“I’ll begin at the multigraphing room,” said Inspector Jessup. “See that someone is always accidentally available if I should need him.”
“Yes, sir.”
The inspector left the room. After a time, special agents followed.
It was five minutes later that, crowding and gawking, the morning tour of Department of Justice sightseers followed their F.B.I. guide down a wide hall on the seventh floor, toward a long room, where presses whirred, multigraphs pounded noisily, and binding machinery clattered. The guide entered the door, walking backward that he might address the variegated group that had followed him. Here were men and women from throughout America who tonight would send home post cards saying they knew all about crime. There were small boys and girls, goggle-eyed at the thought of being in the same building with G-men. There was a sprinkling of newspapermen and women from out of town, and not a few who appeared to be business executives, or persons of responsibility interested in law enforcement. At one side, somewhat apart from the throng, was a keen-featured man of about forty-five, who bore a frank air of interest in everything about him. The guide, still walking backward, now raised his voice above the roar of machinery.
“In this room,” he began, “are all the reproductive processes by which reward sheets are multigraphed, pamphlets bound, and the F.B.I.’s Law Enforcement Bulletin assembled and shipped to more than ten thousand police bodies, sheriffs, and other enforcement agencies. In a kidnaping, the lists of ransom notes are reproduced here; in one case, this room turned out a job in thirty-six hours of continuous effort that would have required three weeks of work in a regulation printing plant. Now if you will follow me—”
“Look out!” came a sharp voice. The warning was too late. The guide collided heavily with the hurrying form of Inspector Jessup, striking him against an elbow. The inspector winced; his right hand flew open, releasing a number of sheets of paper that evidently had just come from a multigraphing machine, and scattering them wildly across the smooth cement floor.
“That’s all right; that’s all right!” the inspector announced hastily to the guide’s apologies, bending swiftly meanwhile in an effort to gather up the papers. Here and there a visitor, seeking to aid, bent also. The inspector apparently took no notice. His eyes, however, were not still.
At last he saw that the keen-eyed man, also a volunteer in the job of reclamation, was covertly peering at each sheet as he picked it from the floor. The inspector waited only a moment more, then, as with sudden realization, whirled.
“Please don’t touch those papers, anyone!” he commanded. A passing agent suddenly moved in upon the scene, joining with the guide in collecting the multigraphed matter from the hands of volunteers. The inspector nodded to the guide.
“If you will move on with your party.”
“Yes, sir. Please follow me.” The group obeyed, and the inspector stood facing the subject of his investigation, who stood extending a sheaf of the papers with one hand, while with the other he fumbled at a hip pocket for his wallet.
“I’m afraid that my curiosity got the better of me,” he announced. “I was so terribly interested that I did not realize this might be a confidential matter.”
The inspector’s brow creased.
“You mean you were reading that announcement?”
“I glanced at it.” His hands now free, he dug into his wallet for a card. “I do hope that my position will guarantee my ability to keep secrets. Kent is my name, sir. Manton Kent. I am president of Superior Products.”
The inspector lost his worried look, extending a pawlike hand in greeting. The main group had passed out of the room now. The guide’s voice echoed from down the halclass="underline"
“We are now entering the Identification Unit, where are assembled a total of more than ten million fingerprints from every part of the United States and numerous foreign countries—”
“I suppose I should catch up with that group,” said Manton Kent. “Although,” he laughed, “I almost know that lecture by heart.”
“Oh, you’ve been here before?”
“This is my third trip in three days.”
“Interested in law enforcement?”
Manton Kent smiled.
“I didn’t realize it until I came through here the other day. Then I began to see how many features could be applied to my business. Fingerprinting, for instance, and scientific apparatus. Although, of course,” he added slowly, “one only gets the barest sort of a glimpse on one of these tours.”
The inspector agreed.
“I’m sorry you didn’t make yourself known at the director’s office. He’d have arranged for a special guide.”
“You really think so?”
“Oh, yes. Persons like yourself, heads of corporations and the like, are the real ones he wants interested in the things we are doing here—”
Manton Kent shrugged.
“So what do I do? I play the boob and look at what turns out to be a confidential matter.”
Inspector Jessup grinned.
“Oh, it isn’t that bad. Fact is, what’s on this sheet is not so terribly secret.”
“I’m glad of that.”
“It’s a bureau matter, of course. Naturally, we don’t want any investigative information to fall into the wrong hands. This just happens to be some multigraphs of reports on evidence we’ve picked up in a murder case here in Washington a few days ago. A man named James Tilliver was killed in his home. Ordinarily that would be a case for the Washington police, except that the government had purchased the place a few days before; Tilliver was to move out the next day. Thus he was on government soil, and that put the case in our jurisdiction.”
“I noticed the report was headed ‘Suspect Unknown,’ or something like that.”
“Yes. We always do that until we have narrowed a case down to its essentials.”
Jessup glanced at his watch.
“I’ve a few free minutes. Perhaps I could show you around.”
“That would be a great privilege.”
They walked together down the long hall. The inspector folded the sheaf of multigraphed reports.
“A queer affair, the Tilliver case. We’ll all be glad to get it cleared up.”
“I suppose you have to chase down every tiny lead.”
“Everything. For instance, you perhaps know about the finding of a woman’s shoe near the curbing, and a pair of gloves, with blood on them, a half block away. Naturally, we have to prove or disprove any connection between this evidence and the identity of the murderer.”
“Then you know the killer?”
Jessup shook his head.
“Oh, I didn’t say that. I said we’re running down these clues. The investigation isn’t completed. I’ll let you watch an experiment or two in the laboratory if you’re interested. I don’t see how it could harm the case.”
“I’d be delighted.”
“First we’d better dip into the Identification Unit if you want to see it again — the fingerprint section, you know.” He opened a large pair of doors leading to a huge room, set with many metal filing cases. “Of course, you’ve been told how we classify the thousands of fingerprints received daily. Which reminds me — have you thought about introducing civil fingerprinting into your business? For identification, in case of illness, accident, amnesia, anything of that sort?”
“I’ve been thinking seriously about it,” said Manton Kent.