“It can’t be a forgery,” the cashier said, “he says that he talked with one of the representatives from our main bank and told him that he was going to dean out the account, that he issued the check to dean out the entire balance and that if we don’t cash it, he’s going to sue us for damages... Who gave you the check?”
“A man,” said Sidney Zoom, “whom I do not know, who asked me to present it for him. He claimed to be working for Mr. Carter. I believe he said he was a butler or something. The whole circumstances seem strange and suspicious to me. Moreover, the signature looks to me like a forgery.”
“Well,” said the cashier, “the check isn’t a forgery. I’m quite familiar with Mr. Carter’s voice over the telephone. He told me unmistakably that I should cash that check.”
“Don’t you think,” said Sidney Zoom, “it would be a good plan to compare the signature with the signatures on some of the other checks?”
The cashier stared suspiciously at Sidney Zoom.
“What were you supposed to do with this money when you got it?” he said. “Were you to give it to the man who handed you the check?”
“No,” said Sidney Zoom, “I was to deposit it to the account of Nell Benton.”
Relief flooded the face of the cashier.
“Oh,” he said, “that’s all tight then, Nell Benton was his secretary. I’m familiar with her, and familiar with her signature. Where were you to make the deposit?”
“In this bank,” said Sidney Zoom.
“She has an account here now,” said the cashier, taking the check and banging a rubber stamp down on it. “It’s quite all right. I’ll simply add this to her account.”
“Well,” said Sidney Zoom, “you can do as you want to, but it looks like a forgery to me. However, I’ve washed my hands of the transaction.”
“Mr. Carter,” said the cashier, speaking with frigid dignity, “was a most unsatisfactory customer. His language over the telephone was abusive.”
Zoom shrugged his shoulders and turned away from the cashier’s window.
“Well,” he said, “you’ll remember that I did my duty.”
“Yes,” said the cashier, “you did your duty.”
Sidney Zoom left the bank. At the corner he climbed into the car which Burt Samson had parked at the curb.
“Well?” asked Samson.
“Now,” said Sidney Zoom, “we wait until we see Harry Exter, the butler, drive up to the bank.”
They waited for some five minutes and then a shining automobile slid smoothly into the curb, a liveried chauffeur at the wheel. A man got out of the cat and entered the bank with quick, rapid steps.
“That,” said Sidney Zoom, “is Exter, the butler. Now step on it and see if we can break a few speed laws getting to Carter’s residence.”
Samson’s voice was dubious.
“I guess,” he said, “that you know what you’re doing. I hope you do.”
Sidney Zoom chuckled.
Chapter VI
Unmasked
At times, Sidney Zoom could be smilingly suave, his manner radiating an urbane dignity.
Now, as he stood before the residence of Finley Carter, his long forefinger pressing the bell button, his lips were twisted in a smile. He motioned his police dog over to a corner back of the door, where it was not readily visible. Burt Samson stood slightly to one side.
There was an interval of silence following the jangling of the bell, and then a thick-necked individual with broad shoulders jerked the door open.
“What do you want?” he asked.
“There has,” said Sidney Zoom, “been some mistake made in connection with Mr. Carter’s account at the Second National Affiliate. I was here previously to see him in regard to that account. The name is Coleridge. He’ll remember me.”
“He won’t remember you,” said the man, “because he won’t see you.”
Listening, Zoom could hear the sounds of feet moving about, could hear noises that seemed to come from people who were moving about in surreptitious haste.
A telephone bell rang somewhere in the interior of the house.
“There has been a mistake made somewhere,” said Sidney Zoom. “Two checks have been presented to the bank, both checks closing out Mr. Carter’s account.”
“Well,” said the man, “he’s got a right to close it out if he wants to, hasn’t he?”
“But,” said Sidney Zoom, “there were two closing checks. One of them must be a forgery.”
The eyes stared in hostile appraisal at Sidney Zoom. The telephone continued to ring.
“I’ve got to answer the telephone,” said the man. “You stay here.”
The door was slammed shut in Sidney Zoom’s face.
“That’s as far as we’ll get,” said Samson.
Zoom shook his head in smiling negation.
“Stick around,” he invited.
There was an interval of some two or three minutes, and then the door opened. The thick-necked individual had changed his manner. There was no longer surly hostility in his demeanor, but, instead, a puzzled bewilderment.
“Come on in,” he said. “Mr. Carter wants to see you.”
He held the door open, and Sidney Zoom courteously stood to one side to let Burt Samson enter ahead of him.
“Who’s this man?” asked the thick-necked one.
“My assistant,” said Sidney Zoom.
The men filed in through the door. Zoom turned.
“All right, Rip,” he said, “you may come in.”
The dog slipped through the door like a tawny streak of light.
“Hey, wait a minute!” said the man who had opened the door. “That dog can’t come in here!”
“Oh, yes,” said Sidney Zoom, brushing the matter aside as though it were of no moment, “he has to come in. You see, he’s very valuable and I wouldn’t dare to leave him outside. He might be stolen.”
As Zoom talked, he headed toward the stairs.
“Wait a minute,” said the thick-necked individual.
“Quite all right,” said Sidney Zoom. “It’s quite all right, my good man. I know the way. You don’t need to show me.”
Sidney Zoom went up the stairs two at a time, his long legs carrying him upward with but little apparent effort. A stair or two behind, Burt Samson was straining every effort to keep up. The thick-necked individual who had been left well behind in the race, was pounding awkwardly up the stairs at a dead run, protesting as he climbed.
“Listen, what are you guys trying to pull? You can’t come busting in here that way. I said Mr. Carter would see you. That doesn’t mean he’s going to see the whole bank, and you can’t get that dog...”
Zoom reached the upper corridor. The police dog that had been guarding the door of the room at the end of the hall was still on duty. He rose to his feet, hair bristling. Zoom’s police dog, padding at the side of his master, gave a throaty growl.
The thick-necked man, dashing up the stairs, suddenly tugged at his hip pocket.
“Say, you guys!” he yelled. “Stop right there!”
Samson whirled, faced the thick-necked individual.
“Get your hand away from that gun,” he said.
The police dog at the end of the corridor charged.
Sidney Zoom spoke quietly to the four-footed companion of his midnight prowls.
“All right, Rip,” he said.
The two dogs came together in a flash of swift motion, raising their front quarters up from the ground, teeth gleaming, flashing and snapping like the jaws of steel traps.
A door burst open and the man who had posed as Finley Carter stepped into the corridor, an automatic glistening in his right hand.
“Listen, you guys,” he said, “stand back.”
His voice was deadly with menace.
Sidney Zoom strode forward, passed the fighting dogs.