The Case of the Empty Tin

by Gardner Erle

Puzzled, as well as interested, Mason returned to the back door. His small flashlight once more explored the lock. He turned the knob and tentatively pushed against the door. It was anchored as firmly as though it had been embedded in concrete.

Mason raised the flashlight to inspect the small square glass panels in the upper part of the door, and then suddenly realized that someone had been there ahead of him.

The putty which held one of the panes of thick glass in place had been neatly cut away, so that a pane some eleven by fifteen inches was now held in place only by four small brads which had been driven into the wood at the corners of the panel.

It took Mason but a few moments to get these brads removed. Then with the blade of his penknife, he was able to pull the glass toward him, so that it dropped gently into his extended palm. Thereafter, it was a simple matter to reach through the opening, find the knurled brass knob on the inside of the spring lock, turn it, and open the door.

When Mason had the door opened, he took the precaution of putting the square of glass back into place and inserting the small brads so that it was once more held in position. In doing this, the realization that someone had anticipated him in his entire procedure was a disquieting thought.

This person, Mason realized, had gone about his work with the cunning skill of a good technician. The putty had been carefully removed with a knife. The dried particles had been gathered up so that there would be no telltale clue left on the threshold or on the wooden floor of the back porch. Replacing the pane of glass with the four brads so neatly and precisely driven into the corners of the supports had made the door seem quite all right to a casual observer.

Mason was just closing the door when he heard the sharp sound of a buzzer cutting through the fog-swept silence of the night.

So explosive was the sound, and so engrossed had he been in the problem which confronted him, that Mason gave a convulsive start as the warning signal sounded. Then, tense with the effort to listen for every sound, Mason stood waiting. When nothing happened, he turned the knurled knob of the lock, and threw the catch which left the bolt held back. He slipped out to the porch, gently closing the door behind him. He could hear no steps, but as he neared the front of the house, he saw a dark form drifting past on the sidewalk, walking so rapidly that it seemed he must almost be running. Mason realized that it was the man who had passed them a few minutes earlier. Probably some neighboring householder, he reassured himself, who had gone down to mail a letter at the mailbox, or to a corner drugstore to replenish some toilet articles.

Moving silently, Mason walked around the house to reassure Della. He gave a low whistle as he saw her standing on the front porch in the position of one ringing the bell.

She came over to the railing at the edge of the porch, and said in a hoarse whisper, “My same little man. He came around the corner as though he’d been shot out of a gun.”