The failure by Harold Ward Amos Duncan paused for a second beside the time clock
in the hallway just outside the offices of Carney and Kirk. Then, his
heart beating like a trip hammer, he mustered up courage enough to push open
the swinging doors and peep into the gloomy interior. He was frightened, scared
to the point of hysteria. Yet for thirty years he had stopped in that
self same place in the hallway morning and noon on his way to work.
For thirty years, fifty two weeks in the year, six days a week,
and twice each day, had he sought his number on the time clock
and pushed the button which registered his comings and his departures. Instinctively four figures
were one of his hobbies. He made the calculation in his head. Eighteen
thousand, seven hundred and twenty times had he pushed his way through those doors.
And never before, except possibly the first time, when he had applied
for a place with the firm, had he been as frightened as he was
now. For this was the first time he had ever come to rob getting
a grip on himself, he entered the Big Office on tip toe an office
covering nearly one fourth of a city block. Yet he knew that Old Bill
Judkins, the watchman, would be making his rounds out in the factory at
that particular hour. It was part of his daily work to check up the
dial on the night watchman's clock. He knew that the old man traveled as
true to schedule as a mail train. He halted just inside the doors and
listened, his eyes taking in every one of the familiar details. From where
he stood, he could discern the dark shapes of rows and rows of desks,
each identical in size and finish with its mates. Around two sides of
the big room were innumerable cubby holes of offices, divided from each other by
ground glass partitions, extending two thirds of the way to the ceiling. During
working hours, they housed the elite of the office world, the men and
women who had pushed their heads above those of their fellows. His own desk
was second from the front, and the second row from the right, just
inside the cashier's cage, a huge affair of wire, netting and glass.
It gave him renewed courage for the task ahead as he gazed upon its outline
staring at him out of the darkness. For twenty seven years, since the
day of his promotion from the office boy ranks, he had occupied that desk
or one like it in Cagney and Kirk's office, giving to Cagney and Kirk
the best of his manhood for starvation wages and two weeks vacation yearly on pay.
Others had gone over his head, scores of them man no better fitted
than he, young cubs would pull or college education. He had long since
given up hopes of promotion. He had reached the point where he was a
mere cog in the machine, a fizzle and a failure. In ninety nine
cases out of every hundred, when a man goes wrong, a woman is
responsible. In Amos Duncan's case, the woman was missus Amos Duncan, a
downtrodden cog in an office machine, the man with little force of character.
In the beginning, hen pecked at home and abroad, Duncan held to the
firm opinion that his wife had conferred a favor upon him by maryan him.
The fact that he had rescued her from a life of drudgery in the shipping
room of the factory changed his opinion not one iota, nor did missus Duncan
fail to keep his memory refreshed whenever opportunity offered itself. Amos Duncan longed to
appear as a hero in the eyes of his wife. It had taken him
two years to screw up his courage to the point of robbing Carney and Kirk,
Yet he had planned the affair so often that he knew he would be
absolutely above suspicion, and with the money once in his hands, he would
hide it until all memory of the affair had blown over, and then,
with a carefully concocted story of a lucky speculation on change, resign and migrate
to some distant city to spend his declining years in ease with the lady who
had assumed his name. Carney and Kirk always paid off in cash. Duncan
knew that there was close to fifty thousand dollars in the vault, ready to
go into pay envelopes in the morning. As assistant cashier and one of the
old timers with the firm he had been entrusted with the combination. He had
read that skilled burglars were able to open vaults by listening to the whirl of
the mechanism. A rag saturated with alcohol would do away with telltale fingerprints.
The police would think the robbery the work of a professional. Still walking on
his toes, he worked his way through the maze of desks to the big
vault in the rear of the office behind the cashier's cage. Taking a tiny
flashlight from his pocket, he pressed the button and allowed the stream of light
to play over the dial while he manipulated the affair with fingers that trembled as
from the augu it refused to work in his nervousness. He had gone past
the number. He took a deep breath, and, with the sweat standing
out out in great beads upon his face, attacked the job again. Someone
was entering the office through one of the rear doors leading from the factory.
He stopped for a second, then, as he heard the footsteps coming toward
him in the darkness, he leapt outside the cage and drew his revolver.
He had never fired a gun in his life. He had bought this one,
a cheap second hand affair, merely as a matter of precaution, and
because he knew that burglars always carried such weapons from out of the darkness came
a flash, a report. A bullet sped past his head and flattened itself
against the vault door. It must be Judkins, the faithful had heard something
suspicious and had entered the realization of his mission in the office at that time
of night stopped him involuntarily. He gave a little squeak of fear. A
second bullet passed unpleasantly near instinctively, just as a cornered rat will fight,
so his finger pressed the trigger of his own gun. He fired aimlessly in
the general direction of the other, dodging from desk to desk, knocking over
chairs. He was in a panic of fear. The other's fire ceased.
Suddenly, from out of the darkness across the great room came a dull,
throaty cry. Something metallic jangled against the tiled floor. An instant later,
it was followed by a heavier body, a body that crashed against a desk
as it dropped. Duncan leaped through the folding doors and out into the hallway
again. To unlock the outer door and dash out into the sidewalk was but
the work of an instant. Around the corner, he heard the shrill whistle
of the policeman on the beat. As attracted by the shots, he came
lumbering along, signaling for his mate. He dodged into the shadow and turned
into the alley. Behind him, he could hear the policeman hammering on the
office door with his nightstick. From two blocks down the street came the sound
of another whistle in the distance. A third shrilled, proving that reinforcements were
on the way. Missus Duncan was sleeping soundly when he arrived home after a
round trip through the alleys and side streets. Letting himself into the house with
his pass key, he hastily sought the security of his own room. So
far as he knew, no one had seen him either going into the factory
nor leaving it. But God, what a fizzle he had made of the
affair. And there was blood on his hands, the blood of poor old
Judkins. What had he gained? Nothing? Absolutely nothing. He paced the
floor, every nerve tangling, he wondered, poor old Judkins. And he
had a crippled wife too. With Judkins gone, she would have to go
to the poorhouse. It was something that he had not foreseen. He was
still pacing the floor when the sun came up in the east. In the
other room, he heard Missus Duncan getting up. In less than two hours,
he would have to go to the office. Of course, no one
would suspect him, but he could hear Missus Duncan rattling the pots and pans
in the kitchen. When the door bell rang. He opened the bedroom door
crack and peeped through. As she answered the summons, A gruff voice was
asking for him. He heard her admit the visitors. There seemed to be
two of them. When she called Shrilly up the stairway for him. He
knew that they were detectives from their heavy tread. They were after him for
killing Judkins. His brain was in a horse. Yet he wondered how it
happened that they associated him with the crime. He had been so careful too.
Probably he had dropped something in his mad rush to the outer door.
He could never face the music and Missus Duncan. What would she say?
He couldn't tell her that he had gone to the office to rob the vault
for her sake and had made a failure. The gun lay in the bureau
drawer where he had tossed it. He picked it up and broke it open.
The chambers were all empty. He had used every cartridge in killing poor
Judkins. From downstairs came a buzz of conversation. Missus Duncan shrieked. He
heard his own name mentioned. God, they had told her what he had
done. He must move rapidly. His glance fell upon a bottle of carbolic
acid. Missus Duncan and was at the bottom of the stairway now shrieking his
name. He placed the bottle to his mouth and emptied it at a gulp,
With the fiery liquid eating into his vitals his throat of fire, he
reeled across the room and tumbled in a heap upon the bed outside. Missus
Duncan was pounding at his door. Amos, wake up. She was shouting
between sobs, for Missus Duncan was a hysterical woman, and awful things happened.
There are two detectives here. Old man Judkins went home sick from the
factory last night, and while he was gone, somebody broke into the office.
The robbers had a fight, cause one of them was found dead when
the police broke in after hearing the shots. Right the cashier is out of
town. And they want you to come down and open the vault and see
if anything is gone. Oh, isn't it awful? Amos? Why don't
you answer the end of the failure