f the Grand Central Railroad
Station on Forty-second Street?"

"How did you get that, Chief?"

Drew chuckled and wheeled in his chair. "I got it," he said, "by simple
arithmetic plus the vice-president's pull. Here's how it was found,
Delaney. Easy as two and two. You remember the howler?"

"I'll never forget it, Chief! Not as long as I live!"

"The howler established considerable in this case. The chief operator
remembers putting it on. She remembers the time. She looked back, after
being jogged by George Westlake, and found that some one had called up
Stockbridge a few minutes after twelve. It was probably this call to
the old man that caused him to be near enough to the telephone to knock
it over when he was shot. The operator did not hear the shot, but she
remembers a thin, piping voice asking for Gramercy Hill 9763."

"The same guy, every time!" declared the operative, mopping his brow
with his sleeve. "I'd like to have that fellow for five minutes,
Chief!"

"We'll get him! We've got the time established twice. Stockbridge's
watch fixes the murder at twelve-four-eighteen. The telephone call at
five minutes past twelve, and the howler put on soon afterward, checks
up. The old man was alive during the telephone call from the Grand
Central, and dead when the howler was put on for the first time. Do you
see that?"

Delaney frowned. "I see it and I don't," he said. "I'm all balled up,
Chief. What with the magpie and the howler and a man shot in a locked
room and the spot of soot on your neck--I'm all twisted into a knot. I
think I'll go out and get a drink!"

"No, Delaney, don't," said Drew. "You'll need your head in this case.
We're squarely up against class of the highest order. Since Sheeney
Mike and the gas-tube over the transom in Chinatown, I don't know of a
more baffling set of clews. All these calls--which seem so important in
the case--lead to a whispering voice of low pitch and timber. Perhaps
the police records will show such a man who is at large--very much at
large."

Delaney furrowed his brows and screwed his face into a painful knot.
"I'm trying to go back, Chief, to the Morphy case and them crooked
witnesses he had. They all had loud voices--like wolves!"

"Yes--I remember them. But then, Delaney, a man can change his voice.
That whole pack will bear watching."

"You've eliminated some things that were worrying, Chief. But there's
some I don't see yet. It's impossible for a man to get shot