HEINZ NOONAN
and
Captain Heinz Noonan, the "Bearded Holmes" of the Sandersonville Police Department, was sound asleep when he received the call. Breaking off the chase of six miscreants who had had the misfortune to have found themselves in his dreams and, as well, had committed a crime in his somnambulant presence, the detective pulled himself alert and answered the phone.
"Captain Noonan?" came an anxious voice from the other end of the line.
"Better be," snapped the detective, fingering his salt-and-pepper beard to make certain himself. "Otherwise I've been having a hell of a time with his wife."
There was an awkward moment of silence on the line. Then the voice continued. "Well, congratulations to you, Sir. I'm sure someone is appreciating your presence. This is Police Commissioner Jerome Hotchkiss in Anchorage, Alaska. We've run into a bit of a problem up here and it was suggested that we contact you right away."
"What time is it up there?" asked Noonan.
"Three a.m., Sir. An hour earlier than where you are."
"Good God!" snapped Noonan. "Why are you calling me this early in the morning?"
"Well, Sir, we have a situation up here that requires immediate attention. We can't seem to solve the problem and time is of the essence."
"Well, I'm awake now. Just don't tell me who gave my phone number. I'm liable to ring their neck."
"It was your wife, Sir. She's visiting relatives here. At least she said she was your wife."
"Yes," Noonan said sadly. "So she is. Just my luck, eh? Now, about your problem."
"Well, embarrassingly,
it appears to be a simple one but we just can't seem to solve it and, as I said,
time is of the essence."
"Fine. Don't waste my time. Tell me about it."
"Last night, about six hours ago, the President of English Petroleum arrived in Anchorage with a signed, certified check for $10 million. The money was to be used to pay for parcels in the Oil Lease Sale auction slated for this afternoon. He arrived at the Alaska Grand Hotel and was checked into room 1320. The room has a special safe and he put the check into that vault. He showered, changed into evening clothes, and then went to a reception. When he returned, he discovered that there was no . . . "
Noonan interrupted him. "Yeah, yeah, yeah. I've heard this before. He got back to the hotel and discovered that not only was there no room 1320 but there wasn't even a 13th floor. Right?"
"How did you know that?" The voice was incredulous.
"I read mystery stories." He took a breath for a moment. "Now, let me further guess that you checked the hotel to make sure someone hadn't switched numbers to make the 12th or 14th floor the 13th and you checked all the other floors to make certain that there wasn't an area that could be converted to look like the 13th Floor."
"That's right. The only floor that could have been used as a phony 13th was the storage floor but there's so much furniture and heating equipment you can barely walk around."
"And just in case someone had made a mistake, you checked rooms 1220 and 1320 just in case the thieves were stupid enough to use one of the rooms immediately above or below the alleged room 1320."
"Yup. And we got zip."
"OK. How many special vaults similar to the one in the alleged Room1320 are there?"
"Thirty, maybe more."
"What rooms are they in?"
"Do you want me to FAX you the numbers?"
"No, read them to me."
"Read them to you?"
"That's correct. Read, it's a four letter word that is also pronounced red, as in the
the color, which is what you should have done by now."
"OK. Here's goes, 1010, 1020. 1030, 1040, 1050, 1110, 1120, 1130, 1140, 1150, 1210, 1220 . . ."
"Hold it. That's enough."
THAT'S ALL?!
THAT'S ALL NOONAN NEEDED?!
WHAT ABOUT YOU?
CAN YOU SEE WHERE NOONAN IS HEADED?
Noonan continue. "Take the key that the idiot who runs English Petroleum has and try it in rooms 1520 and 1720. But you'd better go in armed. Whoever's behind this will be in the room, probably working on the safe."
"Are you sure?"
"If you arrest someone, don't call me until tomorrow. If not, call me back right away."
At ten the next morning, Noonan was pulled out of an administrative meeting to speak with Anchorage Police Commissioner Hotchkiss.
"I suppose you got 'em all?" Noonan wasn't one for pleasantries.
"Three of them anyway," said Hotchkiss. "We're still missing the brains behind the scheme. How did you know it was room 1720, by the way?"
"I didn't. I just knew that you couldn't make a floor disappear. Since no one floor could be used as a decoy, room 1320 had to be either 1520 or 1720. You had already checked 1220 and 1420 so that only left 1520 and 1720. They're in the same position on the hotel floor plan, and probably fairly close to the elevator. I know there has to be a 13th floor on the elevator switchboard for this scam to work. "
"You're right. How did you know that?"
"To make the plan work, the perpetrators had to make the President feel as though he was on the 13th floor. Even though there isn't a 13th floor in the hotel, the elevator probably has a panel that includes the number 13. They probably rigged the elevator wiring so that when they pushed the button for the 13th floor, the panel light in the elevator indicating the 13th floor lit up. Then they took out the bulbs for the 14, 15, 16 and17th floor."
"Why not room 1120?"
"The elevator ride wouldn't have been long enough."
"How did they know which elevator he would use?"
"They didn't. They probably jimmied all of them."
"But what about the room numbers? When the President stepped off elevator, he would have known he was on the 17th floor. Signs are everywhere."
"I'll bet there are only three signs by the elevators. All three indicate which way to what room numbers. Someone just reprinted those three signs. And they replaced the numbers on the rooms in hallway that the President might have seen on his way to 1720 -- which was changed to 1320. All the signs indicated he should be on the 13th floor so there was no reason for him to doubt it. And he clearly had one of those anti-theft electronic keys. They don't have any room numbers on them. Then, after he left for the reception, the signs and room numbers were changed back to their original state."
"Why didn't they just put him in room 1720 and then break into the safe when he left?"
"They needed time to get into the safe quietly so they had to make sure that he didn't come back unexpectedly."
"Looking back on it, it was a fairly simply plan."
"Yes it was. As far as your mastermind is concerned, he's the man who arranged reservations for 1720."
"Well that wraps up everything."
"Just about. Don't be
surprised if the President of English Petroleum is out of a job. Anyone stupid
enough to carry around a signed, certified check for $10 million and then leaves
it in a hotel room safe ought to be fired."
"He was," replied Hotchkiss.
HOW DID YOU DO?
COULD YOU HAVE SOLVED THIS ON YOUR OWN?