“Anyway, Colonel,” he said, “when Louie drifted in here, the two of them fixed up this game and they carried it out slick.”
Again the lawyer introduced an interruption.
“Now, that is just what I am anxious to know, Mr. Barkman. I am anxious to know precisely what they did and how they did it. I want to know, in detail, everything that happened that night.”
“Well,” replied the witness, “this is the way I figure it out, Colonel, and I think it’s straight dope: these men fixed up their plan and Louie hung around until he found that the bank president was alone in his house. That was the night his family went to the Springs. It was in the newspapers. Everybody knew it. Then about midnight they went up to Mr. Halloway’s house.”
“And how did they get into the house?” inquired the lawyer.
“That was no trouble,” said the witness. “They rang the bell. They wanted Mr. Halloway to come down just as he did come down, with his dressing gown on, like he was found dead in the library.”
The attorney had changed his posture. He was idly fingering the two polka-dot handkerchiefs.
The witness went on:
“When Mr. Halloway opened the door, one of these crooks jammed a pistol against him. They shut the door and marched him into the library. And there they told him what they were going to do. They held him up, right there in the library, and forced him to give them the combination to the bank safe.”
“And how were they to know,” inquired the attorney, “that the combination which the banker gave them was the correct one? Would not his impulse be—would not any one’s impulse be—to give an incorrect combination of figures?”