “If anything happens to me tonight, deliver this stuff to Sweeney’s agency, Delevan. Tell them to get in touch with Selma Elmore.”

“Oh, Mr. Baxter!” The girl looked genuinely dismayed. “You are in danger! For heaven’s sake, be careful!”

It was one of life’s little quirks, thought Stan. Red Delevan was a fine, loyal girl, and an exceptionally lovely one. Yet she did not quicken his pulse at all. He had to fall for Selma, who was already in love with another man.

Perhaps Miss Delevan was thinking the same thing. She went silently to fetch the depository key.

He drove up Lycinth Hill again. Lights burned on the lower story of the Elmore house, and Selma came to the door.

“Is the judge at home now?”

“No-o; but he will be, any minute. Come in, Mr. Baxter.”

John Harne got up from a chair in front of the fire. His square chin wore a grape-purple bruise, but he greeted Stan with a grin.

“The judge wanted to take those records back to the plant. He’ll be along very soon. Sit down, Baxter.”

Stan glanced around the room with its shaded, intimate lights. “I don’t want to butt in,” he said, a little awkwardly. “I could wail in his den.”

Harne laughed. “Nonsense. We were only talking about the murders. You’re the authority. We’d be glad to listen to your ideas about it.”

Stan walked slowly across the room. He stared for a moment into the fire. “All right,” he said abruptly, and turned to Selma.

“Miss Elmore, let’s take a hypothetical case. Suppose you’re a young woman who stands to inherit a large sum of money.”

“That’s not very hypothetical,” said Harne with a smile. “Selma ought to be able to imagine that very easily.”

Stan ignored the comment. His eyes remained fixed on the girl. “But also suppose that up to this minute you had been kept in ignorance of the truth. A certain man was hiding your real identity from you. Only by accident did you learn that he had proofs of your right to — say, several hundred thousand dollars. What would you do?”

Selma smiled. “I suppose I’d grab the proofs and run like the devil.”

“You couldn’t. The proof is kept locked in a safe, and you haven’t the combination.”

“Well, I’d certainly do something!”

“But what?”

Selma tossed her brunette head. “Mr. Baxter, I think I’d hire you to help me.”

“And if you had no money to hire me?”

“Oh. John would lend me some,” she said, with a glance at Harne.

“Yes,” Stan muttered. “I was afraid of that. Yes, it’s all perfectly logical.”

He told them the story, leaving out the conversation with Judge Elmore, however.

“Don’t you see?” he concluded. “Callum had those papers. If Lois saw them, she couldn’t help realizing their importance. Therefore she called upon her closest friend — you, Miss Elmore — and borrowed money. But that very evening, Callum offered to sell the papers to Kendall. You see where it leads?”

“Lois was upstairs with me,” Selma countered.

“She let Kendall into the house. She may have guessed what Callum was up to. She may have lingered on the stairs long enough to hear them talking.”

The girl gasped, “You mean she might have killed Callum so he couldn’t sell those proofs?”

“It is plausible,” Stan said coldly. “The evidence was forged, but she couldn’t know that. There was a fortune at stake.”

“Wait,” said John Harne. “Callum wasn’t killed until after Kendall had left the house. How could Lois know the papers hadn’t gone with him?”

Stan shrugged.

“She came downstairs a second time, to let the blond man into the house. From the stairway, she could look into her uncle’s study. The papers may have been in plain sight there,” he argued. “Besides, Kendall wouldn’t carry ten grand in his pockets. And Callum wouldn’t want to take a check, under such circumstances. It would be logical for Lois to expect Kendall to come back later — or the next day — with the money.”

Selma’s brown eyes flashed. “Stan Baxter, you don’t really believe all of that.”

“No. No, I don’t.”

“Then why say such things about Lois?”

“Because the D.A. will think these things,” Stan said grimly. “It all goes to supply Lois with a motive. An urgent motive for murdering Callum that night. It ties up with the nitrate stains on her hand and the bullet torn oil-cloth.”

Selma exclaimed, “But she explained those things!”

Stan shook his head.

“Let’s take the legal view of it,” he said. “Suppose she did practice with the gun. Suppose she did accidentally put a bullet hole into the garage. She could have done all those things and still killed Callum.”

He smashed his fist into his palm. “It’s even worse than that. The bullet hole in the garage can be twisted to show premeditation. They’ll say she put that bullet hole there on purpose, so that later on she could explain away the oil-cloth.”

Selma stared at the young lawyer in stupefied silence. She gnawed her underlip nervously.

“Then,” said John Harne. “Lois is in more danger than ever?”

Stan nodded. “She’s in the greatest possible danger. No attorney could persuade a jury that she didn’t kill her uncle. Not on the facts we now have.”

“But what about the Randt killing?” Selma cried. “You mean the same killer murdered both, and she was in jail when Randt was shot.”

“Yes, I believe that,” Stan said gently. “But I couldn’t tell it to the jury. Couldn’t even get the facts before them. Any testimony about Randt’s death would be ruled out of court.”

“Incompetent, irrelevant, and immaterial?” asked Harne.

“Exactly.”

Selma wrung her hands. The diamond flashed in the firelight. “But we’ve got to do something! In spite of all you say, Lois is innocent. We can’t let her go to... to the chair!”

“There’s only one thing we can do,” said Stan. “We’ve got to catch the real murderer.”

There was a little silence, broken only by the ticking of a clock and the snapping of the eucalyptus fire. The three ex changed nervous glances.

Harne spoke first, clearing his throat. “What about Frank Kendall? If he wanted those documents badly enough — if it was cheaper to kill Callum rather than pay ten thousand dollars—?”

“I don’t think so,” said Stan. “Kendall would not have shot Callum at the door. He would have gone into the study. He would have forced his victim to open the safe. He didn’t know that Lois hadn’t the combination to the safe.”

Harne growied. “But if he was on the grounds when Mr. Randt was shot—?”

“No,” said Stan. “That won’t do, either. The man I trailed across the yard never got to the porch — never even crossed the terrace. He wasn’t that far ahead of me.”

“But you chased him, didn’t you?” said Harne. “And I saw him running down the driveway.”

“You saw him — not the killer.”

“But how—”

Stan said, “The murderer was still on the porch when you saw Kendall running across the yard.”

John Harne gulped. “I didn’t look down the porch at all! He could have been crouching there among the elephant ears — then he could have darted across the yard the other way. He could even have fled back into the house.”

There was another startled silence. Stan broke it this time.

“I’ve got to see the judge,” he said. “I’m going to the plant.”

Chapter XII The Blond Man

The steel gate in front of the Randt Camera Company building was locked. On the gatepost appeared a panel into which was set a button, and the sign, Night Bell. Stan Baxter rang and waited.

He got no response.

His stare went up to the office wing of the building. A yellow panel in the night was a window, with shade drawn. As if thrown on a magic lantern screen, a shadow appeared against the shade. Stan recognized the bulky silhouette. It was Judge Horace Elmore.

The judge was putting on a topcoat and a hat. The light went out, and the whole building stood shrouded in darkness.

After this, nothing at all happened.

It was very odd, thought Stan Baxter. Odd that it should have taken Elmore this long merely to return some papers to the office. That the watchman had not answered the night bell. And most curious that Horace Elmore, several minutes after snapping off the office light, had not emerged from the building.

Stan stepped back and peered up at the riot fence which surrounded the plant. The fence, a very strong one, was at least twelve feet high; then it was furnished with a setback of barbed wire. A similar setback protected the top of the steel gate. Even a man with a ladder would have had a sorry time scaling this fence. To tackle the thing barehanded was out of the question.

Stan Baxter started. He had heard a groan. The sound was muffled, but certainly it had originated in a human throat.

Then a light flickered briefly inside the building. It was at the lower end of the plant, and Stan saw it only because the groan had seemed to come from that direction.

He took two long steps to his coupé, which was parked in the driveway fronting the gate. He snapped his flashlight from its clips along the steering column. He ran up the street.

On the afternoon which preceded Joseph Callum’s death, Stan had observed a street improvement project here. A sewer main was being placed. At that time he had scarcely noted the work. Mainly he had been watching Selma and John Harne drive away in Harne’s roadster. The steam shovel had been an unimportant factor, but it was all-important now.

During the day, some fifty yards had been added to the trench beside the riot fence. Stan covered that fifty yards at top speed. He leaped into the cab, came out onto the rusted arm of the machine.

It was a steep climb. Stan made sure that his flashlight and Elmore’s .38 were snugly stowed in his coat pockets before attempting it. He made the climb on all-fours.

The thing had looked very simple from the ground. Twenty feet up in the night, with a brisk cold wind whipping into his face, it became a good deal more of a feat Stan balanced precariously erect on the narrow slant of the yard arm. Directly below him was the big metal bucket. Also below him, but several yards away, the fence stretched its wickedly barbed top.

His knees bent in to a jumper’s crouch.

Sole leather whisked a sound into the night. There was another, explosive sound. “Huh-h!”

And then. “Oh, hell!”

Stan was still on the shovel’s arm, sprawled there with his arms hanging over one side of it and his legs on the other. He had been extremely lucky. He had slipped before actually jumping, and he had instinctively thrown himself across the arm instead of plunging down onto the biting edges of the dirt bucket.

The damage was slight — a little wind knocked out.

Stan pulled himself to his feet. It took nerve to do this, and more nerve to stare out over the fence where the steel barbs glimmered their menace.

A little shiver ran up his spine, and he wet his lips nervously. He was not a fool. And even a fool would have been impressed by the possibilities of that barbed wire setback. A man who landed in that hell’s thicket would lose a good deal of blood before he got out.

And even if he cleared it, he might easily break a leg when he struck the waste-rock yard on the other side of the fence.

He crouched. The muscles in his calves bulged in an effort to grip the metal underfoot. He relaxed deliberately. He inhaled deeply, swung his arms twice, and jumped.

The fence seemed to come right up at his face. But he was over it with a breathtaking inch to spare. He struck the rock, stumbled, and rolled over; sat up with his fists filled with small, sharp stones.

He drew a deep breath of relief and got to his feet again. The palm of his right hand smarted with painful lacerations. A trickle of blood ran warmly down one kneecap, exposed where the trouserleg had been torn across.

Stan gripped the gun in one hand, the flashlight in the other. He strode to the deeper shadows along the wall of the plant, and followed the wall until he came to the main door. It was unlocked.

The darkness inside was warmer, and very silent. And he listened carefully, without hearing a sound. Stan knew the layout of the plant only vaguely. The wing to his left housed the offices. The central and right portions of the building contained the machinery, but which departments were which he had no idea.

Stan turned right, toward the groan and the flicker of light...

He was in a corridor, one with a rubber-matted floor. He did not use the flashlight; did not dare to. A vague gray oblong in the distance was his only guide. He supposed it to be a window at the end of the corridor. When he reached it, he would also have reached the right wing of the gigantic plant.

Stan stopped in front of this window. His eyes had grown accustomed to the darkness. He could at least see that he had come out into a second corridor, at a right angle to the first. But the place remained as silent as a tomb.

This silence became menacing, as he thought of it. Where was the watchman? What had happened to Judge Elmore? And whoever was responsible for the groan and that flicker of light at the window? There flashed into Stan’s mind the picture of another man waiting in this silence — waiting in ambush.

It began to look as if he had risked his neck for nothing. Certainly he would accomplish nothing by blundering ahead into the darkness. But neither could he use the flashlight; it would only betray his presence, perhaps make a target of him.

He thought for a moment, and then groped in his pocket until he found a half dollar. His muscular fingers set the coin a-spinning on the window sill.

The half dollar made scarcely any sound at first. Stan tiptoed along the corridor. He flattened himself against the wall as the coin stopped spinning on its rim — keeled over — and gave its prolonged silvery ring.

Now, a footstep.

A door on the other side of the corridor opened. A ray of white light sprang from the opening. It passed the sill, where the half dollar was ringing its final note, and probed that end of the hall.

Stan’s grip tightened on the butt of the .38 — the hard rubber was slick with blood from his lacerated palm. To see him, the other would have to open the door wider.

Instead, the door slowly closed.

Was this a trick? Stan had to chance it. He went forward, shifted the flashlight so that he held it between his biceps and chest, and dropped his left hand to the doorknob. This kept his right arm and the gun free for action.

He tugged gently at the knob. He was not so much afraid of a squeaking hinge here as of a sudden, warning draught of air.

A faint whitish glow appeared. He waited, watched, with the door only inches open. The faint light was motionless, and certainly not pointed in his direction. Reassured, he heeled the door another half foot and knifed his lean figure through the opening.

He could see now that the white glow emanated from an electric torch. The torch itself was out of sight behind a stack of wooden packing boxes, but its area of illumination reached to the opposite wall. There was light enough to see that he had come into Randt’s shipping department.

Some wooden boxes and a greater number of cardboard cartons were ranged across the concrete floor. The cartons bore the Randt label, and prominent stickers that said, Fragile! Use No Hooks!

With the flashlight again in his left hand, Stan started across the floor. He followed a tier of the cardboard cartons, came out behind the electric torch.

The torch lay across a packing box. Its owner had his back turned to Stan. Both his arms were buried to their elbows in the wooden box.

Stan Baxter’s brows lifted in mute surprise.

“Seventy-four.” the man was whispering under his breath. “Seventy-five, six, seven.” A faint rustle of paper accompanied the count.

Stan said sharply: “You’re covered, mister!”

The other man grunted, and then rather slowly turned around. Stan’s gaze searched the face which was thus revealed to him.

It was a plumpish face, well fed and closely shaved. It was also a very fair-skinned face. Stan got an impression of large blue eyes under the blondest of brows. A felt hat, pushed high up from the forehead, let several strands of stringy, tow-colored hair fall across the man’s forehead.

The other features were present, but unimportant. He was neither strikingly handsome nor markedly ugly. He was neither very fat nor very thin: not tall and not short. His clothes seemed ordinary, neither ragged nor stylish.

In short, there was only one thing noticeable about him. He was blond. And not just an ordinary blond, but remarkably and memorably so. His pale coloring gripped the eye. It caused him to stand out like one white canary among a thousand yellow songsters.

The two men faced each other for a long moment, neither speaking. During that moment, Stan remembered Lieutenant Andreason’s skepticism because Lois Callum could not give a better description of the mysterious caller. Rut it had really been an excellent description. Trained operative that he was, Stan could not have improved on the girl’s simple phrase, “a blond man.”

The blond man broke the silence.

“You can put away your gun,” he said quietly. “I’m not a criminal.”

“Yeah. What are you?”

The other shrugged. “I’ll explain that to the proper authorities.”

“Your mistake, my friend,” said Stan. “You’ll explain it to me.”

“No, sir.” The blond man was unfrightened and thoroughly businesslike. “You’ll have to call the police. I won’t offer any resistance, I promise. But on the other hand, I refuse to say anything to you — or anyone else connected with the Randt company. And that’s another promise.”

Stan Baxter said, “Raise the hands, mister.”

He slapped a hand over the other’s garments.

“You see,” said the blond man, “I am unarmed.”

Stan grunted, reached into the man’s inner coat pocket. He drew out a brown leather wallet. The blond man made a gesture of protest; said, “You’ve no right to—”

Stan’s eyes widened over the wallet’s identification card. “Good Lord!”

The blond man nodded. “Yes. My name’s George Worthington. I’m an investigator for the Federal Trade Commission.”

Chapter XIII Pieces of Glass

Stan Baxter echoed, “The Federal Trade Commission!” He regarded the blond man with considerable respect. The Federal Trade Commission, to the average newspaper reader, would mean little — just another vaguely familiar arm of the United States Government — in fact, not even an arm, but only one of Uncle Sam’s little fingers. FTC — it didn’t sound very glamorous. Probably another of those alphabetical agencies. A gang of long-haired economists poring over charts and graphs. A bunch of people with soft jobs.

But Stan knew better. His law schooling had given him an insight into the workings of the Commission. It was the watchdog, the umpire of American business. It maintained headquarters in Washington, with field offices in New York, Chicago, Seattle, and San Francisco. Its staff, over five hundred strong, was constantly on the alert to squelch fraud and deception.

These men were the government’s aces in a war against business rackets, just as the men of the FBI were its aces in the war against underworld crime.

True, the FTC lacked glamor. Unless you could see the glamor in forcing poisonous tonics and contaminated foodstuffs off the American market. Unless there was glamor in keeping shifty schemers from stealing people’s money with false advertising of phony products.

All of this flashed through Stan’s mind in an instant. Then he closed the wallet and handed it back to Worthington. “But what are you doing here?”

The FTC investigator shrugged. “I’ve told you twice, I won’t answer that — except to the police.”

“But look, Worthington,” said Stan quickly. “I’m not the night watchman, as you seem to think. I don’t work for the Randt company at all. And what’s more, I don’t intend to hand you over to the police.”

The other’s blue eyes narrowed in a frown. “Well!” he said. “Then what in the devil are you doing here?”

Stan Baxter smiled. Events had taken an unpredictable turn — the kind of a turn the police would call “the break” in the case. He meant to make the most of that break, and to do so he had to win the blond man’s confidence. It was a vital step.

He said: “Frankly, I have no business in the plant. I’m as much of a trespasser here as you are. My name is Baxter. I’m Lois Callum’s lawyer. You surely know that she’s been arrested for the murder of her uncle?”

“Yes, sir,” said the blond man. “I read that in the papers.”

“Then you also read that the police want you as a witness?”

“I know.” Worthington’s lips tightened. “It happens that I can’t tell the police anything of importance. My work is extremely confidential. I wanted to avoid publicity, at least for a day or so. The circumstances were unusual, and I took it upon myself to say nothing. After all, there’s no doubt the girl did kill Callum, is there?”

“I doubt it,” said Stan grimly.

“Speaking as her lawyer?”

“No. Speaking as man to man. I think she’s innocent, and I expect you to help me prove it.”

The blond man did not attempt to disguise his amazement. “Oh! In that case, naturally I’ll report to the authorities at once! I only kept silent because I thought Miss Callum’s guilt was unquestionable. And, as I say, because I knew nothing whatever about the murder.”

Stan grunted. “But it won’t do any good for you to report to the police.”

“What? Why not?”

“Because they think her guilt is unquestionable,” said Stan. “Because your story won’t mean a thing to them.”

The FTC man studied Stan Baxter searchingly. He shook his head slowly.

“I’m sorry, Baxter. What you are saying doesn’t make sense to me.”

Stan said: “All right, it doesn’t make sense to you. But will you trust me, anyway? Will you? — remembering that a girl’s life depends on your decision? For this means life or death to Lois Callum.”

The words were impressive, and even more impressive was the manner in which Stan voiced them.

“No decent man could say no,” replied the blond man. “But wait a moment, Mr. Baxter. Your name is familiar — I saw that in the newspapers, too. But can you prove your identity? How do I know that you are Baxter?”

Stan nodded. “I was a private detective before I became an attorney. I carry a permit and a pistol license. Here they are.”

“These papers could have been stolen,” said Worthington. He drew a fountain pen from his coat, and took a scrap of wrapping paper from the packing box. “Will you sign your name here?”

“Sure!”

The blond man carefully compared the freshly written signature with those on the permit and license.

“Thank you,” he said gravely. “The precaution seemed necessary to me. Now, what do you want to know?”

Stan drew a long breath of relief. “First,” he said, “I’ve got to know why you went to Callum’s home last night.”

Worthington nodded. “I was sent there by Frank Kendall. Mr. Kendall recently filed a complaint with the Commission, alleging that his Ameroptic Company was suffering unfair competition from the Randt Camera Company. The investigation was assigned to me. I called on Kendall yesterday morning, and he arranged an appointment for me to meet Callum.”

“Why?”

“Kendall claimed Callum had some evidence against Randt.”

“That doesn’t surprise me,” said Stan. “Callum told me the same story. But did you actually see any such evidence?”

The blond man frowned thoughtfully.

“I wouldn’t call it evidence. Not so far as the Commission was concerned. Callum took me into his study. He opened his safe and got out a bundle of papers. They were freight records, and they tended to show the volume of Randt’s business. But they did not directly concern the complaint I was investigating.”

“Those records,” said Stan musingly. “Did Callum hand them over to you?”

“No. He hardly allowed me to touch them,” said Worthington. “I got the idea he intended to wring a lot of money out of someone for them — either Kendall or Randt. The whole thing had a fishy look to me.”

“Did he put them back in the safe, then?”

“No, not that, either. My recollection is that they remained on the desk. I remember he covered them with a paperweight. There was quite a draught from the window.”

Stan said, “You stayed there how long?”

“About twenty minutes, more or less. It was longer than I wanted to stay,” muttered the blond man. “Callum was very eager for the FTC to take action against Randt. You can see why. He thought it would make those papers of his just so much more valuable.”

Stan reflected. “You must have left the house five or ten minutes before the shooting occurred.”

“Yes. I judge so, by the newspaper accounts.”

“And tonight you went to see Julius Randt?”

“Correct,” nodded Worthington. “I went there early in the evening, because l understood he received no one during the day. It had something to do with his health — asthma, I think.”

“Why did you go to him?”

“It was routine,” said Worthington, “I asked Mr. Randt about the complaint. He denied it. In fact, he all but had me thrown out of his house. He accused me of being in league with Kendall and Callum.”

“Hot-headed, eh?”

“Of course, it was a serious matter for him,” the blond man said quietly. “If anything like that could be proved, it would ruin the company. No retailer would ever take chances on stocking a Randt product again.”

“Yeah,” Stan said. “Is it that bad?”

Worthington’s fingers drummed slowly on the packing box. “It is every bit as bad as that. You can see why I wanted to keep the investigation secret. I didn’t want to start any rumors until I knew all the facts.”

He paused for a moment, then said: “Kendall’s complaint charged the Randt company with fraud. The Randt camera is advertised to be equipped with a Clarex lens. Kendall claims that a large percentage of the output is really equipped with a less expensive and inferior Japanese lens.”

This interested Stan, He reflected that Judge Elmore had called Callum’s suit absurd, because the reported camera sales corresponded exactly with the purchases of Clarex lenses. But if some of the cameras were equipped with another lens, then the stockholders were certainly being rooked.

“Well,” he asked, “is that possible?”

Worthington nodded.

“Oh, yes. Only an expert could tell the difference — at first. But these inferior lenses are put together — they consist of a number of pieces of glass, you know — with a synthetic cement in. stead of balsam. After a year or so, the stuff discolors badly. And the lens is then worthless.”

Stan said. “Rut the ordinary purchaser wouldn’t find that out for a year or so?”

“No. By that time, Randt could have rolled up huge profits. He could undersell Kendall — which was what Kendall kicked about. He would destroy the reputation of the Clarex product. And he would bilk a great many camera buyers.”

“Yes, it sounds like a clever racket,” said Stan. “But how did Kendall get wise to it?”

The blond man explained: “He showed me a collection of Randt cameras in his office. The lenses were inferior, all right. But that proved nothing. Kendall might have switched them himself. You’d be surprised the gags these fellows will think up, in order to persuade the FTC to crack down on a competitor.”

“I can imagine.”

“I don’t have to imagine. I’ve seen it.”

Both men laughed softly.

“So,” continued Worthington, “I realized after my talk with Randt that I wouldn’t get any cooperation out of his crowd. I went back to my hotel, and found a wire from the San Francisco office. They had checked with the Customs along the coast. Randt had never imported any lenses openly. If he used any, they were smuggled into this country.”

“Oh!”

“Oh is right,” said the blond man. “And if that was his game, he’d try to cover up after talking to me. I wanted to get into the plant here. It would be illegal, but I didn’t mind chancing that.”

“Yes, but how did you get in?”

Worthington smiled. “Through the gate. A fellow drove in ahead of me. I slipped through before he parked his car in the yard and came back to lock up again.”

Followed Elmore in, Stan decided.

He said, “You found something, didn’t you?”

“Plenty!” the blond man agreed. “These wooden boxes, Baxter! Each of them holds a gross of those Japanese lenses! You can figure it out for yourself.”

He chuckled: the elation passed quickly, though.

“I wonder,” he said, “what possessed Randt. A man of his wealth and personal standing in such a racket!”

Stan’s lips pressed into a narrow straightness.

“You’ll never know.”

“What—?” he exclaimed.

“He’s dead.”

Worthington flinched a bit. “You mean, he took that way out?”

“He was shot — murdered.”

They looked at each other steadily.

Worthington moistened his lips. “It’s a funny thing. I had a feeling — almost a physical feeling. In here, tonight.”

Stan grunted. “Well?”

“Of course, I don’t believe in spiritualism, or anything like that,” the blond man said hastily. “But I thought I heard — well, a groaning sound. I flashed the light out into the halt just before you came in.”

He broke off, chuckled.

“But I’m talking nonsense. It was you I heard moving around in the building.”

Stan Baxter said, “Not me! Listen! Do you hear that?”

Chapter XIV A Man’s Secret

They froze to attention. For a long moment, they heard nothing at all. Then the sound repeated itself — an eerie, muffled, painful groan.

“That’s it!” Worthington breathed. “It wasn’t so loud before. We’d better look into this, Baxter!”

He snatched the electric torch from the packing box and started across the shipping room.

“No! Not that way.”

The blond man halted, looked around in surprise. Stan’s lean face was an enigmatic mask in the shadows back of the flashbeam.

“We won’t be decoyed through that door,” Stan said grimly. “Callum made that mistake. Randt opened a door, too. It’s damned unhealthy.”

“You don’t think—”

“That anyone would take a potshot at us?” Stan finished the other’s thought. “Yes, I do. I’m certain of it.”

As the FTC man stared, the groan wrenched the silence again.

“It’s under us!” Worthington gasped.

“Uh-huh. Throw the light around here once.”

The circular spot of white enlarged as it followed the wall.

Stan said, “There!”

He peered at the large carrier half which traversed the opposite end of the room. The belt entered through an aperture in the side wall, and traveled above a long workbench.

The utility of the device was obvious. The belt came from the assembly department, bringing the completed cameras to the bench where they were packed into individual boxes, replaced on the belt, and then finally stowed into the shipping cartons.

What interested Stan was the fact that the belt disappeared through a panel in the floor. He said:

“That’s big enough for us to go through, isn’t it?”

“It looks that way.”

They had walked to the end of the bench. Stan knelt, and prized up the metal lattice-guard surrounding the belt. He stared through the uncovered gap in the floor.

“It’s easy — only a seven or eight foot drop. I’ll go first.”

He gripped the sides of the opening, slid down into the aperture. The hole wasn’t too large — Stan’s chest and wide shoulders only scraped through. As he straightened out, his toe found the basement floor.

He stepped aside, reaching for the gun and the flashlight he had again stowed in his coat pockets. But there was no need for the flashlight. Ahead of him, the basement was dimly illuminated by the pale yellow glow of an electric bulb over the hulking form of a furnace.

He had dropped into the boiler room of the plant. And now Worthington was at his side again.

“There!” the blond man whispered. “There it is again!”

“Uh-huh, come on.”

They tiptoed past the toothless, fire-reddened gums of the gaping furnace door. Stan, ahead of Worthington, stopped and silently pointed. They had found the source of the groan. _

A man was propped on the bench under the dropcord bulb beyond the furnace. An elderly man, on the fattish side, he had one hand clapped to his forehead. He wore overalls and a denim jacket. A tin, live-pointed star pinned to the jacket’s upper left pocket said Watchman.

The elderly man’s body teetered unhappily on the bench, and as the two men stared, another woeful groan fell from the fellow’s lips.

On the coal-grimed floor some bits of rope and a wet wad of bandana handkerchief told their own story.

Worthington started toward the watchman, found his path barred by Stan’s arm. Stan pointed again.

Back of the watchman’s bench, a flight of wooden steps climbed through the boiler room ceiling. There was visible a pair of trouser legs, standing motionless on the third from the topmost step.

Stan and Worthington exchanged glances. Stan jerked his head, and both men backed around to the other side of the furnace. The watchman, preoccupied with his own troubles, had not noticed them.

Stan pointed at an iron poker propped against the furnace, then pantomimed what Worthington was to do with this poker in case the watchman pulled a gun.

The blondman nodded.

Stan’s hand firmed on the .38. The lacerated palm had swollen rather painfully. He went past the rear of the furnace, tiptoed toward the stairs. He looked up.

The steps climbed to a hallway, having a door which opened onto the right wing corridor of the ground floor. The door stood ajar. The man on the steps was peering out into the corridor. A cocked revolver glinted in his hand.

It would have been just too bad for an intruder in the corridor. Or for anyone coming out of the shipping room! Stan spoke softly:

“What goes on, Judge?”

The big man on the steps started convulsively. He lifted his hands, and then turned slowly. It was Judge Elmore, all right.

He stared at Stan Baxter, and dropped his hands. “You!” he ejaculated. “What are you doing here?” Then, in a theatrical whisper:

“Burglars!” the judge said. “They slugged the watchman — tied and gagged him. They’re up in the shipping department now!”

Stan glanced around, grinned. Worthington stood in front of the furnace, weighing the poker in his hand. There was no need for it. The watchman just sat and stared helplessly at the scene.

“I don’t think so, Judge,” Stan said. “We just came from the shipping department.”

“You what?” Elmore demanded. “But you couldn’t! I’ve been watching! Baxter, what the hell is all this?” He came heavily down the steps and saw Worthington. “And who is this fellow?”

The blond man gave Stan a warning look.

“He’s helping me with this affair,” Stan evaded.

“But what in the devil are you doing here?”

Stan said, “I wanted to see you, Judge. Selma told me you were at the plant, and I came here. Now it’s your turn.”

Elmore nodded. “I had a little work to clean up in my office. I beard a groan, and traced it to the boiler room. I found the watchman here writhing on the floor, tied hand and foot, with a handkerchief in his mouth. He says three men slugged him down here, about an hour ago.”

The watchman rubbed his forehead and groaned piteously.

“He was still practically unconscious,” Elmore continued. “It took me a while to revive him, enough so he could talk sense. Then I heard voices in the shipping room overhead. So I took his gun and went up to the top of the stairs.”

Stan turned to the watchman. “You’re revived now, aren’t you?”

“My head,” the old man mumbled. “My head hurls bad.”

“But you feel well enough to show my friend here to a telephone?”

“I guess,” the watchman said dubiously.

“Then go ahead. Here, Judge. Let’s have that gun.” Stan handed the weapon to Worthington. He grinned at the blond man. “You know what to phone the cops about all this.”

Elmore said, “We can all go now.”

“Oh, no, Judge. I want to talk to you — alone.”

“I see.” But Horace Elmore’s florid features looked confused. He watched Worthington and the watchman climb the stairs; he shook his head.

“It’s a mistake to leave a poor old duffer like that in this place alone at night. I always said so. It’s a job for a young fellow with red blood in him. Well, Baxter, what’s on your mind?”

Stan chuckled. “Judge,” he said, “do you expect me to take you seriously? Am I supposed to believe that you — in your office, in the other wing of the building — could hear a man groaning in the boiler room? Especially when that man was practically unconscious, and had a gag in his mouth?”

Elmore flared, “Certainly I heard him!”

“Baloney. It’s impossible!”

“Young man” — the judge’s tone was icy — “do you mean to call me a liar?”

Stan said, “Uh-huh. Not only a liar, but a damn poor one!”

Horace Elmore moistened his lips.

“Look,” said Stan. “You didn’t trace any groan here. You came here, and it was pure accident you found the watchman on the floor. Isn’t that the fact?”

“It is not.”

“Oh yes it is. And the reason you won’t admit it,” Stan went on, “is that someone might ask what you came to the boiler room for. You wouldn’t like to answer that, would you?”

The judge did not reply. His eyes seemed tortured under the younger man’s relentless inspection. His gaze shifted to the door.

Stan shrugged. “All right, don’t answer. I’ll just go through your pockets.” “You can’t do that!”

“No?” Stan eyed the bulge of Elmore’s coat-front. “You came down here to burn something in the furnace — and then didn’t do it. You worked over the watchman first. And then you wanted to get rid of him before you destroyed the stuff. And now you’re not going to have a chance to.”

He took a step toward Elmore. The man’s face had gone very pale.

“Wait a moment.” he said huskily. “This isn’t what you’re probably thinking. It... it’s personal, it concerns no one but myself.”

“You admit you came here to burn what you have in your pocket.”

“Yes,” said Elmore, his plump lips trembling. “Some personal papers — no longer important since Mr. Randt is dead. A little trouble he once had. That’s all. And out of respect for his memory, I think it best they be destroyed.”

Stan’s voice was dry, harsh: “Those papers,” he said, “concern Selma!”

The blood rushed furiously into Horace Elmore’s cheeks. He gave the younger man a burning stare. There was anger in his eyes, and fear,

He swallowed twice before he could speak at all. He cried then, “Baxter, I warn you! Leave my daughter’s name out of this!”

Stan sighed. He faced an unpleasant job. And he pitied Horace Elmore at this moment.

“I’m not a fool,” he muttered. “Tonight at Randt’s you pledged me to secrecy. You said you didn’t want to stir up an old scandal. Why? Whom were you afraid of hurting, Judge?”

The big man recoiled from that question. Shrank, as if from a physical blow.

Stan went on remorselessly: “Why couldn’t you tell the police? Randt was dead. Julia had been dead for many years. Frank Kendall lived, but you hated him. Whom were you afraid of wounding? Judge, wasn’t it some other living person — a person very near and dear to you?”

A sudden perspiration dampened the other’s Hushed face. With a trembling hand, Horace Elmore loosened his collar. But his breathing remained as hard as before. He said heavily:

“No living person, Baxter! You see, I loved Julia. I loved her as much as Randt did, and just as hopelessly. And I didn’t want to have her name in a murder case. Not even twenty years after her death.”

A twisted smile touched Stan’s lips. “I guessed that you loved her, Judge. And I knew you lied when you hinted Lois Callum might be Julia’s daughter. I knew that after I talked to Selma.”

“You told Selma?”

Stan said, “She told me that you paid no more attention to Lois than to her other chums. It stood to reason you would have had a very special interest in Julia’s daughter.”

“But I didn’t know it!” Elmore cried. “I found out only the other day that Callum had papers—”

“Forgeries!” Stan said. “I’ve seen them. And you knew very well Callum’s documents were forged.”

“That’s not true.”

“It is,” Stan insisted. “The genuine papers were in your hands. But in a minute they’ll he in mine. Because I’m taking them away from you!”

He advanced a long step and his hand shot out to grasp the other’s lapel.

And then the strength seemed to ebb out of Horace Elmore. The man’s whole body sagged. He cried in a strange, broken voice:

“All right! Selma isn’t my child! Her real name is Leslie Kendall!”

Chapter XV Eyes in the Dark

The only sound was Judge Elmore’s sobbing breath. The color had deserted his face, leaving the skin an ashen gray in which the eyes burned like coals. He slowly sank down onto the watchman’s bench.

Stan shook his head.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I’m sorry that I had to hammer the truth out of you.”

Several moments ticked away. Elmore looked up. “Well, you’ve got the truth. Julia begged me to take care of the baby if anything happened to her. I made arrangements with an orphanage — one of my father’s pet charities. The baby was left there a few weeks, and then my wife and I took her away. My wife knew the whole story. We told our friends that we wished to raise the girl as her own — the fact that she had only foster parents was not to be mentioned to her, ever.”

“Did Randt know?”

“No!”

Stan said, “What were your plans?”

The judge hunched his shoulders helplessly. “There were no definite plans. I expected to reveal the thing some day, after Selma grew up. She had a claim to a good deal of money — Julia’s money, not Kendall’s by rights. But tonight changed all that.”

Elmore fell into a moody silence.

“Well?” Stan prompted.

“She doesn’t need Julia’s money. Selma is well enough off as my daughter — and John Harne’s wife.”

Stan frowned. “But, Judge, you knew that before.”

Horace Elmore’s large head drooped. “Yes. But I didn’t know Kendall was a cold-blooded killer. There’s the vital thing. Selma must never be branded as the child of a murderer!” He raised a clouded, brooding gaze to Stan’s face. “Baxter, you agree with me, don’t you?”

“Wait a moment,” the young lawyer said. “What makes you so sure Kendall is a murderer?”

The judge got up from the little bench. He began a nervous pacing across the grimy floor. Bits of coal crunched under his feet.

“But there’s no doubt about it,” he declared. “I know the whole story. Callum asked Randt for money to start a suit against Kendall. When Frank Kendall got wind of it, he killed them both. He believed that Lois was Julia’s daughter, and he went gunning for the two men who knew the secret.”

Stan shrugged. “Judge, you’re lawyer enough to know that’s only a theory.”

“But there are facts to prove it,” the older man asserted. “I might as well tell you. Randt planned a meeting in his home tonight. He invited Harne and me — told me Frank Kendall would be there. Kendall had been kicking up a fuss with the government — some unfair competition charge. Ranch intended to confront him, accusing him of killing Joe Callum. There’s no doubt in my mind that Kendall knew what to expect, and therefore he shot Randt.”

“It isn’t proof,” Stan said. “It’s only more theory.”

“That isn’t all,” Elmore gulped. “Baxter, I arrived at Randt’s home tonight before the police did! As I drove up the hill, a man came running out of the driveway with a gun in his hand. He ran over the top of the hill and leaped into a sedan parked in the shadows there. Instead of turning into Randt’s driveway. I followed that sedan. It went straight to Frank Kendall’s home.”

“But you didn’t tell the police that?”

“No.”

“Why not?”

The judge threw back his head, straightened. “Because they would have held me as a material witness. I didn’t know how much they would make Kendall confess, if they arrested him. Sooner or later, I thought, they would get at most of the truth.” He was pacing now and he paused in front of the furnace and said. “I wanted to keep Selma’s name out of it. I wanted time to do this!”

He whirled, with astonishing speed for a man of his bulk and years. His plump right hand clawed, raked open the furnace door. The other hand darted inside his coat.

The furnace flames threw dancing red shadows across Horace Elmore’s face, distorted with a look of wild triumph.

Stan Baxter blurted, “Hold that!” and hurled himself forward. A thunderous crash-h boomed and echoed. There was a metallic ping, and the electric bulb exploded into bits. Darkness washed across the basement, turned to a ruddy pink in front of the furnace where Stan grappled with the judge. A reek of pungent gunsmoke penetrated the air.

The two men weaved momentarily in a tangle of interlocked limbs. Stan grunted, flung Horace Elmore into the blackness beyond the furnace. The gun roared again as they rolled on the concrete. Stan could hear the bullet glance from the furnace.

Stan gritted an oath and succeeded in pinning his weight across the other’s body. He could hear the big man’s breath whistling through clenched teeth. Elmore flung himself into another convulsive struggle.

Stan pinned a hand to Elmore’s threshing arm, forced that down. He had a leg across the other arm. He looked up. A cry choked in his throat.

Across the boiler room two tiny, gleaming eyes shone in the dark. They were very bright, curiously wedge-shaped. They wavered, seemed to swim together...

Stan shivered. An icy tingle engulfed his tensed muscles. Those eves weren’t human! They were—

There was another blinding flash, a bellow that reverberated under the low ceiling.

Stan quickly let go of Horace Elmore. He yanked the flashlight from his pocket, clicked its switch. Nothing happened. Afterward, he found the bulb broken; it must have shattered when he fell on the steam shovel, or perhaps when he landed in the yard...

The eyes had disappeared, anyway.

Someone came running along the corridor upstairs. A spill of light swept down the steps. Thin smoke drifted across the beam.

“Baxter!” It was Worthington’s voice. “Are you all right? What happened?”

Stan said, “Get that light down here!”

The blond man came down the steps, two at a time, and Stan met him; took the electric torch. He pointed it around.

Horace Elmore sat up on the floor; he was thoroughly smeared with coal dust, and he looked both ill and angry.

“You fool!” the judge said. “Pulling a gun on me!”

Stan cried, “Me? I didn’t pull any gun!” He had the .38 in his hand now, though. He ran across the boiler room, flinging the electric beam under a thicket of asbestos-wrapped pipes. He looked into the coal bin, and scowled. He looked around the furnace, too. Farther on, he found an ash-lift. This had a chain operated hoist.

Staring up, he saw the hatch open, saw stars in the sky.

Behind him, Horace Elmore wailed, “Baxter! Come here!”

It was an agonized cry. Stan swung around, came back into the boiler room. On Elmore’s face was an expression of helpless panic.

“The papers!” he gasped. “Have you got them. Baxter?”

“No!”

The judge said, “I dropped them! They’re gone!” He was hunting around in front of the furnace, and he said: “They’re here somewhere. Got to be! Let’s have that light, Baxter!”

Stan said. “You didn’t throw them in the furnace?”

“No, no!”

Stan made sure of this. He stared into the furnace, studied the red flame licking over the undisturbed coals. There wasn’t a trace the blackened crisp papers would have left.

He wet his lips. “All right. They’re gone. They’re just gone.”

The judge couldn’t believe it. He searched around the furnace thoroughly. He swore. Finally he turned to Worthington.

“You didn’t pick them up?”

“No,” the blond man said. “What were they?”

“He could have,” Elmore said to Stan. “I insist we search this man!”

Stan grunted. “That’s wasting time. Where’s that watchman?”

“Why, with me,” Worthington said. “At the phone. I left him there when I heard the first shot.”

They went upstairs. Stan stepped outside. The steel gate was open now. He had rather expected that. He went inside again: the watchman was still beside the telephone, in a little room off the main corridor.

Stan sat down, put his hands on his knees, and looked intently into the old man’s face. “You’re scared, aren’t you?”

“I’m hurt. My head hurts,” the old fellow said plaintively. He rubbed his forehead and groaned.

“What’s your name?”

“Sam Bedlow. I’m sixty-three years old.”

“How long have you worked here?”

“Nine months.”

“The man before him got pensioned,” Judge Elmore interrupted. He leaned against the wall, frowning. “What’s the point of all this, Baxter?”

Stan said to Sam Bedlow, “What happened tonight?”

“I was in the boiler room. They sneaked behind me. I didn’t have any chance.”

“Who sneaked behind you?”

“Them,” Bedlow said. “Three of them. They had masks on.”

Stan grunted. “What were you doing in the boiler room?”

“I fired up. I was pulling my box when they grabbed me. I couldn’t fight off three of them, grabbing me from behind that way.”

“He means the police call box,” Horace Elmore said. “He pulls it every hour on that hour.”

Stan didn’t look up at the judge. “If that happened a couple of hours ago, how does it happen that the police didn’t come here? You must have missed the next hour.”

“I dunno,” Bedlow said. “Maybe they pulled the box then.”

“Don’t you know?”

“My head hurts. They hit me. How could I know? I was knocked out cold.”

Stan said, “You were out cold for two hours?”

“I must have been.”

“Yeah. They hit you from behind, but your forehead hurts.”

Bedlow looked frightened. “My whole head hurts. I’m sick. I don’t know what I’m saying.”

Stan laughed a little, not pleasantly.

“Your whole head hurts. You were knocked out for a couple of hours. It’s mighty queer they hit you that hard, and didn’t even raise a bump on your skull!”

Bedlow was trembling, his eyes blurred and confused. “It hurts inside,” he protested.

“Look at your wrists,” Stan said. “They didn’t tie you up very tight, did they?”

Bedlow blubbered unhappily. He had reason to. A police siren wailed down the street.

Stan got up hastily. “Come on, Judge. I’m going to get to the bottom of this beautiful hocus-pocus. We’ll have a talk with Selma.”

Elmore blinked.

“Selma!” he exclaimed. “But she couldn’t know anything about it.”

“That,” said Stan, “is what you think.”