The Mystery of the Steel Disc | Page 9

might get from him in your chats, bit by bit, knowledge of just what to put your hand on in the short time you were in the vault, and how to conceal the theft long enough for you to convert the securities. This is one of the deepest and cleverest criminal plots of which I have ever heard. Your life for all these years has been devoted to it. I am not surprised that you succeeded. Your one mistake was in giving so flimsy a pretext to Mr. Duncan for calling him up and retaining him. That attracted my attention to you. What you really wanted was to be able to have constant information from Mr. Duncan when he should become Rhodes's counsel in the natural course of events, as to efforts to explain the disappearance of the bonds in order to defend Rhodes. In that way you would always know how close he was on the track of the real thief, Mr. Martin Anderson. Few men pay attorneys $500 retaining fees to persuade young men who really love their daughters from dragging them into a scandal which does not essentially concern the daughters at best. You were surprised into this mistake when Rhodes called you up and crystallized your plan to force your choice of counsel on him too hastily.
"On Sunday night a week ago you went to the bank, as your duplicate time-lock showed you the steel disc was worn so thin a jar on the door would cause the standard to drop and the lock to release. Hanahan, as he told me an hour ago, went across the street for some tobacco that Sunday night, leaving you in the bank. In ninety seconds you had opened the vault, taken the right packet, opened the case of the time-lock, replaced the disc with a brass one, closed the case, and closed the vault, but--you carelessly dropped this worn disc on the floor.
"You used the bonds as collateral to buy stock, not as a speculation, but as an investment that would conceal the bonds, and by chance chose Overland Pacific at a low figure and it rose. You thought best to take your profits, and only your greed prevented you from returning the bonds to Rhodes by mail. As we have seen, you had not thought long enough or deeply enough what you would do with your lifetime harvest after you got it in your hands, and suddenly you found yourself out of your depth. You hid the bonds in a jar, just like a foolish old woman. But I must compliment you on your clear thinking and previous planning. I have never known of anything so deliberate, and only a phlegmatic Scandinavian would be capable of it, especially to end up with such good nerves as you have shown to-night. Mr. Smith does not wish to prosecute you and expose his speculations. Since Mr. Smith and Mr. Duncan doubtless have other engagements to-night, kindly write as I requested a few minutes ago."
Muttering objurgations in his native tongue, Anderson wrote the two drafts, Rhodes's being for more than one hundred thousand, and both Rhodes and Smith receipted. Smith took the bonds and thrust them into his overcoat pocket. Miss Anderson refused to remain an hour longer under her father's roof, and left the house to go to the home of a distant relative. I pocketed the odd little steel dish, which lies before me as I write, with a slip copied from a page of Rand's notebook that lays out so plainly and simply his quick, sure, and unerring processes in this remarkable case, that I can not refrain from giving it.
(1) Anderson's retaining Duncan very strange.
(2) Rhodes' cranium shows moral incapacity for theft. Innocent.
(3) Neilson's brother-in-law could know lock construction.
(4) Smith lost speculating. Thief won half million with bonds.
(5) Time-clock lost 90 sec. Sunday night, week before discovery.
(6) Disk of steel instead of brass. Meant to wear out. Is discarded part of lock. Must be a new disc in lock. Work of expert. Prepared since making of lock.
(7) Marie Nielson Anderson.
(8) Anderson was alone in bank 3 min. Sunday night of robbery.
Anderson guilty. Proved and confessed. Adjusted, no proceedings, by L. R

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