“Great stuff!” he exclaimed, admiringly. “Inspector Herbert Zull identifies murdered gangster as the slayer of Richard Harkness. Gee! That’s hot!
“The morning papers tell of finding Clink’s body in an auto junk yard. By afternoon, Zull has doped it out. Clink killed Harkness. New clews — finger prints on the table that corresponds with Clink’s. Finding of the death gun on the dead gangster.
“Jake Grimble — alias Clink — small-time racketeer. They’ve got all the dope here, haven’t they, Bob?”
“Right,” was the reply, “and it fixes things all right for us. There’s no connection between Clink and us. That’s where we’re safe.
“Clink was just a hanger-on with Moose Shargin’s mob. The kind of a guy that would try to stick up Harkness for whatever might be in the place.”
“He was around with us, though — and I was there with him,” said Briggs, doubtfully.
“What of it?” demanded Bob. “You don’t get the lay, Briggs. While the murderer was unknown, Zull was in a tough spot.
“That’s his business — to track down murderers. Some rookie dick might have come along and found some evidence that would have made Zull look cheap.
“You know how he works — he won’t stop at anything, that guy. He’d hang a murder on his own brother if he could fake it.
“Now he’s hung this one on Clink — and he’s got the guy that really killed Harkness. That closes it. Zull has other work to do. This is a big find for him, and he’s not going to waste time trying to locate an accomplice that nobody even suspects.