The Red Blot

CHAPTER XVII THE PRELUDE

IT was after two o’clock when Dobson Pringle returned to the offices of the Amalgamated Builders’ Association. The girl in the anteroom informed him that a man had called, and left without giving his name; but that bit of news was not regarded as important by Pringle. The girl made another announcement, that was much more vital; namely that Felix Cushman and a friend were waiting Pringle’s return in the president’s office.

Hurrying across the floor, Pringle reached his own room, and found Cushman there. The man with the chief director was one whom Pringle immediately recognized — Detective Merton Hembroke, from headquarters.

As soon as Pringle had closed the door, Cushman motioned him to his desk and began to speak in a tense tone.

“I have brought Hembroke here,” he announced. “by arrangement with Commissioner Weston. Hembroke is the principal detective on this case; and he suggested that it would be well to make an inside inspection of these premises prior to tonight’s meeting.”

“An excellent idea,” agreed Pringle. “You mean that Hembroke will remain here after the office is empty?”

“For a short while,” returned Cushman cannily. “Every one will be gone by six o’clock. Hembroke can stay for an hour longer. But I would not deem it advisable for him to remain after seven o’clock.”

“Why not?”

“Because we must adhere closely to the terms of the demand. I am convinced, Pringle, that an emissary is coming from The Red Blot. As the hour for the meeting approaches, everything must be clear.”

“I can see no harm in Hembroke staying, “declared Pringle, in opposition to the director’s statement. “Nevertheless, my opinions seems to be considered of little weight.”

“The funds are arriving at half past eight,” resumed Cushman, summarily ignoring Pringle’s objection. “We must all be here by then — you and I and the directors. Right there is where we have scored against this criminal with whom we are dealing. If his spies are watching outside of this building, we shall be able to completely delude them.”

“How?” questioned Pringle.

“Commissioner Weston figured it out,” broke in Hembroke. “He has a great idea, Mr. Pringle—”

“Which is partly your suggestion, Hembroke,” interrupted Cushman in a commending tone.

“Credit belongs to the commissioner,” declared Hembroke. “I was there to talk it over with him — that’s all. Figure it this way, Mr. Pringle. How would anyone transport five million dollars?”

“Under police guard, of course.”

“That’s it. Well, the cash is coming up — in an armored bank truck. There’ll be police all around the place. As soon as the dough is in — away they’ll go. That will leave nearly one hour before the scheduled time.”

“But we aren’t all going, see? There’ll be me and Joe Cardona and a dozen other detectives all around this floor. That’s why I want to look over the layout. So I can arrange the posts.”

“Do you understand, Pringle?” questioned Cushman. “Our directors’ meeting will be in the conference room. No police in there at all. Everything in accordance with The Red Blot’s terms. But unless we get Selfridge Woodstock — there will be no negotiations completed. The agent will walk into a trap. The money will be bait. All will look fair; but we will be ready to snare him.”

“Well planned, Cushman,” stated Pringle. “Nevertheless, I still persist in my final decision of last night. Mark my words, Cushman; and I call you, Detective Hembroke, to be witness. We are placing five million dollars in jeopardy. We may lose all, and gain nothing.”

“We are chancing it,” said Cushman shortly, “and the odds are all in our favor. That’s final, Pringle.”

“It is a very good plan,” nodded the president. “It is quite natural that the money should be brought up under strong guard. Nevertheless, we might use blank paper, instead of real money. However—”

Pringle broke off and shrugged his shoulders as he saw an antagonistic glare in Cushman’s eyes. The chairman of the directors arose and conducted Merton Hembroke through a door at the side of Pringle’s office. This was a connection with a room which the directors used as an office.

The door closed behind Cushman and Hembroke. Pringle rang a bell for a stenographer.

IT was half past the hour before Dobson Pringle had finished with a mass of detail work. Pringle knew that by this time Cushman must have left, with Hembroke remaining in the adjacent office.

While resting in his large swivel chair, Pringle heard a rap at the outer door. He spoke; the door opened, and Carlton Carmody entered.

The white-haired architect closed the door behind him and sat down in a chair by the desk. He looked at the president with troubled eyes.

“What’s the matter, Carmody?” asked Pringle, in a kindly tone.

“I’m thinking of your worries, Mr. Pringle,” declared Carmody. “Last night troubled me a great deal. It wasn’t fair, the way you were overruled by Felix Cushman.”

“That’s part of my job, Carmody,” smiled Pringle.

“Things aren’t right, sir,” protested Carmody. “It impressed me that your opinions should at least have been given more consideration.”

“Cushman holds the whip hand, Carmody.”

“I know that, Mr. Pringle. Just the same, this situation has been bothering me all day. Of course, I can’t say anything — I was only at the meeting in case Mr. Woodstock had wanted to put questions that I could answer. But I feel that you have been treated unjustly.”

“Forget it, Carmody.”

“I’ll try to, Mr. Pringle. I’ve been working on those half-completed plans for the Soudervale Building — maybe they’ll take my mind from all this trouble. But it seems as though I can’t think of anything now but The Red Blot.”

“Don’t read the newspapers,” commented Pringle dryly. “Rather a hardship, Carmody, but advisable under the circumstances. Perhaps this trouble will be settled effectively tonight.”

“I hope so, Mr. Pringle.”

After Carmody had gone from the office, Pringle prepared to leave for the day. The president could not forget the architect’s solicitude. A good worker, Carmody; one who could scarcely hope to be the equal of Hubert Craft; nevertheless, Carmody’s close attention to detail made him a valuable man to carry on the work of one whose labors had been unfinished.

Dobson Pringle’s departure before five o’clock was a signal for early leave on the part of the employees. Usually the genial president set an example by staying until five thirty. A gradual emptying of offices began immediately after five; within half an hour, the place was deserted.

THE door of the directors’ office opened cautiously; into the floor space now illuminated only by emergency lights stepped Detective Merton Hembroke. The sleuth strolled about the large central office, making a rather cursory inspection.

A closed door caught his eye. A light glimmered from beneath it. The door bore the title:

Carlton Carmody was still at work. Hembroke remembered the fellow from last night. A rather eccentric-looking character, Carmody. Hembroke decided to wait until the man was gone.

Instead of going back to the office where he had stayed in wait, the detective sought the seclusion of the anteroom and watched through the glass partition.

In his office, Carmody was trying to concentrate upon the plans for the new Soudervale Building. Studying the ground floor, in a space intended for a banking office, he noted a peculiar alcove arrangement, which was unmarked. Carmody wondered why that extension was in the plans.

Could it be a special vault space? Such was unlikely. No banking institution had arranged to take the ground floor of the proposed building. This alcove was not conventional; why had Hubert Craft designed it?

Thoughtfully, Carmody dipped a pen into the red ink with which he was accustomed to mark these plans. The pen sank deeper than the architect noticed. When he held the lettering instrument above the plans, a drop of ink fell free and splattered upon the very space that had caused Carmody’s perplexity.

The Red Blot!

The splotch of ink resembled the strange signature that Carmody had seen upon the ransom note! The peculiar coincidence caused a strain of fleeting thoughts in the architect’s bewildered mind.

An unexplained alcove in a ground-floor plan; a feature which Carmody, methodical to the extreme, had been going over with mechanical precision — and now, upon it, appeared the sign of The Red Blot.

Details impressed Carlton Carmody more than important matters. That had been the chief reason for the architect’s slow rise to prominence. Yet Carmody had hidden qualities of imagination; and this stimulus caused him to picture the menace of The Red Blot in mammoth proportions.

He recalled last night’s episode in the Hotel Gigantic; with sudden impulse, he went to a filing cabinet and produced the plans of that huge building which Hubert Craft had designed.

Going through the floor plans, Carmody noticed an unmarked spot that made him pause. He dropped the Gigantic plans upon those of the Soudervale Building.

The Red Blot! Carmody’s mind went back to the reports that he had read of Tony Loretti’s murder — the deed that had brought The Red Blot into such tremendous prominence. Loretti had been killed in the Club Janeiro. The night club was located in the Stellar Theater Building — an edifice which the Amalgamated Builders had also erected!

Back at the filing cabinet, Carmody discovered the floor plans of the Stellar Theater Building, and began to study the diagrams of the first floor. A new impulse seizing him, he laid this plan beside that of the Hotel Gigantic. With his red-dipped pen he shook one blot upon each diagram. Grinning wildly, he stepped back to survey his work.

Then, with the eagerness of a madman, Carmody went through the files, until he produced the plans of the building in which he now stood. He studied the fifth floor of the Amalgamated Building, and placed his finger tip upon the conference room, where tonight’s meeting was to be held. With a gleeful chuckle, Carmody spotted the plan with another crimson blot!

A CLOCK on the window sill showed half past six. Gathering the plans which he had marked, Carmody clutched them close to his body, and went from the little office. He crept across the large floor until he reached the door of the conference room. It was unlocked. Carmody entered and switched on the light.

The room had a peculiar entrance — a sort of an anteroom of its own — a space much narrower than the conference room itself. The entrance was at the outer corner of the inset square. At the left of the anteroom was a paneled wall.

Carmody went through to the large conference room. It spread to the left, where the windows were located. The architect laid his plans upon the large table in the center of the room, and began to spread them out.

He stopped, looked up, and quickly shoved the plans into a compact pile. A man had entered after him; Carmody now recognized the face of Detective Merton Hembroke. The sleuth had evidently not intended to disturb the architect. Now that Carmody was aware of his presence, Hembroke put a prompt question.

“What’s the idea?” he quizzed. “No one is supposed to be in this room. What are you doing here?”

“I–I - I have discovered something,” stammered Carmody. “Something very important. Yes — it may be very important.”

“What is it?”

Carmody hesitated. He did not care to discuss this matter with the detective alone. He preferred to talk to Dobson Pringle.

There was a peculiar challenge in Hembroke’s gaze; and Carmody suddenly repented of his action in dabbing these plans with red blotches. What would a police detective know about building diagrams? Carmody became suddenly reliant.

“I must talk to Mr. Pringle,” he asserted. “It is very important that I should do so.”

“Mr. Pringle has gone home,” returned Hembroke. “I was just looking around here to see that the place was empty. I saw you come into this room.”

“I can call Mr. Pringle,” pleaded Carmody. “Really — I must discuss a most important matter with him. Very important.”

“I’ll call him,” said Hembroke shortly.

The detective picked up a telephone. He found that it was not connected.

“I’ll have to go out to the switchboard,” he decided. “Come along. I’ll call Pringle.”

Clutching his precious plans, Carmody preceded the suspicious detective. As he saw Hembroke pick up the telephone, the architect supplied him with Pringle’s number.

“It’s unlisted,” he explained. “Call Mr. Pringle right away. It’s very important.”

Hembroke put in the call. Within a few minutes, he was talking with the president of the Amalgamated Builders.

“This is Detective Hembroke,” explained the sleuth. “I’m in the office in the Amalgamated Building… Just ready to leave… One of your men here — Carmody, the architect… I found him in the conference room… Wants to talk with you about some plans…”

“Tell him I must see him before the meeting!” exclaimed Carmody, in a tense voice. “I want to see him in the conference room!”

“Wants to see you personally,” resumed Hembroke. “Says he wants to see you in the conference room — before tonight’s meeting… No, he hasn’t told me what it’s about. He’s all excited, and he’s got a whole stack of diagrams with him… Say — maybe I ought to take this bird down to headquarters… What’s that? No… Yes, I understand… All right, Mr. Pringle… ”

Hembroke hung up the telephone and turned toward Carmody with a disgruntled air.

“This is a poor time to start acting loony,” observed the detective, “but your boss gives you an O.K. Says he knows you’re all right. He’s coming down here as soon as he finishes dinner. Says for you to wait for him in the conference room.”

“Good!” exclaimed Carmody, in a breathless tone.

“I’m leaving here,” observed Hembroke. “I’m supposed to be out by seven. I don’t like the idea of you staying — but it’s on Pringle’s say-so. Come on.”

Hembroke conducted the architect back to the conference room. He pointed to a chair by the table. Carmody seated himself; Hembroke stalked about the room, and stared suspiciously at every corner. Satisfied that all was well, he went out and closed the door of the little anteroom behind him.

The detective paused to listen for a few minutes; then shrugged his shoulders and continued on his way. He left the offices of the Amalgamated Builders’ Association, and took an elevator to the ground floor.

In the conference room, Carlton Carmody waited until he was sure that the detective was really gone. Then, with an eager smile, the architect spread the plans on the table before him. His eyes were agog as he surveyed those charts — each of which now bore a crimson spot.

Minutes dragged by. Carlton Carmody was like a man in a trance as he noted the features of the plans. He was unconscious of the passage of time, concentrated solely upon the diagrams before him. Forty minutes passed. It was nearly half past seven, and he was still immersed in his work.

Suddenly, the lights of the conference room went out. After that event, Carlton Carmody knew no more.

This was the prelude to crime that was to follow, elsewhere as well as in this very room.