The alarm had first been given by young Mr. Archibald, the assistant cashier. When he had arrived at a quarter to nine at the offices of Messrs. Diddle & Snatch, the estate agents who employed him, Mr. Archibald said, a scene of chaos confronted him.

One of the windows in the cashier’s room on the first floor was shattered, numerous papers were scattered about, the back of the safe had been forced off, and nearly £500 was missing.

“£500, eh? A nice little haul for someone,” remarked the Inspector when he was called in. “Do you usually have so much cash on the premises?"

Mr Diddle, the senior partner, looked flustered.

“Not usually, but a good many people call in here on a Saturday morning. It’s the only time they can get off. If a deposit is to be paid on a house it is usually done then.”

“Surely most people pay by cheque," said the Inspector.

Mr. Diddle shook his head. “Not at all. Younger couples usually pay in cash, usually because they haven’t got around to opening an account and have only the bare amount of the deposit.”

“And you don't bank on Saturdays?”

“No,” replied Mr. Diddle. “You see, the Bank shuts at twelve but we open until one, so there is usually a fair amount of cash here until Monday, when we bank.

The Inspector nodded. “And who knew that there was that amount in the office at weekends?”

“Only members of the staff,” admitted Mr. Diddle.

“And you say the resident caretaker heard nothing at all suspicious during the weekend?”

“No,” replied Mr. Diddle. “She has rooms overhead, and the floors are thin. She would have heard anyone smashing the place up in this way.”

The Inspector went over to the cashier’s room. It was a long a narrow room looking onto the caretaker’s garden at the back of the premises, really an annex partitioned off with wood and glass from the main office. He looked around, hoping for something, some clue that would give him a lead. There was just the usual office furniture, a desk, two high stools, and the safe. A thin green carpet covered the middle of the room. The floor was of a highly polished dark wood which, the Inspector noted, being a fastidious man who always kept his apartment in spotless condition, would show every speck of dusk and dirty mark.

The Inspector’s eye was caught by a series of small round marks, not much bigger than a farthing, which dotted the floor between the carpet and the safe door.

He frowned for a moment, then turned to Mr. Diddle.

“Which of the staff has a key to the safe?” he asked.

Mr. Diddle thought for a moment. “Well, there’s myself, of course, and my partner, Mr Snatch. Then, of course, both Mr. Archibald and Mr. Chubb have one. That’s all.”

“Tell me what you know about Chubb and Archibald,” said the Inspector.

Mr. Diddle hesitated. “Er, as a matter of fact, Chubb, our senior cashier, is a relative of my wife’s. He has, well, he has a criminal record. But not for dishonesty,” he added hastily. “Many years ago he was convicted of indecent exposure. Naturally, it’s something we never talk about, but my wife thought it would restore his self respect if he were given a decent job. That’s how he comes to be here. Married, now, thank goodness, and a respectable family man.”

“What about Archibald?”

“He’s a bachelor. He lives on his own in his own flat. He earns a good salary here, runs a car, and seems popular with the girls…doesn’t seem to want to settle down, though.”

“Who else is on the staff?" asked the Inspector.

“Miss Pringle, the senior typist. Lives with her invalid mother, single, but goes about for the chap named Johnson, a fellow we sacked some time ago for inefficiency. A case of love being blind, I suppose, otherwise nothing against her. Then there’s Miss Flippit, the junior typist, who’s our local Beauty Queen. She was at one of the dances in town on Saturday night. I think she had better things to do than opening a safe.”

“Anybody else?”

“My partner, Mr. Snatch, away on holiday in Capri. And then there are my two managing clerks, Mr. Haydock and Mr. Perrin. Haydock’s wife had a baby Saturday night – not an auspicious time for doing a burglary, although I believe they are hard up. Perrin’s single but his family are well off. He is walking with a limp at present and has to use a stick to get about with: they are excavating the road outside, and he had to go and trip over a warning notice, of all things, silly young ass. "

“And that’s the lot?”

“Well, of course, there’s a Mrs. Bunce who comes on Saturday afternoons when we’re closed, and cleans up.”

“And she noticed nothing unusual?”

“No, I’ve been on the telephone to her, and she says everything was in its place on Saturday afternoon. I’m afraid that’s all I can tell you.”

A sound of boots coming from the stairs leading to the back of the building put a stop to the Inspector’s questions. A constable came in carrying a crowbar.

“Found this in the bushes in the yard, sir. It must have been dropped there when the thief made off. There are some prints in the soft earth, too, sir.”

The Inspector looked at the crowbar and grunted noncommittally. Then he asked Mr. Diddle’s permission to have the staff assembled for the purpose of examining the soles of their shoes. The Inspector’s request was met with winks and giggles, but all the staff showed themselves willing to cooperate.

Miss Pringle had on sensible court shoes with moderate heels; Miss Flippit ridiculous sling-backs with heels like stilts. Mr. Chubb, Mr. Haydock, and Mr. Perrin wore sober black calf shoes, while Mr. Archibald wore a fashionable brown handmade suede pair.

The Inspector looked at each pair of soles, then pronounced himself satisfied, except that he wanted a word with Mr. Chubb.

“Did either you or Mr. Archibald remove anything from the safe during Saturday morning?”

“Certainly not,” replied Mr. Chubb “Most of the morning I was out here dictating various accounts for Miss Pringle to type, and had Mr. Archibald removed anything from the safe I should have seen him through the glass of the partition.”

“But you, yourself, went to the safe to deposit the money there?”

“Yes, indeed,” said Mr. Chubb. “Mr. Diddle brought me all the cash which had been taken on the Saturday morning at about twelve forty five and I myself placed it in the safe. No more money came in that morning and I locked the safe at one o’clock and left with the rest of the staff.”

* * *

“Well, that’s the lot, sir,” said Sargeant Pennycuik later. “What do you make of it?”

“First of all,” said the Inspector, “Despite the finding of the crowbar, everything points to an inside job, done by someone who knew there was a tidy sum in the office at weekends. Consider the difficulty of climbing up to this window. Hardly profitable if the money could be pinched more easily from the inside.”

“But the crowbar. It looked as if the office was broken into from outside?”“Yes, it was found in the bushes, where it could easily have been thrown from this window.”

“When was the theft done, then? Mrs. Bunce noticed nothing unusual when she came Saturday afternoon, and anyone breaking in would have been heard by the caretaker both Saturday and Sunday.”

The inspector walked over to where the small round marks he had noticed earlier showed clearly on the black shining floor.

“Do you know what these marks are?” he asked. The constable shook his head. “Toe marks. The marks of someone who had a hole in his sock just there. Someone, presumably, who has no one to darn for him, someone who slipped his shoes off for quietness sake when he opened safe – with a key!”

“You mean Archibald?”

“Yes,” said the Inspector, “I've been having inquiries made about Archibald. It seems his popularity with the girls costs him quite a packet. When I looked at his soles, it wasn’t his shoes I was interested in, but his socks – they were fine woollen ones. Much more likely to spring a hole than the nylon one the others wore.

“As for proof, those prints were made on Mrs. Bunce’s polished floor after she had cleaned up on Saturday afternoon. Consequently they are excellent ones, couldn’t be better. And as toe-prints are as big a giveaway as thumbprints, I don’t think there will be any difficulty in pinning our friend Archibald.

The constable’s eyes shone with admiration, but there was still one thing that puzzled him.

“Then when was the smash up done?”

“On Monday morning, before the staff arrived, when there was too much noise for the job to be heard.”

The Inspector went over and opened the window. Quite clearly from the excavations below came the clatter of the electric road drill.

“Could you hear anything above that?”

The constable shook his head, then thought of something.

“What about the footprints in the garden?”

“The milkman comes to the caretaker’s door at the back and steps across that garden. Someone should tell him of it. He’s ruining those roses.”