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Roy Glashan's Library
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Craig Kennedy and his "workshop of scientific crime" have rarely had a more baffling puzzle to solve than the extraordinary blackmailing attack made upon the wealthy Mrs. Blake, so cleverly managed that it seemed as though even the most astute scientist would be unable to penetrate the mystery. Have you ever heard of germ-free toxins? Well, here is a chance to add to your store of knowledge and keep up to date with all the latest wrinkles of the medical and chemical professions. There is a strange fascination in reflecting on the great possibilities for evil that have gone hand in hand with the great good that scientific investigators have accomplished for the human race.
"READ the letter, Professor Kennedy. Then I will tell you the
sequel."
Mrs. Hunter Blake lay back in the cushions of her invalid-chair in the sun-parlor of the great Blake mansion on Riverside Drive, facing the Hudson with its continuous reel of maritime life framed against the green-hilled background of the Jersey shore.
Her nurse, Miss Dora Sears, gently smoothed out the pillows and adjusted them so that the invalid could more easily watch us. Mrs. Blake, wealthy, known as a philanthropist, was not an old woman but had been for years a great sufferer from rheumatism.
I watched Miss Sears eagerly. Full-bosomed, fine of face and figure, she was something more than a nurse; she was a companion. She had bright, sparkling black eyes and an expression about her well-cut mouth which made one want to laugh with her. It seemed to say that the world was a huge joke and that she invited you to enjoy the joke with her.
Kennedy took the letter which Miss Sears proffered him, and, as he did so, I could not help noticing her full, plump fore-arm, on which gleamed a handsome, plain-gold bracelet. He spread the letter out on a dainty wicker table in such a way that we both could see it.
We had been summoned over the telephone to the Blake mansion by Reginald Blake, Mrs. Blake's eldest son. Reginald had been very reticent over the reason, but had seemed very anxious and insistent that Kennedy should come immediately.
Craig read quickly, and I followed him, fascinated by the letter.
"Dear Madam," it began. "Having received my diploma
as doctor of medicine and bacteriology at Heidelberg, in 1909, I
came to the United States to study a most serious disease which
is prevalent in several of the Western mountain-states."
So far, I reflected, it looked like an ordinary appeal for aid. The next words, however, were queer: "I have four hundred persons of wealth on my list. Your name was—"
Kennedy turned the page. Oh the next leaf of the letter-sheet was pasted a strip of gelatin. The first page had adhered slightly to the gelatin.
"—chosen by fate," went on the sentence ominously.
I read, "you have liberated millions of the virulent bacteria of this disease. Without a doubt you are infected by this time, for no human body is impervious to them, and up to the present only one in one hundred has fully recovered after going through all its stages."
I gasped. The gelatin had evidently been arranged so that,
when the two sheets were pulled apart, the germs would be thrown
into the air about the person opening the letter. It was all very
ingenious.
The letter continued: "I am happy to say, however, that I have a prophylactic which will destroy any number of these germs if used up to the ninth day. It is necessary only that you should place five thousand dollars in an envelope and leave it for me to be called for at the desk of the Prince Henry Hotel. When the messenger delivers the money to me, the prophylactic will be sent immediately.
"First of all, take a match and burn this letter to avoid spreading the disease. Then change your clothes and burn the old ones. Enclosed you will find in a germ-proof envelope an exact copy of this letter. The room should then be thoroughly fumigated. Do not come into close contact with anyone near and dear to you until you have used the prophylactic. Tell no one. In case you do, the prophylactic will not be sent under any circumstances. Very truly yours, Dr. Hans Hopf."
"Blackmail!" exclaimed Kennedy, looking intently again at the gelatin on the second page.
"Yes, I know," responded Mrs. Blake anxiously; "but is it true?"
There could be no doubt from the tone of her voice that she more than half believed that it was true.
"I cannot say—yet," replied Craig, still cautiously scanning the apparently innocent piece of gelatin on the original letter, which Mrs. Blake had not destroyed. "I shall have to keep it and examine it."
On the gelatin I could see a dark mass which evidently was supposed to contain the germs.
"I opened the letter here in this room," she went on. "At first, I thought nothing of it. But this morning, when Buster, my prize Pekingese, who had been with me, sitting on my lap at the time and closer to the letter even than I was—when Buster was taken suddenly ill, I—well, I began to worry."
She finished with a little nervous laugh, as people will, to hide their real feelings.
"I should like to see the dog," remarked Kennedy simply.
"Miss Sears," asked her mistress, "will you get Buster, please?"
The nurse left the room. No longer was there the laughing look on her face. This was serious business.
A few minutes later she reappeared carrying gingerly a small dog-basket. Mrs. Blake lifted the lid. Inside was a beautiful little "Peke," and it was easy to see that Buster was indeed ill.
"Who is your doctor?" asked Craig, considering.
"Doctor Rae Wilson, a very well-known woman physician."
Kennedy nodded recognition of the name. "What does she say?" he asked, observing the dog narrowly.
"We haven't told any one, outside, of it yet," replied Mrs. Blake. "In fact, until Buster fell sick, I thought it was a hoax."
"You haven't told any one?"
"Only Reginald and my daughter Betty. Betty is frantic—not with fear for herself but with fear for me. No one can reassure her. In fact, it was as much for her sake as any one's that I sent for you. Reginald has tried to trace the thing down himself, but has not succeeded."
She paused. The door opened, and Reginald Blake entered. He was a young fellow, self-confident, and no doubt very efficient at the new dances, though scarcely fitted to rub elbows with a cold world which, outside of his own immediate circle, knew not the name of Blake. He stood for a moment regarding us through the smoke of his cigarette.
"Tell me just what you have done?" asked Kennedy of him, as his mother introduced him, although he had done the talking for her over the telephone.
"Done?" he drawled. "Why, as soon as mother told me of the letter, I left an envelope up at the Prince Henry, as it directed."
"With the money?" put in Craig quickly.
"Oh, no—just as a decoy."
"Yes. What happened?"
"Well, I waited around a long time. It was far along in the day when a woman appeared at the desk. I had instructed the clerk to be on the watch for anyone who asked for mail addressed to a Doctor Hopf. The clerk slammed the register. That was the signal. I moved up closer."
"What did she look like?"
"I couldn't see her face. But she was beautifully dressed, with a long, light, flowing linen duster, a veil that hid her features, and on her hands and arms a long pair of doeskin motoring-gloves. By George, she was a winner—in general looks, though! Well, something about the clerk, I suppose, must have aroused her suspicions. For, a moment later, she was gone in the crowd. But she did not leave by the front entrance, through which she had entered. I concluded that she must have left by one of the side-street carriage doors."
"And she got away?"
"Yes. I found that she asked one of the boys at the door to crank up a car standing at the curb. She slid into the seat and was off in a minute."
Kennedy said nothing. But I knew that he was making a mighty effort to restrain comment on the bungling amateur-detective work of the son of our client.
Reginald saw the look on his face. "Still," he hastened, "I got the number of the car. It was 200859, New York."
"You have looked it up?" queried Kennedy quickly.
"I didn't need to do it. A few minutes later, Doctor Rae Wilson herself came out—storming like mad. Her car had been stolen at the very door of the hotel by this woman, with the innocent aid of the hotel employees."
Kennedy was evidently keenly interested. The mention of the stolen car had apparently at once suggested an idea to him.
"Mrs. Blake," he said, as he rose to go, "I shall take this letter with me. Will you see that Buster is sent up to my laboratory immediately?"
She nodded. It was evident that Buster was a great pet with her, and that it was with difficulty she kept from smoothing his silky coat.
"You—you won't hurt Buster?" she pleaded.
"No. Trust me. More than that, if there is any possible way of untangling this mystery, I shall do it."
Mrs. Blake looked, rather than spoke, her thanks. As we went down-stairs, accompanied by Miss Sears, we could see in the music-room a very interesting couple chatting earnestly over the piano.
As we went down-stairs we could see in the music-room a
very interesting couple chatting earnestly over the piano.
BETTY BLAKE, a slip of a girl in her first season, was
dividing her attention between her visitor and the door by which
we were passing.
She rose as she heard us, leaving the young man standing alone at the piano. He was of an age perhaps a year or two older than Reginald Blake. It was evident that, whatever Miss Betty might think, he had eyes for no one else but the pretty debutante. He even seemed to be regarding Kennedy sullenly, as a possible rival.
"You—you don't think it is serious?" whispered Betty, in an undertone, scarcely waiting to be introduced. She had evidently known of our visit but had been unable to get away to be present up-stairs.
"Really, Miss Blake," reassured Kennedy, "I can't say. All I can do is to repeat what I have already said to your mother. Keep up a good heart and trust me to work it out."
"Thank you," she murmured, and then, impulsively extending her small hand to Craig, she added, "Mr. Kennedy, if there is anything I can do to help you, I beg that you will call on me."
"I shall not forget," he answered, relinquishing the hand reluctantly. Then, as she thanked him and turned again to her guest, he added, in a low tone, to me, "A remarkable girl, Walter—a girl that can be depended on."
We followed Miss Sears down the hall.
"Who was that young man in the music-room?" asked Kennedy, when we were out of ear-shot.
"Duncan Baldwin," she answered. "A friend and bosom companion of Reginald's."
"He seems to think more of Betty than of her brother," Craig remarked dryly.
Miss Sears smiled. "Sometimes, we think they are secretly engaged," she returned. We had almost reached the door. "By the way," she asked anxiously, "do you think there are any precautions that I should take for Mrs. Blake—and the rest?"
"Hardly," answered Kennedy, after a moment's consideration, "as long as you have taken none in particular already. Still, I suppose it will do no harm to be as antiseptic as possible."
"I shall try," she promised, her face showing that she considered the affair, now, in a much more serious light.
"And keep me informed of anything that turns up," added Kennedy, handing her a card with the telephone-number of the laboratory.
As we left the Blake mansion, Kennedy remarked, "We must trace that car somehow—at least we must get some one working on that."
HALF an hour later we were in a towering office-building on
Liberty Street, the home of various kinds of insurance. Kennedy
stopped before a door which bore the name, "Douglas Garwood: Insurance Adjuster."
Briefly, Craig told the story of the stolen car, omitting the account of the dastardly method taken to blackmail Mrs. Blake. As he proceeded, a light seemed to break on the face of Garwood, a heavy-set man whose very gaze was inquisitorial.
"Yes; the theft has been reported to us already by Doctor Wilson herself," he interrupted. "The car was insured in a company I represent."
"I had hoped so," remarked Kennedy. "Do you know the woman?" he added, watching the insurance adjuster, who had been listening intently as he told about the fair motor-car thief.
"Know her?" repeated Garwood emphatically. "Why, man, we have been so close to that woman that I feel almost intimate, with her. The descriptions are those of a lady, well dressed, and with a voice and manner that would carry her through any of the fashionable hotels, perhaps into society itself."
"One of a gang of blackmailers, then," I hazarded quickly.
Garwood shrugged his shoulders. "Perhaps," he acquiesced. "It is automobile-thieving that interests me, though. Why," he went on, rising excitedly, "the gangs of these thieves are getting away with half a million dollars' worth of high-priced cars every year. The police seem to be powerless to stop it. We appeal to them, but with no result. So, now we have taken things into our own hands."
"What are you doing in this case?" asked Kennedy.
"What the insurance companies have to do to recover stolen automobiles," Garwood replied. "For, with all deference to your friend, Deputy O'Connor, it is the insurance companies, rather than the police, which get stolen cars back."
He had pulled out a postal card from a pigeonhole in his desk, selecting it from several apparently similar. We read:
$250.00 REWARD
We will pay $100.00 for car, $150.00 additional for information which will convict the thief. When last seen, driven by a woman, name not known, who is described as dark-haired, well dressed, slight, apparently thirty years old. The car is a Dixon, 1912, seven-passenger, touring, No. 193,222, License No. 200859, New York; dark-red body, mohair top, brass lamps, has no wind-shield; rear-axle brake-band clevis has extra nut on turn-buckle, not painted. Car last seen near Prince Henry Hotel, New York City, Friday the 10th.
Communicate by telegraph or telephone, after notifying nearest Police Department, with Douglas Garwood, New York City.
"The secret of it is," explained Garwood, as we finished reading, "that there are innumerable people who keep their eyes open and like to earn money easily. Thus we have several hundreds of amateur and enthusiastic detectives watching all over the city and country for any car that looks suspicious."
Kennedy thanked him for his courtesy, and we rose to go. "I shall be glad to keep you informed of anything that turns up," he promised.
IN the laboratory, Kennedy quietly set to work. He began by
tearing from the germ letter the piece of gelatin and first
examining it with a pocket-lens. Then, with a sterile platinum
wire, he picked out several minute sections of the black spot on
the gelatin and placed them in agar, blood-serum, and other media
on which they would be likely to grow.
"I shall have to wait until to-morrow to examine them properly," he remarked. "There are colonies of something there, all right, but I must have them more fully developed."
A hurried telephone-call late in the day from Miss Sears told us that Mrs. Blake herself had begun to complain, and that Doctor Wilson had been summoned but had been unable to give an opinion on the nature of the malady. Kennedy quickly decided on making a visit to the doctor, who lived not far down-town from the laboratory.
DOCTOR RAE WILSON proved to be a nervous little woman,
inclined, I felt, to be dictatorial. I thought that secretly she
felt a little piqued at our having been taken into the Blakes'
confidence before herself, and Kennedy made every effort to
smooth that aspect over tactfully.
"Have you any idea what it can be?" he asked finally.
She shook her head non-committally. "I have taken blood-smears," she answered, "but so far haven't been able to discover anything. I shall have to have her under observation for a day or two before I can answer that. Still, as Mrs. Blake is so ill, I have ordered another trained nurse to relieve Miss Sears of the added work—a very efficient nurse, a Miss Rogers."
Kennedy had risen to go. "You have had no word about your car?" he asked casually.
"None yet. I'm not worrying. It was insured."
"Who is this arch-criminal, Doctor Hopf?" I mused, as we retraced our steps to the laboratory. "Is Mrs. Blake stricken, now, by the same trouble that seems to have affected Buster?"
"Only my examination will show," Craig said. "I shall let nothing interfere with that, now. It must be the starting-point for any work that I may do in the case."
We arrived at Kennedy's workshop of scientific crime, and he immediately plunged into work. Looking up, he caught sight of me standing helplessly idle.
"Walter," he remarked thoughtfully, adjusting a microscope, "suppose you run down and see Garwood. Perhaps he has something to report. And, by the way, while you are out, make inquiries about the Blakes, young Baldwin, Miss Sears, and this Doctor Wilson. I have heard of her before, at least by name. Perhaps you may find something interesting."
Glad to have a chance to seem to be doing something, whether it amounted to anything or not, I dropped in to see Garwood. So far he had nothing to report except the usual number of false alarms. From his office I went up to the Star where, fortunately, I found one of the reporters who wrote society notes.
The Blakes, I found, as we already knew, to be well known and moving in the highest social circles. As far as known, they had no particular enemies other than those common to all people of great wealth. Doctor Wilson had a large practice, built up in recent years, and was one of the best known society-physicians for women. Miss Sears was unknown, as far as I could determine. As for Duncan Baldwin, I found that he had become acquainted with Reginald Blake at college, that he came of no particular family, and seemed to have no great means, although he was very popular in the best circles. In fact, he had had, thanks to his friend, a rather meteoric rise in society, though it was reported that he was somewhat involved in debt as a result.
I RETURNED to the laboratory to find that Craig had taken out
of a cabinet a peculiar-looking arrangement. It consisted of
thirty-two tubes, each about sixteen inches long, with S-turns,
like a minute radiator. It was altogether not over a cubic foot
in size, and enclosed in a glass cylinder. There were in it,
perhaps, fifty feet of tubes, a perfectly closed tubular system,
which I noticed Kennedy was keeping perfectly sterile in a
germicidal solution of some kind.
Inside the tubes and surrounding them was a saline solution which was kept at a uniform temperature by a special heating apparatus.
Kennedy had placed the apparatus on the laboratory table, and then gently took the little dog from his basket and laid him beside it. A few minutes later, the poor little suffering Buster was mercifully under the influence of an anesthetic.
Quickly Craig worked. First, he attached the end of one of the tubes by means of a little cannula to the carotid artery of the dog. Then the other was attached to the jugular vein.
As he released the clamp which held the artery, the little dog's feverishly beating heart spurted the arterial blood from the carotid into the tubes holding the normal salt solution, and that pressure, in turn, pumped the salt solution which filled the tubes into the jugular vein, thus replacing the arterial blood that had poured into the tubes from the other end and maintaining the normal hydrostatic conditions in the body circulation. The dog was being kept alive, although perhaps a third of his blood was out of his body.
"You see," he said, at length, after we had watched the process a few minutes, "what I have here is in reality an artificial kidney. It is a system that has been devised by several doctors at Johns Hopkins.
"If there is any toxin in the blood of this dog, the kidneys are naturally endeavoring to eliminate it. Perhaps it is being eliminated too slowly. In that case, this arrangement which I have here will aid them. We call it vividiffusion, and it depends for its action on the physical principle of osmosis, the passage of substances of a certain kind through a porous membrane, such as these tubes of celloidin.
"Thus, any substance, any poison that is dialyzable is diffused into the surrounding salt solution and the blood is passed back into the body with no air in it, no infection, and without alteration. Clotting is prevented by the injection of a harmless substance derived from leeches, known as hirudin. I prevent the loss of anything in the blood which I want retained by placing in the salt solution around the tubes an amount of that substance equal to that held in solution by the blood. Of course that does not apply to the colloidal substances in the blood, which would not pass by osmosis under any circumstances. But by such adjustments I can remove and study any desired substance in the blood, provided it is capable of diffusion. In fact, this little apparatus has been found in practise to compare favorably with the kidneys themselves in removing even a lethal dose of poison."
I watched in amazement. He was actually cleansing the blood of the dog and putting it back again, purified, into the little body. Far from being cruel, as perhaps it might seem, it was in reality probably the only method by which the animal could be saved, and at the same time it was giving us a clue as to some elusive, subtle substance used in the case.
"Indeed," Kennedy went on reflectively, "this process can be kept up for several hours without injury to the dog, though I do not think that will be necessary to relieve the unwonted strain that has been put upon his natural organs. Finally, at the close of the operation, serious loss of blood is overcome by driving back the greater part of it into his body, closing up the artery and vein, and taking good care of the animal so that he will make a quick recovery."
For a long time I watched the fascinating process of seeing the life-blood coursing through the porous tubes in the salt solution, while Kennedy gave his undivided attention to the success of the delicate experiment. It was late when I left him, still at work over Buster, and went up to our apartment to turn in, convinced that nothing more would happen that night.
THE next morning, with characteristic energy, Craig was at
work early, examining the cultures he had made from the black
spots on the gelatin.
By the look of perplexity on his face I knew that he had discovered something that further deepened the mystery.
"What do you find?" I asked anxiously.
"Walter," he exclaimed, "that stuff on the gelatin is entirely harmless. There was nothing in it except common mold."
For the moment I did not comprehend. "Mold?" I repeated.
"Yes," he replied, "just common, ordinary mold such as grows on the top of a jar of fruit or preserves exposed to the air."
I stifled an exclamation of incredulity. It seemed impossible that the deadly germ note should be harmless, in view of the events that had followed its receipt.
Just then the laboratory door was flung open and Reginald Blake, pale and excited, entered.
"What's the matter?" asked Craig.
"It's about my mother," he blurted out. "She seems to be getting worse all the time. Miss Sears is alarmed, and Betty is almost ill herself with worry. Doctor Wilson doesn't seem to know what it is that affects her. Can't you do something?"
There was a tone of appeal in his voice that was not like the self-sufficient Reginald of the day before.
"Does there seem to be any immediate danger?" asked Kennedy.
"Perhaps not—I can't say," he urged. "But she is gradually getting worse instead of better."
Kennedy thought a moment. "Has anything else happened?" he asked slowly.
"N-no. That's enough, isn't it?"
"Indeed it is," replied Craig, trying to be reassuring. Then, recollecting Betty, he added: "Reginald, go back and tell your sister for me that she must positively make the greatest effort of her life to control herself. Tell her that her mother needs her—needs her well and brave. I shall be up at the house immediately. Do the best you can. I depend on you."
Kennedy's words seemed to have a bracing effect on Reginald, and a few moments later he left, much calmer.
"I hope I have given him something to do which will keep him from mussing things up again," remarked Kennedy.
Meanwhile Craig plunged furiously into his study of the substances he had isolated from the saline solution in which he had "washed" the blood of the little Pekingese.
"There's no use doing anything in the dark," he explained. "Until we know what it is we are fighting, we can't very well fight."
For the moment I was overwhelmed by the impending tragedy that seemed to be hanging over Mrs. Blake. The more I thought of it, the more inexplicable became the discovery of the mold.
"That is all very well about the mold on the gelatin strip in the letter," I insisted, at length. "But, Craig, there must be something wrong somewhere. Mere molds could not have made Buster so ill, and now the infection, or whatever it is, has spread to Mrs. Blake herself."
He looked up from his close scrutiny of the material in one of the test-tubes which contained something he had recovered from the saline solution.
I could read on his face that, whatever it was, it was serious. "What is it?" I repeated, almost breathlessly.
"I suppose I might coin a word to describe it," he answered slowly, measuring his phrases. "Perhaps it might be called hyperamino-acidemia."
I puckered my eyes at the mouth-filling term.
Kennedy smiled. "It would mean," he explained, "a great quantity of the amino-acids—non-coagulable, nitrogenous compounds in the blood. You know the indols, the phenols, and the amins are produced both by putrefactive bacteria and by the process of metabolism, the burning-up of the tissues in the process of utilizing the energy that means life. But under normal circumstances, the amins are not present in the blood in any such quantities as I have discovered by this new method of diffusion."
He paused a moment, as if in deference to my inability to follow him on such an abstruse topic, then resumed: "As far as I am able to determine, this poison or toxin is an amin similar to that secreted by certain cephalopods found in the neighborhood of Naples. It is an aromatic amin. Smell it."
I bent over and inhaled the peculiar odor.
"Those creatures," he continued, "catch their prey by this highly active poison secreted by the so-called salivary glands. Even a little bit will kill a crab easily."
I was following him, now, with intense interest, thinking of the astuteness of a mind capable of thinking of such a poison.
"Indeed it is surprising," he resumed thoughtfully, "how many an innocent substance can be changed by bacteria into a virulent poison. In fact, our poisons and our drugs are in many instances the close relations of harmless compounds that represent the intermediate steps in the daily process of metabolism."
"Then," I put in, "the toxin was produced by germs, after all?"
"I did not say that," he corrected. "It might have been. But I find no germs in the blood of Buster. Nor did Doctor Wilson find any in the blood-smears which she took from Mrs. Blake.
"The writer of that letter," he went on, waving the piece of sterile platinum wire with which he had been transferring drops of liquid in his search for germs, "was a much more skilful bacteriologist than I thought, evidently. No; the trouble does not seem to be from germs breathed in, or from germs at all—it is from some kind of germ-free toxin that has been injected or otherwise introduced."
Vaguely, now, I began to appreciate the terrible significance of what he had discovered.
"But the letter?" I persisted mechanically.
"The writer of that was quite as shrewd a psychologist as a bacteriologist," pursued Craig impressively. "He calculated the moral effect of the letter, then of Buster's illness, and finally of reaching Mrs. Blake herself."
"You think Doctor Rae Wilson knows nothing of it yet?" I queried.
Kennedy appeared to consider his answer carefully. Then he said slowly: "Almost any doctor with a microscope and the faintest trace of a scientific education could recognize disease-germs either naturally or feloniously implanted. But when it comes to the detection of concentrated, filtered, germ-free toxins, almost any scientist might be baffled. Walter," he concluded, "this is not mere blackmail, although perhaps the visit of that woman to the Prince Henry—a desperate thing in itself, although she did get away by her quick thinking—perhaps that shows that these people are ready to stop at nothing. No; it goes deeper than blackmail."
I stood aghast at the discovery of this new method of scientific murder. The astute criminal, whoever he might be, had planned to leave not even the slender clue that might be afforded by disease-germs. He was operating not with disease itself but with something showing the ultimate effects, perhaps, of disease, with none of the preliminary symptoms, baffling even to the best of physicians.
I scarcely knew what to say. Before I realized it, however, Craig was at last ready for the promised visit to Mrs. Blake. We went together, carrying Buster in his basket, not recovered, to be sure, but a very different little animal from the dying creature that had been sent to us at the laboratory.
WE reached the Blake mansion and were promptly admitted. Miss
Betty, bearing up bravely under Reginald's reassurances, greeted
us before we were fairly inside the door, though she and her
brother were not able to conceal the fact that their mother was
no better. Miss Sears was out for an airing, and the new nurse,
Miss Rogers, was in charge of the patient.
"How do you feel this morning?" inquired Kennedy, as we entered the sun-parlor where Mrs. Blake had first received us. A single glance was enough to satisfy me of the seriousness of her condition. She seemed to be in almost a stupor, from which she roused herself only with difficulty. It was as if some overpowering toxin were gradually undermining her already weakened constitution. She nodded recognition, but nothing further.
Kennedy had set the dog-basket down near her wheel-chair, and she caught sight of it.
"Buster?" she murmured, raising her eyes. "Is—he—all right?"
For answer, Craig simply raised the lid of the basket. Buster already seemed to have recognized the voice of his mistress, and, with an almost human instinct, to realize that, though he himself was still weak and ill, she needed encouragement.
As Mrs. Blake stretched out her slender hand, drawn with pain, to his silky head, he gave a little yelp of delight, and his little red tongue eagerly caressed her hand.
It was as though the two understood each other. Although Mrs. Blake, as yet, had no idea of what had happened to her pet, she seemed to feel, by some subtle means of thought-transference, that the intelligent little animal was conveying to her a message of hope. The caress, the sharp, joyous yelp, and the happy wagging of the bushy tail seemed to brighten her up, at least for the moment, almost as if she had received a new impetus.
The happy wagging of the bushy tail seemed to
brighten her up, at least for the moment.
"Buster!" she exclaimed, overjoyed to get her pet back again in so much improved a condition.
"I wouldn't exert myself too much, Mrs. Blake," cautioned Kennedy.
"Were—were there any germs in the letter?" she asked.
"Yes, but about as harmless as those would be on a piece of cheese," Kennedy hastened.
"But I—I feel so weak, so played out—and my head...."
Her voice trailed off, a too evident reminder that her improvement had been only momentary and prompted by the excitement of our arrival.
Betty bent down solicitously and made her more comfortable, as only one woman can for another. Kennedy, meanwhile, had been talking to Miss Rogers, and I could see that he was secretly taking her measure.
"Has Doctor Wilson been here this morning?" I heard him ask.
"Not yet," she replied. "But we expect her soon."
"Professor Kennedy?" announced a servant.
"Yes?" answered Craig.
"There is someone on the telephone who wants to speak to you. He said he had called the laboratory first and that they told him to call you here."
Kennedy hurried after the servant, while Betty and Reginald joined me, waiting, for we seemed to feel that something was about to happen.
"One of the unofficial detectives has unearthed a clue," Craig whispered to me, a few moments later, when he returned. "It was Garwood." Then, to the others, he added: "A car, repainted and with the number changed, but otherwise answering the description of Doctor Wilson's, has been traced to the West Side. It is somewhere in the neighborhood of a saloon and garage where drivers of taxi-cabs hang out. Reginald, I wish you would come along with us."
To Betty's unspoken question, Craig hastened to add: "I don't think there is any immediate danger. If there is any change—let me know. I shall call up soon. And meanwhile," he lowered his voice to impress the instruction on her, "don't leave your mother for a moment."
Reginald was ready, and together we three set off to meet Garwood at a subway station near the point where the car had been reported. We had scarcely closed the front door when we ran into Duncan Baldwin coming down the street, evidently bent on inquiring how Mrs. Blake and Betty were.
"Much better," reassured Kennedy. "Come on, Baldwin. We can't have too many on whom we can rely on an expedition like this."
"Like what?" he asked, evidently not comprehending.
"There's a clue, they think, to that car of Doctor Wilson's," hastily explained Reginald, linking his arm into that of his friend and falling in behind us.
It did not take long to reach the subway, and, as we waited for the train, Craig remarked: "This is a pretty good example of how the automobile is becoming one of the most dangerous of criminal weapons. All one has to do nowadays, apparently, after committing a crime, is to jump into a waiting car and breeze away, safe."
We met Garwood and, under his guidance, picked our way westward from the better known streets in the heart of the city to a section that was anything but prepossessing.
The place which Garwood sought was a typical Raines Law hotel on a corner, with a saloon on the first floor, and apparently the requisite number of rooms above to give it a legal license.
We had separated a little, so that we would not attract undue attention. Kennedy and I entered the swinging doors boldly, while the others continued across to the other corner to wait with Garwood and take in the situation. It was a strange expedition, and Reginald was fidgeting, while Duncan seemed nervous.
Among the group of chauffeurs lounging at the bar and in the back-room, any one who had ever had any dealings with the gangs of New York might have recognized the faces of men whose pictures were in the Rogues' Gallery and who were members of those various aristocratic organizations of the underworld.
Kennedy glanced about at the motley crowd. "This is a place where you need only to be introduced properly," he whispered to me, "to have any kind of crime committed for you."
As we stood there observing, without appearing to do so, through an open window on the side street I could tell from the sounds that there was a garage in the rear.
We were startled to hear a sudden uproar from the street.
Garwood, impatient at our delay, had walked down past the garage to reconnoiter. A car was being backed out hurriedly, and, as it turned and swung around the corner, his trained eye had recognized it.
Instantly he had reasoned that it was an attempt to make a getaway and had raised an alarm.
Those nearest the door piled out, keen for any excitement. We, too, dashed out on the street. There we saw passing an automobile, swaying and lurching at the terrific speed with which its driver urged it up the avenue. As he flashed by, he looked like an Italian to me, perhaps a gunman. Garwood had impressed a passing trolley-car into service and was pursuing the automobile in it, as it swayed on its tracks as crazily as the motor did on the roadway, running with all the power the motorman could apply.
A mounted policeman galloped past us, blazing away at the tires. The avenue was stirred, as seldom even in its strenuous life, with reports of shots, honking of horns, the clang of trolley-bells, and the shouts of men.
The pursuers were losing when there came a rattle and roar from the rear wheels which told that the tires were punctured and the heavy car was riding on its rims. A huge brewery wagon crossing a side street paused to see the fun, effectually blocking the road.
The car jolted to a stop. The chauffeur leaped out and, a moment later, dived into a cellar. In that congested district, pursuit was useless.
"Only an accomplice," commented Kennedy. "Perhaps we can get him some other way if we can catch the man—or woman—higher up."
Down the street, now, we could see Garwood surrounded by a curious crowd but in possession of the car. I looked about for Duncan and Reginald. They had apparently been swallowed up in the crowds of idlers which seemed to be pouring out of nowhere.
As I ran my eye over them, I caught sight of Reginald, near the corner where we had left him, in an incipient fight with someone who had a fancied grievance. A moment later we had rescued him.
"Where's Duncan?" he panted. "Did anything happen to him? Garwood told us to stay here—but we got separated."
Policemen had appeared on the heels of the crowd, and now things seemed to be calming down.
The excitement over and the people thinning out, Kennedy still could not find any trace of Duncan. Finally, he glanced in again through the swinging doors. There was Duncan, evidently quite upset by what had occurred, fortifying himself at the bar.
Suddenly from above came a heavy thud, as if someone had fallen on the floor above us, followed by a suppressed shuffling of feet and a cry of help. Kennedy sprang toward a side door which led out into the hall to the hotel rooms above. It was locked. Before any of the others, he ran out on the street and into the hall that way, past a little cubby-hole of an "office," and down the upper hall to a door whence came the cry.
It was a peculiar room into which we burst, half bedroom, half workshop or rather laboratory, for, on a deal table by a window, stood a rack of test-tubes, several beakers, and other paraphernalia.
A chambermaid was shrieking over a woman who was lying lethargic on the floor.A chambermaid was shrieking over a woman who was lying lethargic on the floor. I looked more closely. It was Dora Sears!
A chambermaid was shrieking over a woman lying lethargic on the floor.
For the moment I could not imagine what had happened. Had the events of the past few days driven her into temporary insanity? Or had the blackmailing gang of automobile thieves, failing in extorting money by their original plan, seized her?
Kennedy bent over and tried to lift her up. As he did so, the gold bracelet, unclasped, clattered to the floor.
He picked it up and, for a moment, looked at it. It was hollow, but in that part of it where it unclasped could be seen a minute hypodermic needle.
"A poison bracelet," he muttered to himself, "one in which enough of a virulent poison could be hidden so that, in an emergency, death could cheat the law."
"But this Doctor Hopf," exclaimed Reginald, who stood behind us, looking from the insensible girl to the bracelet and slowly comprehending what it all meant; "she alone knows where and who he is!"
We looked at Kennedy. What was to be done? Was the criminal higher up to escape because one of his tools had been cornered and had taken the easiest way to get out? Kennedy had taken down the receiver of the wall telephone in the room. A moment later he was calling insistently for his laboratory. One of the students in another part of the building answered. Quickly he described the apparatus for vividiffusion and how to handle it.
"The large one," he ordered, "with one hundred and ninety-two tubes. And hurry!"
Before the student appeared there came an ambulance which someone in the excitement had summoned. Kennedy quickly commandeered both the young doctor and what surgical material he had with him.
Briefly he explained what he proposed to do, and before the student arrived with the apparatus, they had placed the nurse in such a position that they were ready.
The next room, which was unoccupied, had been thrown open to us, and there I waited with Reginald and Duncan, endeavoring to explain to them the mysteries of the new process of washing the blood.
The minutes lengthened into hours as the blood of the poisoned girl coursed through its artificial channel, literally being washed of the toxin from the bracelet.
Would it succeed? It had saved the life of Buster. But would it bring back the unfortunate before us, long enough, even, for her to yield her secret and enable us to catch the real criminal? What if she died?
As Kennedy worked, the young men with me became more and more fascinated watching him.
In the intervals when he left the apparatus in charge of the young ambulance surgeon, Kennedy was looking over the room. In a trunk, which was open, he found several bundles of papers. As he ran his eye over them quickly, he selected some and stuffed them into his pocket, then went back to watch the working of the apparatus.
Reginald, who had been growing more and more nervous, at last asked if he might call up Betty to find out how his mother was. He came back from the telephone, his face wrinkled.
"Poor mother," he remarked, anxiously, "do you think she will pull through, Professor?"
Kennedy thought for a moment. "Of course," he said, "your mother has had no such relative amount of the poison as Buster has had. I think that undoubtedly she will recover by purely natural means. I hope so. But if not, here is the apparatus," and he patted the vividiffusion tubes in their glass case, "that will save her."
As well as I could, I explained to Reginald the nature of the toxin that Kennedy had discovered. Duncan listened, putting in a question now and then. But it was evident that his thoughts were on something else, and, now and then, Reginald, breaking into his old humor, rallied him about thinking of Betty.
A low exclamation from both Kennedy and the surgeon attracted us.
Dora Sears had moved.
The operation of the apparatus was stopped; the artery and vein had been joined up, and she was slowly coming out from under the effects of the anesthetic.
As we gathered about her, we heard her cry in her delirium, "I—I—would have—done—anything for him."
We strained our ears. Was she talking of the blackmailer, Doctor Hopf?
"Who?" asked Craig, bending over.
"I—I would—have done anything," she repeated, as if some one had contradicted her. She went on, dreamily, ramblingly, "He—he—is—my brother. I—"
She stopped through weakness. "Where is Doctor Hopf?" asked Kennedy, trying to recall her fleeting attention.
"Doctor Hopf? Doctor Hopf?" she repeated, then smiling to herself as people will when they are leaving the border-line of anesthesia, she repeated the name, "Hopf?"
"Yes," persisted Kennedy.
"There is no Doctor Hopf," she added. "Tell me—did—did they—"
"No Doctor Hopf?" Kennedy insisted. She had lapsed again into half-insensibility. Craig rose and faced us, speaking rapidly:
"New York seems to have a mysterious and uncanny attraction for odds and ends of humanity, among them the great army of adventuresses. In fact, there often seems to be something decidedly adventurous about the nursing profession. This is a girl of unusual education in medicine. Evidently she has traveled—her letters show it. Many of them show that she has been in Italy. Perhaps it was there that she heard of the drug that has been used in this case. It was she who injected the germ-free toxin, first into the dog, then into Mrs. Blake, she who wrote the blackmail letter which was to have explained the death."
He paused. Evidently she had heard dimly, was straining every effort to hear. In her effort, she caught sight of our faces, and she raised herself with almost superhuman strength.
"Duncan!" she cried. "Duncan! Why—didn't you—get away—while there was time—after you warned me?"
Kennedy had wheeled about and was facing us. He was holding in his hand some of the letters he had taken from the trunk. Among others was a folded piece of parchment that looked like a diploma. He unfolded it, and we bent over to read.
It was a diploma from the Central Western College of Nursing. As I read the name written in, it was with a shock. It was not Dora Sears, but Dora Baldwin.
"A very clever plot," he ground out, taking a step nearer us. "With the aid of your sister and a disreputable gang you planned to hasten the death of Mrs. Blake, to hasten the inheritance of the Blake fortune by your future wife. I think your creditors will have less chance of collecting now than ever, Duncan Baldwin."
Roy Glashan's Library
Non sibi sed omnibus
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