"Every little bit."
"All right. Clear out!"
When Murphy left the room, Whitney turned to the manager and, with a wry smile, remarked: "Well, we've discovered where the car came from and how they got it. But that's all. We're really as much in the dark as before."
"No," replied the manager, musingly. "Not quite as much. Possibly you don't know it, but we have a device on every car that leaves this garage to take care of just such cases as this—to prevent drivers from running their machines all over town without pulling down the lever and then holding out the fares on us. Just a minute and I'll show you.
"Joe," he called, "bring me the record tape of Murphy's machine for last night and hold his car till you hear from me."
"This tape," he explained, a few minutes later, "is operated something along the lines of a seismograph or any other instrument for detecting change in direction. An inked needle marks these straight lines and curves all the time the machine is moving, and when it is standing still it oscillates slightly. By glancing at these tapes we can tell when any chauffeur is holding out on us, for it forms a clear record—not only of the distance the machine has traveled, but of the route it followed."
"Doesn't the speedometer give you the distance?" asked Whitney.
"Theoretically, yes. But it's a very simple matter to disconnect a speedometer, while this record is kept in a locked box and not one driver in ten even knows it's there. Now, let's see what Murphy's record tape tells us....
"Yes, here's the trip to the theater around eight-thirty. See the sharp turn from Fifth Avenue into Forty-second Street, the momentary stop in front of the Amsterdam, and the complete sweep as he turned around to get back to Broadway. Then there's the journey up to the Bronx or Harlem or wherever he went, another complete turn and an uninterrupted trip back down on Broadway."
"Then this," cut in Whitney, unable to keep the excitement out of his voice, "is where he stopped to speak to the Germans?"