watching him, but he knew this was impossible. The automobile engine had finally started, and the automobile had gone away with a noisy meshing of cold gears. Simeon March still moaned. He wondered why someone didn t do something about him.
He wondered what could possibly have happened to Ann. He remembered the fun he d had with her in New York. He remembered a walk in soft rain through Central Park on an April morning, the gift of a straw-enclosed bottle of chianti from a restaurant proprietor who thought they were newlyweds, watching Army play in the Polo Grounds with Ann sharing his fur rug, a mad swing session with Stuff Smith at the Onyx Club, a brief, surprised kiss in a taxicab…
At last three o clock came, but he didn t feel any better. He knew ahead of him lay another night until three- thirty, and another until four, and another until four-thirty. By five he d probably be mad, if he wasn t already. He hoped Ann was having an easier time. He d welcome the arrival of the murderer. Anything was better than waiting. Why the hell didn t they shut up Simeon March?
The elevator whined, but it didn t stop at his floor. Like the veils of a classical dancer, the curtains quivered in the wind. There was light enough in the room to see their movements, sometimes languid, sometimes wild. The blue light in the corridor gave them a milky, diaphanous appearance, but it was strange; they cast no shadows. He watched them closely during an angry tarantella, but there were no shadows. It was like ghosts dancing.
A man was standing beside the bed. He must have come through the door on rubber-soled shoes, have tiptoed to the bed. Noiselessly, he put a black bag on the table under the shadow; only his hands were visible.
Hardly breathing, Crane remained motionless.
In the lime-colored rays from the lamp the hands were an unhealthy white. Sparse black hair grew from the wrists to the knuckles, sprouted in tufts from the fingers. The fingers were strong and supple. They opened the black case and withdrew an atomizer with a metal snout and an egg-size rubber bulb. This they put on the table, then returned to the bag. Without haste, but quickly, they emerged with a silver hypodermic syringe.
The right hand held the syringe between the first two fingers. The thumb pressed the plunger a fraction of an inch and fluid bubbled from the needle, fell in two drops to the table.
'Aaaaaaaanaaahaa,' moaned Simeon March.
The man in the room moved closer to the bed. He held the hypodermic syringe in his right hand; with his left hand he reached for Simeon March s arm.
'No!' Crane flung himself off the chair, jerked out the revolver. 'I ve got you covered! Don t move!'
Simultaneously, the lights flashed on. Crane aimed the revolver at the man. Miss Edens stood by the door, her left hand on the light switch.
Holding the hypodermic syringe, Dr Woodrin blinked at them, his pink-and-white face astonished and alarmed. 'My God!' he exclaimed. 'You gave me a start.' He bent over Simeon March and gave him an injection with the syringe. 'I thought you were both in the anteroom.'
Crane said, 'I thought it was better to wait in the same room.'
'How is he, Doctor?' Miss Edens asked.
Dr Woodrin put the syringe and the atomizer in the black bag. 'The next hour or two will tell. I think he ll live, but how the morning paper can be so sure is beyond me.'
'Newspapers are that way,' Crane said. 'But maybe the murderer will believe them.'
The white skin over the doctor s nose wrinkled in two V s when he thought. 'If there is a murderer… You know I really think these deaths were accidental.'
'Maybe you re right,' Crane said. 'We ll see. If there was a murderer he won t want Simeon March to recover, particularly if the old man saw him.'
'That s reasonable enough.' Dr Woodrin picked up the bag. 'Good luck. If you need me I ll be downstairs with Peter and Carmel.'
With the room dark, it didn t take Crane long to become thoroughly nervous again. The encounter with the doctor, although it was all right, hadn t been quieting. He shuddered when he thought of the weird effect made by the doctor s hands in the puddle of light from the night lamp. The effect was like that of those horror movies Universal used to make in which the hero is fastened to an operating table in a cathedral-size laboratory and a mad scientist gets ready to change him into an ape.
He decided he had never really appreciated the truth of those movies.
He had, he admitted, for a moment thought the doctor was planning to inject Simeon March with something to prevent his recovery. Yet the doctor, when the lights were on, had gone ahead with the injection. He wouldn t have dared kill the old man before witnesses. And besides, he was definitely not involved in the attempt upon Simeon March.
He was still thinking about the case when the clock outside struck four. He had a feeling the solution was within reach of his brain if only he could get the facts in their correct perspective. What was the thing he d been talking about earlier that day? Oh yes, the relevant clue. The persistent odor of gardenias; how did they fit into the picture?
And Ann! What could he do about her?
He heard a faint noise in the corridor and held his breath. Somebody was whispering; a man said something, a woman replied, and then there was silence. Simeon March no longer moaned, but he was breathing hoarsely.
He thought about the attack at the Duck Club. Was it really on him? And if it was, why had it been made? He certainly had no information that would make it worth while for the murderer to kill him. Could the attack have been on Dr Woodrin?
The wind had suddenly died, and the curtains hung limply beside the half-open window. From a switch engine a long distance away came two shrill toots. The room felt as though it had been packed with ice. It felt like a cold- storage vault.
The nurse came in and stood beside Crane s bed.
'I m afraid it s a flop,' she said.
'There s still two hours.'
'I fixed you a drink.' She handed him a glass. 'A Mr Williams sent it up.'
'That was thoughtful of him.'
The whisky, well diluted with water, was smooth. It warmed his throat, his stomach, made his mouth feel clean. He felt better immediately. She took the glass, returned to her room.
He felt a little sleepy. He was no longer scared; the whisky had fixed that, and there was only a mild feeling of excitement. He supposed that he had been over-ambitious in his plans for the murderer s capture; the murderer must have known about them. Yet who did know? He and Williams, Dr Rutledge and Dr Woodrin, and the nurse. That was all; not even the men guarding the hospital knew.
A dog two blocks away was barking at something. His barks came in bursts of threes, finishing up on an interrogative note, as though he wasn t sure what he was barking about. The queer blue shadow of a man with a cloak was still on the ceiling by the transom.
Crane twisted his body so he was sitting on his left hip and thought: to hell with it all! To hell with the blue man in the cloak! To hell with all the various and sundry noises! A hospital was the last place he d ever go for a rest.
He wondered, suddenly feeling sick to his stomach, about Ann. He knew she was being held, or was dead. He knew he d be through if she was dead. Never again, if he got out of this mess, would he work on a case with somebody he cared for terribly. What was it Delia Young had said? 'I feel hollow inside.' That was the way thinking about Ann made him feel.
Who could be holding her? He wondered if Williams was doing anything about her. He hadn t seen him all evening. He wondered what he would do when daylight came. He d have to call in the police. Imagine a private detective asking help…
A scream, so brief he hardly believed his ears, sounded in the corridor. The sound was not repeated. What the hell? He found his revolver and slid out of the chair.
At the same instant the door to the room opened. Sudden draft made the muslin curtains dance wildly. A bulky woman with a floppy hat and a fur coat tiptoed toward the bed, a pillow in her hands. Crane said, 'I ve got you!' The woman dropped the pillow, fired two shots in his direction. The yellow flare of her gun blinded Crane. He crouched under the fluttering curtains and fired a shot at the door. His revolver made a deeper noise than the
