On Secret Service: Detective-Mystery Stories Based on Real Cases Solved by Government Agents — John Shaqi
On Secret Service: Detective-Mystery Stories Based on Real Cases Solved by Government AgentsTaft, William Nelson
General
On Secret Service: Detective-Mystery Stories Based on Real Cases Solved by Government Agents
Taft, William Nelson
Detective and mystery stories, American; Secret service -- United States -- Fiction; Short stories, American
One day, for example, you could have seen his big bulk swinging
nonchalantly up Broadway, as if he didn't have a care in the world. A
hundred feet or more behind him was Bob Dugan, one of Kenney's men. When
Weimar disappeared into the Subway station at Times Square, Dugan was
right behind him, and when the Austrian boarded the local for Grand
Central Station, Dugan was on the same train--on the same car, in fact.
But when they reached the station, things began to happen. Weimar left
the local and commenced to stroll up and down the platform, waiting
until a local train and an express arrived at the same time. That was
his opportunity. He made a step or two forward, as if to board the
express, and Dugan--not wishing to make himself too conspicuous--slipped
on board just as the doors were closing, only to see Weimar push back
and jam his way on the local!
Variations of that stunt occurred time after time. Even the detailing of
two men to follow him failed in its purpose, for the Austrian would
enter a big office building, leap into an express elevator just as it
was about to ascend, slip the operator a dollar to stop at one of the
lower floors, and be lost for the day or until some one picked him up by
accident.
So Cap Kenney called in four of his best men and told them that it was
essential that Weimar be watched.
"Two of you," he directed, "stick with him all the time. Suppose you
locate him the first thing in the morning at his house on Twenty-fourth
Street, for example. You, Cottrell, station yourself two blocks up the
street. Gary, you go the same distance down. Then, no matter which way
he starts he'll have one of you in front of him and one behind. The man
in front will have to use his wits to guess which way he intends to go
and to beat him to it. If he boards a car, the man in front can pick him
up with the certainty that the other will cover the trail in the rear.
In that way you ought to be able to find out where he is going and,
possibly, what he is doing there."
The scheme, thanks to the quick thinking of the men assigned to the job,
worked splendidly for months--at least it worked in so far as keeping a
watch on Weimar was concerned. But that was all. In the summer of 1915
the government knew precisely where Weimar had been for the past six
months, with whom he had talked, and so on--but the kernel of the nut
was missing. There wasn't the least clue to what he had talked about and
what deviltry he had planned!
Without that information, all the dope the government had was about as
useful as a movie to a blind man.
Washington was so certain that Weimar had the key to a number of very
important developments--among them the first attempt to blow up the
Welland Canal--that the chief of the Secret Service made a special trip
to New York to talk to Kenney.
"Isn't it possible," he suggested, "to plant your men close enough to
Weimar to find out, for example, what he talks about over the phone?"
Kenney smiled, grimly.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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