“What would he be jumping off for?” queried the old coachman, irritably. “And wouldn't I have heard the door slam? I can't account for it! My God! Where's Mr. Garrettson? Where is he? Where is he?” He repeated himself like one distraught.
“Could he have jumped out without your knowing it?” queried Kidder.
“Shut up, Jim. That's a reporter!” the policeman warned the coachman. “Wait here and I'll tell Mr. Jenkins.”
The private policeman rushed into the bank, and rushed out, followed by William P. Jenkins, junior partner of W. H. Garrettson & Company.
“What is all this about?” Mr. Jenkins, who had been speaking in a sharp voice to the coachman, caught sight of Kidder. Nothing concerning Mr. Garrettson's whereabouts could be discussed by or before newspaper men.
“Come with me, James,” Mr. Jenkins said, peremptorily, to the old coachman.
“Get on the job!” whispered Robison to Kidder. “Don't be bluffed. You've got enough to raise the dickens if printed. It's the scoop of a lifetime!”
Amos Kidder nodded eagerly. He had ceased to think of Robison's eccentricities and was occupied with the disappearance of the great financier. He followed Jenkins and the coachman into the office, but all efforts to listen to their colloquy were in vain. He could see perturbation plainly printed on the face of Mr. Jenkins, for all that Garrettson's junior partner was one of the master bluffers of Wall Street and a consummate artist at poker. The newspaper man was, moreover, fortunate enough to overhear Mr. Jenkins's private secretary say: “Mrs. Garrettson says Mr. Garrettson left the house about nine-twenty in the carriage, as usual. The butler saw him get in; the footman helped him into the cab. She wanted to know what had happened. I said, 'Nothing that I know of.'”
Jenkins nodded approval of the typical financier's evasion and hastened back to the private office, where the cross-examination of the coachman—a man above suspicion—was carried on by the other partners.
Amos Kidder had heard enough. He rushed out and, accompanied by the patient Robison, telephoned to his office this bulletin: