“Well, what’s the first thing to do, Larry?” asked Mr. Potter, with a smile. He had returned to the bank shortly after giving Larry the details of the robbery. “How are you going at it to solve this mystery?”
“I don’t know,” answered the young reporter frankly. “There are many ends to be covered. I guess I’ll have to ask you a lot of questions,” he said to the president. “That’s how a reporter gets his news,” he continued with a smile.
“Ask as many as you like,” replied the head of the bank. “We’ll give you all the aid possible.”
Larry rapidly thought over the case. He wanted to get all the facts clear in his mind.
Several of the directors, who had business elsewhere, left, as there was nothing more they could do at the bank. The arrangements for meeting the heavy financial loss had been made a day or two previous, as soon as the robbery was discovered, and though the credit of the institution was strained to the utmost, it was seen that it could weather the storm.
“I think I understand pretty well how the money was packed in the valise, and taken to the other bank,” began Larry after a pause. “Then, as the robbery did not take place outside of this bank, and did not occur in the other bank, it must have been done here—right in your own institution,” he said to the president.
“Impossible!” exclaimed the black-moustached man, whose name it developed was Mr. Kent Wilson. “Impossible!”
“Not at all impossible,” replied Mr. Bentfield. “In fact, that is the only way to account for it, Mr. Wilson. The detectives are all agreed on that point.”
“And you say you do not suspect any of your employees?” asked Larry.
“Not a one, though of course, as is but natural, a watch is being kept over every one, from the smallest messenger boy, up to—well, I may say ourselves,” spoke the president. “It is an unpleasant thing to do, but necessary. But it does not seem possible that any of them, working together, or singly, could have taken that money.”