“Why, yes—now that I think of it, it does seem to me that they have a sort of—” At loss for a word I stopped. O’Leary completed the sentence.
“Understanding?”
“Well, yes. And yet I have seen nothing definite. It is just a feeling that I have. And of course, the fact that he has been up at the Letheny cottage a great deal. I’ve seen him there often.”
He twisted the pencil up and down; I wondered that there was any shred of paint remaining on the shabby thing.
“Another thing,” he began rather hesitantly. “They say—don’t ask me who says, for it is a sort of drifting gossip that we detectives have to encourage—they say that Dr. Letheny admired the pretty nurse.”
“The pretty nurse. Who?”
“I thought you’d guess,” he said quietly. “I mean Miss Day.”
“If he did admire her, I never knew it,” I said with vigour.
“You never even surmised it?” he persisted gently.
“No,” I said bluntly. “Certainly not.” And then recalled certain things. That last dinner—Dr. Letheny’s smouldering eyes on Maida—the gesture with which he took her wrap—those burning, restless eyes seeking her in the corridor of the south wing before he turned away through the door and I caught my last glimpse of Dr. Letheny alive. “That is—perhaps—yes,” I amended in a smaller voice.
“Did Miss Day return his—interest?”
“No. I’m sure that she did not. Quite the contrary.”
“Quite the contrary?”
“I mean that I believe she disliked him particularly. I do not know why.”
He lifted his eyes from the pencil. They were clear now and very gray.
“You would likely know,” he said casually. “You possess the strangest aura of—integrity. One feels you are a respecter of confidences. I presume you are the repository of many secrets.”
“I’m sure I don’t know any secrets,” I replied hastily. The man needn’t think he could worm things out of me. “I wish,” I added, “I wish that you had talked to Higgins.”
His expression became serious at once.
“I wish so too,” he said soberly. “Though as far as that goes I did talk to Higgins, but couldn’t get a thing out of him. He must have been desperately afraid of getting into trouble.” He eyed the stub of pencil solicitously. “… getting into trouble,” he repeated musingly.
“If I had only known the danger he was in,” I said regretfully. “But somehow we never know until it is too late.”
“About this matter of the lights going out last night. It seems to coincide too strangely with the affair of Thursday night. The lights being out at that time was, of course, an accident, but one is inclined to think that someone profited by that accident to such an extent that he decided to repeat the fortuitous circumstances. But it was actually no accident this time; the switch plug had been purposely pulled out. Now then, the switch box is in the basement, on the wall next to the grade door that leads out just below the main entrance.”
I nodded as his keen, serious eyes rose to mine.
“That grade door was locked and the key inside the lock as it should be. Was there time, Miss Keate, between the lights going out and the sound of the shot for someone to come from that grade door around the corner of the hospital, enter the south door in the darkness, go into Eighteen, which is right next to the south door, take the radium from the loud speaker and—and that is as far as we know. We can only surmise, now, how Higgins came into it.”
“The intruder might have been Higgins, himself.” I was suddenly struck by the thought. “He would have access to the basement, could have stolen the key from the chart desk that would open the south door if it were locked. Perhaps he was taking the radium out of the speaker; he told me, you know, that he knew where it was hidden.”
“All the circumstances point to what we call an inside job,” admitted O’Leary slowly. “But someone besides Higgins was in Room 18.”
“The window?” I suggested.
“No. He could not have come through the window for it was still bolted. How about it, Miss Keate?” He returned to his inquiry. “How long a time elapsed between the lights going out and the sound of the shot?”
“It seemed a long time,” I said hesitantly. “You see, it was so still and dark and I was a little frightened. I waited for a few moments, thinking that the lights would come on again. Yes, I think there was time enough for—for all that you think took place. While I waited I felt a current of air on my shoulders.”
He looked up quickly.
“That was the door opening, then. You are sure about the length of time? You see it is rather important that we settle that point definitely for if there was not time for all that to go on, it would indicate that there were two people, besides Higgins, who were interested in getting into Room 18 last night. And that one of them managed the business of turning off the lights and the other came into Room 18 with the results of which we know. Confound it!” He broke off suddenly. “I wish I needn’t have to figure on more than one or two ways of getting in and out of this old hospital. Don’t you ever have thieves in a hospital! Don’t you ever have to safeguard yourselves!”
“Only the third and fourth floor windows,” I said absently.
He snorted.
“The third and fourth floor windows! That does me a lot of good!”
“On account of delirious patients,” I said rebukingly. “And as for there being two people trying to get the radium, I think there must be at least that many. I don’t believe that one person, alone and unaided, could make so much trouble.”
He grinned faintly at that, and then frowned.
“The chief of police wants to arrest the whole outfit at once. He is convinced that you
