Page:The achievements of Luther Trant - Balmer and MacHarg - 1910.djvu/165

Rh during the week, even for a day, the single combination word to open the safe."

"What do you mean?" Howell demanded.

"I will tell you all. It seemed to me," Trant explained, "when first you told me of the case, that the cause of the troubles to the cashier was the effort of some one to get at some secret personal paper which the cashier carried, but the existence of which, for some reason, Gordon could not confess to you. It was clear, of course, from the consistent search made of the cashier's coat, pocketbook, and private papers that the person who was trying to get it believed that Gordon carried it about with him. It was clear, too, from his taking the blotters and pads, that the paper—probably a memorandum of some sort—was often made out by Gordon at the office; for if Gordon wrote in pencil upon a pad and tore off the first sheet, the other man could hope to get an impression from the next in the pad, and if Gordon wrote in ink, he might get an obverse from the blotters. But besides this, from the fact that the waste-baskets were searched, it was clear that the fellow believed that the paper would become valueless to Gordon after a time and he would throw it away.

"So much I could make out when you told me the outlines of the case at my office. But I could make absolutely nothing, then, of the reason for the attempt to get into the typewriter desk. You also told me then of young Gordon's trouble; and I commented at once upon the coincidence of one trouble coming so soon after the other, though I was obviously unable to even guess at the connection. But even then I was