The Bridgeport times and evening farmer., 1921-01-17
UNSEEN HANDS
A BeWildering DetectiUe Story By Robert Orr. Chipperfield

up, with letter boxes and bells III | the vestibule!' s'Did Smith find out what she was | doing there? Whom she was call 1 ing on?'
 '"The party she was looking for was gone. Smith saw her read over the names on both sides of the vesti- bu1e two or three times; and when she came out she looked discouraged. The janitor was sweeping the side walk, and she stopped to speak to him for a minute; so after she had got in her taxi Smith went up to him, slipped him a buck and asked 1 him whom the young lady had been 1 looking for. He said it was one of | the remnants who had gone away sick eight or nine months before, a Mrs. i Gael"
 | name of the woman whose husband divorced her and brought in Drew as | corespondent.''
 So little Miss Chalmers was not so | unsophisticated as she had seemed. | Her desire to see Drew must have l been desperate, indeed, to have led her to cast aside all ordinary conven- | tions and seek him at the home of l the woman whom he had discarded. Exactly" the chief responded dry | ly. ''She didn't know where to look | for him apparently. for she went ! straightahome from there; and Smith | says that she had a scene with her | aunt which reduced the poor woman | to tears, and then locked herself in | her room. So much for his report. 1 Taylor searched Genes room night | before last when he beat it to keep | his date with Drew, but he didn't find | anything except clothes and stuff for | outdoor sports; skates and tennis l racketS and polo and golf and hockey sticks. He went through Miss Meades | room yesterday morning and the one l her sister used to occupy, but found 1 nothing suspicious in either of them,
 of course. He won't have an opportu- | nifty to get into Lorne's room for some time to come. and the younger l son, the hunchback, is still sick; but
 I left Taylor on the job on the chance
 that you would turn up today and | might need him. The outside men
 report nothing doing"
 And Kelly?" The detective, in l men tally gatherine up the loose | threads of his investigation at the
 point where his abduction had in
 terrupted it, recalled the fourth man. to whom he had assigned the task of searching for the tools with which the
 picture wire had been severed and the
 top step of the stairs sawed through.
 Hasn't he sent in any report yet?" | "On1y these" The chief swung
 about in his chair and took from the
 floor, where they had rested against
 the wall unnoticed by Ode11, a long,
 heavy steel saw and file with an
 electric attachment. "Are they the
 tools you were after?"
 The detective reached forward and
 examined them eagerly.
 l Good york; he exclaimed. 'Where did Kelly find them?"
 .tIn the last place he would have
 thought to search for them; the open tool chest in the cellar He says he | passed them up a dozen times that
 l first day; looked straight at them ana never even saw them! It took a cool head; that, to leave them out in plain view on the chance that they would
 not be noticed among the other tools.' .'' '"The obscurity of the obvious!"
 n nI Ion iloI c1x ha1- n ct , , I said to you the other day about the : secondary mind, captain?-'
 ; 'This is clear evidence of it; and f 1t will be small help, I can tell = you, in tracing the culprit although
 I've known from the first that no or f dinary mentality was back of this ; series of crimes. in spite of the strange | element of carelessness which enters I instinct of the ordinary crimina = | would have been to secrete these = tools in as out-of-the-wayS a place e as their size would permit; but if ht n | were a degree higher in intelligence F he would realize that such spo Il l would be the first in which the, e would be searched for. and the mex a step in his reasoning would be tha e if they were left in plain view wit s others of their kind which were il Q occasional legitimate use in the house o hold they would be overlooked.' =
 Sure; that's what I said" Tn L. chief moved impatiently in his chail
 "They are what you were after. al ,s | right. Kelly asked Peters last nigh n | if there were any electrical carpen N tering tools in the house or a bi w saw, and he says that the buffers sur d l prise looked like the real thing "a him. Peters told him they'd neve if had any use for a big saw, and he ha K apparently never heard of e1ectrics .J too1s."
 'n odell laid the file and saw bac ,r on the table.
 le "It is too bad they had been har h f1ngerprints and mine and two ( re three more are all superimposed 0 ,d them.''
 , 1a ."That doesn't matter" the chic 11n grunted. Look at your hands, sa "Phew Oil, eh?" OdeH pulled al grfmy handkerchief from his pockt
 and wiped his fingers. @1 commar ,e deered this from the garage mar
 clean. Did Kelly upset an oilcan i ". the too1chest?"
 SS6 'No. He said all the other thing tn in it were rusty from disuse. YoI
 secondary minded murderer nu st have cleaned these carefully with C ht to remove his own fingerprints b. sS fore putting them with the others of Odel1 shook his head.
 of T don't get it, he admitted. 'TI to combination of foresight and finger
 uity- together with rank carelessne
 in detail stumps me. It must be tn iss there are two of them working ,s gether, or rather one carrying O n5 | the instruction of another and doil eI it in a bungling fashion. The met ba cd of work suggests two distinct De Ia sonalities and yet I cannot point cS even one possible suspect now" lev To Be Continued. io9 o3 NEW HEIICoPToR