was it?” demanded the reporter eagerly. “How did it happen?”
“The prisoner’s name is Philip Gilfoil. I don’t know how he got out, but he is out.”
“Philip Gilfoil?” Hatch repeated. “He’s the forger who—”
“Yes, the forger,” said The Thinking Machine abruptly. “He’s out. You might go over and investigate, then come by and see me.”
Hatch spoke to his city editor and rushed out. Half an hour later he was at Chisholm prison, a vast spreading structure of granite in the suburbs, and in conversation with the warden, an old acquaintance.
“Who was it that escaped?” Hatch began briskly.
“Escaped?” repeated the warden with a momentary start, and then he laughed. “Nobody.”
“You have been keeping Philip Gilfoil here, haven’t you?”
“I am keeping Philip Gilfoil here,” was the grim response. “He is No. 97, and is now in Cell 9.”
“How long since you have seen him?” the reporter insisted.
“Ten minutes,” was the ready response.
The reporter was staring at him steadily; but the warden’s eyes met his frankly. There have been instances where denials of this sort have been made offhand with the idea of preventing the public from knowing the truth as long as possible. Hatch knew of several.
“May I see Gilfoil?” he inquired coldly.
“Sure,” replied the warden cheerfully. “Come on and I’ll show you.”
He escorted the newspaper man along the corridor to Cell 9. “Ninety-seven, are you there?” he called.
“Where’d you expect I’d be?” grumbled some one inside.
“Come to the door for a minute.”
There was a movement inside the cell, and the figure of a man approached the door out of the gloom. It had been several months since Hatch had seen Philip Gilfoil; but there was not the slightest question in his mind about the identity of this man. It was Gilfoil—the same sharp, hooked nose, the same thin lipped mouth, everything the same save now that the prison pallor was upon him. There was frank surprise in the reporter’s face.
“Do you know me, Gilfoil?” he inquired.
“I’ll never forget you,” replied the prisoner. There was anything but a kindly expression in the voice. “You’re the fellow who helped to send me here—you and the old professor chap.”
Hatch led the way back to the warden’s office. “Look here, warden!” he remarked pointedly, accusingly. “I want to know the real facts. Has that man been out of his cell since he has been here?”
“No, except for exercise,” was the reply. “All the prisoners are allowed a certain time each day for that.”
“I mean has he never been out of the prison?”
“Not on your life!” declared the warden. “He’s in for eight years, and he doesn’t get out till that’s up.”
“I have reason to believe—the best reason in the world to believe—that he has been out,” insisted the reporter.
“You are talking through your hat, Hatch,” said the warden, and he laughed with the utmost good nature. “What’s the matter, anyway?”
Hatch didn’t choose to tell him. He went instead to a telephone and called up The Thinking Machine.
“You are mistaken about Gilfoil having escaped,” he told the scientist. “He is still in Chisholm prison.”
“Did you see him?” came the irritable demand.
“Saw him and talked to him,” replied the reporter. “He was in Cell 9 not five minutes ago.”
There was a long silence. Hatch could imagine what it meant—The Thinking Machine was turning this over and over in his mind.
“You are mistaken, Mr. Hatch,” came the surprising statement at last in the same irritable, querulous voice. “Gilfoil is not in his cell. I know he is not. There is no need to argue about it. Good by.”
It so happened that Professor Augustus S. F. X. Van Dusen was well acquainted with the warden of Chisholm prison. Thus it was that when he called at the prison half an hour or so after Hatch had gone he was received with more courtesy and attention than would have been the case if he had been a casual visitor. The warden shook hands with him and there was a pleasant reminiscent grin on his face.
“I want to find out something about this man Gilfoil,” the scientist began abruptly.
“You too?” remarked the warden. “Hutchinson Hatch was here a little while ago inquiring about him.”
“Yes, I sent him,” said the scientist. “He tells me that Gilfoil is still here?”
“He is still here,” said the warden emphatically. “He’s been here for nearly a year, and will remain here for another seven years. Hatch seemed to have an impression that he had escaped. Do you happen to know where he got that idea?”
The Thinking Machine squinted into his face for an instant inscrutably, then glanced up at the clock. It was eighteen minutes past eight o’clock.
“Are you sure that Gilfoil is in his cell?” he demanded curtly.
“I know he is—in Cell 9.” The warden tilted his cigar to an angle which was only a little less than aggressive, and glared at his visitor curiously. This constant questioning as to Convict 97, and the implied doubt behind it, was anything but soothing. The Thinking Machine dropped back into a chair, and the watery blue eyes were turned upward. The warden knew the attitude.
“How long have you had Gilfoil?” queried The Thinking Machine after a moment.
“A little more than ten months.”
“Well behaved prisoner?”
“Well, yes, now he is. When he first came he was rather an unpleasant customer, and was given to profanity, but lately he has realized the uselessness of it all, and now, I may say, he is a model of decency. That’s the usual course with prisoners; they are bad at first, and then in nine cases out of ten they settle down and behave themselves.”
“Naturally,” mused the scientist. “Just when did you first notice this change for the better in his conduct?”
“Oh, a month or six weeks ago,” was the reply.
“Was it a gradual change or a sudden change?”
“I couldn’t say, really,” responded the wondering warden. “I suppose it might be called a sudden change. I noticed one day that he didn’t swear at me as I passed his cell, and that was unusual.”
The Thinking Machine straightened up in his chair suddenly and squinted belligerently
