Sidney Zoom pulled his hat down low on his forehead, turned toward the door.
“I understand,” he said.
Stapleton watched him curiously as Zoom walked across the room to the front door. The servant held the front door open, and Sidney Zoom strode out into the night.
“Just a moment,” called Stapleton, unable to restrain himself longer, as Zoom made his wordless exit. “I don’t want you to misunderstand me, Mr. Zoom...” Sidney Zoom whirled to face him.
“I don’t misunderstand you,” he said. “Either you are guilty of murder, or I have been misled. I just want to tell you that if you are guilty of murder, all that suave cunning which has heretofore served you will not stand between you and your punishment. Do you understand that?”
Stapleton’s face did not change expression. There was still the same mocking glint in his eyes; the same sardonic smile twisting his lips.
“Yes,” he said, “I understand what you say, but your words mean nothing to me.”
“You have,” said Sidney Zoom, “always outwitted the persons with whom you came in contact. That has been your strong point; the thing that has hitherto enabled you to laugh at justice. Now I am telling you that there is something higher than the ordinary technical man-made justice that you have been mocking; something that is more infallible than the laws of man filled with technicalities that you have taken advantage of, and I have the honor, sir, to wish you a very good evening.”
Zoom waited for no further words, but strode across the porch, down the steps, then along the walk to his automobile. He slammed the door and drove off into the night.
Behind him, Paul Stapleton stood in the doorway, staring along the road after the gleaming ruby which marked the tail light of Zoom’s automobile.
The expression of mocking, sardonic humor was no longer on Stapleton’s face. His eyes were slitted in thought, and his face had set into grim lines.
“James,” he said, without turning his head.
“Yes, sir,” said the servant.
“If that man ever comes near this house again, see that he doesn’t get in.”
“Yes, sir.”
“If you catch him prowling around, act on the theory that he is a burglar, and shoot him.”
“Yes, sir.”
“And shoot to kill.”
“Yes, sir.”
Paul Stapleton stepped back into the house and slammed the door. The servant slipped the safety chain into position.
Chapter IV
Mad Dog
Once more, Sidney Zoom entered the chamber of death. He entered for a particular purpose, and moved with swift efficiency. The lights clicked on. Zoom walked across the room, stooped to the murder gun, picked it up and started polishing its greasy surface with a handkerchief. He polished the gun until the steel fairly shone; polished it until all of the oil and grease had been removed from the blued steel surface. Then he breathed upon it and polished again, taking care all of the time not to touch it with the tips of his fingers, holding it only with the cloth touching the steel.
When he had carefully and completely obliterated all fingerprints from the gun, he looked around the apartment until he found a small bottle of oil. He placed a thin coat of oil over the steel of the gun, rubbing it with the corner of his handkerchief so that it was evenly distributed. Then, holding the gun in the folds of the handkerchief, he once more left the apartment.
Sidney Zoom moved with a swift purpose, as though his actions had been carefully rehearsed. He went down the corridor, turned the comer, stepped to the door of the vacant apartment.
He knew now exactly which skeleton key delivered results, and it was but a moment until he had clicked back the bolt and opened the door.
Once in the apartment, he walked directly to the window, then paused for a moment, thinking. Finally he nodded to himself and slipped his hand to his coat pocket. He took out several .38 blank cartridges which he had carried up from his automobile, which was a veritable storehouse of various weapons and munitions.
Taking care not to leave any fingerprints on the weapon, he swung open the cylinder and dropped blank cartridges into the chambers, slipping the one empty cartridge and the five loaded ones into his pocket.
It was but a matter of seconds until he had fixed the gun to his liking, leaving it on the floor by the chair, and had once more stepped into the corridor, pulling the door shut behind him.
He went at once to his automobile, drove five blocks to an all night drugstore, looked up the telephone number of Paul Stapleton, and dialed the number on the telephone.
He knew at once from Stapleton’s voice that the man had not been asleep. He had, instead, been near the telephone, perhaps waiting for a call. His voice when he answered was calm and cautious.
“Hello,” he said, “who is it?”
Sidney Zoom lowered his voice to a deep, rumbling bass.
“Do you know a guy by the name of Sidney Zoom?” he asked.
“What about it?” asked Stapleton.
“Never mind what about it,” said Zoom, still using his deep bass voice. “I happen to be trailing Zoom around because I’m trying to get something on him. He came out to your house an hour or so ago, and busted on in. I want to know if he gave you his right name and what he talked to you about.”
“I’m afraid,” said Stapleton, “that I can’t help you.”
“Well, get a load of this,” said Zoom in the same rumbling monotone. “I don’t know whether it makes any difference to you or not. But after Zoom left your place, he went to the Richmore Apartments and went into apartment 35B. He’s got a key that fits it. He came out of that apartment carrying a gun, and tiptoed around the comer of the corridor to apartment 38E, and when he came out, he didn’t have the gun with him.
“Now, I don’t know what happened, but that fellow’s a smooth worker, and I have an idea that perhaps when he was out at your place he might have picked up something that belonged to you. See? And maybe he planted that stuff in that apartment — 38E — together with the gun. Now, I don’t know what’s up or what he’s doing, but anything he’s trying to do, I want to block.
“Personally I think he’s a crook. He’s always messing around and pulling some fast stuff and gets by because nobody has called him on it. But I’m calling him on it, and I just thought perhaps you’d like to know what he was doing. I thought perhaps the information might interest you.”
Zoom ceased speaking.
There was a moment of silence, broken only by the buzzing of the telephone connection, then Paul Stapleton’s voice, calmly, suave and courteous.
“I’m sure,” he said, “I haven’t the faintest idea what you’re talking about. It is true that a man named Zoom called upon me, but I wasn’t interested in the proposition he had to offer, and he left at once. I’m certainly not interested in any of Mr. Zoom’s subsequent activities.”
And the receiver at the other end of the line clicked onto the hook.
Sidney Zoom strode to his automobile, drove to a point half a block from the apartment house, where he could leave the automobile in the shadows of the driveway, then sat on the running board and watched the entrance to the Richmore Apartments.
He sat smoking calmly and contentedly, apparently without the slightest trace of nervous tension. Everything about the man seemed relaxed, save his eyes, which were keen and hawk-like. Those eyes stared in a concentration of scrutiny that was cold and unwinking.