“Hereward’s dead to the world,” Elkins commented, nodding his head toward the sleeping reporter on the adjacent table.
“He was out working on the Schenck murder case all last night and yesterday,” said Brewer, “and he’s worn out.”
“That’s just like the tender consideration of the chief,” grumbled Elkins, blowing out the match and tossing it down on the paper strewn floor. “It’s just like him to put a tired out man on emergency duty.”
He picked up the dice and jerked them across the table. “Six is my point,” he said, lowering his voice so as not to wake the sleeper. “Come a little easy six! Come a four and a two!”
A five and a two came instead and he rolled the dice across to Brewer.
“I’m sorry for Hereward,” said the copy reader. “He isn’t getting a fair show here.”
“Neither is any one for that matter,” growled Elkins.
It is an unwritten rule among newspaper men to grumble at those in authority, and to bemoan their own hard luck — a peculiarity which they share with three fourths of the world’s working population.
“Hereward’s a first rate reporter,” went on Brewer, “but he’s had bad luck on nearly every assignment since the new managing editor’s been here. So he’s in bad with the chief. If he gets thrown down on this Schenck murder case I’m afraid they’ll send in his resignation.”
The Schenck murder case had attracted a great deal of attention. Otto Schenck, a rich Wall Street broker, had lived with his aged parents on Madison Avenue. He had been found lying huddled in a heap, in the vestibule of his home, one morning ten days earlier. Outer and inner front door of the house were wide open, and valuable plate was missing from the diningroom.
The motive for the murder, said the police, was quite clear. A thief, or thieves, had entered and robbed the Schenck house, and on departing had met the young man coming in the front door. Otto had showed fight and was killed.
Thus far the case seemed Simple enough. But there was another, more inexplicable element in it. The only mark of violence on the victim was a tiny reddish spot over the heart. Around this spot were one or two minute flakes of dark brown dust.
The spot was too tiny to be caused by even a stiletto blow. Yet an autopsy proved the heart to have been pierced by a weapon of some sort, the point of which had entered at the right ventricle. Some wiseacre had showed that such a blow, delivered in such a fashion, must have been dealt with the left hand.
And there the police knowledge stopped short. They were scouring the city for a left handed thief. Pawnshops had been ransacked in vain for traces of the stolen silver. The Schenck servants, and Otto’s father and mother, testified that they had slept peacefully through the whole tragedy.
Old Mrs. Schenck was prostrated by the blow. Her husband bore himself with stem fortitude, but he had aged ten years during the past fortnight.
And this was the helpless case to which Jack Hereward, of the Morning Planet, had been assigned. Like other reporters he had written columns of uninteresting detail and conjecture and had elaborated each police theory to three times the space it was worth.
He had done his best, but ill luck dogged his steps; and, as Brewer said, if he didn’t make a hit of some sort on the case, there was every chance of his being discharged.
“Three o’clock! Sure glad we can get out of this!” cried Elkins, dropping the dice into his drawer. “Wake up, Hereward, and go home.”
“Eh! What?” muttered Hereward, sitting up. “Time to go home?” he went on, clambering down from the table. His head was heavy with sleep, and he staggered as he tried to stand. He threw out one arm to save himself from falling, and brought down his left hand heavily on the copy desk.
A cry of pain followed his action, echoed by exclamations of horror from Brewer and Elkins.
Hereward, in his effort to preserve his balance, had thrown his full weight on the hand that fell on the copy desk. The hand had come down with terrible force on a spindle that held half a dozen sheets of yellow “flimsy.”
This spindle was like others of its sort used for the filing of papers. It consisted of an upright steel wire, sharpened to a fine point, and attached to a round wooden base.
The spindle had run clean through the reporter’s hand.
“Come down to the drug store,” cried Brewer, “and get the wound disinfected, or you may get an infection.”
But Hereward, having drawn out the spindle with a groan of pain, was staring open mouthed at his hand. He gazed at it with an eager intensity, that for a moment drove all memory of pain from his mind.
“What are you waiting for?” said Elkins, holding open the door for him.
Hereward glanced again at the tiny, almost bloodless spot on his palm, and at the little flakes of rust left by the spindle. He answered briefly:
“I’m not waiting for anything. Come on.”
In the hallway that led to the drug store were one or two other newspaper men. Elkins and Brewer shouldered their way past them and gained the door of the shop.
“Where’s Hereward?” asked Brewer as they paused.
He had vanished.
Slipping through the outer door, Hereward had gained the street. His hand throbbed and ached furiously, but the reporter wrapped a handkerchief about the wound and set his teeth to keep down the pain.
Two minutes later he was speeding up town as fast as a Third Avenue “L” train could carry him.
It was 3:30 A.M. when the father of Otto Schenck, lying awake in his silent, death desolated house, heard a quick step at the front door, followed by the sharp burr-r-r of the electric bell.
Hastily donning a dressing gown, and putting on a pair of slippers, the old man groped his way down stairs and opened the front door.
“Who is it?” he asked.
“Here ward — Planet reporter,” was the response. “I have a clue that may be of interest and I came here before notifying the police. Sorry to disturb you at this time of night, but you’ve offered five thousand dollars reward for the murderer’s arrest and I thought you ought to be the first to hear of any clue.”
“I wasn’t asleep,” replied the old man. “Come into my study and tell me about it.”
The tall, dressing gowned figure led the way into a back room, found the electric key and flooded the room with light.
“Now, then, Mr. Hereward—” he began. Then he broke off in surprise: “Why, you’re white as a sheet, man! and you’re trembling. What’s the matter?”
“I had an accident,” answered the reporter briefly, pointing to his bandaged hand. The pain was intolerable, but he choked it back and tried to speak calmly.
“A glass of whiskey will brace you up,” said Mr. Schenck. “Wait a moment and I’ll get you some.”
The old man turned to a Japanned cupboard on the wall. Hereward’s gaze swept the book lined walls, resting at last on the littered study table. There his eyes contracted and he remained looking fixedly among the pile of letters and papers that strewed the table. He had been in this room several times before, but never had anything in it interested him to such an extent.
Meantime Mr. Schenck had brought from the cupboard a huge decanter nearly full of whiskey and two glasses. Placing them on the table he sat down opposite Hereward.
The reporter raised his eyes from the table and looked keenly at the old man.
“You’ll feel better for a drink,” said Schenck. “Then you can tell me about this new clue of yours.”
As he spoke Mr. Schenck lifted the heavy decanter easily, and turning it, filled both glasses.
“He’s strong in the wrists for such an old man; but why doesn’t he let me fill my own glass?” wondered Hereward, who was an adept in all points of etiquette governing drinking bouts.