Flynn’s Weekly Detective Fiction. Vol. 25, No. 2, August 13, 1927

I braced myself against the door jamb and pulled back as hard as I could, kicking Huffy’s shins whenever I could reach him. He saw that he needed to use both arms and turned to throw the fistful of slugs at the pot.

I jerked just as he let them fly and most of the pieces fell short of the pot and landed on the floor. That made him absolutely wild and he grabbed me with both arms lammed me down on my head and then started dragging me toward the fire, swearing every inch of the way.

We were close enough to feel the scorching heat now and I never did feel as near death before.

My fingers gave way every time I got a fresh hold on a benchleg or corner and I’d about given up hope when my dragging hands brushed over a pig and before Bert knew what was coming I drew myself up on one elbow and let it fly at his head.

It struck him over one eye and he fell like a stuck hog, with blood streaming from the gash. I took time enough to gather up the four lines of type that he’d been fighting over and ran down and out the front door as fast as I could tear.

I felt easier when I got down town, about two blocks away from the plant, and stopped in front of a drug store to think. I realized one thing; that was that I didn’t want to go home by myself — out across the Hollow. Bert might come to in time to meet me out there before I could reach our house. Besides, I had those precious slugs in my hand and I was anxious to turn them over to somebody.

I held them up in the light from the store window and tried to make out what they said. And I saw something on one of them which made up my mind for me. I caught the next dinky street car that passed and rode out to Dr. Manifew’s house.

By good luck he was at home, just getting ready to go to bed, but, tired as he was, he listened to my story with the closest attention. I told him about the extra paper in front of Huffy’s house, about the slugs in the hell-box and about the fight.

Then we got a bottle of ink and smeared on the type lines and I pulled a proof on a piece of writing paper. The lines didn’t look like much at first glance. They read:

body will be sent to this city for bur-identified as Gretchen Lane, daughter Sante Fe. The engineer stated that he whis-is an employee of the Argus-Enterprise.

I didn’t have to study those words more than a minute before the whole story dawned on me.

“Look, doctor,” I cried. “It’s as plain as the nose on your face.” The doctor was too interested to take any offense at that personal remark, but just nodded his head two or three times, quick.

“See here,” I went on. “Here’s the whole thing. Huffy waited to-night till I had brought up the forms. Then he sent me on a wild goose chase long enough to give him time to pull out a stick or two of type from the front page, in a prominent spot, where his wife would be bound to see it.

“During the day, at noon probably, he had set up this story about her daughter being killed in a crossing accident. He slipped that story into the form — fudging it’s called in a newspaper office — and probably pulled a hand proof of the front page with a block and mallet. He’d have plenty of time while I was gone, and there is no one in the make-up room at that hour of the day.

“He pasted that front page on a regular edition, knowing that his wife would never notice the pasted edge, and hid beside the porch till I came along. When I threw my paper he was there to see that his was the one that Missus Rafferty got hold of.

“He waited outside till the thing had done its work, then he went in and destroyed the dummy Argus-Enterprise. He could have stuck it in the stove without a bit of trouble, Missus Rafferty being blind and terribly excited. He had hid the type slugs from the fake story in the hell-box till he could get a chance to destroy them and pied the form they came out of so nobody would notice the hole they left. If we didn’t have these four pieces of metal there wouldn’t be a thing in the world to accuse him!”

The coroner sat still a minute after I finished, then jumped to the phone and called the police station. “Go arrest Bert Huffy,” he ordered them. Then he stood there listening to something that they were telling him.

“Well I’ll be hanged,” he exclaimed after a minute. “Well, perhaps that’s the best after all.” He hung up the receiver and turned around to me. “Bert Huffy jumped off the railroad bridge about fifteen minutes ago,” he said, slow and solemn-like.

The next day Dr. Manifew and I checked over the case and found that my guess had been right on every count. It came out, too, that Huffy had been carrying two thousand dollars’ life insurance on his wife for years and years. I guess he just couldn’t wait any longer.