Detective Burton investigates Burke Devore’s connection to two murders during a Saturday-morning visit to Burke’s home. The encounter turns a seemingly ordinary conversation into a near exposure: Burton establishes that Herbert Everly and Kane Asche were killed with the same gun and that both had applied for the same job Burke also sought. Burke hides his recognition of the men and denies knowing them, but afterward understands that the investigation has identified the pattern he failed to anticipate. The visit also changes his plans: the Luger can no longer be used for another killing without risking a connection to the earlier murders.

The Visit and Its Uneasy Setting

Burton arrives while Burke is in his office, taking the last résumé from a file drawer and reaching for a road atlas. Burke places the atlas over the résumé just before Marjorie Devore knocks and tells him that a detective is there to speak with him. The overlap between the hidden job-search file and the visitor’s stated purpose makes the interruption immediately threatening. Burke’s first response is inward: he believes he has been caught and that all his efforts have been in vain. Aloud, he tries to make the visit seem connected to a different family concern, asking whether it has something to do with Billy.

The scene then shifts from the office to a sitting room. Burton shakes Burke’s hand, identifies himself as a state CID detective, and takes an interest in a Winslow Homer painting. His friendly attention to the picture and his talk of growing up around boats offer Burke a momentary reason to feel reassured. Burton’s ease, however, does not mean the visit is harmless. He takes out a notebook and begins asking about people and employment, turning a sociable encounter into an investigation without changing its conversational tone.

The Links Burton Establishes

Burton asks whether Burke knows Herbert Everly, then Kane Asche. Burke pretends that neither name means anything to him. Burton next confirms that Burke worked for Halcyon Mills for a long time, then explains why that employment matters: both men worked at paper mills, though not the same ones as Burke. Burke replies that he was interviewed for the job under discussion but did not receive a callback. That answer places him among the applicants while preserving the appearance that he had no personal connection to the two dead men.

Burton explains that four applicants were called for a second interview and that two of them had been killed. He identifies Everly and Asche as those two, and says ballistics has shown that both were shot with the same gun. The shared weapon gives the investigation a physical connection between otherwise separate deaths. Burton adds that investigators have found no link between the victims apart from their having applied for the same job; as far as they can tell, the men did not know each other. The point of the visit is therefore not that Burton already has a complete account of the killings, but that he is testing possible connections around the job and its applicants.

Burton asks Burke to look at photographs and say whether he has met either man. Burke recognizes the images as the faces belonging to the first and fourth résumés he collected. That private knowledge sharply contrasts with the denial he offers Burton. Looking at the photographs, Burke feels sadness and says the men seem ordinary and likeable. Burton interprets the emotional response as identification with people whose deaths feel close to home, rather than as evidence that Burke knew them. Burke hands the photographs back and says he does not think he has met either man. Burton accepts the answer without openly challenging it, puts the pictures away in his notebook, and says that coincidence cannot simply be ruled out.

A Narrow Escape and a New Constraint

After Burton leaves, Burke tells Marjorie why the detective came and discusses the two murders with her longer than he wants to. Back in his office, he shakes as the nearness of the danger catches up with him. He considers the possibility that two dead applicants could still be explained as coincidence, but recognizes that a third would make the shared job and shared weapon much harder to dismiss. In his reasoning, if Garrett Roger Blackstone had not obtained a label job, and Burke had killed him during one of his visits that week, the police would have had three paper-mill managerial applicants shot in the same state with the same gun. The additional case would have supplied a clearer pattern and given investigators a motive to pursue.

Burke sees that he has been both careless and lucky. He had assumed the weapon’s anonymity would protect him: it had not been fired for more than fifty years, had no recorded existence in North America, and seemed untraceable. Burton’s questions and the ballistics result overturn that confidence. An unidentified gun can still connect separate crimes through the bullets it fires. Burke also thinks that the personnel contact at Willis and Kendall helped set the inquiry in motion, suggesting that the connection might otherwise have gone unnoticed. He notes that another shooting in Massachusetts has already been solved, while Everett Boyd Dynes was not killed with this gun; neither circumstance erases the danger posed by the two linked deaths.

The immediate consequence is practical as well as psychological. Burke decides that he cannot use the Luger again. He has no other gun and sees no way to obtain one without leaving an ownership trail; entering the criminal world to find another weapon seems dangerous to him. The gun had seemed clean and impersonal because it placed distance between its user and the act. Now its apparent anonymity has failed: the same distance that made it attractive cannot conceal its recurring evidence. Burton leaves without exposing Burke, but the interview ends Burke’s confidence that he can repeat the method safely.