Marsh replaced everything in the suitcase, put it back in the cupboard, and closed the door.
"We're through here for the present, Nels," he said.
Shutting off the lights, the two men returned to the main floor. As they entered the library, Morgan and Tierney appeared, having completed their search of the upper part of the house.
"Any luck?" asked Marsh.
"Nothing at all with any bearing on the case," answered Morgan. "How about you?"
"I found all the evidence we need; most of it in a suitcase, which is probably the one Atwood removed from his apartment."
"There goes one of your theories, Marsh," laughed Morgan.
"Which one?" inquired Marsh.
"That Clark Atwood and this man Hunt were not in cahoots."
Marsh smiled. "What is the proverb?" he said. "'Tis wisdom sometimes to seem a fool.'"
"Now then, Morgan," he continued, briskly, "there's the telephone. You make arrangements to have your men come out and take care of the evidence in the basement, and the prisoners. While you're doing that, the rest of us will bring in those fellows we left out by the road."
Morgan went to the telephone as directed, and Marsh led the others down the drive to the gate. Everything was just as they had left it, and they found the two men where they had placed them, behind the bushes.
"If I'm any example," said Tierney, "these two guys must be near frozen to death."
"That'll cool off their ambition for a fight," replied Marsh.
Marsh placed Wagner, who was the smaller of the two men, over his shoulder, and Tierney and Nels, carrying the other man between them, followed Marsh back to the house. They put the two men in chairs in the library, and lifting the other man from the floor placed him in a chair near them. Marsh then turned to Morgan.
"Have you fixed everything up?"
"Yes, they ought to be here inside of an hour and a half."
"Fine!" commented Marsh. Then turning to Nels, he pulled out a bill and presented it.
"Nels," he said, "we've all got to go into the city. Somebody must watch this place while we're gone. You have a good gun there, so you can stick around until the police come."
"Sure—Aye watch."
"Come on," Marsh called, and the three men started out. The last thing Marsh heard as he went down the steps, was a voice murmuring, "He bane fine man."
Oak Street lay shadowy and deserted, as Marsh, accompanied by Morgan and Tierney, turned into it from Rush Street.
"Wait here for a minute," requested Marsh, as they stopped in front of the entrance to Hunt's building, and he moved toward the dark tradesmen's entrance. As he neared it, a man appeared from the shadows. They held a low-voiced conversation, and Marsh then returned to the others. When the door was opened, in answer to their ring, the three detectives climbed the stairs.
Hunt's man-servant stood at the door.
"Mr. Hunt in?" asked Marsh.
"Yes, sir," replied the man. "I think you were here before, sir."
"Yes, Sunday night."
"Walk right in, sir. Mr. Hunt's in the living room."
Hunt had evidently been reading, but had risen at the sound of voices, for on entering the living room they found him standing by the davenport, with his finger between the pages of a book.
"Good evening," said Marsh.
There was a look of surprise on Hunt's face, but he quickly mastered it.
"I hardly expected to see you here," he observed, significantly. "And who are your friends?"
"Detective Sergeant Morgan, whom you have met before; and his partner, Detective Sergeant Tierney."
Again that astonished expression passed over Hunt's face. He spoke quite calmly, however.
"May I ask the reason for this late call?"
"It's really a continuation of the visit I made here Sunday night," answered Marsh. "My story has had another and more interesting chapter added to it, and I thought you might like to hear it."
"Naturally, I am interested," returned Hunt, smiling. "Will you gentlemen take chairs?"
Hunt's man, who had followed them into the room, now offered to assist them in taking off their coats.
"Never mind," said Marsh, "we shall be here only a few minutes," and the man left the room.
Marsh now seated himself in the chair he had occupied on the occasion of his previous visit, and Morgan and Tierney took chairs on the opposite side of the fireplace. Hunt laid aside his book and offered them cigars from a humidor. Marsh refused, calling attention to the fact that he was lighting a cigarette, but Morgan and Tierney accepted, and Hunt, selecting a cigar for himself, then settled down among the cushions in a corner of the davenport.
"My story really begins two years ago, Mr. Hunt," said Marsh, "but I will pass briefly over the early part of it by merely saying that at that time I took up the trail of a counterfeiter, known as Clark Atwood."
"Why should you take up the trail of a counterfeiter?" inquired Hunt.
"Because," declared Marsh, throwing back his coat and exposing his badge, "I belong to the Secret Service Division of the United States Treasury Department."
Hunt remained silent and Marsh continued. "Upon the death of his wife in St. Louis, a few months ago, this man Atwood brought his daughter to Chicago and placed her in an apartment on Sheridan Road. Posing as a traveling man, Atwood was busy in other places, and made only occasional visits to his daughter. To maintain a place of safety and refuge in time of trouble, this man Atwood kept his daughter in ignorance of his real occupation. I may say, at this point, that Atwood had made his living by criminal means for many years, and the venture in counterfeiting was simply the latest of his many ways of gaining a livelihood."
"In the course of time it became necessary for Atwood to get a certain man out of the way. The plans were carefully laid and the stage set. His daughter believed him to be traveling on the road, but after he was sure that she had retired for the night, he quietly entered his apartment, went to her bedroom, and by means of a hypodermic needle, charged with morphine, rendered her unconscious while she slept, so that there would be no chance of her awakening and spoiling his plans. Then Atwood, and a well known police character known as 'Baldy' Newman, entered an empty apartment across the hall by means of a duplicate key. At twelve o'clock, this man 'Baldy' telephoned the victim at his hotel. Newman represented himself as the man's former chauffeur, and appealed for immediate assistance to get out of some trouble he was in. Atwood, and his confederate, then waited in the dining room of this apartment until the victim rang the bell. Newman admitted him and led him into the dining room. There the two men confronted him with revolvers and on the threat of taking his life, forced him to sign a paper."
"After that, the victim made an attempt to escape. He fled to the front of the apartment, closely pursued by the two men. They attempted to make away with him silently, as originally planned, by knifing him to death. The victim brought a hitch into their plans by drawing a revolver and firing one shot before he died. Had this not occurred, it is probable that the murderers' plans would not have been discovered until long after they had made a safe getaway. As it was, the shot merely hastened their actions at the time. The lights in the apartment were turned out, the dead man was carried across the hall, through Atwood's apartment, and down the rear stairs, where he was thrown into a waiting automobile. When the police arrived, a few minutes later, the men believed that they had gotten safely away, without leaving a trace. They did leave traces, however, and from that minute the police never left the trail until they closed in on the men today."
Marsh took a photograph from his pocket. "Among the traces left in that apartment," he went on, "were the imprints of a man's hands on the dining room table. I have here a photograph of those imprints, and among the many identifying marks there is a scar of a peculiar shape."
Marsh returned the photograph to his pocket.
"I am very glad to learn that you have cleared up the murder of my employer, Mr. Marsh," said Hunt. "What seems curious to me, however, is why you should think this man Atwood would want to kill Mr. Merton. Surely Mr. Merton could never have had any dealings with a criminal such as you describe Atwood to be."
"On the contrary, Mr. Hunt," returned Marsh, "Merton had extensive business dealings with Atwood. In fact, he went so far as to place Atwood in a position where he could rob Merton of several hundred thousand dollars worth of stocks and bonds. The transfer of these securities had been taking place for a year or more, and it had reached the point where the greater part of Merton's fortune was in Atwood's hands. It is evident that Atwood's original intention was to step quietly out of sight with this fortune, but subsequent events led him to believe that he could go on in quiet security if Merton were out of the way. That was the reason why Merton was murdered."
Hunt threw the remains of his cigar into the fireplace, and slipped the hand that had held it down into the pillows of the davenport.
"And you think you have at last located this man Atwood do you, Mr. Marsh?"
"Yes," returned Marsh, calmly, "because I have absolute proof that CLARK ATWOOD AND GILBERT HUNT ARE ONE AND THE SAME MAN!"
Instantly Hunt's hand whipped out from behind the sofa cushions, and the three detectives found themselves covered by an automatic as Hunt stood up.
"Clever work, gentlemen," he said, smiling. "But after leading men of your type around by the nose for many years, you can hardly expect me to stay here and calmly accept defeat now."
"Oh, no," answered Marsh. "We fully expected you to put up a good fight." He slipped his hands into his trouser pockets, and crossing his legs, leaned back, smiling up at Hunt. "Go ahead; what's your next move?"
"My next move," cried Hunt, sharply, "is to leave you damn fools sitting right there. When I didn't hear from my men this afternoon I knew that something was wrong, and my way of escape is ready."
He backed slowly toward the door, keeping the detectives covered with his automatic. When he reached the door of the room, he called, "Everything ready, George?"
"Yes, sir," a voice replied from the distance.
Hunt again addressed the detectives. "I advise you gentlemen to stay quietly where you are for a few minutes. I am going out of the back door of this apartment, and you, will find it difficult to find YOUR way through in the dark—especially as you may meet a shot at any moment. I bid you good evening, gentlemen."
With that, Hunt backed out of sight through the doorway and all was silent. Immediately, Morgan and Tierney leaped to their feet and dashed toward the door.
"Hold on!" exclaimed Marsh, still sitting quietly in his chair, "Where are you going?"
The two detectives stopped in astonishment.
"We're going to get him!" shouted Tierney.
"No need of taking all that trouble," returned Marsh. "My men are ready for him. Long ago a Secret Service man even replaced his driver at the wheel of his car."
As if in answer to this statement from Marsh, there was a distant fusillade of shots.
"They've got him," said Marsh, rising. "Now we can go."
"If there's no hurry now," said Morgan, "I wish you would tell us the rest of the story."
"What do you mean?" inquired Marsh.
"How did you come to connect these two men, and how did you get that inside dope on the stealing?"
"You know all the incidents," returned Marsh, "and you ought to be able to connect them as I did. The only information I had about which you did not know was that notebook. The book contained memoranda in Hunt's handwriting, which, by the way, closely resembled the writing in Atwood's last letter. Among these were the names, addresses and telephone numbers of the men who worked with him, and showing their different locations during the past year or two. He also made notations of the different stocks and bonds which he took out of Merton's vaults at various times."
"Atwood, you know, took a suitcase at the last moment from his apartment. This afternoon I located a suitcase in the Merton house, containing the counterfeit plates, and the stocks and bonds which I had found noted in Hunt's memorandum book. Naturally, a large part of the story I told tonight was merely surmise on my part, but you can see how near I came to the truth from the way Hunt acted."
"Another interesting point, due to your foresight, Morgan, was that matter of the scar. I studied very carefully the photograph you had taken. Sunday night, when I was calling here on Hunt, I goaded him into a rage, so that he shook his right fist in my face. I had a good view of the scar then, and my last doubt vanished."
"Another point that isn't clear," queried Morgan, "is that paper Merton signed. What was it?"
"I don't know," said Marsh. "That was a wild guess on my part; that he had signed any paper at all. It seemed odd, however, that an experienced financier like Merton would make an employee sole executor. So I decided that before his death, Merton was forced to sign either a new will, or a codicil to his old will, which was dated back some months so as to offset any suspicions."
"And what do you suppose Hunt expected to gain by kidnapping all of us?" again questioned Morgan.
"Don't you see," explained Marsh, "that we were getting too close, and might be expected to spring the trap at any minute. Our disappearance would divert the police into a search for us instead of for them. In the meantime, they could get quietly away and vanish. And besides, I was supposed to have that notebook—the most incriminating evidence we possessed at that time."
"But see here," now broke in Tierney. "Why did you let that guy think he had a chance to get away, when you had the goods on him? The three of us could have nabbed him the minute we came in."
"Tierney," replied Marsh, "there's a little girl up north that I hope to marry some day. You know her—she's Atwood's daughter. If that girl knew that her father was a crook it would break her heart. I didn't intend that she should ever know. I told Hunt that story tonight so as to show him the hopelessness of his position, and thus drive him out to a finish battle with my men. Sooner or later he had to pay the penalty of being a murderer, and I did not think he would allow himself to be taken alive, so I gave him his chance. His death prevents a personal trial and the presenting of all the evidence. The name of Atwood need not now appear in the reports of the case, and the girl will never connect the references that may be made to Gilbert Hunt, with her father."
"One week!" exclaimed Morgan. "Marsh, you complimented me once on twenty-four hours bum work; It's my turn now, to hand it to you for one week's REAL work."
"I appreciate your good intentions, Morgan," laughed Marsh, "but you forget that I have actually been two years on this job. The last week was simply the windup. It was not my superior work—merely a slip in the man's plans that gave me a clue."
"Hell!" cried Tierney. "Cut that modest stuff. A man who could turn the biggest mystery the Department ever had into a CLUE, is some guy!"
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