Dutch Shoe Mystery (5 page)

Dr. Janney stared, seemed about to speak. But he clamped his lips firmly together, wheeled and limped back to his wall.

T
HE ANTEROOM TO THE
Amphitheater was almost square except for one corner, where it was cut off by a small cubicle. On the same wall stood a compartment, the door of which bore the words:

AMPHITHEATER LIFT

(For Operating-Room Use Only)

For the rest, there were a few of the familiar cabinets, shining with enamel and glass, a washbowl, a wheel-table and one white metal chair.

Minchen paused at the door from the theater, and commandeered the use of several chairs. These were brought in by nurses and the door closed.

Ellery stood still in the center of the room and surveyed this unpromising domain.

“Scarcely a plethora of clews, eh, Minchen?” he said with a grimace. “This, I take it, is the room in which Mrs. Doorn was kept before being taken into the theater?”

“That’s right,” replied Minchen gloomily. “Was brought in here about a quarter after ten, I think. She was certainly alive then, if that’s what you’re driving at.”

“There are a few elementary problems to solve, old man,” murmured Ellery, “besides the question of whether she was alive when they brought her into this room. By the way, how can you be sure? She was in a coma, wasn’t she? Seems perfectly possible that she might have been done in
before.”

“Janney ought to have an idea about that,” Minchen muttered. “He examined her pretty thoroughly in the theater while they were applying the oxygen and adrenalin.”

“Let’s get Dr. Janney in here.”

Dr. Minchen went to the door. “Dr. Janney,” he called in a low voice. Ellery heard the slow, limping footsteps of the surgeon approach, lag, then resume with a sudden vigor. Dr. Janney stamped into the Anteroom, regarded Ellery challengingly.

“Well, sir!”

Ellery bowed. “Be seated, Doctor. We may as well be comfortable. …” They sat down. Minchen prowled back and forth before the door to the theater.

Ellery smoothed his right palm on his knee, regarded his shoe-top lovingly. Suddenly he looked up. “I think, Doctor, it would be best for us to begin in the most incipient place—to wit, the beginning. Please relate to me the incidents of this morning in relation to Mrs. Doorn. I have an avid ear for detail. Would you mind—?”

The surgeon snorted. “Good God, man, do you want me to give you a case history now? I’ve things to do—arrangements to make—patients to see!”

“Nevertheless, Doctor,” smiled Ellery, “as you must know very well, there’s nothing quite so important in a murder investigation as the apprehension of the murderer. Perhaps you’re not familiar with the New Testament? So few scientists are! ‘Gather up the fragments that remain, that nothing be lost.’ I mean to gather up the fragments. I believe you possess some of them. Well, sir!”

Janney stared fixedly at Ellery’s cheerful lips. He darted one of his quick, keen glances at Minchen from the corner of his eye.

“I see I’m in for it. What precisely do you want me to tell you?”

“A small order. Everything.”

Dr. Janney crossed his legs, lit a cigarette with steady fingers. “At 8:15 this morning I was summoned from my first inspection in the Surgical Ward to the foot of the main stairway of the third floor. There I found Mrs. Doorn, where she had just been picked up. She had fallen from the head of the stairs and ruptured her gall-bladder as a result of the impact to her abdomen as she landed. Preliminary examination indicated that she had been seized by a typical diabetic coma while in the act of descending, and naturally, becoming unconscious, lost command of her muscular action.”

“Very good,” murmured Ellery. “You had her immediately removed, I suppose?”

“Of course!” barked the surgeon. “Had her taken to one of the private rooms on the third floor, undressed at once, and put to bed. Rupture was bad. Absolutely demanded immediate surgical attention. But the diabetic complication forced us to lower the sugar content by the dangerous but essential insulin-glucose treatments. The coma was lucky—only bit of good fortune in the whole business. Anæsthesia would have added to the risk. … As it was, we worked her sugar down to normal by these intravenous injections, and by the time I was through with a rush case in Operating Room ‘A’ the patient was already in the Anteroom, waiting.”

Ellery said swiftly, “Are you prepared to say, Doctor, that Mrs. Doorn was alive when she was wheeled into the Anteroom?”

The surgeon’s jaws clamped together. “I’m prepared to say nothing of the kind, Queen—not from personal experience. Patient was under the care of Dr. Leslie, an associate, while I operated in ‘A.’ Better ask Leslie. … From the condition of the body, though, I should say she’d been dead no longer than twenty minutes, possibly a few minutes less, when we discovered the wire around her neck.”

“I see. … Dr. Leslie, eh?” Ellery stared thoughtfully at the rubber-tiled floor. “John, old man, would you mind calling Dr. Leslie, if he’s available? It’s all right, Dr. Janney?”

“Oh, yes. Of course, of course.” Janney waved his white muscular hand negligently. Minchen left the room by the Amphitheater door, returning promptly with a white-garbed surgeon in tow—one of the men who had aided Dr. Janney.

“Dr. Leslie?”

“Arthur Leslie, that’s right,” said the surgeon. He nodded to Janney, who sat morosely in his chair puffing at his cigarette. “What’s this—an inquisition?”

“Of a sort. …” Ellery leaned forward. “Dr. Leslie, were you with Mrs. Doorn from the time Dr. Janney left her to attend his other operation until the time Mrs. Doorn was wheeled into the Amphitheater?”

“Not at all.” Leslie looked interrogatively at Minchen. “Am I suspected of murder, John? …No, old man, I wasn’t with her all the time. Left her in this Anteroom under the care of Miss Price.”

“Oh, I see! But you were with her every minute of the time before she was brought here?”

“Now you’re talking. That’s right.”

Ellery tapped his finger lightly on his knee. “Are you prepared to swear, Dr. Leslie, that Mrs. Doorn was alive when you left this room?”

The surgeon’s eyebrows went up quizzically. “Don’t know how valid my oath is, but—yes. I examined her before leaving this room. Heart was certainly pumping. She was alive, brother.”

“Well, well! We’re getting somewhere at last,” murmured Ellery. “Limits the time nicely, and corroborates Dr. Janney’s estimate about the approximate time of death. That will be all, Doctor.”

Leslie smiled, turned on his heel. “Oh, by the way, Doctor,” Ellery drawled. “At exactly what time was the patient brought into this room?”

“Ask me a harder one. 10:20. Wheeled right from her room on the third floor to the lift over there”—he pointed across the room to the door marked
AMPHITHEATER LIFT
—“and carried directly from the lift into this room. Lift’s used only to convey patients to and from operations in the Amphitheater, you know. To make the report minutely correct, Miss Price and Miss Clayton accompanied me downstairs, after which Miss Price was left to watch the patient while I went into the theater to get things ready and Miss Clayton departed for other duties. Miss Price is Dr. Janney’s assistant, you know.”

“She’s been helping Dr. Janney with Mrs. Doorn for several years,” interposed Minchen.

“Is that all?” demanded Dr. Leslie.

“Quite. Will you ask Miss Price and Miss Clayton to step in here, please?”

“Right!” Leslie departed, whistling cheerfully.

Janney stirred. “Look here, Queen, surely you don’t need me any more. Let me get out of here.”

Ellery rose, flexed his biceps. “Sorry, Doctor—we’ve still a use for you. … Ah, come in!”

Minchen opened the door wide to admit two young women in regulation white uniform.

Ellery bowed gallantly, looked from one to the other. “Miss Price—Miss Clayton?”

One of the nurses—a tall, fair girl with roguish dimples—said quickly, “Oh, I’m Clayton, sir.
This
is Miss Price. Isn’t it
dreadful?
We—”

“Undoubtedly.” Ellery stepped back, indicated two chairs. Janney had not risen. He sat glaring savagely at his left leg. “Won’t you sit down? … Now, Miss Clayton, I understand that you and Miss Price brought Mrs. Doorn down on a wheel-table from the third floor some time ago, in company with Dr. Leslie. Is that correct?”

“Yes, sir. Then Dr. Leslie went into the Amphitheater and I had to get back to Ward G—that’s off the third floor—and Miss Price remained here,” replied the tall nurse.

“Right, Miss Price?”

“Yes, sir.” The second nurse was a medium-sized brunette with fresh rosy skin and clear eyes.

“Excellent! Ellery beamed. “Miss Price, can you recall what happened while you were in this room alone with Mrs. Doorn?”

“Oh, perfectly.”

Ellery shot a quick glance toward the other occupants of the room. Janney still sat glowering; to judge from the expression on his face, he was absorbed in dour reflections. Minchen leaned against the door, intently listening. Miss Clayton was watching Ellery with a sort of frank fascination. Miss Price sat quietly, hands folded in her lap.

Ellery leaned forward.
“Miss Price, who entered this room after Dr. Leslie and Miss Clayton left?”

The extraordinary earnestness of his tone seemed to befuddle the nurse. She hesitated. “Why—no one but Dr. Janney, sir.”

“Hey?” roared Dr. Janney. He had leaped to his feet so suddenly that Miss Clayton uttered a stifled scream. “Why, Lucille, you must be mad! Do you mean to sit there and say to my face that I came into this room before the operation?”

“Why, Dr. Janney,” said the girl faintly. Her face had whitened. “I—I saw you.”

The surgeon stared at his assistant, his long simian arms dangling ludicrously to his knees. Ellery looked at Janney, at Miss Price, at Minchen—and clucked tenderly beneath his breath. When he spoke his voice was soft, a little vibrant.

“You may go now, Miss Clayton.”

The fair nurse opened her eyes widely. “Oh, but—”

“If you please.”

She left the room reluctantly, casting a longing glance back over her shoulder as Minchen closed the door behind her.

“Now!” Ellery removed his
pince-nez
eyeglasses; he began with a gentle circular motion to polish them. “We seem to have reached a slight point of disagreement. You say, Doctor, that you
weren’t
in this room before the operation?”

Janney glared. “Of course I say so! It’s the most ridiculous nonsense! Why, you yourself talked to me about 10:30 in the corridor just after I’d been operating for twenty minutes, and I don’t doubt saw me leave with Cobb the doorman to go toward the Waiting Room. How could I have been in this room? Lucille, you’re absolutely mistaken!”

“Just a moment, Doctor,” interposed Ellery. “Miss Price, at what time did Dr. Janney enter? Can you recall?”

The nurse’s fingers were nervously plucking at her starched gown. “Why—I don’t remember exactly—about 10:30—perhaps a few minutes later. Doctor, I’m—”

“And how do you know it was Dr. Janney, Miss Price?”

She laughed, nervously. “Why, naturally I thought—I just recognized him—I took it for granted it was Dr. Janney. …”

“Ah! You took it for granted?” said Ellery. He took a swift step forward. “Why, didn’t you see his face? Surely, if you had seen his face you’d have known
positively.”

“Certainly!” interrupted Janney. “You’ve known me long enough, Lucille. I can’t understand—” Beneath his irritation he seemed bewildered. Minchen looked on in stupefaction.

“Oh, you—he wore gown, cap and gag,” stammered the girl, “so I could only see the eyes—but—well, he
limped,
sir, and he was about the same height, and—you see, that’s what I mean by taking it for granted. You never quite know
why.”

Janney stared at her. “By God, some one’s been impersonating me!” he cried. “That’s it! I’m damn easy to impersonate … game leg … gag … Queen, some one—some one …”

E
LLERY PLACED A RESTRAINING
hand on the little surgeon’s quivering arm. “Take it easy, Doctor. Sit down, sit down. We’ll get to the bottom of this only too quickly. … Well. Come in!”

There had been a short knock on the door. It opened now to admit a giant of a man in street clothes. He had tremendous shoulders, light eyes, a rock-ribbed face.

“Velie!” exclaimed Ellery. “Dad here already?”

The newcomer under thick brows examined Janney, Minchen, the nurse. … “No, Mr. Queen. On his way. Men from the local precinct and detectives from District Headquarters are here. Want to come in. I suppose you don’t want—” He glanced significantly at Ellery’s audience.

“No, no, Velie,” said Ellery quickly. “Keep those fellows busy outside. Don’t let any of ’em in here until I give the word. Let me know the instant dad arrives.”

“Okay.” The giant retreated silently, and as silently closed the door behind him.

Ellery addressed the nurse again. “Now, Miss Price, you must be as exact as if your life depended upon accuracy. Tell me just what happened in here all the time from the moment Dr. Leslie and Miss Clayton left you alone with Mrs. Doorn until she was wheeled into the theater next door.”

The nurse moistened her lips and cast a shy, nervous glance at the surgeon, who had subsided into his chair and was watching her with dull eyes.

“I—well …” she laughed forcedly. “It’s so simple, really—Mr. Queen, is it? …Dr. Leslie and Miss Clayton left directly after we brought Mrs. Doorn down here from the third floor room. There was nothing for me to do. The doctor had taken another look at the patient and everything was apparently all right. … Of course you know that no anæsthesia was used?” Ellery nodded. “That meant that it wasn’t necessary for an anæsthetist to be present with me, nor for me to watch the patient’s pulse continually. She was in a coma and ready for the operation. …”

“Yes, yes,” said Ellery impatiently, “we know that, Miss Price. Please get on to your visitor.”

The nurse flushed. “Yes, sir. … The man I—I thought was Dr. Janney came into the Anteroom about ten or fifteen minutes after Dr. Leslie, and Miss Clayton left. He—”