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ONE DROP OF BLOOD


Author of
THE BLACK PIGEON
MURDER BACKSTAIRS
MURDER AT BRIDGE
THE AVENGING PARROT
etc.


ONE DROP OF BLOOD
A MYSTERY NOVEL
BY
ANNE AUSTIN
NEW YORK
THE MACMILLAN COMPANY
1932


COPYRIGHT, 1932,
By ANNE AUSTIN.
All rights reserved-no part of this book may be
reproduced in any form without permission in writing
from the publisher, except by a reviewer who wishes
to quote brief passages in connection with a review
written for inclusion in magazine or newspaper.
Set up and electrotyped. Published February, 1932.
jin
SET UP BY BROWN BROTHERS LINOTYPERS
PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
BY THE FERRIS PRINTING COMPANY


FOR
R. H. W
AND
AGNES FAHY, R.N.





Bequest
0.4 Butler
11-21-39
The invaluable advice and criticism of the staff
of Compton Sanitarium, Compton, California,
during the writing of this novel, is gratefully
acknowledged by the author.





ONE DROP OF BLOOD





ONE DROP OF BLOOD
CHAPTER ONE
“SURE you wouldn't be better off in a hospital, Chief?”.
James F. Dundee rose, to end his call upon the district
attorney, who had been laid very flat by an attack of
pleurisy.
Sanderson started to chuckle, then clapped a hand to his
right side, as a grimace of pain contracted his pleasantly
homely, freckled face. “Whoever first described this pain
as like the thrust of a knife hit on the only apt simile for
it in the English language,” he groaned, but his gray eyes
twinkled affectionately at his "special investigator." "No,
Bonnie me lad, as Captain Strawn calls you, I haven't the
heart to cheat my sister of the thrill of playing nurse. She
has a passion for thermometers, hot-water bottles and in-
valid trays, that amounts to an obsession. Our mother
used to say that Nell would resort to feeding the family
small doses of poison, if she couldn't get hold of an invalid
in any other way."
"Well, don't let her kill you with kindness,” Dundee
grinned. “Things are dismally quiet now, but we're just
about due for another crime wave.”
“Can't kill a husky like me," District Attorney Sander-
son boasted. “I'll be thirty-six in July, but damned if I
don't feel more like a colt than I did at twenty-one. ...
By the way, what do you hear from—from Penny?”
Dundee stopped halfway to the door of the sickroom.
"From Penelope Crain?” he asked, as if it had required a
prodigious feat of memory to dig up the full name of his


ONE DROP OF BLOOD
to ask, wiongratulations a fiery reamazement maised, grin-
chief's former secretary. "Haven't had a letter for months.
... How is she liking law school by this time? A grand
little female spellbinder Penny ought to make, that is, if
she can keep from bawling out the judge when he makes
a decision she doesn't like.”
"She is a peppery little piece,” Sanderson agreed, grin-
ning broadly, but to Dundee's amazement his chief's
freckled face was turning a fiery red.
"Are—congratulations in order, Chief?” he managed
to ask, with great cheeriness, but his heart contracted
sharply with a return of the old pain of which he had
thought it cured. Darling little Penny! Clever, quick,
thorny little Penny, who had helped him so marvelously,
so chummily in the solving of the famous Bridge Murder
Mystery.*
"I—I thought maybe she'd written you,” Sanderson
stammered. “You two were great friends, weren't you?
I confess I was afraid you'd beaten me to the prize,
Bonnie. "
"Oh, no! No!” Dundee reassured him, with unneces-
sary vehemence. "Nothing like that, Chief! I'll have to
be making a lot more money and have a more dignified
job than that of a common dick' before I can ask a girl
like Penny Crain to marry me."
"I'm afraid there isn't another girl like Penny Crain,"
Sanderson smiled almost fatuously. "But you're not a
'common dick,' and you know it. You're an expert crim-
inologist, and I'm damned proud to have you attached to
my office. . . . You're not quoting Penny, by any
chance?”
"I never gave her a chance to turn me down,” Dundee
answered, his blue eyes frank and friendly again. “But I
don't mind telling you that you're the luckiest man in the
world, Mr. Sanderson. . . . When is it to be?”
* Recounted in "Murder at Bridge," by Anne Austin (Macmillan,
1931).


ONE DROP OF BLOOD
"Oh, not for another year yet," the district attorney
answered, with sudden glumness. "Penny insists on grad-
uating from law school—Now, who the devil can be ring-
ing me at this time of the night?” He stilled the clamor of
the telephone bell by lifting the receiver. "Hello! . .
Yes, this is the district attorney speaking . . . Dr. who?
... Oh, yes, Dr. Cantrell . . . What's that? ...
Dr. Koenig!? My God! ... Yes . . . Yes ... How
long—? ... Yes, I see . . . Any idea who—?... I
see . . . You have my heartfelt sympathy, Dr. Cantrell.
It's a national tragedy. ... No, Doctor, I'm sorry to say
I can't come in person. A nasty attack of pleurisy. But
I'll send young Dundee, special investigator attached to
my office. I consider him the ablest detective I have ever
met. ... Thanks. By the way, have you notified the
police? ... Then I'll call them for you ... No, no.
I'm quite equal to it. Glad to relieve you of the job.
You'll see that nothing is disturbed, of course. . . . Ter-
ribly sorry, Doctor. Good-bye.”
Dundee waited tensely, like a hunter poised to take a
fence. Very slowly the district attorney replaced the tele-
phone receiver.
"Dr. Carl Koenig,” he began heavily, "was murdered
tonight in his office at the Mayfield Sanitarium. Exit a
fine man and a great psychiatrist. ... The back of his
head cracked open-God!”
"Who did it?-a loony patient?” Dundee asked.
"That will be the conclusion both police and news.
papers will jump at, of course, since it seems to be one of
those motiveless, clueless mysteries,” Sanderson answered.
"That was Dr. Cantrell on the phone—medical head of
the sanitarium, and sort of a partner, I believe. . . . Well,
hop to it, boy, and keep in touch with me. Why, damn it!
Koenig was a friend of mine, as well as the finest alienist
I ever had on the witness stand.”
But Dundee did not "hop” instantly. "Can you give me


ONE DROP OF BLOOD
a line on the sanitarium, Chief? Are most of the patients
crazy?"
"Not by any means," Sanderson assured him. "Only a
small minority of the patients have been 'committed
that is, adjudged insane in court. Those are in a locked
ward, of course. Then there's quite a large group of more
or less mild psychopathic cases, voluntary patients—cases
of senility, incipient paresis, epilepsy, manic depression,
chronic alcoholism, amnesia, aphasia, and victims of all
sorts of complexes, psychoses and neuroses, harmful, usu-
ally, to no one but themselves. In addition, the place has
become the most fashionable 'rest cure and convalescent
home in the state. Society women go there to indulge in
'nervous prostration' or the luxury of being psychoana-
lyzed, and rich men to be 'boiled out after a prolonged
spree. A good example of the latter is that handsome
scapegrace, young Webster. He's in and out of the place
half a dozen times a year—seems to enjoy it."
"Expensive?” Dundee interrupted.
"A big price range, but they've rather gone in for luxury
for those that can afford it," Sanderson answered. “Suites
of sitting room, bedroom and bath, at a hundred and fifty
a week, I believe, and even separate cottages that are pretty
darned ultra. Dr. Koenig's reputation as a psychiatrist,
neurologist and psychoanalyst is so great that he's been
the making of the place from a financial standpoint. It's
now considered smart to go to Mayfield for treatment,
whereas it used to be considered a disgrace to have to go
into a 'mental hospital.'"
"Know anyone else there, sir?"
"I think not. No, wait! Bruce Cantrell found himself
a peach of a wife among the patients, one of our society
girls who went there to be psychoanalyzed a year or so
ago. Claire Hobson, she was; pretty and rich as butter.
".. But you'd better get going, my lad."
"Right, sir! But give me a ten or fifteen minutes start
"I think notwife among the bychoanalyzed ich as butte


ONE DROP OF BLOOD
Wichis Poor pe tice in the site eleverish black
before you notify Captain Strawn, won't you? I'd like to
have a few uninterrupted moments on the scene of the
crime. By the way, where is the sanitarium?”
Within two minutes Dundee had his roadster headed
south, his foot pressing hard upon the accelerator, for
there was little traffic in the streets of Hamilton at that
hour of the night—a quarter to eleven. The cool June
breeze lifted the crisp waves of his Irish black hair, hat-
free, and fanned into flame the recently quenched fires of
hope and ambition. Life was good, when it could so easily
fling one into a big new job, the kind of adventure he liked
best in the world. A new job, a new—Good Lord! He
caught himself up sharply, half amused and half ashamed.
He'd almost said, "A new job, a new girl!" Of course he
was miserable. Hadn't he lost precious, funny, peppery
little Penny? Ye-e-es. But Well, he told himself
defiantly, every one of his three big jobs heretofore in
Hamilton had brought him a new girl. Why not admit it?
Hadn't he felt almost as badly over Norma Paige's being
disgustingly satisfied with Walter Styles; over Gigi Berke-
ley's being just a little too young to be taken seriously?
And now Penny Crain had broken his heart. . . . But
was it really broken? Wasn't it true that, a mystery tri-
umphantly solved, a murderer unmasked, the romantic ad-
venture which had gone hand in hand with the adventure
of crime-detection always displayed an alarming tendency
to write Finis for itself too? Perhaps—and he grinned at
the thought-if he ran into an unsolvable crime and a
lovable girl at the same time, he'd be permanently
intrigued by both. ....
A new job, a new girl, his blood persisted in singing to
the hum of his speeding motor. . . . But that was absurd,
his common sense objected. What more unlikely place for
romance than a sanitarium for "mental” cases?
Suddenly his handsome young face became grim and
purposeful, as, throwing off nonsense, he recalled the first


ONE DROP OF BLOOD
and last time he had seen the famous psychiatrist. Dr.
Carl Koenig had been called by District Attorney Sander-
son as an expert witness, to testify as to the legal sanity of
a confessed murderer on trial for his life, and whom bril-
liant defense attorneys were trying to save on a plea of
insanity.
As if he were before him then, in a phantom witness
box, Dundee saw the thin, dark, rather small man, with
his lean, clever face uplifted in an attitude of patient
listening, as a defense attorney read a long hypothetical
question requiring the alienist's uncompromising "Yes"
or “No.” He saw those smoky dark eyes, sad eyes they
were, light up for an instant with a gleam of humor, as he
uttered an answer which confounded his heckler. The
face of a scholar and of an ascetic, a Christlike face, the
lips thin but mobile, the swart skin drawn tight over high
cheek bones, the nose high-bridged and wide-nostrilled.
Not a man to be greeted as "Doc" and clapped on the
back. Not a man for a patient to get chummy with, but a
man of such sincere humanitarianism, Dundee believed,
that any patient could trust him with any secret, however
vile and shameful, and find in his tortured mind a great
peace after the telling. ....
And now the famous healer of sick minds was dead.
Murdered. As unjustly dead as was justly dead the mur-
derer against whom he had given expert testimony. Would
there be another courtroom battle between alienists, with
perhaps the ghost of the great Koenig whispering in a col-
league's ear: "Forgive him. He knew not what he did.”
His speedometer told Dundee that he had been traveling
for nearly five miles along Mirror Lake Road. He slowed
down, and began to search for the highway sign that
would tell him when he had reached Willow Creek Drive,
the turning which would take him, after a hundred yards
or so, to Mayfield Sanitarium.
If he had known the road and had been driving fast he
man of Not a man freeted as Fidged and


ONE DROP OF BLOOD
would probably not have noticed, in the darkness which
was doubly black in contrast with the light from his head-
lamps, that which caused him to step so hard and so sud-
denly upon his footbrake that he was almost catapulted
over his own windshield.
And if her dress had not been white — But he did
see and he did stop, after swerving his car so that the head-
lights threw their bright glare across the huddled body
of a girl.
For a moment he thought she was dead, her fragile body
crushed and flung into the roadside weeds by a hit-and-run
driver. But as he knelt to lift her she moaned faintly, and
the largest pair of dark blue eyes he had ever seen fluttered
open and gazed upward at him with curious trustfulness,
as if she were looking at a very old friend.
"Hello!” he greeted her happily, out of the profound-
ness of his relief.
"How do you do?” she returned with quaint politeness,
lifting a hand feebly to push back the tumbled golden-
chestnut curls from her childlike forehead. But with the
gesture she seemed to remember many things. Fear dis-
torted her delicate, very white face.
"Are you a—a policeman?" she amazed him by asking,
as she cowered away from the hands which were extended
to help her rise.
"No," Dundee answered, truthfully enough. "Why?”
But she was not satisfied. One fragile, beautifully kept
hand fluttered to his coat and turned back the left lapel.
Reassured, she sighed and sank back upon her pillow of
dusty weeds.
"I think,” she said faintly, without answering his ques-
tion, "I've sprained my ankle. Probably it's broken. It
hurts dreadfully. ... I was running away,” she explained
simply. “Will you help me to run away?”
"We'll discuss that later,” Dundee retorted cheerfully.
"First, I'm going to take you to Mayfield Sanitarium,


.
ONE DROP OF BLOOD
"No, no! Not there!” she panted, her whole body
shrinking away from him. “Any place else—a hospital in
Hamilton—anywhere ”
"But I'm on my way there myself, and it's the nearest,'
Dundee reasoned with her gently.
"You-going to Mayfield?” she cried in horror.
"You poor kid!” Dundee ejaculated, but he was smil-
ing. "You've got an idea that all the patients there are
crazy. Isn't that it?”
"No." She shook her head and closed her eyes with
great weariness. "It's—Mayfield I'm running away from.”
"And you thought I was a policeman sent to bring
you in-dead or alive?” Dundee asked, smiling more
broadly. Then a cold chill raced down his spine. Only in-
sane patients could fear such an aftermath to running away
—those who had been committed. ... Was this lovely,
frail girl-crazy?
"Yes, yes!” she answered quickly. "I was afraid they'd
-missed me and sent the police after me. I was afraid
they'd put me in the locked ward for running away.”
"Then you're not a locked ward patient?” he asked
tactlessly.
"Ima locked ward patient?" she echoed indignantly.
"Certainly not! I'm there for—for nerves.”
"I see," Dundee said gently, not believing her for an
instant. What a terrible pity that one so young, so lovely
should be demented. . . . "But I'll really have to take
you back, you know, since I have to go there myself— ”
"It's long past visiting hours," the girl protested. “And
you can't be going as a patient. I'm sure you're not
nervous, or—or anything queer, and you look awfully
healthy— "
Dundee made a sudden resolve. “I'm sorry to say I am
going as a patient. I've been working too hard,” he went
on, lying gracelessly but convincingly. “My doctor orders
rest and regular hours—that sort of thing. You see,” and
he grinned, making use of his earlier reflections on his sus-


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 9
genoved the hich shevith paipundee hele he hade newspapers
ceptibility, “I'm subject to heart attacks. No organic
disease; purelymer, functional, but quite distressing at the
time.”
"Oh!” the girl breathed softly, and stroked his hand
with a rose-tipped, slim forefinger. "I'm so sorry."
"And I'm afraid,” Dundee took advantage of her
shamelessly but truthfully, "that I feel an attack coming
on now."
"Then—then good-bye,” she quavered, and lay back on
her bed of weeds. "Please don't tell anyone you saw me."
"Silly! Do you think I'm going to leave you here?"
And over her hysterical protests Dundee lifted her feather-
weight but rather long body in his arms and carried her to
his roadster.
After the car was bowling along the highway again the
girl suddenly ceased to struggle and protest. Dundee had
removed the little white sandal from her badly swollen
left foot, which she now nursed against her right knee,
whimpering softly with pain.
"What's your name?" Dundee asked, partly to divert
her. "Mine is Dundee,” he added, for he had determined
not to resort to the use of an alias. Outside of newspaper
and police circles he was known scarcely at all. There was
scant probability that any patient at Mayfield Sanitarium
would recognize his name or suspect his connection with
the district attorney's office.
"E-Enid Rambler," she told him, and Dundee won-
dered if her. "nerves” caused her to stammer.
"That's a pretty name,” Dundee commented idly. "I
don't think I've ever known any Ramblers except the an-
cient automobiles of that name.”
Oddly enough, the girl shrank from him at that. ...
A queer little thing she was. . .
"Isn't this where we turn?" He slowed the car to scan
a highway sign. "Yes. Willow Creek Drive. You were
going to let me miss my turn, weren't you?”
Sulking, Dundee decided, as she did not answer. But


10
ONE DROP OF BLOOD
after he had made the right-hand turn, a swift glance told
him that she was not sulking. The expression on her rigid
face and in her unwinking, staring eyes was that of hope-
less despair.
"Why were you running away?” he asked, very gently.
She appeared not to have heard.
Suddenly the detective instinct in him asserted itself
over the knight-to-ladies-in-distress. "When did you run
away?"
She answered that, dully: "I don't know what time it
was. I was nervous. I get that way—hysterical. I can't
sit still or lie still. I wandered around, looking for the
head nurse, Miss Lacey, or for one of the doctors to give
me a bromide. But I couldn't find anyone, so I—I walked
about the grounds for a—a long time. Then I ran away.
The gates are never locked.”
Even if the gates she had referred to had not loomed
ahead of him then he would not have dared question her
further, for fear of exciting her suspicions as to his busi-
ness at Mayfield. He swung his roadster between the high
stone pillars and drove slowly along the winding, box-
hedged driveway. On either side lay acres of beautifully
kept lawn, studded with formal flower beds and majestic
trees, the whole faintly lighted by powerful electric lamps
set at intervals along the base of the high wrought-iron
fence.
"Don't take me to the offices," the girl begged, her
hands gripping his right arm with sudden vehemence.
"Take me nearly to the door of the cottage I live in, and
let me out. Then drive away and I'll call for help. A
nurse will be sure to hear me. Please, please! If they
know I've run away-
Because of the mounting hysteria in her voice Dundee
agreed, silently regretful that he would have to betray her
to Captain Strawn, turn her over to him for questioning.
For even if she did not know that Dr. Koenig had been
ahe even if the never lochana, long


ONE DROP OF BLOOD
11
murdered, by her own confession she had been "wandering
around" either shortly before or shortly after the murder.
Probably the girl herself did not have the least idea how
long she had lain unconscious after spraining her ankle,
but Strawn would certainly pounce upon her. ...
"Stop here!” the girl commanded. “That's my cottage
over there. I'll crawl along on my hands and knees till I
get to the steps, and I'll tell Miss Hunter-she's the night
attendant—that I sprained my ankle while walking on the
grounds
"Do you have a cottage to yourself?” Dundee asked, as
he stopped the car.
“Oh, no. Just a suite. There are six suites in Sunflower
Court. They're built around a patio, where we can sit
when we don't want to be on the main lawn with the other
patients,” Enid Rambler explained hurriedly. "There's a
vacancy. Maybe they'll assign you to it,” she added shyly,
but hopefully.
"That would be nice," Dundee agreed, his mind in-
stantly made up to subject the county to that expense,
however large it might be. "Sure you'll be all right?_not
faint again?
"Sure,” she whispered. “And thank you with all my
heart, Mr. Dundee. Only-I wish you hadn't made me
come back,” she added, terror again stamping her delicate,
mobile face. "The main building is straight ahead. It's
the biggest building. You can't miss it.”
Ruefully aware that the accident of his discovering the
crippled runaway had cost him several of the precious
minutes by which he had planned to beat Captain Strawn
to the scene of the crime, Dundee drove rapidly up the
driveway and stopped in a vacant space in a row of several
cars parked diagonally in front of the main building. To
his vast relief, Captain Strawn's car was not among them,
nor was any policeman on guard.
He was walking toward the steps leading to the broad


12
ONE DROP OF BLOOD
porch of the cream-colored brick building when a man
stepped from behind one of the white Doric columns, a
flashlight and a metal box in his hands.
"I'm the night watchman, sir. Who you want to see?”
"Dr. Cantrell. He's expecting me.”
"You're from the district attorney's office, sir?"
"Yes.”.
"I'll take you in, sir. I was just going to register the
hour on my rounds. Eleven o'clock, but—" and the griz-
zled, heavy-bodied man sighed, as he pointed to the dial
of the boxed clock he was carrying, "all is not well. ...
It's a sad night for Mayfield, sir, a mighty sad night.”
"You check in here every hour?” Dundee asked.
"Yes, sir. And parole the grounds and buildings all
night long."
"Did you see or hear anything at all unusual to-night?”
"No, sir. That is, not until Miss Hunter, who's night
attendant over at Sunflower Court told me to look about
the grounds for one of her patients a young lady by the
name of Rambler. Rambler by name, and now rambler in
fact, it looks like, sir-
"I found her unconscious on the highway. A sprained
ankle. I've just set her down at Sunflower Court,” Dundee
explained impatiently. "And please tell Miss Hunter for
me to keep the girl under constant supervision for the
rest of the night. . . . Now, outside of Miss Rambler's
disappearance ?"
"Nothing, sir, until Dr. Cantrell blew his whistle for
me half an hour ago. I was over at 'Ten'-that's what we
call the locked ward, sir—and when I got here Dr.
Cantrell told me Dr. Koenig had been killed, and asked
me if I'd seen any suspicious characters about, but I told
him, with all the comings and goings to-night- "
"What's that?" Dundee cut in sharply.
"We have a picture show every Wednesday night, sir,
in the O. T. Shop, and nearly all the patients are allowed
To looks liker. Rama


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 13
to invite guests to see the show, so there's always a lot of
strangers about of a Wednesday night.”
"Where and what is the O. Ť. Shop?” Dundee asked.
"O. T. stands for Occupational Therapy, sir," the night
watchman answered, with a trace of condescension.
"Where the patients make baskets and shawls and hooked
rugs and pottery. It's good for their nerves, sir. The O. T.
Shop is in this building, sir, a big room at the center
back. Talking pitchures we have, sir. We spare no
expense-
Dundee grinned at the proud use of the personal pro-
noun, but he made haste to interrupt. “And at what time
was the show over to-night?”
"It was an extry long pitchure, a fine new talkie called
Manslaughter,' all about a girl that gets sent to prison for
killing a traffic cop with her automobile-
“Yes, yes, I know! But when was it over?"
"There was a comedy first,” the night watchman went
on, a little offended, "and then the feature pitchure, and
futhermore the operator was nearly an hour late getting
here, so it was just turned ten, because it was almost time
for me to clock in- ”
"And you'd been watching the show, of course?” Dun-
dee pounced.
"Off and on, sir, everything being quiet-like," the man
admitted.
"So that Dr. Koenig could have been murdered while
you were enjoying 'Manslaughter,'” Dundee drove in his
point relentlessly. Then: "Āre any patients quartered in
this building?"
"No," Whalen answered flatly, omitting the "sir."
"Some of the staff have apartments on the second floor,
and downstairs we have the doctors' offices, and the chart-
room where Miss Lacey—she's the head nurse—has her
desk, and then there's a big living room with a fireplace
for the use of the patients, besides the O. T. Shop. And in


14 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
in no their is room fetchen, ut
the left wing there's the main kitchen, the staff's dining
room, and another dining room for the men patients who
don't want trays in their rooms.
"We'll go in now," Dundee cut into the watchman's
volubility. "Is this door usually closed?”
"No, sir, except in cold weather, and then it's not
locked. There's likely to be comings and goings all night,
and the night head nurse is on duty in the chartroom. But
the other outside doors to the doctors' offices are locked at
night, after the secretary, Miss Horne, is gone, unless one
of the doctors is working late.”
"Other outside doors?" Dundee repeated. “How many
are there?”
"There's an outside front entrance, sir, just to the right
of this porch, leading into the reception room where Miss
Horne and Dr. Harlow—that's Dr. Koenig's young lady
doctor—do their work, and where patients and visitors are
received,” the night watchman explained, with a returning
relish of his importance as guide. “Dr. Koenig's office is
right behind the little reception room, and to the right of
his office with a door between is Dr. Cantrell's office. And
there's a back outside door to Dr. Cantrell's office. He
uses it to go home, sir. His house is about two hundred
feet back of the office.”
Without comment, Dundee followed the watchman
into a large central hall, pleasantly furnished with lamps,
chairs and settees.
"This first door on your right opens into the reception
room, and that next one into Dr. Koenig's office,” Whalen
continued, then, shaking his grizzled head lugubriously:
"And this is the first time I ever knowed the Big Doctor's
door to be shut when he was in his office. Always open it
was, sir, no matter how busy he might be - '
"Why?” Dundee asked, surprised.
"Because, sir, a lot of our patients are not exactly what
you'd call theirselves, in a manner of speaking, and they


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 15
get so nervous and upset that nothing will do them any
good but to speak to Dr. Koenig himself. So they ain't no
red tape here, Mister. A patient can—I mean could walk
right in on the Big Doctor and have a chin with him any
time of the day or night, if he was in his office. I don't
know what we'll do without him. Looks to me like the
place will go to the dogs— "
"I hope not. ... This is the living room for the
patients' use, I suppose?” and Dundee nodded toward the
wide, arched doorway on his left, beyond which he could
see a piano, a huge sofa, a set-up bridge table, smoking
stands, overstuffed armchairs, and floor lamps.
"Yes, sir. It's used mostly by the bridge players in the
evening after it gets too dark to play on the lawn.”
"Was there a game this evening?” Dundee asked hope-
fully, since players would have a clear view of the doctor's
office directly across the hall.
"No, sir, more's the pity,” the watchman answered
gloomily. "You see, sir, nearly all the patients was attend-
ing the pitchure show this evening. Like as not, if the
bridge game had been going on as usual the murderer-
may he burn in hell!—wouldn't have had a chance to kill
the poor doctor and wreck his office without somebody
hearing the fuss he made."
. "You're probably right," Dundee assured him, then
wheeled to face a small, gray-haired, pale-faced nurse who
had entered from the porch. "Good evening. I've come
to see Dr. Cantrell. He's expecting me.”
"Oh, yes, sir,” the nurse gasped. "I'm sorry I wasn't
here when you arrived. I was busy giving a hypodermic to
a patient in 'Ten.' I'll tell Dr. Cantrell you're here,
Mr.— ?"
"Dundee, from the district attorney's office. . . . Just
a minute, Mr. Whalen,” the detective halted the watch-
man, who was moving on. "I may find it necessary to stay
on here for a day or two, and if I do it will be as a patient.


16 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
Duca.
You understand? None of the patients is to know what
I am here for."
"Yes, sir, yes, sir!” Whalen answered eagerly, gloom
giving way to keen relish.
And the nurse smiled at Dundee from tear-reddened
eyes before scurrying across the hall to knock at the recep-
tion-room door.
Dundee was not kept waiting. Two men and two
women rose to receive him as the night nurse slipped
away, closing the door after her. A rather stout man, of
perhaps forty, advanced with outstretched hand.
"Mr. Dundee? I'm Dr. Cantrell, medical head of
Mayfield Sanitarium.”
Burning, deep-sunken black eyes under an incongruous
thatch of rust-colored hair held 'Dundee's eyes briefly be-
fore the doctor continued:
"And this is Dr. Harlow-Dr. Justine Harlow, Dr.
Koenig's assistant psychiatrist.”
He paused impatiently for the small and very girlish,
pretty young doctor to shake hands with the detective;
then:
"And this is Mr. Baldwin, our business manager, and
a partner with Dr. Koenig and myself. . . . And this is
Miss Lacey, our head nurse.'
Dundee shook hands first with the nurse, whose Irish
youthfulness of face was belied by the threads of white
in her curling black hair, then gave his attention to the
business manager. And he felt a swift, unreasoning dis-
like of Mr. Baldwin. In the first place, the man was physi-
cally most unattractive, with his insignificant, round-
shouldered body, his glistening, egg-shaped head whose
bald area was fringed with thin, white hair, his curiously
dead-looking brown eyes, and his hooked nose pointing to
a tightly pursed mouth. But it was something more subtle
than physical appearance which repelled Dundee. He fum-
bled for an explanation and found it before Baldwin's


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 17.
limp hand had quickly released his own firm clasp. There
was a complete absence of decent grief in the man. His
partner had been brutally murdered, and this man was not
grieving. He was angry, disturbed, indignant. But he was
not grief-stricken. The obvious desolation of the two
women and the burning sorrow in the medical doctor's
eyes put him to shame. And they were all aware, too, of
Baldwin's callousness to the tragedy, for Dundee was posi-
tive that they shrank from him, huddled together spir-
itually for consolation.
As the detective was about to voice his personal grief
for the man he had seen only once, but had respected and
admired deeply, the business manager cut in sharply:
"Yes, yes. But there is something I must request imme-
diately, sir, immediately! Since you are representing the
district attorney, and will therefore have prestige with
the reporters who are certain to flock around like vultures,
I must insist- ” He may have realized that he was
going too far, for the pursed lips sucked in a whistling
breath before shaping more tactful words. “I must beg
of you, Mr. Dundee, to do everything in your power to
keep the press from jumping to the conclusion that one of
our patients murdered Dr. Koenig!"
"But—if the evidence points to that conclusion?” Dun-
dee asked mildly.
"If it does, I assure you that the murderer faked it very
cleverly," Baldwin assured him vehemently. "Wouldn't
that be the natural thing for the fiend to do? Not only to
throw suspicion from himself, but to bring ruin upon the
institution which Dr. Koenig's great skill and outstanding
· reputation have built up. And I must ask you to help
defeat that base intention, Mr. Dundee. Prospective pa-
tients will shun us like the plague if they are led to believe
that not even the doctors themselves are safe from the
violence of demented patients. I tell you, sir, every pre-
caution is taken here-


18 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
"May I see the body, please?” Dundee interrupted
curtly. The old fool! Did he think he was making a
speech before a jury? And was he so concerned with bal-
ance sheets that he would be more than willing to have his
partner's death unavenged, if the murderer should indeed
be one of his precious and profitable patients? Every
precaution indeed! When he-Dundee himself-had
found a patient unconscious by the roadside a mile from
the sanitarium; when he had been in the hall of the main
building for minutes before even a nurse had appeared;
when Dr. Koenig's office had been accessible that night
from at least three unlocked doors, while visitors and
patients had swarmed in and out of the building!
It was Dr. Cantrell who, after a glance of bitter con-
tempt at his partner, was about to lead the way into the
small office where the murder had been committed, when
the outside door was opened unceremoniously and a very
plump, cherubic man bounded into the room.
"Hello, folks! 'Happy' Day is here again!" the man yo-
deled, his round face one vast smile, which abated some-
what with embarrassment as his beaming brown eyes
encountered Dundee. " 'Scuse! Didn't know you were
busy!”
"It's all right, 'Happy'," Dr. Harlow quavered, as if his
joyousness hurt every nerve in her body. "I'm glad you
got my message. It's your friend, Archie, this time. He's
over in 'Ten.'
"Thanks, doc! That's swell. Archie's a great kid. Be-
lieve me, I'm glad to get another case so soon. I feel like
a fish out of water when I'm not at Mayfield.”
Dundee permitted the man to bounce blithely away,
before he asked Dr. Harlow: "And who is the happy
young man?”
The girl doctor smiled tremulously. "His nickname
does suit him, doesn't it? His name is Howard Day, but
everyone calls him 'Happy' Day. He is one of our most
plumpello, folkind face


ONE DROP OF BLOOD
19
nsferred M has been on calles was overdue,
popular attendants. The case he had been on for a long
time was transferred Monday to the State Hospital for
Mental Diseases, and he has been 'on call' since."
Because time was pressing, and Strawn was overdue,
Dundee forebore to inquire into the popular attendant's
new case. His chief interest now lay in the murdered doc-
tor's office. And one sweeping glance sufficed to show
Dundee that Business Manager Baldwin had good cause
to fear that suspicion would fall upon one of Mayfield's
demented patients.


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 21
it sink swhat time was in the disorder inkwell both
itself which had crashed through the skull of the doctor,
for it bore traces of its gruesome use—a few short black
hairs matted to the bronze with dried blood.
Inserting the toe of his boot beneath the body of the
bronze athlete, Dundee raised the statue an inch or so
from the rug, stared thoughtfully for a moment, then let
it sink slowly into its former place.
"At what time was the murder discovered?” Dundee
asked, as his eyes took in the disorder of the desk: pulled-
out drawers, a flower vase and an inkwell both over-
turned upon the blotter, ashes and stubs scattered from a
metal cigarette tray and wet from the same fluids which
had stained the bowed face of the dead man. The three
lovely roses, which almost touched the nose that could
no longer inhale their fragrance, had also been stained
with ink. Unusual roses they were, too: their gold-tipped
petals shading into a deep, rosy saffron. Still crisply fresh
and only half-opened. ...
"At about ten twenty-five,” Dr. Cantrell answered.
“Miss Lacey-
“Just a minute. I'll get her story later. When did you
view the body?”
"Not more than three minutes after Miss Lacey discov-
ered what had happened. I was at home. She called me
on the telephone. My house is only two or three hundred
feet back of this suite of offices. I answered the telephone
myself and came immediately."
"Did you make any tests to determine how long the
doctor had been dead?”
"Yes. I took the body temperature, and tested for rigor
mortis, which had not set in to any appreciable extent,"
Dr. Cantrell replied. “To the best of my ability to calcu-
late, Dr. Koenig had then been dead about forty-five
minutes."
"Which, you would say, places the murder at approxi-
mately nine forty-five?"


ONE DROP OF BLOOD
teady wood befo what you's
"Certainly, Dr. Harlow. . . . Will you come in?"
The small, girlish doctor advanced gingerly, her little
low-heeled patent leather pumps as careful not to tread
upon the litter as the detective's had been. Very pretty,
indeed, she was, Dundee observed appreciatively, although
amber-rimmed spectacles detracted from the beauty of her
large, gray-green eyes, and her magnificent red hair, which
she wore in great coils over her ears, had become sadly
disordered in the storm of grief through which she had
undoubtedly passed. She was still in uniform-stiffly
starched white linen, with only a severe little black crêpe
de chine jacket and the absence of a cap to distinguish her
from the institution's nurses.
"I overheard what you asked Dr. Cantrell,” she began
as she stood before him, her lovely voice becoming quite
steady with the professional authority that sat quaintly
upon her smallness and girlishness. "Please remember
that I am speaking as a doctor, as a psychiatrist, when I
beg you not to voice any such theory to reporters.”
“May I ask why?"
"I can't expect you to be in sympathy with our problems
here," the little doctor began, a note of despair in her
voice. "But if the morning papers print a theory that a
patient here is the—the murderer— ” She flinched at
the word, then brought it out bravely—“it will do untold
damage here, not only among those who are mentally ill,
but throughout the institution. It would simply create a
panic. We could not possibly hire enough attendants and
special nurses to handle the situation of a sanitarium
full of terror-stricken patients, each one fearing he or
she might be the next victim. And even if we doubled
our staff, the patients, believing we feared for their
safety— ” The beautiful voice broke, and the girl doc-
tor's small but very firm hands stretched toward the de-
tective appealingly.
"I understand," Dundee assured her gently.
speciej We cout the iny amont bravel


24
ONE DROP OF BLOOD
"Oh, I hope you do!” she breathed, almost prayerfully.
"But there's still—another angle. I can illustrate by telling
you that when one patient commits suicide-and in spite
of our vigilance that does happen sometimes—we can
count on five attempted suicides when the news gets about.
Do you—see what I mean?” she persisted, her gray-green
eyes wide with a very real terror.
"I think I do,” Dundee answered slowly. "You
mean—the power of suggestion might bring about other
murders, or attempted murders?”
"Yes,” the little doctor nodded. “And undoubtedly a
flurry of confessions, which would only hinder you in
your work.”
"I am sure you are right,” Dundee assured her, with
entirely respectful admiration. “And I'll gladly do all'I
can, not only because I want to help, but–because I do
not believe Dr. Koenig was murdered by a person in a
homicidal rage!"
Dundee watched her face keenly as he spoke the slow,
emphasized words. He saw relief give place to blankness,
then—and he was very sure of that startled fear flickered
in those candid eyes and twitched her pretty, rougeless
lips.
* It was with obvious effort that she spoke again, after a
shuddering intake of breath: “Then—you don't think a
patient did it?"
"I didn't say that,” Dundee reminded her, and he was
sure she was again relieved. “Of course I have no power
to dictate what Captain Strawn of the Homicide Squad
shall say to the press, but, for my part, if I cannot escape
the reporters entirely, I shall voice no theories and make
no statements as to the murderer unless our investigation
tonight succeeds far beyond my expectations. ... And
by the way, I wonder what is detaining the captain so long.
The District Attorney was to telephone him "
"Oh!” Dr. Harlow gasped, flushing. "He's in the recep-


26
ONE DROP OF BLOOD
psychiat do that! Dont But I've ad he tells
"Sure I'm right,” Strawn went on emphatically, as if
Dr. Cantrell had confirmed his suspicion. "Got a lot of
nuts here who could a-done it, eh, Doc?”
"I do not feel qualified to answer that question, sir,”
Dr. Cantrell answered stiffly. “My work is purely medical.
I am not a psychiatrist. But I may say that all patients who
have shown any tendency to harm themselves or others are
kept in a locked ward—Ward Ten, we call it, and are
under constant observation when not locked in their rooms.
But I suggest you question Dr. Harlow, the assistant
psychiatrist, along these lines.”
"I'll do that! Don't worry,” Strawn retorted, stung by
the doctor's attitude. "But I've already had a talk with
your night watchman, Whalen, and he tells me there was
a picture show in what he calls the O. T. Shop this eve-
ning. Moreover, he says that five of the crazy patients out
of 'Ten' attended the show. Saw 'em himself,” Strawn
added triumphantly.
"If he saw them, then he also saw their attendants,"
Cantrell retorted coldly.
"It was pretty dark in the O. T. Shop while the pictures
was being run, wasn't it? ... Well, then! . . . And by
the way, Doctor, it struck me as being kinda funny that a
picture called 'Manslaughter' would be picked out to
amuse a bunch of nuts and nervous patients.”
"I thought of that, too, Captain,” Dundee commented
approvingly. “I admit I don't know the story, but I have
been wondering about—the power of suggestion."
"I saw the picture Monday evening in Hamilton,” Dr.
Cantrell said, plainly on the defensive. "Certainly it
would have no power to suggest the crime that was com-
mitted here to-night, since 'Manslaughter is the story of a
girl who kills a traffic policeman who has been chasing her
for speeding. Accidental homicide, in other words, though
the girl in the case was extremely culpable and deserved
the prison sentence she received. I feel sure that there was


ONE DROP OF BLOOD
27
nothing unduly exciting, even to the very nervous, and
that, on the contrary, the punishment of the girl would
have a salutary effect on any patient with tendencies to
violence. In fact, I feel safe in assuming that our business
manager, Mr. Baldwin, had just such an effect in mind
when he chose the picture for tonight's run. His choice
of pictures is limited, also, since Dr. Koenig had banned
the showing of gangster pictures and movies which were
decidedly 'sexy.'”
"Why?” Strawn demanded.
"Gangster pictures are full of violence, shooting and
sudden death," Cantrell explained impatiently, "and the
so-called 'sexy' pictures, in Dr. Koenig's opinion, would
cause decidedly erotic reactions among the psychopathic
patients, as well as create a restlessness among our other
patients who are temporarily deprived of the society of
their mates or sweethearts.”
"You mean the loony patients are apt to be nuts on sex,
eh?” Strawn decoded the doctor's academic explanation.
"To put it crudely—yes!”
"Must cost you a lot to rent a popular movie like that,"
Strawn ruminated.
"Not an excessive amount," Cantrell answered coldly.
"One of Dr. Koenig's grateful patients donated the rather
expensive machines for the showing of talking pictures,
and Mr. Baldwin has made an arrangement with the Ham-
ilton theaters whereby, at a nominal sum in addition to the
payment for the operator's services, he secures first-class
pictures. We usually show a comedy, which is secured
from one theater, and a feature picture from another. As
you know, the downtown theaters have two-hour pro-
grams. We arrange for the transportation of the films,
picking them up as soon as the theater operators have fin-
ished running them, and returning them before they are
needed for the next show."
"I see,” Strawn admitted. "Now, Doc, you were called
alton theaters the operatshow a comicture from mo-hour poos,


28 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
in to view the body right after it was discovered, weren't
you?"
Dundee, already familiar with the forthcoming ques-
tions and answers, began to wander about the room, mi-
nutely investigating its disorder. He paused first at the desk,
considered it thoughtfully, then concentrated upon the low
typewriter table placed near the end of the desk, farthest
from the door into the hall, and at right angles to the desk.
The table was large enough to hold a telephone of the
French type, a stack of typewriter paper, and a portable
machine. Nothing here was disarranged, except that the
ribbon had been yanked from the typewriter's spools and
lay in purple coils upon the keys. But there was something
else, Dundee discovered. He had almost missed it, for the
torn scrap of paper was nearly hidden under the rubber
platen of the typewriter. Someone, whether Dr. Koenig,
dissatisfied with what he had written, or his murderer, had
snatched from the machine the last sheet of paper upon
which the doctor would ever type. And, remembering the
quietness and calmness of the alienist upon the witness
stand, Dundee could not believe that it was Koenig's hand
which had done the violent snatching.
With increasing excitement, the young detective con-
tinued his wandering. Kneeling, he examined the over-
turned floor lamp, carefully scrutinizing the socket, the
globe and the decorated parchment shade. Next he paused
before the large bookcase, principally devoted to textbooks
on mental diseases. The gaps in the rows were accounted
for by the books scattered over the floor. Kneeling before
the book nearest the case, he lifted it very carefully, then
examined the thick pile of the rug in a circle of at least
three feet in diameter. He repeated the strange procedure
with all the scattered books, then, more than satisfied,
turned his attention to the five-drawer steel filing cabinet
set against the wall between the bookcase and the door
leading into the reception room. All the drawers had
tal darse borated partly scruthe exact detect


30
ONE DROP OF BLOOD
topped desk, a swivel chair, two straight chairs, and a
well-stocked bookcase, which was topped with a leather-
framed photograph of a beautiful girl, whose silver-
blonde hair was in enchanting contrast to large, liquid
black eyes. Cantrell's wife, of course. ...
Here was perfect order, apparently. But Dundee left
nothing to chance. He made a thorough tour of the room,
looking for any faintest trace of the murderer's visit. And
at last he was triumphantly justified.
He had pressed his foot upon the pedal which raised
the lid of the smaller of the two white-enameled hampers,
and had gasped at his discovery.
"Bloodstained swabs!" he gloated. "And rubber
gloves. . . . Of course he would wear rubber gloves.
And what more certain than that he would find a pair in
Dr. Cantrell's office!"
Stooping, he fished out the two red rubber gloves, one
badly torn at the wrist. But strangely enough Dundee was
disappointed with his first examination of the find. Then
he swiftly turned the gloves inside out and let his eyes run
eagerly over the tips of the thumbs and fingers. And he
found what he was looking for.
"Hey, Bonnie! Stealing another march on me?" Cap-
tain Strawn boomed from the doorway, his bulk almost
hiding the doctor, who stood behind him.
"I'm afraid I am," Dundee assented gravely. "Will
you come here a moment, Dr. Cantrell?”
When the doctor had joined him Dundee pointed rather
melodramatically to the blood-soaked gauze swabs in the
hamper. “A tidy murderer, after all, in spite of the mess
he made in that other office!”
Dr. Cantrell laughed, a sharp, mirthless bark. "I'm
afraid I'm the tidy one, but—not the murderer. I dropped
those swabs into that hamper myself. One of the male
patients, who has the reputation of being rather an exhibi-
tionist, and given to half-hearted attempts at suicide, which
he takes good care will not be fatal, slashed his arm from


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 31
the wrist almost to the elbow this evening, and I dressed it.
Miss Caplan, the night nurse, helped me.”
Dundee did not seem so dashed as Strawn, broadly
grinning, evidently expected him to be.
"And these rubber gloves, doctor?”
"Miss Caplan wore them. There was not time for her
to 'scrub up. She put the gloves on and applied a tourni-
quet, while I washed my hands with an antiseptic before
sewing up the wound,” Dr. Cantrell explained.
"Did you notice whether she tore them when she re-
moved the gloves?” Dundee asked. “And whether she
discarded them?"
"I didn't notice,” Cantrell answered, then caught him-
self up short. "Yes. I do remember seeing her take them
off. But—she didn't drop them into that hamper! It's
used for waste stuff only, such as the swabs we used in
staunching the blood and cleansing the wound. I dis-
tinctly remember seeing her drop them into the instrument
tray she had got ready for me. Here's the tray on top of
the cabinet,” he added, frowning slightly. “I see that Miss
Caplan did not sterilize the instruments and return them
to the cabinet. Called away, I presume.”
"Then the gloves she had used were in plain sight and
accessible to anyone who wanted to use them?” Dundee
persisted.
"Apparently so," Dr. Cantrell admitted. “But I can't
see- "
"Where did Miss Caplan get the rubber gloves?”
"Out of the cabinet, of course. It is kept locked, so that
no patient with suicidal tendencies can possibly get at a
sharp instrument. As an added precaution, the windows
and doors of this office are always kept locked when I am
not using it.”
"Then you locked the door between your office and Dr.
Koenig's when you finished in here this evening?” Dundee
asked.
"No. Dr. Koenig was in his office, and I left this door


ONE DROP OF BLOOD
33
prints from the inside of the gloves—which was then the
outside, of course, since he had shucked them off his hands,
turning them by doing so. And, unidentifiable, it is true,
the towel he spread across his hands while manipulating
the washing and drying of the gloves is now in the other
hamper. Just my opinion, of course, but it is the obvious
thing for him to have done. You see, he was canny
enough to take no chances. Or so he thought! He forgot
to cleanse again what had become the inside of the gloves
when he shucked them off. Look, Doctor! Don't you agree
with me that the forefinger and thumb of this glove, which
I turned after I found the pair, are stained with purple
typewriter-ribbon ink?”
"It looks like it," Dr. Cantrell agreed, furrowing his
brows as he studied the glove extended for his inspection.
"But how ?"
"Just a little souvenir of the murderer's 'mad rage,'
which by the way, was probably the most noiseless, me-
thodical ‘mad rage' on record!"


CHAPTER THREE
"NOISELESS!" ejaculated Captain Strawn, as he stepped
back into the dead doctor's office. “With this room in the
mess it is? Books thrown around, that big lamp and the
smoking stand turned over-
"All of which is exactly what the murderer counted on
your saying,” Dundee assured his former chief. “But I'll
wager only two sounds could have been heard, even
faintly, outside one of these closed doors tonight. The
first, made before the murderer had put on the rubber
gloves, of course, was the sound of the blow, or blows,
which did the deed. And the second was the much fainter
and not at all suspicious sound of paper being torn."
"You're cuckoo, Bonnie!" Strawn was becoming
angry. "Why, when he flung down that statue
"Yes. If he had flung it down. But it just happens
that there is proof that he laid it down beside the doctor's
chair—very carefully, without any noise whatever, after
wiping it clean of his fingerprints.”
"You can't know that!” Strawn protested hotly.
"Look, Chief,” Dundee urged, as he again inserted the
toe of his boot beneath the prone statue of “The Discus
Thrower,” raising it slightly from its resting place on the
rug. "The pile of the rug is mashed down only very
slightly. If the statue had been hurled or even dropped
from a height of a few feet-say from the hand of the
murderer—there would be deep indentations in the pile
of the rug, where the sharp edges of the statue struck.
After Carraway quite unsuccessfully tests it for finger-
prints, I can demonstrate my point to you, if you wish.
But I can convince you otherwise, I believe. : . . Look at
this lamp!"
34


ONE DROP OF BLOOD
35
one. The sce, though the smiled. "The
where the bindes, with Sting the volumepon his digni
"Well, what about it? Toppled over, ain't it?" Strawn
growled.
"But oh, so gently!” Dundee smiled. “The globe is not
broken, you notice, though the lamp standard is a heavy
metal one. The socket is not bent even slightly, as invari-
ably happens when I tip over a floor lamp by catching my
foot in the cord. And, lastly, the light wire frame of the
shade is not bent, either. . . . Now for the books. ...
Dr. Cantrell, will you be good enough to take a book from
that bookcase and hurl it across the room?"
Frowning, as if he resented this attack upon his dignity,
Dr. Cantrell obeyed, throwing the volume with consider-
able force. Dundee, with Strawn at his heels, strolled over
to where the book lay open, face downward, some of the
leaves ruffled and bent, and one of the stiff corners of the
binding sadly broken.
"That's the way a thrown book usually looks,” Dundee
pointed out. “But look at the books our murderer depos-
ited over the room. Two are open, face downward, but
quite tidily so, with no leaves crumpled, no corners broken.
The other five books are very decorous indeed, showing
no signs whatever of having been hurled—not even a
strain on the ribs. . . . No, Captain. These books were
never thrown. They were very carefully and noiselessly
deposited on the floor. . . . But that's not all!"
And Dundee led the way to the psychiatrist's desk.
"Here we have an overturned, very fragile crystal vase. It
is not broken, you see. Moreover, it was carefully laid on
its side on the blotter, although, judging by this dust-free
circle near the back of the desk which fits the size of the
base of the vase, the murderer had to move it nearly two
feet, before his 'rage' overcame him. . .. I wonder,” he
said softly, “if this was a sardonic touch: the overturning
of the vase so that the roses would exude their fragrance
directly against a nose which would never smell roses
again?


36
ONE DROP OF BLOOD
and then lerng it, the mur keys. "A
"Don't go fancy on us, Dundee,” Strawn snorted with
disgust.
"Sorry!" Dundee apologized, his blue eyes twinkling.
"Now for the inkwell. You'll observe that it lies half on,
half off the blotter. But there is not even a faint scar on
the mahogany, as would have been inevitable if the mur-
derer had picked up the heavy inkwell and dashed it
down. Right?"
"Maybe,” Strawn conceded grudgingly.
"And here is where the murderer over-reached himself,"
Dundee went on, pointing to the coils of purple ribbon
lying across the typewriter keys. "A nice little touch, that.
But in adding it, the murderer stained his rubber gloves,
and then left faint smudges on the case history he tore into
exceedingly fine fragments, as well as on case histories
whose folders he touched while searching for the one he
wanted to destroy."
"Case histories!” Dr. Cantrell exclaimed. “Good Lord,
Dundee! Are you sure? Why, that's a calamity!"
"Calamity?" Strawn boomed. “It's a lucky break for
us, you mean. Find the guy whose case history is
missing-
"Just what did you mean, Dr. Cantrell?” Dundee asked
curiously.
The doctor wiped his forehead with a newly unfolded
handkerchief. "Only that case histories are sacred, and
guarded above anything else in the institution. If anyone
has wantonly destroyed some of them it will be a very
serious loss.”
"I take it, then, that this filing cabinet is usually kept
locked?'' Dundee asked.
"Always,” the doctor answered emphatically. "And
there are only four keys in existence. Dr. Koenig had one,
Dr. Harlow has another, Miss Horne, the secretary, has the
third, and I have the fourth myself. Since the cabinet is
open, Dr. Koenig must have been making some additions
to a case history this evening.”


ONE DROP OF BLOOD
37
"Was Dr. Koenig in the habit of typing such things
himself?"
"Oh, yes. He was an expert on the typewriter, and he
never bothered to wait to dictate, if the secretary wasn't
available.”
"Then we can assume that Dr. Koenig was typing an
addition to a case history on the sheet of paper that the
murderer tore from the machine?” Dundee persisted.
"If a sheet of paper was torn from the machine—yes!"
Dr. Cantrell answered. "Dr. Koenig almost never wrote
letters in the evening, but frequently worked on the
histories.”
"Listen, Doc!” Strawn interrupted excitedly. “Do the
nutty patients know their what-d'-you-call-it?—their diag-
nosis? I mean, does the brain doctor tell 'em the technical
names for their troubles?”
"Certainly not, as a rule," Dr. Cantrell answered, with
great dignity. “Naturally some of the patients are edu-
cated enough to know the technical terms without being
told, and have enough self-knowledge to know their own
diagnoses. Epileptics, for instance, and most manic de-
pressives
“But now looky here!" Strawn interrupted impatiently.
"Suppose a guy come in here to-night to have a chin with
the brain doctor. The doctor looks up, says wait a minute,
and goes on with his typing. But the patient comes close,
bends over, sees what the doc is writing, and—it's all
about this patient, see? With terrible-sounding words that
the patient don't understand but which sound like an insult
to him. . . . See? . . . Well, the patient backs off, the
doc keeps on typing, the patient sneaks the statue off that
bookcase where you said it was kept, and bangs the doctor
over the head. Then he jerks the sheet of paper out of the
typewriter, tears it up; finds the rest of the case history
open on the doc's desk, tears it up, too ”
"First calming down enough to hunt for and find a pair
of rubber gloves, so as to make sure of leaving no finger-


38 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
prints," Dundee interrupted. "Wait, Chief! I'm not say.
ing you aren't right. In fact, there are strong indications
that you are
"Spoken like the sport you are, lad!” Strawn beamed.
"Sure I'm right! This bird gets cagey. He says to himself,
'If I tear up only my own case history, they'll pin it on me
sure, when they check up on the case history file. So
I'll destroy one or two more, just to put 'em off the
track! . . . Which he does.”
"Thereby proving himself a very level-headed, calcu-
lating ‘nut as you call him, Chief,” Dundee smiled.
"A great many psychopathic patients are not ‘insane' at
all, in the sense that the layman understands the term,”.
Dr. Cantrell volunteered. “They are quite capable of sane,
sound reasoning. And, at the risk of poaching upon Dr.
Harlow's preserves, I may add that we are quite familiar
here with the extreme cunning of some of the definitely
insane.”
“The legally insane?” Dundee asked.
"Yes.”
"But would not a legally insane patient—and he must
know his legal status if he has been committed after hav-
ing been adjudged insane—know that he could not be held
accountable for his crime, and therefore not take the
trouble to set the stage as this murderer did?”.
"That is true,” Cantrell admitted. “But it is also true
no patient, however insane, would relish the idea of being
transferred to an asylum for the criminally insane. I assure
you that even our locked ward here is heaven compared to
such a place."
"And you have already assured me that your definitely
insane patients are kept under constant observation in the
locked ward,” Dundee reminded him.
"That is true,” Cantrell assented shortly. “Every patient
who has been committed after being adjudged insane is
kept in the locked ward. But we have a few patients who


ONE DROP OF BLOOD
39
have not been committed, who are here voluntarily or
because their relatives have placed them here, and who,
because they have shown no disposition toward running
away or toward violence, are permitted to live in the cot-
tages, although they could be legally committed, if a
charge were made.”
"Why, looky, my lad!” Strawn became excited again.
"That's the ticket, right there! Our friend the murderer is
one of these patients who don't even know he's loony,
because the family has been protecting him, see? And he
sees the doc writing it all out—how crazy he is, and that
he ought to be locked up, maybe. . . . Look at it this way,
Bonnie! Supposing you're here, with the folks kidding
you that you're here for ‘nerves.' You're restless, don't
like it here much, have come in to ask the doc to let you
go home. Well, you take a peep at what the doc's writing,
and you find out that he thinks you're bugs; not only that,
but a dangerous lunatic. And you know that what this doc
says will be gospel to the lunacy commission! Not only
that, but, being loony, you jump to the conclusion that
they' te trying to frame you, put you away to get hold of
your fortune, or something like that," the Chief of the
Homicide Squad ended lamely, aware of the movie-
melodrama tinge to his last few words.
"Pretty clever, Captain,” Dundee applauded. “And of
course if his case history is destroyed and the doctor whose
word is gospel with the lunacy commission is dead, your
theoretical murderer would feel doubly safe.”
"Exactly!” Strawn agreed with great satisfaction.
"Come in!” he bawled, as he was interrupted by a knock
on the door. "What is it, little lady?"
Dr. Harlow, her dignity affronted, tried her best to look
three inches taller and ten years older, as she announced:
"Dr. Price, the coroner, is here with the morgue ambu-
lance.” But her voice broke childishly on the dreadful
word.
entre un erous That he thi peep at mask the festless, idding
iste Squad something purpose the coom Nobis do


40 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
· "Come on in, Price!" Strawn bawled, through the partly
opened door, and the coroner obeyed, his thin legs very
spry, but a look of real regret on his nice old face.
"Too bad, Captain, too bad! . . . How're ye, Bon-
nie? . . . Had the pleasure of knowing Dr. Koenig. Fine
man! Fine man! : . . Hmm! Death must have been
instantaneous. A ve-ry nasty blow. Hmm.”
“Carraway!” Strawn called. “Bring in your camera, and
get busy!”
The fingerprint expert, who was also the police depart-
ment's official photographer, sauntered into the office,
carrying camera and tripod, as well as the box containing
his fingerprinting paraphernalia.
"Pictures of the corpse after Doc Price has finished with
it,” Strawn directed. “Also of the room from all angles.
Then pick up any fingerprints you can find on the desk,
the flower vase, the inkwell, that statue laying there, the
smoking stand, the lamp, the books and the doorknobs.
Also, gather up all them scraps of paper on the floor and
go over every one of them with your powder. . . . By the
way, little lady," and he turned to Dr. Harlow, "whose
fingerprints would normally be on the case histories?"
"Case histories!" she repeated, the same acute dismay in
her voice as had characterized Dr. Cantrell's at the men-
tion of those important documents.
"Sure! The murderer tore up some of 'em, including
his own, to my way of thinking!” Strawn told her. “Now,
who's been handling them in the ordinary course of duty?”
"Why- ” she began, her voice still flat with dismay.
Then, more firmly: "Only Dr. Koenig, myself, and the
secretary, Miss Horne. . . . That is,” she amended con-
scientiously, "we are the only three who have handled the
case histories during the last five years, with the excep-
tion of temporary stenographers, who have relieved Miss
Horne when she was on vacation.”
"Five years?" Strawn pounced. "Mean to say a kid like
you has been a doctor for five years?"


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 41
"I'm twenty-nine years old,” Dr. Harlow informed him,
with great dignity. "Dr. Koenig took me on as his assist-
ant when he became head psychiatrist here, five years ago.”
"And who was here ahead of him?" Strawn asked.
"Dr. Cyrus Mayfield,” the girl doctor answered in a low
voice, as she shot a strange glance at Dr. Cantrell.
"And where is this Dr. Mayfield now, Dr. Harlow?"
Dundee interrupted, since he was sure that that was the
one question the diminutive doctor most wished not to
hear.
"Why, he-he's ” The girl drew a deep breath,
pushing a loose strand of curling red hair off her
forehead.
“Dead?” Dundee helped her gently.
“His—body is alive,” the girl answered, her voice
quivering.


CHAPTER FOUR
"Just what do you mean, Dr. Harlow?" Dundee per-
sisted. “You put it very strangely—'his body is alive."
Before the girl doctor could answer, Baldwin, the busi-
ness manager, stepped into the office from the reception
room.
"Let me explain, Justine," he commanded curtly. "She
means exactly what she says, Dundee. Dr. Mayfield's body
is alive, but his mind is practically dead. He is and has
been for about six years the victim of senility-or, in
medical terms, senile dementia."
"And where is Dr. Mayfield now?" Dundee asked.
"In his apartment upstairs,” Baldwin astounded him by
announcing calmly. "I may explain that when Dr. May-
field's condition became painfully apparent, some six years
ago, his daughter, Harriet, who is now Madame Arnaud
and a resident of Paris, took her father abroad for rest and
treatment. He became worse steadily, and when I met
them on a ship returning to America, Miss Mayfield told
me that it would be necessary to have her father adjudged
incompetent, in order to protect his estate and to permit
the sanitarium to pass into other hands. Dr. Cantrell was
with the party, as Dr. Mayfield's physician, and it was at
his suggestion that the two of us conferred on the possi-
bility of a three-way partnership-neither of us having
money enough to purchase the sanitarium outright.”
"That is correct,” Dr. Cantrell corroborated him. "But
let me add that the original suggestion of such a partner
ship came from Miss Mayfield, who also suggested that we
approach Dr. Koenig, whom she and Dr. Mayfield knew
personally, and in whom she had the highest confidence.
After the legal steps had been taken here in Hamilton, the
money enough to way partnershus conferred
42


ONE DROP OF BLOOD
-
43
partnership was formed, one of the conditions of sale
being that Dr. Mayfield be taken care of here for the rest
of his life, retaining his former apartment upstairs,
and ” He hesitated and glanced uneasily at Dr.
Harlow.
"Yes?” Dundee prompted.
Dr. Harlow obeyed the unspoken appeal in her col-
league's eyes. “Miss Mayfield also stipulated that her
father never be told that he was no longer head of the
sanitarium. . . . It is a characteristic of senility, you know,
that the patient believes he is still in his mental prime,
and quite capable of managing his own affairs.”
"I see,” Dundee said slowly, as he pondered frown-
ingly upon what he had heard.
"I say, Bonnie!” Strawn ejaculated. "We're onto some-
thing, sure as you live! . . . Listen, little doctor!" and he
turned to Dr. Harlow. “Dr. Koenig kept a case history on
the old doc, same as on any other patient, I take it?”
"Yes,” the girl admitted, startled.
"Is this loony old doctor bedridden, by any chance?"
Strawn went on, with mounting excitement.
"No. He is quite feeble, and in bed a good many hours
of the day, but ".
“He can walk all right, can't he? Get up and down-
stairs without help?” Strawn persisted.
"Yes. He spends a part of each day, when the weather
permits, in a little private garden.”
"And where is that?”
"Behind these offices, between here and Dr. Cantrell's
house," the girl answered faintly.
"All right!” Strawn struck his hands together trium-
phantly. The old doctor thinks he's still the big cheese
here and thinks Dr. Koenig is just his hired assistant. ...
That so?”
"Yes,” the girl answered, rather defiantly.
“Look, then! Dr. Mayfield wanders downstairs, sees


46
ONE DROP OF BLOOD
questions? ... Make 'em snappy! I'm getting old and
I've got the post-mortem ahead of me yet to-night.”
"Did you find the skull to be of the usual thickness?"
Dundee asked, remembering Dr. Cantrell's opinion.
"No. On the contrary. Very thin skull.”
"At approximately what hour do you calculate that
death occurred?” Strawn took a hand.
"Somewhere between half-past nine and ten o'clock this
evening," the coroner answered. “By the way, Doctor,"
and he turned to Cantrell, "what time did Dr. Koenig
dine? That will help me fix the time of death more accu-
rately, after I've examined the stomach contents."
"At six o'clock promptly, in the staff dining room,” Dr.
Cantrell replied. “The patients have their dinner between
eleven-thirty and twelve, and their supper between five
and five-thirty, but the members of the staff have dinner
together at six o'clock.”
"Any other wounds or abrasions of any kind, besides
the head wound?” Dundee asked, as a matter of form.
"A bruise on the chin, slightly to the right of the
mouth,” Dr. Price answered laconically.
"What!” Dundee exclaimed. “I don't see how that hap-
pened. The head was bowed in such a position that only
the forehead struck the desk at all.”
"Well, then, you've got something to play sleuth with,"
Price twinkled. "For the forehead is not bruised, and the
chin is. In my opinion—to be verified by the post-mortem,
of course the bruise was made after death. : . . Would
you care to look, Doctor?”
The two medical men returned to the body, consulted
together in low tones, then retraced their steps to where
Dundee was standing, deep in thought.
"I am inclined to agree with Dr. Price," Cantrell
announced tiredly.
"I confess that's a poser," the detective said, frowning,
but his reflections were interrupted by the return of Cain
Of cois. In my opinor the foreheading to play sleuth


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 47
and Dr. Harlow, followed by a young man in the white
uniform of an attendant.
"Found this bird asleep at the switch, Chief,” Cain
blurted out. "His patient, a white-haired old gent, was
reading in bed.”
"Reading, was he?” Strawn boomed. “Thought you
said the old doc was clear gone in the upper story, little
lady!”
"He has lucid intervals, and such an interval is likely to
follow an attack of senile delirium,” Dr. Harlow answered
with dignity. “Though I confess I expected the sedative
to keep Dr. Mayfield asleep longer than it did.”
"So you were snoozing on the job, eh?” Strawn lashed
out at the cringing attendant. “What's your name?"
"Peters, sir. I'm afraid I did doze off- "
“Doze!” Cain repeated contemptuously. “This baby
had to be shook before he opens his peepers ”
"You see, sir,” the attendant stammered, “my wife is
pretty sick, and I didn't get any sleep at all today. But I
give you my word I hadn't been dozing more than a few
minutes. Dr. Mayfield was sleeping-
"So you thought you'd keep him company in slumber-
land!” Strawn snarled.
"I'm sorry if any harm's been done ” the poor
young man began timidly, well aware that he had lost his
job.
"Harm?" Strawn snorted. “Just a little matter of
murder, that's all.... All right, Price. You can take
the body away."
While the morgue ambulance crew were busy with the
stretcher, Peters cowered, trembling and white-faced,
against the door leading into the hall.
"Now, young fellow," Strawn began again, when the
body had been removed. "Just what were you doing
between nine and ten o'clock to-night?”
"Sitting outside Dr. Mayfield's door,” the attendant


48 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
quavered. “I was reading a detective story, but it was hard
to keep my mind on the story, because I could hear the
voices from the talking picture right under Dr. Mayfield's
apartment.”
"So you went down to have a look at the pictures your-
self?” Strawn pounced.
"No, sir!” the attendant denied emphatically.
"Cain! How close to the bedroom door was this man's
chair?"
"About two feet away from it, sir.”
"Room for the old man to pass without waking up this
bird?”
"Yes, sir.”
"Listen, you! Does your patient ever get up and wander
around at night?"
"Some—sometimes,” Peters stammered. “But I always
persuade him to get back to bed.”
“Did he get out of bed tonight?"
"No, sir!”
"You mean, if he did, he didn't wake you up!” Strawn
corrected contemptuously. "Cain, you go with this baby
and keep him company for the rest of the night. And
listen hard for anything the old gentleman may say.”
"You know, Chief, Dundee began mildly, when the
two men had left the room, "I don't really believe that
feeble old doctor murdered Koenig. Remember, his case
history, with today's addition to it, was left in the files.
That fact alone destroys your theory. But there is another
point. Case histories are sacred to a physician! You have
heard both Dr. Harlow and Dr. Cantrell say so, and have
seen their dismay at the idea of case histories being
destroyed. Dr. Mayfield was, first and last, a doctor, a
psychiatrist. To him, too, case histories would be sacred.
Granted that he would destroy his own, in a fit of rage, I
believe it is psychologically impossible for him to destroy
others.”
Kated coin compling theundee bdon't rememb


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 49
"Tommyrot!” Strawn snorted.
"Am I right, Dr. Harlow?"
"Absolutely!” the girl doctor assured him eagerly.
"Even in his present condition, Dr. Mayfield's every lucid
and-delusional thought is connected with his work. He
was and still is devoted to it. In fact, his devotion is so
strong that we have to humor him when he desires to
interview patients.”
"He actually treats patients?” Dundee asked, in aston-
ishment.
"Oh, yes, or he thinks he does. He questions them
quite in his old manner. . . . Of course," she added, "we
send him only those patients who were here when he was
still in charge, and whom he remembers. Sometimes he
sends for a patient who is dead or who has left, and we
persuade him to talk to another of the old stand-bys. They
are very kind to him. They understand, and enjoy their
visits.”
"Very interesting,” Dundee commented absently. Then:
"Dr. Harlow, have you a list of all the patients who are
here at present?"
"Yes, of course. In the chartroom, with the room or
suite number opposite the name of each patient, for the
convenience of the head nurse."
"Then will you please check the file, and tell us which
case histories are missing?”
As Dr. Harlow left the office, Carraway sauntered up to
his chief.
"What luck?” Strawn asked the fingerprint expert.
"A world of prints, most of 'em not so new,” Carraway
answered. “But none at all on the statue. Been wiped
clean."
"What about those fine-torn scraps of paper?” Dundee
asked.
"Four sets of prints, taking the whole heap of scraps,"
Carraway answered. "A man's fingerprints—I've com-


50
ONE DROP OF BLOOD
pared them with the corpse's and they match—and three
sets that look like they belong to women. Smaller, with the
ridges more delicate and less pronounced, you know.”
"Confirming my suspicion that the murderer wore
gloves,” Dundee commented. “Undoubtedly the women's
prints will be found to belong to Dr. Harlow and a couple
of stenographers—easy enough to check the correspond-
ence files for similar prints. . . . Anything else, Carra-
way?”
"A flock of prints that I got from doorknobs and doors
and door frames. . . . Say, I supposed you noticed that
smear on the desk?"
"What smear?” Dundee was plainly chagrined.
"Looks like where somebody wiped off blood,” Carra-
way answered nonchalantly. "You and the Captain were
both busy, and I took the liberty of wiping the spot some
more with the damp end of a towel. Dr. Price said it was
blood, all right, but he's going to make a report later. . ..
Look! You can see where I wiped the desk. I didn't make
the smear any bigger.”
Both Strawn and Dundee bent over the spot which was
easily discernible near the right-hand corner of the desk.
The dampness of the towel and the original stain had
dulled the bright polish of the mahogany.
"That's damned odd,” Dundee said slowly. “Look,
Chief! Here's something that looks like blood on the blot-
ter, too, which we couldn't have seen without lifting up
the head.”
"I believe I can explain that stain," Dr. Cantrell inter-
rupted. Uninvited, he had come close. “A blow such as
killed Dr. Koenig causes a slow oozing of blood from the
ears. As the head was resting, the right ear would have
been directly over that spot on the blotter."
"'Is that so?” Dundee commented, still frowning. "But
-why the blood on the corner of the desk? How did it
get 'way over there, why should the murderer wipe it up,


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 51
and what did he wipe it with? . . . By Jove! Those
blood-stained swabs in the hamper!"
"I have explained them,” Dr. Cantrell reminded him.
“Yes, but there they were, some of them not so badly
soiled!” Dundee pointed out. "When the murderer dis-
carded the rubber gloves, he must have seen them. All
nicely made to order for his purpose! A little more blood
on one of those swabs would never be noticed—and blood
on the corner of the desk doesn't fit into the picture our
murderer is painting. . . . Well, we have a couple of
posers, Chief. A bruise that has no business to be on the
doctor's chin; blood that couldn't logically be on this cor-
ner of the desk -
"Why should the murderer bother about the blood and
whether it could be explained?” Strawn objected.
"That's exactly what I should like to know," Dundee
admitted, very thoughtfully. "There's the key to the puz-
hy should the explained?" I like to know to the puz-
admitted, very ich mistaken!"kets he bent al
With his hands in his pockets he bent a brooding gaze
upon the dead doctor's desk. Nothing there to explain the
bruise made after death. True, there were the ash tray, the
overturned vase, the inkwell, a couple of pencils, and a
penholder. But all these objects had been well away
from the doctor's bowed face. Granted, for the sake of
argument, that the chin had struck one of these objects:
why had the murderer removed it?
His puzzled, roving eyes came to rest upon a small,
loose-leaf desk calendar, which, curiously enough, had not
been disturbed by the murderer. The used leaves had been
turned back over the metal rings, and the exposed leaf
bore the date of the following day, Thursday, June 4th.
The doctor had obviously used the calendar as a memory
tickler, for, in pencil, were the notations:
Call Morse
Inner-spring mattresses
Dr. Sandlin


52
ONE DROP OF BLOOD
The last two words were heavily underlined.
"Dr. Harlow!” Dundee called suddenly to the girl who
was busy at the case history file. “Who is Dr. Sandlin?"
The little doctor stared blankly then shook her head.
It was the business manager, Baldwin, who threw a bomb-
shell into the quiet room with his answer.


CHAPTER FIVE
"DR. SANDLIN,” the business manager announced
calmly, “is the psychiatrist whom Dr. Koenig hoped to be
able to hire to take Dr. Harlow's place here."
Dr. Cantrell's reaction to the news was apparently blank
surprise, but it was to Justine Harlow's vivid little face
that Dundee shifted his eyes. She looked as if she had
been knocked almost senseless by a blow in the solar
plexus. Her small body seemed bent and shrunken in
the suddenly too-large white uniform. Every scrap of color
had left her cheeks, leaving them waxen and drawn. Even
her eyes were changed in color, the green being scarcely
noticeable now.
"No, no! —don't believe it,” her white lips quivered,
the voice so low that Dundee could scarcely distinguish
the words.
“This is the first intimation you have had that you were
not-giving entire satisfaction?”' Dundee asked, and was
instantly ashamed of the wording. As if she were a
servant-girl!
The girl doctor did not answer, except to straighten her
small body as if to brace it for the new blow he had dealt
her.
“Dr. Koenig was extremely fond of Justine—of Dr.
Harlow, I mean,” Dr. Cantrell put in, emphatically. "I
am afraid Mr. Baldwin misunderstood something our col-
league said "
“Not a chance!" Baldwin denied brusquely. "The doc-
tor and I had a business conference this afternoon—infor-
mal, of course, or you would have been included, Bruce.
53


54 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
You see, Dundee, Dr. Koenig had returned late Monday,
from a three weeks' trip, and there were a number of mat-
ters I had to take up with him.”
"What was the nature of the trip?” Dundee asked.
"Partly business, partly a lecture tour,” Baldwin an-
swered. “Business took him to New York, where he com-
pleted negotiations with the principal creditors of a sani-
tarium at Meridian, about a hundred miles from here, to
take over their patients and some of their equipment. A
good stroke of business for Mayfield, since we eliminate
our only local competition, and increase our prestige enor-
mously. We already have plans under way for the build-
ing of one large new cottage.”
"And we were agreed that it meant the hiring of another
assistant to Dr. Koenig,” Dr. Cantrell added curtly. "A
male assistant. But I feel absolutely sure that Dr. Koenig
had no intention of dispensing with Dr. Harlow's
services."
"What makes you feel so certain, Doctor?” Dundee
asked, his pitying eyes still fixed on Dr. Harlow's white
fact Because I know as an assistant -raving his
"Because I know how much Dr. Koenig valued her,
both as a friend and as an assistant,” the medical man re-
torted stoutly. "I hope I am not betraying his confidence
when I say that his appreciation of Dr. Harlow is amply
proved by the terms of Dr. Koenig's will."
"Ah!” Dundee breathed. “And—you know the terms
of that will, Doctor?”
"I do, because I was one of the witnesses when it was
signed. My wife was another. By the terms of that will,
drawn by Clifford Forrest, Dr. Koenig's attorney, Justine
Harlow and Norah Lacey, our head nurse, share equally in
the estate, which of course includes Dr. Koenig's third
interest in Mayfield Sanitarium.”
"You mean to say that those two girls are to have an
equal say-so with you and me?" Baldwin demanded, his
lips twisted with anger.


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 55.
"I'm satisfied!” Cantrell retorted curtly.
Dundee saw the girl draw a deep, quivering breath,
which seemed to bring color to her cheeks and a sparkle to
her eyes, as well as tears.
"I knew it!” she cried. “I knew he was too big a man
to let one little disagreement turn him against me!"
"So you had a quarrel with the Big Doctor, eh?" Strawn
pounced, as if to say, "Now we're getting somewhere!"
"Certainly not!” Justine Harlow Aared indignantly. "It
was only the slightest disagreement-purely professional!”
“So the doctor thought you were getting too big for your
britches, eh?” Strawn suggested vulgarly. “When did this
quarrel take place?"
The girl's cheeks were scarlet. "I refuse to discuss the
matter if you insist upon calling it a quarrel!”
"Easy, Chief!”. Dundee warned, in a low voice. "Dr.
Harlow," he began, in a friendly, casual voice: "It is nat-
ural enough for two physicians to disagree about a diagno-
sis or the treatment of a case. I take it that you and
Dr. Koenig did disagree in regard to some patient?"
"Yes," the girl answered, turning to the young detec-
tive and ignoring the older. "It was really too trivial for
me even to remember, until—until it appeared that Dr.
Koenig wished to replace me. Professional ethics forbid
me to go into details, but the disagreement was over a
young girl patient who has been almost entirely under my
care. I thought her condition much more serious—increas-
ingly serious—than Dr. Koenig, who had been away a
good deal since the girl came here, was inclined to re-
gard it.”
"Are you, by any chance, referring to a girl named Enid
Rambler?”' Dundee asked.
The girl's eyes widened. "I am, as a matter of fact,
but-
"Then let me assure you that I believe you were right,
and Dr. Koenig wrong for once," Dundee said quietly.
“The young lady was in so serious a state tonight that she


56 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
became hysterical and tried to run away from the sani-
tarium.”
"And got herself arrested for disturbing the peace?"
Baldwin cut in.
"No. She was very quiet when I found her—uncon-
scious, in fact. In a ditch by the roadside, with a sprained
ankle. I brought her back.”
"Enid Rambler?”' Dr. Harlow asked, incredulity written
all over her expressive face. "I can't imagine Enid's run-
ning away— ?
"Why not?” Dundee forestalled Strawn, who was chew-
ing his gray mustache in a way that portended a new
theory.
"Because Enid Rambler has consistently refused to leave
the grounds, even with other patients or for a drive with
me,” Dr. Harlow answered, her brows still knit with per-
plexity, and professional ethics apparently forgotten.
"Why, Enid would run like a deer to keep from meeting
a stranger! If a patient begged her to meet his visitors,
she refused, and hid in her room until the visitors were
gone. And the very suggestion that she must try to get
well so that she could leave was enough to send her into
hysterics."
"Then it's about time I had a go at that young lady!"
Strawn interrupted grimly. "If Dundee found her on the
roadside, after she'd run away from the sanitarium, and if
what Dr. Harlow tells us is true, it's a cinch she had one
swell reason for running away this particular night. And
say! The Big Doctor was anxious to get rid of her, wasn't
he? Wanted to send her away and you said she wasn't
able to go-eh, little lady?"
Justine Harlow's cheeks again burned scarlet in resent-
ment of the insinuation behind the old detective's words.
"That's not true!" she flashed. "I suggested to Dr. Koenig
that the girl should be thoroughly psychoanalyzed, to rid


58 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
e two casc Archibald dee's mer
to panic the girl, and that that something may very well be
connected with the murder."
"I'll say it's connected!” Strawn snorted. “Did you fin.
ish checking that file, little lady?"
"Yes. I was just finishing when Mr. Dundee called me."
"Then I'll wager my shield you found this Rambler
baby's case history among the missing!” Strawn challenged
her triumphantly.
“Then you lose your shield,” the young doctor told him
coolly. “There are two case histories missing, the patients
being Samuel Rowan and Archibald Webster.”
The last name rang a bell in Dundee's memory. What
was it Sanderson had said?—"rich, handsome scapegrace,
young Webster. . . . In and out of the place half a dozen
times a year”-
But Strawn was crawfishing with ease: "That don't
mean nothing, but that the dame is smarter than I give
her credit for. Fixed it so's the blame would fall on two
other guys—take your choice, or, better still, take the guy
who can't give an ironclad alibi.”
Dundee smiled. “I'm afraid I'm more interested, at the
moment, in the 'two other guys, Captain, than I am in
Miss Rambler. Can any of you tell us whether either or
both of these patients attended the movie?"
Baldwin, Cantrell and Dr. Harlow shook their heads.
Then the girl doctor suggested: "I feel sure Miss Caplan,
the night head nurse, could answer that question. I'll call
her.” She went to the door leading into the main hall,
opened it, and called: “Rose! Rose! . . . Will you come
here, please?"
The thin, gray-haired, pale-faced nurse who had re-
ceived Dundee came hurrying across the hall, frightened
deference in her voice as she answered: "Yes, Dr.
Harlow?"
"These gentlemen wish to question you, Rose. Don't
be afraid to tell anything you know, or to answer any ques-
tion whatever."


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 59
Strawn waved her to Dundee, as if granting the younger
detective's greater ability where the questioning of women
was concerned.
"At what time did you come on duty, Miss Caplan?"
Dundee asked, accepting the task gladly.
"At seven o'clock,” the nurse quavered.
"And at what time did the patients begin to gather for
the picture show?"
"About fifteen minutes after I came on duty. Our
movies usually start about 7:20, but, due to a misunder-
standing on the operator's part, because the downtown
theaters had changed their schedules, the first picture did
not start until eight o'clock this evening,” the nurse an-
swered painstakingly, little gasps punctuating her sen-
tences.
"And did the patients wait in the O. T. Shop all that
time?” Dundee continued.
"Some did, laughing and talking together in groups.
Some strolled about the grounds until they saw the car
arrive with the films.”
"Were you in a position to note all arrivals and
departures, and returns?”
"Yes, sir, except when the phone rang. And even when
I had to talk over the phone I kept an eye on the hall. You
see, the door to the chartroom is very close to the door
into the O. T. Shop, and I kept a watch because I was
afraid something might happen—with the patients getting
restless and excitable
"I understand,” Dundee assured her, as her voice trem-
bled to an uncertain pause. "Now, Miss Caplan, can you
tell us whether Mr. Rowan and Mr. Webster attended the
show?"
"Mr. Rowan did,” the nurse answered more confidently.
"I noticed him particularly, because”-and she turned
shining, glad eyes upon Dr. Harlow, as if to share her
pleasure -" he talked and laughed with two of the
patients while they were waiting for the films to come!"


ONE DROP OF BLOOD
"And is that extraordinary?” Dundee asked quickly.
"Very extraordinary," Dr. Harlow replied. "Poor Mr.
Rowan has been almost completely silent for two years.
No one could reach him, no one could make him talk.
But this afternoon he walked into Dr. Koenig's office and
voluntarily began to talk. He talked for three hours
until Dr. Koenig had to make him stop. The doctor was
jubilant, told me he was sure Rowan could be cured
now "
"What did Rowan talk about?” Dundee asked.
The little doctor stiffened. "I don't know," she an.
swered coldly, "and if I did, professional ethics '
"Ethics be damned, Doctor—begging your pardon,"
Strawn interrupted. "Get wise, little lady! This is
murder!”
"I have told you I don't know. Dr. Koenig did not
have an opportunity to go into Rowan's case with me
then.”
"But in all probability he made some additions to Row-
an's case history this evening?” Dundee suggested
"It is quite likely. He worked steadily all evening."
“Did he tell you—or you and Dundee turned first
to Cantrell and then to Baldwin, "what Rowan talked
about? It must have been a rather important unburden.
ing, if it unlocked a silence of two years' duration.”
"No," Dr. Cantrell answered flatly.
"No," Baldwin said, too, then: "But he did remark to
me that if a psychiatrist chose to, he could give the police
plenty to keep them busy!"
"Did he make that remark apropos of Rowan?"
"No. But Rowan had just left. I passed him in the
hall, on my way into Dr. Koenig's office. It was just a
few minutes before five-supper-time for the patients. Dr..
Koenig was pretty 'high,' and I took the remark to refer
to the last patient he'd been seeing. A success like that
always stirred him up, made another man out of him."


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 61
"And it was during this same visit that Dr. Koenig men-
tioned Dr. Sandlin?" Dundee remembered to ask.
"Yes."
"What time does Miss Horne, the secretary, leave?"
"At five," Baldwin answered. “She came in to say good.
night while I was still with the doctor.”
"Thanks. . . . Now, Miss Caplan, will you tell us
whether Mr. Rowan stayed for the entire showing of the
pictures?"
"So far as I know, he did. I saw him come out with the
others when the program was over.”
"Is there more than one door to the O. T. Shop?” Dun.
dee asked.
"Yes. There are two other doors. One opens out onto
the back lawn, and another leads into the storeroom, back
the back aldwin's office locked?" was the nurse
"Were these doors locked?"
"The door into the storeroom was," the nurse answered.
"Mr. Baldwin has one key, and the other is kept in a desk
drawer in the chartroom. The storeroom door is always
locked. But the other door was open for the sake of cool.
ness—it was a hot night.”
"Then it was possible, while the shop was dark for the
showing of pictures, for a patient or a patient's visitor to
slip out of that back door without being noticed?”
"Possible, of course," the nurse answered hesitantly.
"Very possible to leave—and return unnoticed?”
"I suppose so. But of course some of the other patients
would have noticed- ”.
"Engrossed in so thrilling a picture as 'Manslaughter?"
Dundee was skeptical.
"I-
"Did you notice anyone leave in that way?" Strawn
"No!" the nurse cried, too emphatically, her face turn-
ing too pale.
Urse


62 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
To Strawn's disgust, Dundee seemed to take sides with
the nurse, for he assured her soothingly: "I understand,
Miss Caplan. You mean to say, don't you, that you were
not in a position to observe arrivals and departures after
the show had started, since you were at your post in the
chartroom?"
"Yes!” the girl fell into the trap. "Of course! I was in
the chartroom—
"But,” Dundee interrupted her regretfully, his brows
knit as if in great perplexity, "I've just remembered that
Miss Rambler said she couldn't find you in the chartroom
after she left the O. T. Shop in the middle of the feature
picture. She said she was looking for a nurse to give her a
sedative. ... But perhaps," he continued guilefully as
the nurse's pale face became ashen, "you were called away
on some duty?”
The woman turned hunted eyes from face to face, but
in that circle of stern judges there was only one friendly,
pitying pair of eyes.
"Don't be frightened, Rose. We all know how conscien-
tious you are. Simply tell the exact truth,” Dr. Harlow
urged.
"I—I was looking at 'Manslaughter,' too,” Miss Caplan
gasped. "I—I knew I could hear my phone ring. I was
just inside the door to the shop
"But, of course," Dundee suggested casually, "the door
was closed because the light from the hall would have
interfered with the showing of the pictures.”
"Yes, sir,” the badgered woman admitted in a low voice.
"Another thing is puzzling me,” Dundee went on. "Dr.
Harlow has told us that Miss Rambler had a complex
against encountering strangers, and yet there were a num-
ber of visitors who came with patients to see the show this
evening.”
"Enid -I mean, Miss Rambler, came in when the shop
was dark for the showing of the pictures, and she left


ONE DROP OF BLOOD
63
before 'Manslaughter' ended,” Miss Caplan explained in
a rush, then clapped her hand to her mouth as she real-
ized, too late, that she had revealed what she had been
trying to conceahat she had tev to her mouth xplained in
anything before the back doo
Dundee showed no triumph, as he asked: "Can you tell
us approximately the time Miss Rambler arrived for the
pictures, and the time she left?”.
“The comedy had been on about ten minutes, so it must
have been about ten minutes after eight when Enid—Miss
Rambler-slipped in,” the nurse answered hopelessly.
"It was pretty dark, but I suppose she recognized me stand-
ing there by the door when she opened it and let a bit of
light in. Anyway, I recognized her, and put out my hand.
She-she took it and squeezed it and said, 'Aren't I brave?'
Then she edged along the wall till she got to the back of
the room, and I saw her hesitate, then creep along in the
dark until she found a seat near the back door. I knew she
would want to escape before the lights went up, and I
didn't think anything about it when I saw her slip out
when 'Manslaughter,' the second picture, was about half
finished.”
"Listen, Doc!” Strawn cut in, turning to Dr. Cantrell.
"You said, when you was telling us about that picture, that
it was about a girl that got sent to prison, didn't you? . .
Well, then, whereabouts in the fillum do they show her in
a cell? About halfway through it, eh?”
"I—believe so," Cantrell answered coldly. ..
"There you are, Bonnie!" Strawn spread his hands in a
gesture of triumph.
“But exactly where am I?” Dundee grinned. "It seems
to me that the sight of another girl in prison would act as
a deterrant to a girl who already has claustrophobia-not
as an incentive for her to go out and kill a man! ...
What do you think, Dr. Harlow?"
"I think Enid's leaving the picture and subsequently
running away was caused by an acute attack of claustropho-


64 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
bia," the little doctor answered emphatically. "It is a well-
known fact that a girl, viewing a motion picture, puts
herself in the place of the heroine, consciously or uncon-
sciously. Temporarily, Enid Rambler was the girl in the
picture, and she could not bear the close quarters or the
locked door. Her other complex-fear of strangers from
the outside world—made her control herself until she was
safely out of the shop. Then, I don't doubt, she became
hysterical. It is likely, too, that for the first time she visual-
ized the sanitarium as a sort of prison, and the impulse to
escape became stronger than her fear of the world.”
"I think that is quite clear,” Dundee commented
respectfully.
"Just a heap of words, if you ask me!" Strawn brushed
it aside violently. "A pretty woman could always make
you believe black is white, Bonnie me boy! Just let me
have a whack at this Rambler dame!”
It was the timid nurse who flared the answer: "She
didn't have a thing to do with that awful murder! Enid
Rambler is the sweetest, kindest, most lovable " She
stopped suddenly, her voice choked with tears.
"Pretty fond of her, ain't you, sister?". Strawn asked
sarcastically.
"I certainly am! But so is nearly everybody else! But
why pick on her? She wasn't the only one who left the
shop while the pictures were on!"
"Ah!” Dundee said softly, about to reap the harvest of
patience and tact. "You saw someone else leave, Miss
Caplan?"
"Two others!” she affirmed emphatically. "Archie
Webster and a man who was visiting him this evening!"
why pick on her?ctures were ons out to reap, to


CHAPTER SIX
"Well, sister, your eyesight and memory are sure im-
proving fast!" Captain Strawn commended the nurse sar-
Castically. "Take a good long think and see if you can't
conveniently remember a few more patients who strolled
out of the dark shop to-night.”
"Others may have left, but I saw only those three,” Miss
Caplan retorted angrily. "The phone rang twice and once
Mrs. Appleby came over to ask for a sedative for her
patient, so I was out of the shop three times while the pic-
tures were being shown.
"But you're sure about Mr. Webster and his visitor,
Miss Caplan, in spite of the shop's being dark?” Dundee
asked, his voice very gentle.
"I am,” she answered earnestly. "You know how your
eyes get accustomed to the dark. And the shop is narrow,
although it's quite long."
"How did you identify these two men in the gloom?"
Dundee persisted
"Well, Mr. Webster is a very unusual type," the nurse
replied confidently. "He's the tallest patient we have here,
and very broad-shouldered. This evening he was wearing a
red-and-white-striped blazer, which showed up clearly.
And I noticed his friend very particularly, because he was
so awfully fat and short-like a balloon that's been blown
up till it's ready to burst. ... I don't know his name.”
"They left together, of course?"
"No. The fat man left first, and about five minutes
later I saw Mr. Webster leave. They both had seats near
the door, in the same row where Enid sat.”
"Did Webster speak to the girl before he left?''
don't ko
No. The gether, of co:
65


66 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
WPIY
locked wa... Seriend, I suphisky an
"Oh, she'd already left, just a minute or so before the
fat man did.”
"But Webster knows Miss Rambler, of course?”
"Ye-es,” the nurse admitted. "He seems to be terribly
in love with Enid, but I don't think she cares especially
for him.”
“There was no reason why you should have had Mr.
Webster followed?"
The nurse flushed and looked toward Dr. Harlow en-
treatingly. "I—well, it would have been safer "
"What do you mean?” Dundee asked sharply.
"Well, you see,” the nurse stammered, “Ārchie—Mr.
Webster-got drunk. We had to—to put him in the
locked ward, because he became violently quarrelsome.”
“Hmm. ... So he'd slipped out to do a little intensive
drinking with his friend, I suppose?”
"He couldn't have got the whisky any other way,” Miss
Caplan assured him defiantly. "I think that fat man was
just a bootlegger-
"When, exactly, was Webster's condition discovered?"
Dundee interrupted.
"When the movies were over and the patients and their
visitors were leaving the shop,” Miss Čaplan told him.
"Archie came lurching into the hall from the front porch,
and tried to pick a quarrel with Mr. Rowan. Archie is
usually the sweetest-tempered person in the world, but
when he's drinking. . . : Well, he said Mr. Rowan had
insulted him yesterday by not speaking to him, and that he
could whip ten Rowans with his hands tied behind him. I
thought,” she added, "that it was too bad he had to pick
on Mr. Rowan, because it was the first time the poor man
had ever attended one of our movie shows, and I did want
him to keep on being happy-
"What happened?".
"Mr. Rowan simply knocked Archie down with one
blow and walked out,” the nurse said, with a trace of
"He's with's. So here became


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 67
pride. “Mr. Whalen had just come to 'clock in,' since
it was ten o'clock, and he helped two of the attendants to
carry Archie off to 'Ten' Dr. Harlow heard the racket
and came down from her apartment upstairs, and she and
I went over to 'Ten' with Archie.”
"And the fat man?”
"I didn't see him, and Mr. Whalen couldn't find him
anywhere on the grounds.”
"You observed the patient closely, of course, Dr. Har-
low?" Dundee turned deferentially to the little doctor.
"Naturally, but his condition was obvious. He was
quite drunk. I administered a sedative, which took effect
very rapidly.”
"Then he's asleep now, I suppose,” Dundee commented
regretfully. "No chance to question him before morning?”
"It would be very unwise, and, in my opinion, quite
useless to arouse him," Dr. Harlow answered emphatically.
"Archie will keep. Besides being in the locked ward, he
will be watched every minute by 'Happy Day, the attend.
ant you saw arrive this evening.'
"What is Webster's trouble?”
"Periodic drunkenness. But he is not, medically speak-
ing, a true alcoholic,” Dr. Harlow told him. "He's a very
rich and idle young man, given to excesses of many sorts,
I am afraid. His father persuades him to enter Mayfield
voluntarily for hydrotherapy and enforced abstinence.
That is all the treatment he needs.”
"Too bad the abstinence wasn't enforced this time,”
Strawn commented sourly.
"It is," the little doctor agreed sturdily. "But it is not
entirely our fault. We have told his father that it is un-
wise for Archie to have visitors, but his father argues that
only by dealing very tactfully with the boy and permitting
him a degree of liberty here, can he induce him to come
for treatment. But I made Mr. Webster agree to his
having an attendant if Archie again succeeded in getting


68
ONE DROP OF BLOOD
liquor while in our charge. He likes Happy-everyone
does; so I don't anticipate any trouble on that score.”
"Let's return to Miss Rambler for a moment,” Dundee
suggested. “You may go back to your work, Miss Caplan,
and thank you very much. ... Now, Dr. Harlow, will
you tell me frankly what Dr. Koenig thought of Miss Ram-
bler's case?”
The doctor hesitated, then apparently decided to waive
professional ethics.“Dr. Koenig was of the opinion that,
for some unknown reason, Enid was malingering—that is,
faking symptoms and exaggerating her probably natural
tendency to hysteria.”
"Did he say why he thought so?"
"He—thought she was having so good a time here that
she didn't want to leave. I granted that she was extremely
popular with our men patients, but I pointed out that so
pretty and charming a girl and one who was apparently a
rich orphan would be popular anywhere, if it were not for
her fear of strangers."
"Then her fear of strangers does not extend to new
poputy and chatould be popu
patients?”
bathe is most and her
"We-ell, yes," the girl hesitated. "When she first
came we could not induce her to leave her suite—the larg.
est in the sanitarium, by the way. But she still avoids
new patients, does not make friends until they have taken
her unawares and—shown themselves friendly. As I said,
she is extremely popular, especially with the men. I am
afraid most of our women patients are a little jealous of
her beauty and her very smart clothes, but all the nurses
and attendants are devoted to her.”
"But Dr. Koenig considered her a disturbing influ-
ence?" Dundee guessed.
"Yes, for both reasons. I may as well be frank. There
have been two or three fights nothing really serious, of
course-among the men who are infatuated with her. And
one of the women patients—a former trained nurse who


ONE DROP OF BLOOD
69
has been a sort of pensioner of Dr. Koenig's since she be-
came paretic about a year ago—had to be put temporarily
in 'Ten' for tearing to pieces three or four of Enid's pret-
tiest dresses.”
"But you are still of the opinion that Miss Rambler is
definitely ill?" Dundee asked.
"Yes, I am, and I feel sure Dr. Koenig would have
agreed with me if he had had more opportunity to observe
her,” the young doctor answered stoutiy. "When I failed
to get at the source of her complexes, I suggested to Dr.
Koenig that he try to get her consent to psychoanalysis.”
"And did he talk with Miss Rambler after you made
that suggestion?”
"Not to my knowledge.”
"Did Miss Rambler appeal to either of you two doctors
for a sedative this evening?"
It was Dr. Cantrell who answered first. "Not to me.
I was at home all evening, but was not called and received
no visitors.”
"I was out from immediately after eight until five min-
utes to ten,” Dr. Harlow told him.
"Alone?” Strawn shot at her.
"Yes!” the girl answered, the gray-green eyes flashing
angrily. "I was out in my car, taking a long drive for
relaxation and fresh air.”
"Worried about something, and wanted to get off to
yourself?” Strawn insinuated.
"Not at all!” the girl flashed. "I am in the habit of
taking a drive whenever I have the opportunity, that is,
when Dr. Koenig is—was on hand to take care of any
emergency that might arise. It is a confining life.”
"Perhaps that is another reason why he planned to take
on an additional assistant,” Dundee suggested tactfully.
"I tell you Koenig said he was going to replace the
girl,” Baldwin, who had been silent for a long time, burst
out.


70 ONE DROP OF BLOOD -**
• "Did he give you any reason for his decision to dismiss
Dr. Harlow?"
"Yes. He said Justine was too credulous, an impractical
idealist, and inclined to let her heart run away with her
head,” the business manager answered without hesitation.
"Then of course there was the question of expense. We
didn't feel that we could afford two assistant psychiatrists
just yet, and Koenig said a man would be required to
handle the batch of new patients we'll be getting. The
Meridian Sanitarium has been catering largely to alcoholics
and drug addicts, and a doctor who has specialized in those
fields as well as in general psychiatry will be badly needed.
And I agreed that, what with the expense of new building
and furnishing, we would not be in a position to afford
two assistants for him, since Dr. Cantrell will also require
an assistant in the medical department.”
"It's you who are always harping on economy and cut-
ting down expenses!" the girl cried indignantly. “Dr.
Koenig never considered expense for a minute when the
good of the patients was jeopardized. He had to fight you
every inch of the way to put improvements through. ...
Look!" and she pointed a trembling forefinger at the dead
doctor's desk calendar. "There's a notation—'inner-spring
mattresses.' He told me this very morning that, in spite of
your opposition, he was going to replace every mattress
in the sanitarium with the finest inner-spring box mat-
tresses.”
"He said the same to me," Dr. Cantrell upheld her.
"Baldwin was holding out for having the old mattresses
renovated at a nominal cost.”
Captain Strawn thrust both hands into his pockets and
looked the business manager up and down with narrowed
gray eyes.
"So you and Koenig had your spats, too, eh?"
"We had differences of opinion-yes!” Baldwin replied
defiantly. “The business manager of any institution has a


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 71
constant fight on his hands to keep down expenses. That's
what business managers are for.”
“Then I take it there wasn't much love lost between you
and the doctor?" Strawn went on, rocking back and forth
on his heels.
“That's a nasty crack, but I'll answer it frankly," Bald-
win retorted, a glow of anger lighting up his usually cold,
emotionless eyes. "I'm not a sentimentalist, like these
two!” and he indicated Dr. Harlow and Dr. Cantrell with
a contemptuous wave of his claw-thin hand. “But I had
the highest respect for Dr. Koenig—as a psychiatrist. He
made this sanitarium! As its business manager I can tell
you that in Dr. Koenig's death Mayfield has suffered the
greatest calamity that could happen to it. And as May-
field's business manager, I mourn Dr. Koenig's death with
all my heart. But I couldn't be truthful and say that I
have lost a bosom friend. We shared a cottage on the
grounds and a manservant; we ate most of our meals to-
gether when the doctor wasn't away on a lecture trip-
every trip being good business, I assure you!—and spent a
good many hours in each other's company, in the way of
business. But we were not congenial. Now-take that
and make the most of it!"
In spite of his instinctive dislike of the man, of his cold-
bloodedness and obvious mercenariness, Dundee could not
help admiring the business manager's fearless frankness.
Certainly this man, together with Dr. Cantrell, had every-
thing to lose and apparently nothing to gain by Dr. Carl
Koenig's death.
"And have you any plans for replacing the man who
'made Mayfield?" Strawn asked, his voice still edged with
sarcasm. "Somebody who'll be a little easier for the busi-
ness office to handle?”
“That question is in pretty bad taste, Captain Strawn,"
Dr. Cantrell interjected quietly. "For two reasons. First:
Dr. Koenig is so recently dead and so tragically dead that
•


172
ONE DROP OF BLOOD
none of us has given any thought to his possible successor.
Second: the implied insinuation against Mr. Baldwin is
unwarranted. It is my experience that an institution's busi-
ness manager is usually not very popular with the doctors,
who are nearly always impractical outside their own partic-
ular field. Mr. Baldwin is no exception, but both Dr. Har-
low and I can tell you that, in the last analysis, he has the
good of Mayfield at heart as much as any of us. . . . Isn't
that correct, Justine?"
Dundee was sure the “Yes” cost the girl doctor a real
effort.
"Thanks!” Baldwin said gruffly, then cleared his throat
before going on: "As for a successor to Dr. Koenig, that's
entirely out of my line. My only concern is that we get a
man of whom Koenig himself would have approved.”
"Meaning this Dr. Sandlin, eh?” Strawn caught him
up. “Friend of yours, eh?”
"I've never met the man in my life,” Baldwin denied
scornfully. “Everything in the world that I know of him
is what Dr. Koenig told me—and that was precious little.
I gathered that Dr. Koenig had a talk with him while he
was on this last trip, though I don't even know where
Sandlin is located.”
"I do," Dr. Harlow said very quietly, but with an
almost fanatic light in her eyes. "He's on the staff of a pri-
vate sanitarium near Chicago. And Dr. Koenig lectured
on mental hygiene at the Medical College of Northwest-
ern University while he was on this trip. Doubtless he
interviewed Dr. Sandlin when he was in Chicago, and I,
for one-if I really have any right to do so—will cast my
vote for him. Dr. Koenig's wishes have been and always
will be sacred to me!"
"Same here!” Dr. Cantrell said emphatically if inele-
gantly.
"No use being hasty," Baldwin reminded his two asso-
ciates. "Dr. Koenig undoubtedly thought this Sandlin
for onewed Dr. Sandlin was on this top of Northweste


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 73
would fill the bill of assistant, but as far as being head
psychiatrist here is concerned- '
"At least, he shall be on the staff," Justine Harlow in-
terrupted stubbornly. "He can—have my place," she
added haltingly, her voice choking. “For if Dr. Koenig
really didn't want me to stay, that wish of his is sacred to
me, too.”
Dr. Cantrell shot a venomous look at Baldwin, as he
reached for the girl's small, firm hand and gripped it
hard. "I don't believe Carl had the least idea of dismissing
you, Justine. Any such idea, I am sure, originated with
Mr. Baldwin, as an economy move-
"Are you intimating that I lied, Bruce?” Baldwin inter-
rupted furiously.
*Not at all,” Dr. Cantrell assured him coldly. “I merely
think it quite possible that you misunderstood Dr.
Koenig."
"It occurs to me,” Dundee interrupted what promised
to be a quarrel, “that if Dr. Koenig seriously considered
dismissing Dr. Harlow, he would first take steps to change
his will. Does anyone know Attorney Forrest's telephone
number?”
"He is my attorney also,” Cantrell told him. "The
office number is Main 0300, the residence number Mirror
3421. But it is after midnight now "
"Sorry!” Dundee smiled, and reached for the telephone
on the dead man's typewriter table. As he dialed the
second number, he kept his eyes on the three most con-
cerned, but observed no expression more incriminating
than tense expectancy.
"Hello! I'm sorry to be calling so late, but it is quite
important. May I speak with Mr. Forrest, please?" He
listened for a moment, disappointment clouding his blue
eyes. Then: "I wonder if you could tell me, Mrs. Forrest,
whether Dr. Carl Koenig tried to reach his attorney this
evening? . . . He did? Then did he tell you the nature


74
ONE DROP OF BLOOD
of the business on which he wished to consult your hus-
band? This is Dundee, of the District Attorney's office.
... No? ... Oh! I see! . . . Thank you very much,
Mrs. Forrest.”
He replaced the hand telephone slowly. "I didn't want
to spoil her sleep by telling her the news. . . . Mrs. For-
rest told me, Captain, that Dr. Koenig telephoned about
half-past nine this evening, asking for Forrest, who is out
of town. Mrs. Forrest told him the lawyer would be back
in the morning, and hoped there was nothing urgent that
could not wait until then.”
"Well?” Strawn prodded, as the young detective paused,
frowning.
"Dr. Koenig replied that the matter was urgent, and
that he would attend to it himself to-night!”
"Well! Well! Well!” and Strawn rocked back and forth
on his heels. "Three guesses, my lad, as to what the doctor
was writing on that sheet that was torn out of his type-
writer! Wants a lawyer quick. Can't wait till morn-
ing-
"
"I'm afraid you're jumping pretty high to reach that
conclusion, Captain,” Dundee warned, averting his eyes
from the girl doctor's blanching cheeks.
"High, nothing! The Big Doctor tells Baldwin here
that he's going to replace the lady doctor. She's down in
his will for one-half his estate. Believe me, boy, whatever
it was that made Koenig determine to get rid of the girl-
and I'm sorry to be as blunt as this, little lady!—was seri-
ous enough to make him determined to draw up a new
will without even waiting until morning! . . . And even
then he wasn't quick enough!"
"I—Oh, Bruce!" It was not a dignified doctor, but a
desolate girl who clung, shuddering, to the only friend
desolate and the room.be girl close f
Cantrell hugged the girl close for a moment, then strode


76
ONE DROP OF BLOOD
Bosh, again! If he had told her it was to his best interest
to have a man assistant, she'd have kissed his feet when
she told him good-bye! ... And what's more, literally
the same applies to Norah Lacey! Sentimental fools, but
—there you are!"
"You're pretty eloquent, Mr. Baldwin,” Dundee com-
mented drily.
"I'm merely being just. And not wholly disinterested
either,” the business manager retorted savagely. "I have
Mayfield's welfare at heart. It's my job to safeguard that
welfare. And God knows we're in for enough scandal
through the very fact that a murder has been committed
here, without it's being broadcast that one of the staff is
under suspicion of having killed the Big Doctor."
"Spoken from the heart,” Dundee murmured. "At least,
Baldwin, you make no bones about being mercenary. It's
quite refreshing to find a man so free from hypocrisy."
"Your opinion of me does not interest me in the slight-
est,” Baldwin told him sourly. "Just stick to your job.
Find the murderer with the least possible delay, keep your
'theories' out of the papers, and above all, don't waste time
barking up the wrong tree.”
"Now that we've got our orders, Captain Strawn,” Dun-
dee said wryly, “don't you think we'd better see Miss
Lacey?"
"Collins!" Strawn bawled, and a plainclothesman
almost instantly opened the door between the office and
the reception room. “Come on in and shut the door. ...
Now, anything to report?”
"Yes, sir. Pretty soon after you come in here, a nurse
by the name of Hunter come and told Miss Lacey that a
patient named Rambler was in a pretty bad state, and Miss
Lacey beat it with her over to a cottage they call Sunflower
Court. I trailed along and waited outside the patient's
door. She was taking on something terrible, but this Lacey
dame quieted her down. Come out and fixed a shot-in-the-


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 77
arm for her, and then set with her till she was asleep. Then
we come back over here, and that's all.”
"All right! Send Miss Lacey in, Collins," Strawn
ordered.
The tip of the nurse's little Irish nose was scarlet, and
dark circles emphasized the grief in her tear-reddened eyes.
Her white cap with its black ribbon band sat askew on her
gray-threaded black curls, a fact of which she was as deso-
lately unconscious as she was of the streaks which tears
had left on her freckled cheeks.
She must have been thirty-five years old, but she looked
curiously like an inconsolable child as she hesitated just
inside the door, little hiccoughy sobs breaking up her
words:
"You—wanted to see me?"
Because she had looked straight into his eyes, Dundee
took upon himself the duty of questioning her.
"I believe it was you who discovered what had happened
here this evening, Miss Lacey,” he began very gently.
"Will you tell us about it?”
"At ten twenty I went up to my apartment on the second
floor to change into my uniform. I always relieve Miss
Caplan while she's at supper, if I'm in. She has supper
between half-past ten and eleven
"Hold on a minute, sister!" Strawn interrupted rudely.
"You say you went upstairs at twenty past ten. Where
were you before that time?”
"I was out,” the nurse answered defiantly.
"Out where?” Strawn demanded. “And who were you
with?"
"I was alone. I—I went to a movie.”
"Yeah? What movie did you see, sister?"
The nurse's eyes widened as she stared at him, then
the tear-reddened lids hid them for a moment before she
answered:
"I went to the Symphony. I saw 'His Wife's Lover.'”


78
ONE DROP OF BLOOD
“Just a minute, Captain,” Dundee interrupted Strawn's
next question.
And very slowly, his eyes on the nurse's paling face, he
drew a folded theater program from his inside breast
pocket.


80
ONE DROP OF BLOOD
"All right! I'll tell,” the nurse capitulated wearily. "I
was lying. I saw that picture Sunday night. I spent this
evening with friends. I didn't want to drag them into
this
"Your friends' names?” Dundee prodded.
Norah Lacey cast a despairing glance at Justine Harlow,
then flung up her head defiantly. "I spent the evening,
from eight o'clock until ten, with Mrs. Satterlee and her
daughter, Mabel.”
"Surely that's an innocent diversion," Dundee com-
mented drily. “Their address and—telephone number?"
"They live on Vine Street in Hamilton–5540 Vine
Street," the nurse told him reluctantly.
"And the telephone number?” Dundee insisted.
"Can't you take my word for it that I was there?" Norah
Lacey protested, almost wailing. “The number is Lake-
wood 0341, but— " and she sprang forward as if to
prevent Dundee by force from using the telephone which
he had picked up. "Please don't call them now. It's so
late. You might wake up the — ” She gasped, then
completed her sentence: "_the old lady."
With his eyes steadily upon her, the young detective
called the number. To his surprise the call was com-
pleted almost immediately. A girl's voice, which, as the
conversation continued, betrayed its owner's Southern
origin, drawled "Hel-lo-o-o!"
"I'm speaking from Mayfield Sanitarium, Miss Satter-
lee. Will you please tell me whether Miss Norah Lacey
was there this evening?"
"Oooh!" the soft voice cooed consternation. "Hasn't
she got home yet? She left here simply ages ago.”
"Can you tell me just when she did leave?” Dundee
asked.
"Why, yes, sir.” The drawl was becoming anxious. “It
was exactly ten o'clock. Miss Lacey said she'd have to be
back at the sanitarium in time to change into her uniform


ONE DROP OF BLOOD
81
before half-past ten. She always leaves exactly at ten. I
simply can't imagine
"Don't be alarmed, Miss Satterlee,” Dundee interrupted
soothingly.
"But I'm simply scared to death," the soft voice
mourned. “Won't you please tell her to call up Mabel the
very minute she gets back?”
Having given the promise, Dundee said good-night,
with apologies, and rather thoughtfully relayed the con-
versation to Strawn.
The Chief of the Homicide Squad was at heart a kindly
man. "Looks all right for you, sister,” he told the nurse
grudgingly, “but I can't see what you made such a to-do
about. Better call up your friend in a minute or two. ...
Now get along with your story."
Relief made the woman's face almost radiant. "I'm
sorry, but I didn't want my friends to be bothered. ...
Well, I changed into my uniform and came downstairs. It
lacked about five minutes of half-past ten, and I thought
I'd get a book out of Dr. Koenig's office. Doctor had
shown me a new textbook on psychiatry which the author
had autographed and sent to him, and I thought I'd read
while I was relieving Miss Caplan, though it wasn't likely
that I'd not be interrupted. The patients are apt to be
restless after the movies, and I'd been told the pictures
lasted late—till ten o'clock-and nine is bedtime here. ...
Well, anyway- ” and she raised one of her clenched
fists to press the knuckles against her trembling lips, "I
tried the door that opens into the main hall, and I found
it locked, of course, but I didn't know what to think when
my key wouldn't work.”
"Then you have a key to Dr. Koenig's office?" Strawn
cut in.
"Certainly,” the nurse answered with a flash of resent-
ment. “So has Miss Caplan, and Miss Horne, Doctor's
secretary, has one, too, of course. Well, I thought maybe


82
ONE DROP OF BLOOD
Doctor had turned the bolt on the door—it has a Yale
lock—and had forgot about it, so I went through the
door that leads from the main hall into the reception
room-
"That door was not locked?” Dundee interrupted.
"No, because patients are brought in at all hours, and
that room is kept ready to receive them. I tried the door
into this office, and it was locked, as I expected, but my
key worked, and I entered. There's a light switch just
inside the door- "
"Then there was no light on in here when you entered?”
"No, of course not. If there had been, I should have
seen it from the transom outside in the hall, and I'd have
knocked, supposing Dr. Koenig was still working. I
pushed the switch button, and—and I saw him—sitting
there— ” Norah Lacey covered her face with her shak-
ing hands.
"I know it's hard, Miss Lacey,” Dundee sympathized.
"Did you touch the-touch him?"
"I_no, I could see he—was— His head "
"Just what did you do?"
"1—ran,” the nurse confessed miserably. "I ran and
unbolted the door and ran on into the chartroom. Miss
Caplan, knowing I was ready to relieve her, had gone on
to her supper, and I - Well, finally I managed to call
Dr. Cantrell on the telephone. Then I ran upstairs and
told Dr. Harlow. She was just getting into bed, and while
she was dressing I ran back downstairs and waited for Dr.
Cantrell in the reception room. When I heard him come
into Dr. Koenig's office- ".
"You came in through your own office, I suppose, Doc-
tor?” Dundee turned to Cantrell.
"Of course! It's the shortest route, and the one I always
use. I unlocked the outside door of my office, and found
the door between the two offices ajar, just as I had left it
shortly after seven o'clock.”


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 83
Nothis telephones are extensionday, Miss
"Thank you. . . . Now, Miss Lacey, was this office left
exactly as you found it?”
"It was. Except that I unbolted the door into the hall,
just as I told you.”
"Dr. Cantrell?”
"I disturbed nothing. I even took care not to shift the
body in the slightest when I took the temperature, in an
effort to decide how long Dr. Koenig had been dead.”
"But you used the telephone later to call the district
attorney?"
"No. Not the instrument in this office. I used the
phone in the chartroom.”
"By the way, are your telephones on a switchboard?”'
Dundee asked.
"No," Cantrell answered. “We have three outside
lines. This telephone is on one of them. This instrument
and the one on my desk are extensions from the telephone
in the reception room. During the day, Miss Horne, the
secretary, answers the telephone, and notifies either myself
or Dr. Koenig of a call by pushing the correct button on
her desk. Mř. Baldwin has another of the outside lines,
with an extension on his secretary-bookkeeper's desk. The
third line, which is listed as 'Mayfield Sanitarium (Infor-
mation);' is in the chartroom. In addition we have an
intercommunicating telephone system between all of the
cottages, the chartroom, my home, the head nurses' apart-
ment on the second floor, and Dr. Harlow's apartment on
the same floor.”
"I see,” Dundee commented, cocking an amused eye-
brow at Strawn's impatience. “Where were you when the
crime was discovered, Mr. Baldwin?”
"In the cottage I share—did share, rather," the business
manager amended without emotion, "with Dr. Koenig.
Bruce—Dr. Cantrell-called me on the intercommunicat-
ing telephone at ten thirty-five. I had not gone to bed, so
I came right over. We talked things over a bit, had


84 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
Whalen in to see if he could tell us anything, then I sug-
gested that we call the district attorney, rather than the
police. Dr. Cantrell agreed, and called Sanderson
himself.”
"And how did you spend the evening, Mr. Baldwin?”
Dundee asked.
"Working," Baldwin told him curtly. "Went back to
my office directly after dinner. Carl-Dr. Koenig—and I
left the dining room together, and parted just outside his
door in the main hall. I had some estimates on the new
two-story building which will be required to house the
new patients, and I wanted to go over them in detail.
Also, since it's just after the first of the month, I had a
flock of sanitarium bills that required my O. K. before the
bookkeeper could pay them.”
"How late did you work?” Dundee persisted.
"I can't say to the minute,” the business manager an-
swered, frowning, "but it must have been about half-past
nine. My office opens into the main hall just to the left
of the staircase, and I pass this door on my way out. It
was ajar.”
"Did you see Dr. Koenig?” Dundee asked.
"I did. But he did not see me. He was typing, so his
back was turned to the door. There was no reason why I
should interrupt him, so I passed on through the hall and
went straight to our cottage.”
"Did you see anyone at all, except Dr. Koenig, in this
building?”
"No one at all,” Baldwin answered emphatically. "I
remember glancing into the patients' living room across
the hall, as I passed, but it appeared to be deserted. Natu-
rally I did not give it more than a passing glance."
"And on your way to your cottage?”
"No one at all,” came the unequivocal answer. "I still
had my mind on the plans for the new building, and I
don't remember looking about at all as I walked."
wa


ONE DROP OF BLOOD
85
Dundee lapsed into a thoughtful silence, and it was
Strawn who took up the burden of the investigation.
"We can take it for granted that the doctor was alive at
half-past nine or thereabout. Now, speak up! Anybody
see him alive after that time??”
There was a throbbing silence.
"How about you, little doctor?” the Chief of the Homi-
cide Squad demanded, pointing a finger at Justine Harlow.
"You got home at five minutes to ten, you say, and you
must have passed through the main hall. Was the doctor's
door open then?”
"No. And there was no light showing through the
transom. I was a little surprised, since Dr. Koenig had
said he would work until I returned,” Dr. Harlow
answered.
"But you made no inquiries as to when the doctor had
left?" Strawn demanded, accusingly.
The girl flushed, but she answered steadily: "No. I
knew he was tired, and I concluded that he had gone to
bed. Since he lived on the grounds, he would have been
accessible in case of emergency. Shortly after I got in,
Miss Caplan called me to help her handle Archie Webster,
but there was no reason at all to call Dr. Koenig."
"What about you, Cantrell?” Strawn leveled his fore-
finger at the medical man.
"I did not see or communicate with Dr. Koenig after
about seven fifteen, when I finished sewing up Chester's
slashed arm," Cantrell answered positively. *Carl—Dr.
Koenig-looked on as I worked, and gave young Chester
a good tongue-lashing for the trouble he had caused.
When I had finished with the boy- "
"Bawled him out, did he?" Strawn pounced. "Kinda
funny way for a brain doctor to treat a patient, ain't it?"
"Not at all!” Justine Harlow took up the cudgels spir-
itedly. "It's exactly the right way to treat a patient like
Luké Chester. He hasn't the slightest intention of com-
finger ata thot see or comen I finished spelý.
Carlhester


86 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
Dr. Koen Loenis, santarily e
n
mitting suicide, but because his father has forbidden his
marriage with a middle-aged adventuress, he has been
punishing his family and indulging his own love of excite-
ment and the limelight by very half-hearted suicide at-
tempts. His father got tired of the excitement and put
him in here. There's nothing actually wrong with the boy
mentally, except a perverted desire for sympathy and
excitement.”
"But the boy got good and sore at the doctor, eh?”
Strawn guessed.
"Not at all!” Dr. Harlow retorted. "He was devoted to
Dr. Koenig, as are all our patients. In fact, he was pleased
that Dr. Koenig should take time to give him a good, stiff
lecture. He voluntarily promised to ask to be put into
'Ten,' the locked ward, the next time the urge came on
him to commit suicide.' And of course,” she smiled, for
the first time that evening, "he'll enjoy himself immensely
when he does go into Ten.' A new and different way of
getting into the limelight.”
"Each to his own fancy!" Strawn growled. "Now,
Cantrell! You say you didn't see or communicate with Dr.
Koenig after seven fifteen. Where were you from that
time on?”
"At home, subject to call. No call came."
"Anyone to back up that alibi?” Strawn demanded
crudely.
"Alibi?” Cantrell repeated angrily. "Don't you think,
sir, that the use of that word is a little premature?"
"I take it, then, that you are going to say you were
alone,” Strawn caught him up shrewdly.
"As a matter of fact, I was alone after eight o'clock,"
Cantrell answered, with an obvious effort to control his an-
ger. “That is, I was alone in the living room of my house,
my wife having gone to bed very shortly after dinner, with
one of her severe neuralgic headaches. Naturally she can-
not support my 'alibi,' as you call it, since our bedroom


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 87.
is so far separated from the living room that I could have
left the house and returned half a dozen times without her
hearing me.”
"Have you told her the news of the murder?"
"I looked in on her when I left, and found she was
asleep. I did not wake her.”
"Then we'd better get hold of her right now, don't you
think, Bonnie?" and Strawn turned to the younger
detective.
Dundee glanced at the medical man's flushed cheeks
and blazing eyes. "Hardly necessary, is it, Chief?” he
answered lazily. "The doctor has already admitted that
his wife cannot corroborate his story of not having left the
house, and if Mrs. Cantrell is ill, it seems rather a shame
to disturb her. . . . Your wife was formerly a patient of
Dr. Koenig's, I believe?”
"She was," Cantrell answered, more pleasantly. ""Not a
'mental case in the usual sense of the word, Claire was a
neurasthenic. Dr. Koenig psychoanalyzed her and she has
been a very normal and happy girl ever since.”
"You don't say!” Strawn commented. "By the way,
Doc, how old are you?"
Again the doctor's eyes blazed wrath, but he answered
with savage brevity: “Forty-nine!”
"And how old is thať pretty little wife of yours?":
Strawn grinned.
"Look here!” The doctor almost choked with anger. “I
don't know why you're wasting time on damn-fool ques-
tions— My wife is twenty-four years old, if that fact
concerns you in the least!"
Strawn's advice to the medical man that he keep a civil
tongue in his head was interrupted by the appearance of
Detective Harmon from the reception room, his heavy face
red and damp with perspiration.
"I can't hold off them newspaper boys much longer,
Chief!” he protested apologetically. "They're threatenin'


88 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
to bust down this door if you don't give 'em a story within
five minutes, so's they can catch their home-edition
deadlines.”
"Tell 'em to go to hell!” Strawn growled. "I ain't
running the Homicide Bureau on newspaper deadlines.
:.. . . You want to see 'em, Bonnie?"
"No, Captain,” Dundee smiled, for he well knew his
old chief's love of publicity. "I'm not in the picture offi-
cially—at least not yet. Keep my name out of it, will
you?”
"Blamed if I know what to tell the boys,” Strawn wor-
ried, scratching his thick gray hair.
"Personally, I don't think it would be wise to let them
see this room,” Dundee suggested tactfully. "I think we
are agreed that this is merely a well-set stage—just a little
too well-set; but I believe the less said about it in the
papers, the better. No use tipping off the murderer that
he overplayed his hand.”
"How's this, lad?” Strawn was still thoughtfully
scratching his scalp. "Owing to the fact that they was a
lot of visitors here to-night, on account of the movies, the
police have a theory that the murderer sneaked in un-
noticed, and killed the doctor to even up some old score. I
can hint that we're on the track of the relative of some
killer that the doctor, as an alienist in court, helped to
hang by testifying he wasn't insane. It's a cinch Koenig
made a slew of enemies that way, first and last.”
"A good idea!” Dundee applauded sincerely, and Dr.
Harlow gave a quick, tremulous sigh of relief.
As Detective Harmon returned to the impatient re-
porters, Strawn rocked back and forth on his heels, his
chest expanded with satisfaction in his own cleverness and
Dundee's appreciation of it. "Now, folks,” he began
pompously, "what I've just said brings up a mighty impor-
tant question, and I want all of you to think seriously and
answer truthfully: did Dr. Koenig have any enemies that
any of you know about?"


ONE DROP OF BLOOD
89
atened metimes the reftermath of dense,
After a suitably long and solemn pause Dr. Harlow
spoke up, her lovely voice very earnest and reasonable:
"You yourself, Captain Strawn, have hit upon one class of
enemies that any alienist is sure to have. Dr. Koenig was
famous as an expert witness on legal insanity, and he has
taken the stand in almost every state in the Union.
Whether he testified for the prosecution or for the defense,
almost every important trial brought its aftermath of death
threats for the doctor. Sometimes the relatives of a mur-
derer's victim threatened his life, because he helped to
send the murderer to an insane asylum instead of to the
death house. More often, of course, the relatives of crimi-
nals who received long-term sentences or the death penalty
swore to be avenged.”
"Did the doctor keep those letters?” Dundee asked.
"Not one of them. Nor did he bother to turn them
over to the police. He did not have an atom of fear in his
make-up,” the little doctor answered emphatically.
"Any other enemies?" Strawn prodded.
"As an alienist in court and as a member of the lunacy
commission,” Dr. Harlow answered, "Dr. Koenig some-
times balked a well-planned conspiracy on the part of
scheming relatives to have a rich member of the family
'put away,' in order to get control of his or her property.
And I should also explain that every patient, at a certain
stage in the treatment, hates his psychiatrist, because the
doctor forces him to face some bitter truth about himself.
But once that truth is faced and understood, and mental
healing has begun, it is just as natural to love the psychia-
trist with a deep devotion.”
"So you admit that a patient could have been at the
hating stage in the treatment, and hated the doctor enough
to kill him?” Strawn bore down on her.
"I admit the possibility—yes!” the young doctor said
quietly. “But I cannot reconcile the scheming and plan-
ning after the murder with the impulsive act of an enraged
patient.”
quietly. me the possibore dow


90
ONE DROP OF BLOOD
"How about this chap Rowan?” Strawn suggested. “By
all accounts, he was the last patient to have an interview
with the doctor, and according to Miss Caplan he has a
violent temper—took a sock at Webster and knocked him
flat.”
"Samuel Rowan did have a three-hour interview with
Dr. Koenig this afternoon,” Dr. Harlow admitted. “But
when he left this office he was a changed man—relieved,
buoyant, sociable, in contrast to two years of almost total
silence. Dr. Koenig was jubilant, as Mr. Baldwin has told
you. And Rowan was so much a new man that he attended
the picture show for the first time since he's been here,
and chatted and laughed with the other patients almost as
normally as if he'd never been ill. Of course he was, and
will be for a time, in a state technically called 'elation'—
the pendulum having swung from extreme depression to
extreme well-being, based on relief. When he is really
completely normal again he will be neither depressed nor
elated. But I can assure you, from all my past experience,
that Samuel Rowan was worshiping Dr. Koenig as his
savior this evening.”
"Just the same, I'd like to have a little powwow with
Mr. Samuel Rowan!” Strawn interrupted her eloquence
belligerently. “This is the way I look at it, Bonnie! Here's
a bird that's had something pretty fierce on his chest for
two years. He spills it to the Big Doctor. Sure he's
relieved! Every crook is, when he confesses! Haven't I
seen a Bluebeard dance a jig and sing a jazz song, after
I'd third-degreed him into telling where he'd buried the
bodies of his four missing wives? . . . Well, this Rowan
chap feels swell until he sees that movie, 'Manslaughter,'
where the girl gets sent to the 'pen.' And he don't feel so
good. He gets to worrying, see? That damned doctor
knows too much! And Rowan wonders how the hell he
happened to go so cuckoo as to spill the beans. Why, the
doc can notify the police and it'll be the 'pen' for Sammy
missing wis that movied he don
oo much!" worrying, spen.' And han


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 91
Rowan! What does he do? He slips out of the dark shop,
and into the doc's office. And the first thing he sees is his
case history lying on the doc's desk, and the doc typing it
all out—what he'd told him, and what's enough to send
him up maybe for the rest of his life. Get it? He don't
stop to reason that the doc can't squeal on him, on account
of professional ethics. He ain't taking no chances! He
kills the doctor, and tears up his case history. But this bird
ain't crazy, and he knows he can't get away with it on no
insanity plea. So he fixes things up to look like one of the
nuts did it, and then strolls away and into the shop again
by the back door. . . . Get it, boy?"
Dundee nodded slowly. It really was amazingly con-
vincing. And he had no better theory of his own to offer.
None half so good, if he would admit the truth. But
still —
"Why, boy, it's air-tight!" Strawn jubilated. “Mr.
Baldwin here has already told us what the doc said to him
after Rowan had had his powwow! Just what was the
words the doc used, sir?”
Baldwin answered reluctantly: "Dr. Koenig remarked
that, if a psychiatrist chose to, he could give the police
plenty to keep them busy. But he did not mention Rowan
by name. I admit that your theory sounds very plausible,
Captain, but I feel absolutely sure that you are making a
mistake-
"So do I, Roger!” Justine Harlow cut in, her lovely
voice warm and rich with gratitude.
The business manager flushed with pleasure at the girl's
first use that evening—and Dundee suspected it was the
very first—of his Christian name.
"I'm beginning to think,” Strawn began savagely, "that
nobody around here wants the doctor's murder cleared up!
But the police do! And I'll thank you to send for this
Rowan bird without any more shillyshallying!
Dr. Harlow's small face flamed with anger, but her


92
ONE DROP OF BLOOD
voice was steady with professional dignity and au-
thority:
"I am sorry to have to refuse that request, Captain
Strawn! Unless you show me a warrant for Samuel
Rowan's arrest you cannot see him to-night!"


94
ONE DROP OF BLOOD
crooked arm shielded her face, but Dundee could see slow
tears trickling down her wan, freckled cheeks, and drop-
ping with tiny splashes upon the stiffness of her uni-
form. ...
"I'm terribly sorry,” he said gently, turning back to the
girl doctor. "I am sure we shall all be the better for a few
hours' rest. I don't believe there is much more that either
Captain Strawn or I can do to-night. By the way, I under-
stand that there is a vacant suite in Sunflower Court. If
you will permit me-
"We shall be glad to have you as our guest," she
assured his h something more than perfunctory polite-
ness, "for üs iong”—and she drew a sharp breath—"as
it may seem necessary for you to remain on the ground.
I'll telephone to Miss Hunter to make you comfortable.
... Oh, Mr. Dundee! Please believe that we all want to
help! You seem so—so understanding, so—kind! You
must realize that we who are left must safeguard our
patients as he would have wished us to ”
"I do understand,” Dundee assured her humbly, for he
could have knelt before her loyalty and courage. "I'll
help you to the very best of my ability. . . . Now, if you
will trust me here alone- " he suggested tactfully.
But before the two doctors, the nurse and the business
manager had obeyed his suggestion, the girl psychiatrist
had locked the precious case history file and had asked for
and received from the detective the key to it which lay
among the few possessions taken from the murdered man's
pockets. Strawn might have considered his yielding a
weakness, but Dundee had a profound respect for Justine
Harlow's attitude toward the secrets that filing cabinet
held. And he felt fairly sure that none of those secrets had
any place in the mystery he was investigating.
"You will not try to piece together those tiny scraps of
the destroyed case histories?” she had asked him anxiously.
"I know they are evidence,' but-


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 95
"I'm afraid that would take many days and a Job's
patience,” he reassured her, and a singularly sweet smile
rewarded him.
When he was alone, awaiting Strawn, who was still
busy with the newspaper men, Dundee poked tentatively at
the great mound of scraps which Carraway, the fingerprint
expert had examined and then left in a glass letter-tray
upon the dead man's desk.
* A superhuman task, indeed, to paste these fragments
into two complete case histories! But what a reward for
patience it might be! What dark secret had clouded
Samuel Rowan's mind and sealed his lips for two long
years? If Rowan himself did not choose to tell—and why
should he?—was that secret to be locked forever in the
dead doctor's brain? And that other case history which the
murderer had destroyed. Why had he chosen Archie Web-
ster's record of drinking debauches and probably mild
attacks of delirium tremens? Had he chosen hit or miss,
as part of his scheme for making this murder look like the
work of a demented patient, or had he, as Strawn believed,
destroyed his own record, and that of another patient
merely as camouflage?
Samuel Rowan. . . . Archibald Webster. . . . Both
current patients, while the files were crowded with case
histories of the dead or departed. And had chance or a
diabolical schemer hit upon two patients who could not
possibly furnish the police with an unassailable alibi? Had
the murderer possibly seen Webster leave the O. T. Shop,
just as Miss Caplan had seen him? And who was Web-
ster's visitor? If Strawn was right in his theory, Rowan
could have seen Webster and his friend leave; could have
made use of that knowledge with the cold-blooded inten-
tion of "framing” the young scapegrace for his crime.
Certainly there had been bad blood between the two
men. . . . But—and Dundee caught himself up short-if
Rowan had actually sneaked out of the shop, committed
the murdturnish the hit upor parted. Anfrowded wici Both


96
ONE DROP OF BLOOD
murder, framed Webster, and crept back into the O. T.
Shop while the movie was still on, would he have been so
foolhardy as to make himself conspicuous and label him.
self violent, by knocking young Webster down? But might
not a super-clever man have done just that? How better to
prove that he had stayed in the shop all evening and
had left with the crowd, than to make a scene out of what
might have passed unnoticed?
Dundee propped his elbows on the dead doctor's desk
and rested his head upon his cupped hands, for he too was
very tired. He had had a hard day. ...
"Damn that blood smear!” he groaned, as his heavy
eyes rested on the whitish spot on the corner of the desk.
How big had the smear been before Carraway had offi-
ciously dabbed at it with a wet towel-end, to make sure
that it was blood? And what the devil was blood doing
there, anyway?
It simply did not fit into the picture. He closed his eyes
and again visualized the murder drama. The doctor tap-
ping away at the typewriter keys, not hearing the soft,
stealthy footsteps, which came from the reception room,
on through the open door and across the thick rug to the
doctor's very chair.
But wait! If the doctor had been typing, he would have
been sitting in such a position that, out of the corner of his
eye at least, he would have caught sight of that stealthy,
approaching figure. For the typewriter table was at right
angles to the desk, which was set against the wall almost
directly opposite the door into the reception room.
Dundee frowned. There were two alternatives, of
course. Either the doctor was bent over work at his desk,
with his back squarely to the door, and the entry had been
so noiseless that he had not heard a sound, or he had been
typing, and the sight of his visitor had not surprised or
alarmed him. Someone he knew! Someone he was accus-
tomed to seeing. Someone who was privileged to walk


ONE DROP OF BLOOD
97
in the machinchose bowed should doctor's chairs
into that office unannounced! But any member of the staff
or any patient in Mayfield could do that!
Dundee again concentrated on visualizing the mur-
derer's movements. The doctor had not been alarmed;
had continued with his typing, with perhaps a word to his
caller. The murderer had strolled to the doctor's chair,
and had glanced over those bowed shoulders at the sheet
of paper in the machine. What had he read there? Some-
where in that mound of fine-torn scraps was the answer-
if Dundee was not guessing wildly. But if he was right,
whatever the murderer had read had been so great a shock
to his mind or so horrible a menace to his liberty that only
by destruction of the writer as well as of the written words
could the doctor's caller ever feel safe again. The doctor
Dundee let the imaginary film unwind rapidly-had gone
on with his typing, unaware that his visitor had peeked.
The murderer had withdrawn a few steps, involuntarily;
had backed slowly away in horror, a terrible resolution
already forming in his shocked brain. He had backed to
the open door leading into the hall, had silently drawn it
shut. And if the doctor had heard the click of the lock, he
had undoubtedly surmised that his visitor desired privacy
for his interview. Then the murderer's eyes had fallen on
the heavy bronze statue atop the bookcase so near at hand,
in the corner between the two doors. Without pausing for
reflection, he had seized the statue, stepped swiftly and
silently back to the doctor's chair, and had brought the
thing crashing down on that bowed, intent head.
For only by that hypothesis could Dundee account for
the bruise upon the murdered psychiatrist's chin. Cer-
tainly the blow struck in that way would force the head
down so violently that the chin could be bruised upon the
frame of the typewriter. And naturally it had been neces-
sary to swing the swivel chair so that the head was no
longer jammed against the typewriter, since the incrimi-
nating sheet of paper must be removed from the machine


98 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
and destroyed. But Dundee could picture the Unknown
recoiling from the machine, even as his fingers were reach-
ing for the all-important paper. Fingerprints! The statue,
which he had carefully and silently laid on the rug beside
the swivel chair, could be wiped clean of betraying prints,
but he must touch nothing else with uncovered fingers.
Gloves! But it was summertime, and he had no gloves
with him. But through the half-open door into Dr. Can-
trell's office he could see the white-enamel instrument
cabinet. Of course! Doctors always used rubber gloves in
making examinations. And silently he had tiptoed into the
medical man's office. There, as if Fate were on his side,
he had found the soiled rubber gloves which the night
nurse had left lying on top of the cabinet in the instrument
tray.
No use picturing all that had followed. It was quite
obvious how the murderer's mind had worked. This was
primarily a sanitarium for the treatment of mental diseases.
There, too, Fate had been working for him. What easier
than to "wreck” the room, so that police and hospital
authorities would jump to the conclusion that one of the
psychopathic patients had gone berserk and had murdered
in a homicidal rage?
But—how had blood come to be upon the corner of the
doctor's desk? The head wound had bled but little, most
of the blood matting in the hair and the rest trickling
down the neck to disappear beneath the collar. And the
blood that had slowly oozed from the right ear had soaked
into the blotter. Dundee swung himself in the swivel
chair until he faced the typewriter, bent his head until it
touched the machine, then raising his head only slightly,
he swung the chair until his forehead came to a rest upon
the desk. No! The blood could not have been flung to the
corner of the desk in that way! But how-how?
Temporarily abandoning that poser, the detective asked
himself who the murderer could be. If his reconstruction
No! hair ungthen raisliter, bonself


ONE DROP OF BLOOD
99
of the crime was even approximately the truth, Dundee
knew certain things about him.
First: the murderer was someone who was privileged to
enter that office unceremoniously.
Second: the murderer was probably someone who was
occupying the doctor's attention at the very moment he had
entered the office. Now, what had the doctor been typing?
One of three things, obviously: an addition to a case his-
tory; a change in his will; or a letter.
Third: the murderer was quick-witted and cold blooded.
Fourth: he was apparently familiar with the names of
the current patients. Or had his choice of case histories to
be destroyed been hit or miss?
As he made his points, Dundee wrote them on a fresh
sheet of paper which he had rolled into the typewriter.
Now he paused and stared at the second paragraph, frown-
ing intently. "An addition to a case history." . . . Only
patients figured in case histories— No, wait! Doctors
and nurses must be mentioned in them, too! And the head
psychiatrist had been away for three weeks. The mental
welfare and the very lives of his patients had been in the
hands of Dr. Cantrell, Dr. Harlow, Norah Lacey, Rose
Caplan, and a small army of attendants.
After so long an absence Dr. Koenig had undoubtedly
been besieged by patients. Was it possible—and Dundee
sat up, startled, at the new train of thought—that a patient
had complained to the Big Doctor of brutal treatment suf-
fered during his absence? Or of criminal neglect on the
part of some member of the staff or of an attendant? And
if so, would not Dr. Koenig have recorded the accusation
in the patient's case history, labeling it, possibly, as evi-
dence of a "persecution complex" or a delusion? But
suppose the accused-attendant, doctor, or trained nurse-
had seen the accusation being typed out by the doctor, and
bad known it to be true? Had known that investigation
would bring about dismissal or disgrace? And was it not


100 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
his link ceous Dog he faceenig's Matters Koenisother
possible, too, that Dr. Koenig had summoned the accused,
to confront him or her with the patient's serious charge?
Such speculation had endless possibilities. An attendant
or a doctor who had criminally assaulted a girl patient.
Such a girl as Enid Rambler, for instance. A subtle drug
administered to produce the symptoms of insanity. Crimi-
nal malpractice, resulting in the death of a patient during
the head doctor's absence. Bribery of a doctor or an
attendant or a nurse by the relative of a patient, so that the
patient would be kept wrongfully incarcerated. Such
things had been done, Dundee knew. Wives of rich old
men had been known to put their undesirable husbands
away in just such institutions as this, so that they might
enjoy the poor devil's money unhampered. With the col-
lusion of a doctor, tempted by a heavy bribe
Dundee's head swam. He closed his eyes and pressed
his fingers into his temples. But he could not drive away
the hideous possibility that lurked behind all these specu-
lations. Finally he faced it squarely.
Roger Baldwin, Koenig's partner and certainly in his
confidence where business matters were concerned, was
authority for the statement that Dr. Koenig had planned
to dismiss Justine Harlow and secure another assistant
psychiatrist in her place. A sudden decision, undoubtedly,
since neither the girl doctor nor the medical head of May-
field had known of it. But the girl was co-legatee with
Norah Lacey in his will. That, certainly, was a fact, since
Dr. Cantrell and his wife had witnessed the will. And it
was as indisputably a fact that Dr. Koenig had been in
pressing need of the services of a lawyer, that he had called
his attorney that night, and, finding that he was out of
town, had told Mrs. Forrest that he would attend to the
matter himself, since it could not wait until morning.
And Justine Harlow herself had admitted that she had
had a "disagreement” with the Big Doctor on the subject
of Enid Rambler. And Enid Rambler was certainly a girl


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 101
of wealth. Was it possible that the girlish, loyal-seeming
little doctor had succumbed to the temptation of a huge
bribe to aggravate the girl's mental condition until she
should finally be a fit subject to be "committed" by a
lunacy commission?
No! Dundee surprised himself by crashing his fist upon
the dead doctor's desk. It was unthinkable! That girl was
all she seemed to be, or he was crazier than any inmate of
Mayfield Sanitarium. But—the doctor bad determined to
dismiss her. The doctor had telephoned his lawyer. ...
And the vicious circle began to spin again in the detective's
head. Justine Harlow was a graduate of medical school
as well as of psychiatry. She knew drugs. And some secret
anxiety had gnawed at her nerves all evening. ...
Dundee was so sunk in miserable speculation that he
did not hear the door open.
"Well, boy! I've got rid of them damned reporters at
last!” Strawn boomed. "And say, one of the boys spun a
theory that ain't so dusty.”
"Yeah?" Dundee asked wearily, without turning to face
his old chief.
"Yeah! Says me!" Strawn retorted. “Creston, of The
News. His idea is that Doc Koenig was in collusion with
some rich woman to keep her hubby shut up here, then go
before the lunacy commission and swear he's a nut, so that
the wife could get herself appointed the guardian of his
person and of his property_ "
"I thought of that,” Dundee interrupted wearily. “But
Koenig was too big a man for that.”
"Every man's got his price," Strawn quoted cynically.
"And I got a hunch of my own. The Big Doc was away
for three weeks. Just got back. This girl doctor probably
don't get a whale of a salary, and if a rich dame come
along and offered her- "
"Great minds run in the same channel, Chief-to quote
another old saw," Dundee interrupted, grinning wryly.
PT 1


102
ONE DROP OF BLOOD
"I'd just been going over that very possibility, and I
can't believe it! Not of that girl!”
"Because she's got red hair and green eyes, and a cute
way of wrinkling her nose when she grins?” Strawn cut in
slyly. "Well, you needn't tear your shirt, lad! I'm think-
ing it's that Rowan bird, and I'll be after him bright and
early in the morning. I'm leaving Harmon and Clinton on
guard outside these doors, and shoving off myself. What
about you?"
"I now become an inmate of Mayfield Sanitarium,"
Dundee grinned. "My temporary address is Sunflower
Court."
"Next door to the Rambler baby, eh? Gonna sit up with
her and hold her little white hand? . . . Well, I'd rather
pound my ear. 'Night!"
"Just a minute, Captain. I'm taking charge of this tray-
ful of scraps, if you don't mind.”
"Sure! Paste 'em up, if you like. I never was any good
at jigsaw puzzles, and there ain't a man on the squad I feel
like giving a week off to do the job. But don't take any
chances with that trash, Bonnie." I'm betting the distria
attorney can make a rope out of it to hang Rowan with.”
"If," Dundee replied slowly, “it's the stuff that hang-
man's rope is made of, why do you suppose the murderer
left it lying about? Why didn't he burn it?"
chances ing a week off here ain't a man never was any


CHAPTER NINE
in which one in the far cord Sunflower across
UNESCORTED, Special Investigator Dundee crossed the
driveway before the main building and struck off across
the dew-wet, thick-grassed lawn toward Sunflower Court.
Except for a small cottage in the far corner of the grounds,
the building in which he was to be housed was the only
structure to the left of the long, U-shaped driveway. In
the faint light diffused by the powerful lamps set at inter-
vals along the high iron fence Dundee saw, in this seg-
ment of the vast grounds, a croquet field, a miniature golf
course, a large flower bed encircling a fountain, two huge,
colorful umbrellas with their scalloped edges futtering in
the flower-scented night air, three iron tables topped with
gay oilcloth, and numerous striped canvas chairs, with
canopies to protect the patient's eyes from the glare of the
summer sun. Truly, these looked like the grounds of a
fashionable resort hotel.
And when he had inspected his suite in Sunflower Court
he knew that for such luxury and comfort a hotel visitor
would pay even more than Mayfield Sanitarium exacted
of its wealthy patients.
Miss Hunter, the nurse in charge of Sunflower Court,
and whose name had bobbed up frequently during the
long hours of the investigation into the murder of Dr.
Carl Koenig, greeted the detective as he was crossing the
cement-floored porch of the stucco building. And she
chuckled richly as he was momentarily dumb with aston-
ishment.
"I know I'm big," she laughed, as she extended the
largest arm Dundee had ever seen on a woman, "but I
103


104 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
ed with a hos distinguish anal board above ut
wouldn't hurt a fly. You'll get used to me. . . . Come
along in, sir, and make yourself at home.”
Dundee grinned apologetically and stepped into a
pleasant, charmingly furnished room, which jutted out
upon the porch. A chart table and a signal board above it
were the only features to distinguish the room as in any
way connected with a hospital.
"Everything quiet now, nurse?” he asked in a low voice.
"Yes, thank heaven!" the huge nurse sighed, but she
could not make her great, red, freckled face look lugu-
brious to save her life. "And what a night it's been!
Honest, my feet are killing me. . . . Have you found out
who did that awful thing, sir? Let me tell you, Mr.
Dundee, a finer man and a greater doctor than Dr. Koenig
never drew breath of life.”
"I'm afraid I don't know any better than you who did
the deed, Miss Hunter," Dundee told her regretfully.
"How is Miss Rambler? It was I who found her and
brought her back, you know."
"Poor lamb! She'd have had a conniption fit if she'd
known you were a detective. . . . She's asleep now, bless
her heart, but she wouldn't shut an eye till Miss Lacey
gave her a hypo and promised to sit with her until it took
effect.”
"Has she an attendant?" Dundee asked.
"Sure! Crippled like she is with that sprained ankle,
poor kid! But she hasn't needed an attendant before
this. . . . Would you like to go to your rooms now, sir?"
Dundee followed her into a narrow hall, which, mid-
way its length, gave upon an immaculate kitchen.
"Most of the food is cooked in the main kitchen, and
brought over," Miss Hunter explained, “but the trays and
extra delicacies are prepared here, as well as the nine
o'clock nourishments. . . . This way out, sir.”
Dundee found himself facing a long open court, car-
peted with grass, bordered and gemmed with flower beds.
A narrow, roofed porch hugged the building on all sides,


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 105
except the far end, which was guarded by a spiked iron
fence.
"Nice little private garden, isn't it?" boasted the nurse
in charge of Sunflower Court. "The gate at the end is
always kept locked, and there's no other way out except
through my office, so you see the patients are pretty safe
here."
The mountainous, jolly nurse leading the way, they
walked softly for a few feet along the left side of the court,
before Miss Hunter paused at a door marked with a
gleaming brass "B."
There was a tiny hall, and to the right of it a large,
luxuriously furnished sitting room, complete with easy
chairs, radio cabinet, bookcase, down-stuffed couch, coffee
table, end tables, and rather good bric-a-brac and pictures.
Gold silk curtains and a golden-brown velvet rug gave the
room a rich glow of comfort.
"And here's your bedroom," Miss Hunter told him
proudly, as she ushered him into a large, exquisitely
appointed chamber. The color scheme was daffodil and
green, carried out in the painted furniture, the window
drapes, bedspread and rug.
"We usually put a woman here,” Miss Hunter admitted,
as Dundee grinned at the thought of his occupying so
feminine a bower. “This is the bathroom. It has a door
into the sitting room, too, to make it convenient for the
attendant, which you'll not be needing, of course."
The green-and-yellow bathroom was as luxurious as the
rest of the suite.
"There are six apartments in the court, I believe?"
Dundee asked, when he had sufficiently praised his
quarters.
"That's right. Miss Rambler has Suite C, next to you
toward the end of the court. It and Suite F are even larger
than this.”
"Who are the other patients in the court?"
"Well, a real old lady, by the name of Horton, has A,"
drapers
cually put a woman thought of his ocht a door


106 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
Miss Hunter began. "That's on the other side of yours.
And across the court in D we have a Mrs. Morse-
"Morse?” Dundee repeated. He saw again the two
words "Call Morse," which headed the three notations on
the dead doctor's calendar.
"Yes. Do you know her? Poor thing! She's been
awfully 'queer' for months, but she's much better now.
Or, rather, she was until tonight, when she got all upset
again.”
"What happened to upset her tonight?” Dundee asked
sharply. "Did she go to the movie?"
"No. Her husband visited with her from about half-
past seven until nearly nine, and when he came through
my office on his way out he said he had never seen his wife
in better spirits,” Miss Hunter explained. “He acted just
tickled to death, poor man. But it wasn't more'n fifteen
minutes before she was taking on something terrible. Her
nurse—she has three attendants, on eight-hour shifts—had
gone to our kitchen to fix her nine o'clock nourishment,
and when Miss Macy took her her hot chocolate and toast
she found Mrs. Morse moaning and shuddering, her head
all covered up with a sheet. She rang for me and I had to
get Miss Caplan to come over and give her a strong
sedative.”
"Did Mrs. Morse say what had upset her?” Dundee
asked.
"No. She wouldn't say anything except that she was
going to kill herself. . . . And here we'd been singing
Hallelujah because she was cured,” the fat nurse sighed.
"Cured? You mean a sudden cure?" Dundee asked,
startled.
"It was like a miracle!” Miss Hunter assured him sol-
emnly. "You know Dr. Koenig had been gone for three
weeks. Well, it seems that he did a lot of studying about
Mrs. Morse's case while he was gone, because as soon as
he got back-


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 107,
was W
"What was wrong with Mrs. Morse?” Dundee inter-
rupted.
"Some kind o delusion, I guess you'd call it,” Miss
Hunter answered. “You see, Mr. Dundee, I'm not a
trained nurse—just head attendant here; so I don't know
all the doctor-book names for things. . . . Well, anyway,
Mrs. Morse never would say 'l' or 'me'— "
"What's that?” Dundee puzzled.
"It was like this, sir,” the nurse explained patiently. "If
anybody spoke to her, said 'How are you, Mrs. Morse?;'
for instance, she'd say, 'She is very well, thank you,' or,
'She says she doesn't feel well to-day. It was the same
every time she referred to herself. Never did say 'I' until
Tuesday, after she'd had a long talk with Dr. Koenig.
You could have knocked me down with a feather, big as I
am, when I come on duty Tuesday night and she answered
me just like anybody else. She spoke right up: 'I'm feel-
ing fine, Miss Hunter!' she said, and I ain't ashamed to tell
you I broke right down and cried, I was so happy to see
the poor darling was cured.”
"You say she talked with Koenig on Tuesday?” Dundee
asked, frowning.
"Yes, sir. You see, Doctor had been psychoanalyzing
her for weeks, and the word went round that he'd finally
hit on whatever it was that had got her poor mind all
kinked up. A complex, they call it. Or maybe it's a
psychosis.”
"Do you know whether Mr. Morse saw Dr. Koenig this
evening, before or after he visited his wife?" Dundee
persisted.
"I guess he did,” the nurse admitted, her hazel eyes
widening. "He said he was going to drop in and speak to
the doctor, to ask him when he could take his wife
home.”
Dundee stared silently into the nurse's apprehensive
eyes, his mind buzzing with questions and conjectures.
brokes Huncer else stesday nighth a feachKocantin
She said Poke rien.d she anbig as I
nadº
the
.


108 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
"Is Mrs. Morse's attendant thoroughly reliable?" he
asked at last. "She must not be left alone an instant."
"You—don't think — ?” the nurse gasped.
"I don't think anything!” Dundee retorted curtly. "But
Mrs. Morse must be guarded every second of the day and
night! ... Now, who are the other patients in the
court?"
The nurse looked like a huge child whose feelings had
been wounded. "Mr. Salter has E, the suite next to Mrs.
Morse, and Archie Webster is in F. That is, he was until
they put him in 'Ten' to-night. I expect he'll be back here
in the morning. He's an awfully sweet boy, except when
he's drinking- ”
"So I've heard,” Dundee interrupted drily, for he was
a little tired of hearing Archie Webster's praises sung by
infatuated nurses. “Who is Mr. Salter? The name sounds
familiar."
"Howard Salter, the writer," the nurse explained. "He
writes Western novels—the most exciting things! But you
don't dare mention them to him. They say he hates his
books like poison, but they've made him rich enough to
afford Suite F, which is two hundred dollars a week—the
same price as Enid's. The rest of these apartments are
only a hundred and fifty.”
"Did Mr. Salter go to the movies to-night?” Dundee
asked.
"No. He hates the movies, too, though I've heard that
five or six of his novels have been made into pictures."
"Perhaps that is why Mr. Salter doesn't like the
movies," Dundee smiled. "Just what did Mr. Salter do
with his evening?”
"Sally Porter, the girl he's going to marry if he ever
gets well- "
"And what's wrong with him?” Dundee interrupted.
"He's what they call a manic depressive," Miss Hunter
elucidated, obviously proud of her knowledge. "Manic
depressives ain't really crazy, you know—just 'mentally


110 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
lay himself down to sleep. He had counted on the warm
shower to relax his nerves, but they remained annoyingly
taut. At last, clad in the delft-blue silk pajamas, black
satin dressing-gown and dark blue leather slippers which
Roger Baldwin had thoughtfully provided for him, the
young detective stepped out of his miniature hall into the
silent, flower-fragrant patio. Perhaps a walk in the balmy
June air would help. : ..
He strolled noiselessly, hands deep in the big pockets,
his brows knit with perplexed thought. If he only had
something to read..: The bookcase in his room was
empty, awaiting the patient's choice of literature —
"What luck!” he ejaculated to himself, as he saw a book
lying open and face down upon one of the iron tables set
at intervals along the roofed porch of the patio. There
was not light enough from the small electric lanterns
which swung from every door along the court, but he
thrust the volume into his dressing-gown pocket, and con-
tinued his stroll to the spiked fence at the rear.
Grinning at the thought that he was as well locked-up
as any psychopathic resident of the court, Dundee idly
shook the heavy iron gate set in the center of the fence.
But the grin was wiped off instantly. The gate was not
locked.
Miss Hunter raised startled eyes from the hooked rug
she was working on, as the newcomer she thought asleep
confronted her.
"You said that gate at the rear was always kept locked!”
he reminded her grimly. “Well, it's not locked now!"
"Not locked?” the nurse repeated blankly. "Oh! Then
Frank, the kitchen man, must have forgot to lock it after.
he brought the supper wagon through. But surely there's
no harm done
"More harm may have been done than you suspect,”
Dundee interrupted darkly. "Dr. Koenig was murdered


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 111
tonight, and Mrs. Morse was mysteriously thrown into a
panic. . ;. . Have you a key to that gate?"
"Yes, sir!" the nurse quavered. "I'll go lock it now.
Such a thing has never happened before
"Who else has a key?”
"There's one in the chartroom in the main building,
and Frank has one.”
"See that Mrs. Morse's nurse doesn't go to sleep on the
job tonight!” the detective warned her, and then left the
room as unceremoniously as he had come.
He was strangely disturbed. And his scalp was prickling
with the same premonitory unease which had served to
warn him of danger so many times in the past. Morse. ...
Morse.... "Call Morse.” ... The name writhed
through his brain. ... Mrs. Morse had been almost
miraculously cured by Dr. Koenig only the day before.
Her husband had come to rejoice over her cure, to plan to
take her home. But had he really rejoiced? Had the unex-
pected cure of his wife upset some vile, deep-laid scheme?
Had Morse stopped in to see the doctor who had wrought
the miracle? If so, why had Dr. Koenig not crossed out
the notation on his calendar- "Call Morse.” Had
death itself interfered with his meticulous efficiency?
With sudden resolution, Dundee knocked upon the door
of Suite D. An elderly woman in nurse's uniform an-
swered his knock, then drew back in startled amazement
at sight of her informally dressed caller.
"You are Mrs. Morse's nurse?” Dundee asked curtly, in
a low voice.
"Yes, sir. Mrs. Appleby is my name.”
"I'm Dundee, of the district attorney's office. I am
occupying Suite B, as a patient, until the mystery of Dr.
Koenig's death is cleared up. You'll remember that, I
hope? . . . Very well. Is your patient asleep?"
"Yes, sir," the woman breathed.
Tim Dundee,
as a patient, Wou'll remembe


112 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
"I understand that Mrs. Morse was unaccountably upset
this evening after her husband's visit,” Dundee went on,
keeping his voice very low. "I want you to tell me about
it. You were with her while Mr. Morse was here?”
"Not in the sitting room with them—no, sir. I never
like to intrude. Part of the time I was in the bedroom, but
most of the time I was out in the patio, close enough to
hear if I was called.”
"Tell me! When did you first notice that Mrs. Morse
was upset?”
"I came in when I saw Mr. Morse leave," the nurse
answered, her voice frightened. "I couldn't find Mrs.
Morse at first, but then I heard the water running in the
bathtub. I called to her and she said she was going to take
a hot bath. I thought her voice sounded a little queer, but
she never likes to have me help her with her bath, so I
turned down the bed, and then went to fix her nine o'clock
nourishment. When I got back with it, I was gone about
fifteen minutes, making toast and hot chocolate, and hav-
ing to whip the cream and everything "
"And gossip with the other nurses, I suppose!” Dundee
cut in grimly.
"I had no reason to think Mrs. Morse wasn't quite all
right!" the elderly woman flared. "She was in high
spirits before Mr. Morse came, seemed to be as well as
anybody."
"And what state did you find her in?” Dundee asked
more gently.
"She was in bed, with the sheet over her head. And she
was crying and moaning-
"Any words you could distinguish?" Dundee inter-
rupted.
"All she said was 'Too late! Too late!-over and over!
But I couldn't make her tell me what she meant. And she
was in such a state that I didn't worry her much with ques-


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 113
tions. I rang for Miss Hunter, and she got Miss Caplan to
give Mrs. Morse a strong sedative.”
"Is it your opinion that something Mr. Morse said or
did to his wife caused this upset, or that it was something
that happened while you were in the kitchen?"
"I don't know, sir, since I didn't see her at all until I got
back with the nourishment.”
Dundee gave it up for then, and, with a word of
apology and thanks, departed for his own suite.
* Determined to "Call Morse” himself the next morning,
and equally as determined to dismiss the matter from his
mind for the night, the weary young detective stretched
out between the smooth, fresh sheets of his bed. The book
he had found in the patio proved to be a mystery story,
and, grinning in anticipation of the technical flaws he was
very apt to spot in it, he adjusted the bedside lamp for
reading.
"Murder Without Motive.” . . . Not a bad title, that.
And it must be a popular book among the patients, Dun-
dee concluded, after a glance at its dog-eared condition.
An envelope pasted upon the fly leaf bore the printed
words: "Ex libris Mayfield Sanitarium. ... Guests are
kindly requested to return books to the library as soon as
they have read them.”
He settled himself to read, slightly annoyed by the fact
that some previous reader had underlined significant sen-
tences and phrases on almost every page. The story con-
cerned the apparently motiveless, brutal slaying of a
housewife at work in her own kitchen. After a crisply
sensational first chapter, the story meandered rather dully,
Dundee thought, but perhaps that was because a far more
baffling mystery in real life persisted in distracting his
attention from the printed pages.
Suddenly, however, he uttered a sharp exclamation. No
need for the penciled underlining to attract his attention to
ing mysten the printed thered a sharpact his att


114 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
these words, uttered by the amateur detective whose "bril-
liant work was putting the police force to shame," as the
author assured the reader:
"No, Sergeant. I am afraid you are wrong. Don't
waste time looking for a foppishly dressed man, the
kind, as you say, who wears gloves in July. Poor
Mrs. Stone furnished her murderer with gloves.
Look!” And Hartley Jarnegan pointed dramatically
at a pair of innocent-looking rubber gloves lying atop
a bar of yellow soap in the soap-dish above the
kitchen sink.
Dundee whistled. Rubber gloves! Had he stumbled
upon an odd coincidence, or had the prospective murderer,
reading this very book, stored away in his subconscious
mind a fact that had proved to have a sinister usefulness?
Was it his hand-or ber hand—which had underlined
these pages so liberally? The story forgotten, Dundee
turned rapidly through the book, searching every page for
a scribbled word, a marginal comment or query. But there
was nothing upon which a handwriting expert could exer-
cise his craft. Who had read this book? Dozens, appar-
ently, but Dundee determined to have a look at the
withdrawal card which undoubtedly reposed this minute
in the sanitarium's library card file. Another chore for the
morning, which promised to be a very busy one. He ticked
morning, wh upon his fingers: libi. That woul
Check up Norah Lacey's alibi. That would necessitate
a trip to the Satterlee home in Hamilton.
Call Morse, to find out what had taken place during his
visit with his wife, and whether he had called upon
Dr. Koenig.
Interview Mrs. Cantrell.
Check the doctor's visitors, including patients, since his
return on Monday, with the secretary, Miss Horne.
Visit Enid Rambler, in the guise of fellow-patient.


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 115
Listen in on Strawn's questioning of Rowan and
Webster.
Circulate among patients on the lawn, to hear comment
on the doctor's murder.
Call on the district attorney, to report progress—or lack
of it!
Dundee sighed as wearily as if he had already per-
formed these labors. Then sleep descended upon him so
suddenly that he could scarcely arouse himself to turn off
his bedside lamp.
A knock startled him into instant wakefulness. He was
sure he had just that minute dozed off, but the sun was
shining brilliantly through the flowered silk curtains at his
bedroom windows.
Miss Hunter's vast bulk filled the door, but over her
shoulder Dundee saw the hennaed and marcelled head of
a stranger.
"Good-morning, Mr. Dundee!" the big nurse greeted
him heartily. "I brought Miss Doty–Lurline Doty—in to
meet you. She's in charge here during the day.
"My, Mr. Dundee! I won't know how to act with a
detective watching me!" the newcomer babbled, a hint of
hysteria in her voice and in her rounded blue eyes. "I'm
still all of a-tremble. I didn't know a blessed thing until
I come on duty ten minutes ago
"Yes. It's pretty bad,” Dundee agreed curtly. “Every-
thing quiet, Miss Hunter?”
To his astonishment the night nurse flushed darkly
behind her freckles and her hazel eyes avoided his.
"Everything's quiet—now. I wanted to wake you up last
night to tell you, seeing as how you're the detective, but
Dr. Harlow wouldn't let me-
Dundee sat bolt upright in bed. "For God's sake, what
happened? Is Mrs. Morse- ?"
"No, sir. It was Mr. Salter!"


CHAPTER TEN
.:NO. bened. Lunter, sadmeld en
"DR. HARLOW, why wasn't I told last night that How-
ard Salter had tried to commit suicide?"
The little doctor, her coiled red braids gleaming, her
uniform crisply immaculate, opened wider the door to her
apartment on the second floor of the main building, with
a gesture which invited the outraged young detective to
enter.
"Why should I have told you?" she countered. Then,
with a hint of laughter in her lovely voice: "But how
stupid of me! I remember now that it is a crime to com-
mit suicide. Naturally you wanted to arrest him! But
isn't it rather early in the morning for you to bully me,
Mr. Dundee? I haven't even been fortified by breakfast.
... By the way, have you?”
"No. I came here as soon as Miss Hunter told me what
had happened.”
“Charlotte Hunter always did talk too much," the girl
reflected with mock sadness. "Pardon me!" and she
stepped to a table which held two telephones and a black
metal box with perhaps a dozen pairs of push buttons.
After a moment of manipulation she spoke into a receiver:
"The kitchen? ... Joe? . . . Dr. Harlow speaking.
Send up two breakfast trays as soon as possible.”
"That's kind of you,” Dundee admitted, a little less
stiffly. “But you must realize, Doctor— ".
He was interrupted by the ringing of a telephone bell.
Justine Harlow, who still stood by the table, picked up the
instrument she had used in her house call.
"Dr. Harlow speaking. ... Yes, Miss Lacey. ...
Very well.” She replaced the receiver and reached for the
116


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 117
low theysand un paper. He of the doctor
other instrument, her eyes on Dundee. "Good-morning,
Captain Strawn. ... No, not very well, thank you. . . .
Yes, I had thought of that, and I've given orders that all
morning papers are to be withheld from the patients. . ..
I beg your pardon? ... Why, ye-es, I suppose so. ...
What time? . . . Very well. Good-bye!"
She slowly hung up the receiver and faced Dundee.
"Captain Strawn will be here about eight o'clock with the
police stenographer, to question every patient in his room.
He has asked that no patient be informed of the doctor's
death, or permitted to see a newspaper. He will begin the
rounds at nine, he says, and until then patients are to be
allowed to follow their regular routine. . . . I suppose,”
she concluded dejectedly, that some sort of examination
of the patients is necessary, but—there's a hard day ahead
for doctors and nurses. . : . Will you accompany Captain
Strawn on his rounds?"
"Remember I'm here as a patient,” Dundee reminded
her. "But about Salter-
"Come in!... Good-morning, Joe. . . . Put the trays
on the table between the windows. ... That's fine.
Thanks!"
A minute later Dundee was facing the little doctor
across the improvised breakfast table, and was accepting a
cup of coffee.
"Now, if you'll let me have just two swallows of
coffee,” she begged, and raised her own cup to her pretty,
unrouged mouth. "Now! I'm beginning to feel human.
... In the first place, I didn't call you last night, or
rather at two o'clock this morning, because I was too busy
to think of anything or anybody but Howard Salter. In the
second place, the poor man was too near dead to be ques-
tioned, and you would have been terribly in the way."
"Just what happened?”' Dundee asked. “Miss Hunter
was called away before she could give me more than the
bare fact that he had tried to kill himself."
We Just as you wooot, man ody but he


118 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
"He slashed his wrist with a safety razor blade. For-
tunately, he neglected to turn off the bathroom light and
shut the door, and Miss Hunter, on her two o'clock visit to
see if he was resting—she makes the rounds every half-
hour—saw the light and investigated. She found Mr.
Salter unconscious and soaked with blood. But for a lucky
chance I am afraid he would have been dead by now "
"You mean the bathroom light?” Dundee interrupted.
"No. The lucky chance was that we were able to give a
blood transfusion immediately. We make a blood test of
every patient who comes in, and also classify his blood
according to type. Howard Salter's blood happens to be
the rarest type. Of course we have a file of blood donors,
classified according to type, but there was no time to send
into Hamilton for a registered donor. Mr. Baldwin, whom
Miss Lacey had aroused to send on errand into Hamilton,
regardless of the apparent hopelessness of the case, volun-
teered the information that he is what we call a 'universal
donor'—that is, his blood can fuse with any other type-
and offered his own blood to save Salter's life. Dr. Can-
trell and I performed the transfusion operation, and How-
ard Salter will live.”
"Baldwin doesn't look as if he has much blood to
spare," Dundee commented with a trace of malice, then,
ashamed of himself, he added: "It was decent of him.”
"Oh, Roger wouldn't thank you for the compliment!”
Justine Harlow laughed. "He'd shut you up by saying it
was good business to save a patient who can afford a suite
in Sunflower Court. But it was decent of him. Perhaps
Roger Baldwin is a much better man than he gives himself
credit for being.”
"Did Salter talk at all? Give any reason for his act?"
"He cursed us feebly for saving his life,” the little doc-
tor twinkled. "And insisted that it was better to be dead
than insane. I tried to convince him that he was in no
danger of losing his mind, but there's no reasoning with
a manic depressive in a suicidal mood."
to por
el informapparen


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 119
"And yet Miss Hunter told me last night that Howard
Salter was greatly improved—that he'd be able to leave
soon and get married,” Dundee told her, frowning
thoughtfully.
"Yes. I confess I was surprised. Dr. Koenig and I both
thought he was almost cured.”
"What is the cause of his trouble?” Dundee wanted to
know.
"A conviction of personal failure," Dr. Harlow an-
swered succinctly. "He is a writer—very well known for
his Western stories. But it seems that for two or three
years he has hated the sort of book he writes, and wanted
to do 'bigger and better things—serious novels, as he calls
them. I understand from Sally Porter, the girl he is
engaged to, that his present breakdown was caused by two
things. Every house in the publishing business rejected a
'serious' novel Salter had worked on intermittently for two
years, and he could not write even the first chapter of a
Western story he had contracted to deliver by May first.
He was in speechless, black despair when he came here
about the middle of April, but oddly enough this is the
first time he had tried to carry out his threats to commit
such time haiddle cess, black
bemost noured. And it? ya
"Salter has the rooms next to Mrs. Morse, hasn't he?"
Dundee asked thoughtfully.
"Why, yes!"
"Rather odd, isn't it? Yesterday Mrs. Morse was con-
sidered cured. And yesterday Howard Salter seemed to be
almost normal. A rather strange coincidence, isn't it, that
both of them should have a serious relapse last night?"
"I don't know what you're talking about!" the girl cried
sharply. "I haven't heard a word about Mrs. Morse's **
relapse. . . . Wait a minute!" and she sprang up from the
breakfast table and ran to the telephone table. In a
moment she was giving a curt order: "Miss Lacey, send
me up the night reports from Sunflower Court imme-
diately!”


120
ONE DROP OF BLOOD
While she was waiting, her small body tense with
impatience, Dundee asked: "Did Salter have an interview
with Dr. Koenig after the doctor's return from his trip?”'
To his surprise the little doctor flushed. "I—don't
think so. In fact, I'm fairly sure he did not. You see, our
patients are a queer lot. They become unreasoningly
attached to the psychiatrist who first gains their confidence,
and they resent any interference whatever. It happens
that Dr. Koenig was out of town when Howard Salter
first came, and that he became so devoted to me that he
never sought out Dr. Koenig at all. In fact, he refused to
talk at all the one time Dr. Koenig summoned him to his
office.”
"Have you read Salter's 'serious' novel?" Dundee asked,
idly enough.
"No. But Dr. Koenig read it. Sally Porter took charge
of the manuscript when Howard came, and just a day or
so before Dr. Koenig left on this last trip she brought it
in to him and asked his opinion. She hoped it would give
the doctor a clew to Howard's mental condition. Doctor
read it on the train.”
"And his opinion of it?" Dundee asked, strangely
eager.
"He said it was terrible,” Dr. Harlow answered simply.
"Fumbling in style, almost amateurish, erotic and futile."
"I wonder," Dundee said slowly, "if last night, while
Sally Porter and Howard Salter were walking on the lawn,
they dropped in to ask the doctor his opinion and—he told
them what you've told me!”
The girl's eyes widened and she paled, but her voice
was quite steady: "If they asked him, he told them the
truth. Carl-Dr. Koenig—was almost ruthlessly honest.
He found honesty the best medicine in treating manic
depressives."
*Strong medicine in this case!" Dundee commented
grimly.


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 121
"You don't think ?... Come in! ... Thank you,
Mary. Yes, that's all.”
The gingham-frocked girl, who, Dundee guessed, was
a maid, handed a sheaf of chart sheets to the little doctor,
and scurried out of the room as if terrified.
Dr. Harlow shuffled the sheets until she found the night
report on Mrs. Morse. He watched her read, saw her
cheeks pale and her lips tighten.
"But—there's something wrong here!” she gasped.
"Mrs. Morse doesn't hear voices! She never has! It doesn't
fit ".
"Voices?” Dundee echoed incredulously. "Miss Hunter
did not tell me last night that Mrs. Morse claims to have
heard voices "
"Only because Miss Hunter did not know it when she
talked with you," the doctor assured him, with a little
click of her teeth. “She seems to have told you everything
else she ever knew. . . . Mrs. Appleby, Mrs. Morse's
night attendant, records that at five o'clock this morning
Mrs. Morse awoke, began to cry hysterically, and then
confessed that 'the voice of God had spoken to her; that
she had heard His voice quite plainly while Mrs. Appleby
was preparing her nine o'clock nourishment. . . . But it's
absurd. Mrs. Morse is not subject to auditory hallucinations.
Her case was a remarkable one—that of a pseudo split
psyche due to a submerged conviction of unpardonable
sin. But Dr. Koenig cured her! I tell you, she was abso-
lutely and definitely cured!" she insisted, a note of hysteria
in her own voice.
"Will you tell me what, exactly, caused Mrs. Morse's
illness?” Dundee asked earnestly. "Believe me, I consider
it important that I know."
"A patient's case history is sacred,” the girl reminded
him in her most professional manner.
"Dr. Harlow, do you want Howard Salter to be cured
of his fear that he has suddenly become insane, and Mrs.


122 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
voicey don't only I want used crisply:
drifted awo reared a Catholic crisply. "Mrs.
Morse to be saved from probable insanity?" Dundee
demanded very solemnly.
“Of course! But- ""
"I'm afraid there is someone who doesn't want one of
those patients ever to be able to leave!” Dundee inter-
rupted grimly. "I'm a detective, not a psychiatrist, so it is
becoming quite plain to me that Mrs. Morse did hear a
voice last night. But it was not the 'voice of God?!”
"I don't understand!”
"And I only have a glimmer,” Dundee assured her.
"Which is why I want you to tell me what brought about
Mrs. Morse's 'split psyche.' ”.
"Very well!" she conceded crisply. “Mrs. Morse was
born and reared a Catholic. During adolescence she
drifted away from the Church, and fancied herself almost
an agnostic. While still in that state of rebellion against
religion, she married—by civil ceremony only—a non-
Catholic, a man who is really an agnostic. They had four
children in ten years. The youngest was two years old
when Mrs. Morse began to show symptoms of mental
derangement. Finally, she repudiated her ego entirely-
refused to be herself any longer. She-
"- referred to herself always in the third person,"
Dundee completed the sentence for the doctor.
1. "Oh, that Hunter!" Dr. Harlow smiled, wrinkling her
nose in the quaint gesture Dundee was beginning to watch
for. "Yes. Subconsciously, you see, she had denied her
own identity, in order to escape the consequences of what
she believed to be an unpardonable sin. That sin, of
course, was her marriage, which, to the true Catholic she
was at heart, was no marriage, but adultery. Her children
born in sin and not baptized ”
"And all this was entirely in the unconscious?" Dundee
asked, wonderingly.
"Oh, yes! Dr. Koenig dug deep, in psychoanalysis,
before he found the root of the mental evil," Dr. Harlow


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 123
answered, pride in her dead hero enriching her beautiful
voice. "He had a long talk with Mrs. Morse on Tuesday,
then sent for Mr. Morse. You see, her cure was in her
husband's power. Dr. Koenig asked him if, to save his
wife, he would be willing to remarry her, with a priest
officiating and blessing the union, and then have his chil-
dren baptized.”
"And what did Morse say?" Dundee demanded tensely.
"He said he would get the Pope himself to marry them,
if it would save his wife's mind."
"Then why did Mrs. Morse hear 'the voice of God
crying to her that it was 'Too late! Too late!'?” Dundee
leaned close to inquire, his blue eyes gleaming with excite-
ment. “For I'm sure Mrs. Morse will tell you that those
are the words she heard. Mrs. Appleby told me last
night-even then I was oddly disturbed by Mrs. Morse's
strange relapse—that the woman would tell her nothing,
would only moan, 'Too late! Too late! . . . Remember!
Her husband had left her only a few minutes before!''
"Yes—so the report says," Dr. Harlow agreed, her
voice dragging. “But Mr. Morse is a good man- " she
protested despairingly.
"I'm afraid Dr. Koenig was right. You're a credulous
child, who lets her heart run away with her head,” Dun-
dee smiled. "By the way, do you have any idea why Dr.
Koenig made the notation, 'Call Morse,' on his desk
calendar?”
"Yes. He made the notation yesterday morning when
he was talking to me about Mrs. Morse,” Dr. Harlow told
him, and Dundee saw her cheeks grow paler and the
gray-green eyes widen behind their spectacles. "You see,
the Morse baby has died since Mrs. Morse came here, and
she has never been told, because Dr. Koenig feared the
effect it might have on her mind. He suddenly remem-
bered about the baby yesterday, and tried to call Mr. Morse
then. But his secretary reported that he was out of town
bered it might been cod since their serow paltarlow her


124 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
lous fool order to drive her window to waid baby's death,
on business, and would not return until today. So Dr.
Koenig wrote that notation to remind himself to call Mr.
Morse today, in order to warn him against telling his wife
until she is stronger."
"And Morse visited his wife last night!" Dundee
reminded her grimly.
"But what you're thinking is fantastic!" Dr. Harlow
protested vehemently. "I tell you, he is a good man, and
a devoted husband! It's absolutely criminal of you to
accuse him of telling her of the unbaptized baby's death,
then of sneaking under her window to wail 'Too late! Too
late!,' in order to drive her crazy again! Call me a credu-
lous fool if you like!” and she stamped her foot, “but I
know-
"Do you happen to know this?” Dundee interrupted
gently but firmly. "Did Mrs. Morse, rich in her own
right, marry a poor man as well as an agnostic?”
""I do not!” she flared.
"It should be rather easy to find out,” Dundee reflected
aloud, as he rose to leave.
"But what has all this to do with Howard Salter?" she
detained him.
"That, with your permission," Dundee assured her
gravely, “is what I am going to find out. As I said before,
I am a detective, not a psychiatrist, but I have a hunch
that I am going to be the Miracle Man in person this
morning.”
"Exactly what do you mean?" the girl demanded.
"Only that, as one poor devil of a patient calling on
another, I'm going to have a pleasant little visit with How-
ard Salter. After that visit, you will either find your manic
depressive quite cured of his fear of insanity, or—he may
be fervently wishing he had succeeded last night!"
"I forbid— ” the little doctor began, imperiously.
"I really don't think you'd better,” Dundee interrupted


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 125
gently, and, as she stood staring dumbly after him, he
strode from the room.
It was still too early—not yet eight o'clock—for patients
to be out and on the grounds. The only persons Dundee
encountered, as he left the main building and set off across
the lawn to Sunflower Court, were the two plainclothes-
men Captain Strawn had left to guard the suite of offices
in which the murder had been committed. He had already
spoken to both of them, and had learned that the only
disturbance during the night had occurred when Dr. Can-
trell and Miss Lacey had asked permission to enter the
former's office shortly after two o'clock in the morning,
for the purpose of getting instruments needed in dealing
with the attempted suicide.
His parley with Miss Doty, the day nurse in charge of
Sunflower Court, was brief but effective. Very meekly, the
henna-haired, blue-eyed girl led the way to Suite É, the
door of which was opened by a male attendant.
“This is Mr. Dundee, Roy,” she whispered. "He wants
to have a private talk with your patient.”
"I'm afraid you'll have to do most of the talking, sir,"
the attendant deprecated respectfully, aware obviously of
Dundee's status. "He ain't said 'Yea,' 'Nay' or 'Go to
hell!' since I come on duty.”
"How is he physically?"
"Oh, fine! Old Baldwin's pint of blood has put roses
in his cheeks. Pulse fine, temperature normal.”
And indeed Howard Salter did not look like a man who
had been snatched from the jaws of death only a few hours
before. His long body was not thin, and there was a faint,
natural color in his swarthy, handsome young face. Only
his gray eyes, which gazed dully and without surprise, at
the detective, gave a hint of the strain through which he
had passed
"Good-morning, Mr. Salter," Dundee began, with the


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 127
"God knows. It sounded like nothing human,” the
novelist assured him. "Just those two words, over and
over, 'Too late! Too late!' I'd hate to tell you what I
thought it was
"The voice of God,' perhaps?” Dundee dared inter-
rupt again.
"Something like that," the other grinned. “I thought it
was a message meant for no other ears but mine. "Too
late,' it said to me, "for you to write a great book, Howard
Salter. 'Too late,' even, for me to write the popular trash
I've been grinding out for years. "Too late because my
mind was tottering, was going even as I listened.... I
tried to kill myself. Didn't fancy being a raving lunatic
locked up in 'Ten,'” he added simply.
"You and me both!” Dundee agreed, still in the rôle
of awkward new patient. "Not even to make an interest-
ing case for the Big Doctor, as they call him. . . . What
sort of a chap is Koenig anyway, old man?”
He watched the novelist narrowly, as he put the appar-
ently innocent question, but the now happy gray eyes did
not change expression.
"One of the best,” Salter assured him heartily. “But
I'm Doctor Harlow's patient. She's a peach, and got a
head on her like old Socrates himself. I do want to see
Koenig today, however, if they'll let me up, and I feel like
a million dollars now. Miss Porter, the girl I'm engaged
toyou'll be meeting Sally—told me last night that she'd
given the Big Doctor my novel to read, and I want to chin
with him about it. If he says it's rot, I'll take it standing,
and begin over again! ... Come in often, Dundee.
Glad to see you any time.”
Dundee shook hands. The man in the bed had an-
swered the one question he had not dared to ask him.
Howard Salter had not talked with Dr. Koenig last night.
Moreover, Salter did not know that the great psychiatrist
was dead. So sure was he of these two things that Dundee
unhesitatingly shook hands with the man he had "healed.”
Ad Sone hanno


CHAPTER ELEVEN
As Dundee stepped into the patio out of the tiny hall
of Suite E, he almost bumped into Salter's attendant, carry-
ing a tray which held nothing but a pint bottle of milk and
a glass.
"If this is Mr. Salter's breakfast, you'd better add a
couple of eggs, some bacon and a stack of toast,” the detec-
tive advised blithely. "Your patient says he feels like a
million dollars now, and he had a hungry gleam in his eye
when I left.”
"Thought you was a detective, not a doctor,” the attend-
ant chuckled. “Say, mister, Dr. Harlow just phoned over
that she wants to see you right away. She's in her private
office on the second floor of the main building.”
Grinning at this evidence that the little doctor had her
share of the feminine vice, curiosity, Dundee set out to
obey the summons. But as he crossed the front porch of
Sunflower Court he determined to let her wait a bit while
he studied the scene of last night's minor mystery—“the
voice of God.”
Whoever, with fiendish cruelty, had wailed those sin.
ister words in a sepulchral, well-disguised voice, must
have stood or crouched beneath the windows of the adjoin.
ing bedrooms of Suites D and E, the first occupied by Mrs.
Morse, the second by Howard Salter. Sunflower Court, he
discovered, was enclosed on all sides but the front with a
high box hedge. Inside the hedge there was a narrow
cement walk, bordered on both sides by grass and flowers.
The hedge ended opposite the front corner of Mrs.
Morse's bedroom. The nocturnal wailer must have bided
his time and slipped inside the hedge; must have crouched
beneath the window of the patient chosen to be the victim
128


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 129
of his cruel plot. Who was that chosen victim? For surely
the plotter had intended that only one person should hear
and be terrified into hysteria or into a relapse into insanity.
An audience of two patients would defeat his purpose
had, in fact, defeated it. For, just as Howard Salter had
been “cured” by the assurance that other ears had heard
that voice, so would Mrs. Morse, Dundee hoped and
believed, be restored to sanity, if not to happiness. Yes, it
was quite clear that the plotter had felt sure, before he
sent that sepulchral wail floating through open windows,
that only one patient would hear it. And, logically, that
patient was Mrs. Morse. Her light was on. The watcher
could see that she was alone; knew, possibly, that her
nurse was in the kitchen. On the other hand, Salter's light
was out. By his own account, he was asleep when the
wailing voice had startled him into wakefulness and the
conviction that his mind was tottering. Had that sinister
plotter beneath the window seen Salter strolling on the
lawn with his fiancée? Had he counted on the fact that
Salter was still out? Or had he known merely that a
movie was being shown that evening, an attraction that
could be counted upon to lure all of Mayfield's guests into
the O. T. Shop? All, that is, who were able to attend-
except Mrs. Morse. How had he known of that exception?
And the logical answer to that was: because he had just
left her in her room.
"I'm getting as acrobatic at jumping to conclusions as
Captain Strawn himself,” Dundee gibed mentally, but he
could find no reason to climb down from the height his
speculations had carried him to.
Very softly, professional curiosity being stronger than
his reluctance to play eavesdropper, the detective crept
along the inside of the hedge until he stood squarely oppo-
site the first of Mrs. Morse's bedroom windows. The
shade was up and the silk curtains pushed aside to admit
the brilliant morning sun.


130 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
His view unobstructed, Dundee gazed eagerly into the
luxurious room. The bed was placed along the wall near
the window, so that the patient, propped on pillows, pre-
sented her profile to the eavesdropper. Dundee caught his
breath with admiration and pity, then held it lest he make
the slightest sound. It was like looking upon a life-size
picture representing "The Grieving Madonna.” Long,
rippling black hair framed a face of extraordinary purity
and pallor. The thin, white fingers of the woman's beauti-
ful hands were laced to support her chin, and to receive,
like a chalice, the tears that strained slowly through the
thick, long, black lashes of her closed eyes. Her eyes
would be black, too, Dundee told himself; large, and
heavy with sorrow. She seemed neither old nor young-
an ageless, heartbreakingly beautiful incarnation of
Motherhossa heartbreakingly beautiful
When he had escaped without betraying himself, Dun-
dee struck off hurriedly across the lawn. Thank God, part
of her burden could be lifted. One of her unbaptized
children was dead, but soon Dr. Harlow could convince
her that God had not spoken out of the night to condemn
her.
Three or four of the patients, ignorant of the tragedy,
had come out for early-morning air and sunshine. An
extremely thin, gray-haired woman was idly slashing at
croquet balls with a mallet. A young man, who seemed
to be partially paralyzed, was staggering along on tiptoe,
eyes bulging out of a drawn, distorted face. A very large,
hideously ugly woman, with thin, greasy blonde hair,
crimson cheeks and thick, wer lips, was squatting before a
flower bed, wantonly tearing the blooms from their stalks.
As Dundee passed near, she looked up and laughed-a
horrible peal of shrill notes that made the detective's scalp
tinglehe ain't laut you, Roand a vagy
"She ain't laughing at you, Buddy! She's laughing at
life. . . . Ain't you, Rosie?"
It was a blithe voice, and a vaguely familiar one. Dun-


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 131
dee turned toward the driveway, and saw two men crossing
it. He paused until they had almost reached him, then
took a step or two to meet them.
“Mr. Day, isn't it? I believe I saw you last night.”
"Sure. 'Happy' Day in person. I've even got a theme
song all my own. . . . Say, Buddy, I didn't catch your
name. . . . Dundee? Scotch-Irish, ain't you? . . . Meet
my pal, Archie Webster.”
Turning from the plump, jolly attendant, Dundee
shook hands with the man he had heard so much about
the night before, and who, apparently, had lost no time in
getting out of "Ten,' the locked ward. Yes, young Web-
ster was amazingly good-looking, he decided. Tall, broad-
shouldered, with an athlete's waist, as yet unspoiled by the
liquor he liked too well. Light-brown hair, thick and curl-
ing back from a handsome brow. Merry eyes of a clear
leaf-brown, the whites only slightly bloodshot from last
night's spree. Firm-feshed, ruddy cheeks, lightly tanned.
A wide mouth, smiling to show splendid teeth.
"Happy is being tactful, Dundee,” Archie Webster
laughed. "The horrid truth is that I'm a patient just out
of 'Ten,' and it's Happy's job to see that I don't get caught
by the Demon Rum. . . . Haven't got a flask on your hip,
have you? I could do with a tastier pick-me-up than the
Eno's salts highball they gave me over in "Ten' this
morning."
"Afraid I haven't,” Dundee answered, “but maybe your
bootlegger will be around again today.”
“My bootlegger?-again today?" young Webster re-
peated, in a puzzled voice. Then he laughed, a frank roar
of mirth. "Ỹou don't mean to tell me Fatty was a boot-
legger, and 11!-didn't tumble! Well, Happy, that's
one on me! That pint he slipped me was just a sample,
and I didn't realize it— "
"Perhaps I'm the one that was mistaken," Dundee inter-
rupted ruefully. "If so, my apologies to your friend "
"No friend of mine!" Webster cut in, still laughing.


132 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
"Never saw him before last night. Don't even know his
name. But I don't look a gift horse in the mouth, so when
he slipped me what was left of the pint after we'd both
had a pull at it, I invited him to see the movies with me,
no questions asked. Matter of fact, he was asking enough
questions for both of us.”
* “Curious about the nuts, I guess,” Happy Day chuckled.
"All visitors are. But who did this chap come to see, if it
wasn't you, Archie?"
“Damned if I know," Webster answered, serious for the
moment. "I was strolling on the lawn with Enid—that's
Miss Rambler, Dundee; the belle of Mayfield—when up
walks this fat bird, and Enid runs like a rabbit. Afraid of
strangers, the funny kid! Well, he asked me if I'd like a
nip, and I said, 'Do I look crazy?' So we had a drink and
then he began to ask all sorts of questions about Enid,
because she'd run away, I suppose. "I wasn't putting out
much, but he hung around, and finally we went into the
0. T. Shop to see the movies. I guess he'd seen 'Man-
slaughter' before; anyway, he ducked out before the pic-
ture was finished -
"Probably to get better acquainted with Miss Rambler,"
Dundee suggested.
"Say! That's a thought! Come to think of it, she had
left just before that fat bozo ducked! Well, the fat old
chaser!” Webster exclaimed in deep disgust. "I'd have
hunted him up and socked him one, if I had suspected that
was his game."
"As it was, I suppose you just sat tight and enjoyed the
show," Dundee suggested craftily.
"Well, no, I ducked, too,” Webster confessed, with a
rueful grin. “That pint of the best was burning a hole in
my hip pocket. Unfortunately, I couldn't find anybody to
share it with me, so it landed me in Ten."
"How was that?” Dundee asked sympathetically.


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 133
Webster grinned. "When I get likkered up, I get
notions in my head. And last night it struck me all of a
sudden that Sam Rowan hadn't been behaving exactly like
a buddy of mine—not speaking, and all that sort of thing.
So I called him for it, and he swung a mean one at my
jaw. If I hadn't been staggering already, that old bag-o'-
bones couldn't have even jarred me. As it was, he knocked
me flat. And it was me they put in Ten,” he added in an
injured voice, but with a gleam of mirth in his eyes.
"Rowan's all right. My fault. ... Well, cheerio, old
sport! Glad to have you here. Not a bad hole. The Big
Doctor's a great guy. ... And the little doctor-Oh,
baby!"
"Come along and get your hydro now, Archie,” the
attendant urged. "See you later, Dundee. . . . Play
bridge? Poker?”
“Both,” Dundee assured him.
"Then we'll be seeing you,” 'Happy' Day promised
blithely, linking a chummy arm in that of his patient.
Hardly the type to commit murder, Dundee reflected,
as he watched Archie Webster swing jauntily along the
driveway. A likeable youngster in spite of, or perhaps
because of, his frank weaknesses. But as the detective con-
tinued on his way to the second floor of the main building
his mind was more engrossed with the problem of the fat
unknown, his unexplained visit, his persistent interest in
Enid Rambler, and his disappearance. Well, Strawn had
an excellent machinery for searching for mysterious
strangers. And he could undoubtedly get an accurate
description from Webster, when he questioned that unre-
generate young man. ...
"I thought you were never coming!” Justine Harlow
scolded from the top landing of the stairway.
"The time seemed long because you're eaten up with
curiosity," Dundee scolded in turn. "How about giving
e assured hion;" Happyf his parieflected,


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 135
"Glad to meet you, Mr. Dundee,” Morse said, clipping
his words like a busy executive. "The doctor here tells me
you've stumbled upon something that closely concerns my
wife.”
"I'm afraid I have,” Dundee admitted seriously. "But
first, will you tell me how you happen to be calling so
early this morning?”
"For two reasons, sir,” Morse answered curtly. "Last
night when I visited my wife—the first visit I have
had with her since she has become-well, herself again,
she began to ask all sorts of questions about the children.
On my previous visits she never mentioned them. That
was part of her—trouble. She acted as if they did not
belong to her, as if she had no responsibility for them.”
"I understand,” Dundee assured him. “I have heard
Dr. Koenig's diagnosis of her trouble.”
The big man touched his forehead with a fine linen
handkerchief. “It has been pretty bad, sir, but thank God
the doctor got at the root of the trouble.”
"I always did say " the mother-in-law began im-
portantly.
"Yes, Mother, you did,” Morse agreed. "Well, last
night when she asked about the children I knew she was
really cured. But when she wanted to know all about the
baby- " his voice broke, and his mother-in-law crossed
herself, facile tears springing into her eyes.
"You told her he was dead?” Dundee asked.
"No. I put her off as best I could, but she sensed some-
thing was wrong-mighty wrong," Morse told him, again
touching his forehead with the linen square. “She asked
me pointblank if he was dead, but I put her off again, told
her he was 'asleep that minute.' But I was sure she wasn't
fooled. It's hard to fool a mother, sir," he added senten-
tiously. “But for my sake she played the game. Didn't get
hysterical or anything like that. But I made up my mind
Loctor got at'i has been preforehead with


136 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
to speak to Koenig and get him to tell her the truth. I
thought it best for her to stay here until she'd got over the
shock.”
"So you called on the doctor last night?” Dundee asked,
tense with excitement.
"No. The doctor was in, but I could tell he was busy,
and I didn't feel much like waiting,” Morse answered.
"Besides, I couldn't help hearing and it embarrassed
me ”
"Tell me exactly what you heard or saw!" Dundee
demanded sternly.
"We-ell, it wasn't anything much," the big man depre-
cated, flushing, "but that's the second reason I dropped in
so early this morning. I thought it just might have some-
thing to do with what happened here last night-
"Go on!” Dundee almost shouted.
"Well, Miss Hunter had told me the doctor was in his
office, so I went to the reception room," Morse began
reluctantly. "It was then close on to nine o'clock. I was
just about to knock when I heard a woman's voice. I
thought it was a patient, of course, and I suppose it was.
Anyway, she was crying and talking at the same time "
"Could you distinguish what they said?” Dundee urged,
as the narrator paused.
"Not a great deal of it. It seemed like he was trying to
get rid of the woman, and she didn't want to go,” Morse
answered slowly. "I heard her say something like: 'I
won't leave you! You can't make me!' And the doctor
tried to pacify her. I heard him say, 'But my darling girl!
and then the woman began to carry on pretty bad-
Again Morse's voice dragged to an embarrassed halt.
"Did you hear anything else they said?” Dundee
prodded.
"Well, the girl said something about he'd made her
love him, and now he hated her, and she could kill him
when he looked at her like that," the man continued
teca


138 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
have been about twenty minutes after ten when Roland
walked in.”
"You live in Hamilton?” Dundee asked.
"Oh, yes, sir. On Maple Drive," she confirmed
proudly, naming one of the most fashionable streets in the
suburbs of the city.
"I drove around for an hour before I called on my
mother-in-law," Roland Morse volunteered, but with no
trace of belligerence. "I was pretty badly upset by my visit
with Lora—my wife. Afraid the news of the baby's death
might unhinge her poor brain again, and yet I realized it
couldn't be kept from her any longer-
"So the poor boy came to talk it over with me,” the
mother-in-law cut in. "Of course I was kind of surprised
to see him— "
"Then Mr. Morse is not a frequent visitor?" Dundee
interrupted swiftly.
The woman flushed and bridled. Morse's heavy cheeks
turned a dull red.
"Well, no, sir, things being like they were,” Mrs. Prade
admitted. "I never have held with mixed marriages, even
when a priest performs the ceremony. To my notion Lora
and Roland aren't married at all-
"Then you did not give your consent to the union?”
Dundee broke in.
“Certainly not! But there wasn't any stopping Lora, her
with her own money and all,” the woman answered. “I
always did say her grandfather made a terrible mistake,
leaving her all that money with no strings tied to it
"Then Mrs. Morse is a very rich woman in her own
right?” Dundee asked softly.
"Too rich!” Mrs. Morse's mother snapped. "It turned
her head "
“Now, Mother!" Roland Morse pleaded, the flush
mounting to his iron-gray hair.
"I'm only answering the gentleman's questions," his


ONE DROP OF BLOOD
139
mother-in-law retorted acidly. "I said last night I'd for-
give you, when you and Lora are married in the Church,
and I'll stick to it. But I'm no hypocrite. You're too old
for Lora, and living in sin with you drove my poor girl
crazy-
Morse shrugged helplessly, and his eyes appealed to
Dundee.
"I understand, Mrs. Prade," the detective began, com-
ing briskly to the rescue, "that Mr. Morse called on you
last night to tell you that your daughter had been almost
miraculously restored to her right mind by Dr. Koenig, but
that he feared the effect of the news of the baby's death.
Is that right?”
"He wanted me to help him out," the mother-in-law
answered. “And when he said he was more than willing
to marry Lora in the Church, I told him that I'd put one
over on him by having poor little Rollie baptized by Father
Ryan. For a minute he looked pretty mad—yes, you did,
Roland Morse!—but it didn't take him a minute to realize
that I'd saved Lora from losing her mind all over again,
and he was man enough to thank me. I told him I was
coming here the first thing this morning and tell my poor
girl the truth. A mother's love to comfort her and help
her bear- ”
"Just say to her," Dundee interrupted, with strange
emphasis, his eyes upon Roland Morse, "that it is not 'too
late! Too late!""


CHAPTER TWELVE
"I FEEL,” Dundee told himself, with a rueful grin, as
he strolled out of the main building of Mayfield Sani-
tarium, "like a Boy Scout with a holiday coming to him.
Only eight o'clock, and I've already done two good deeds
today.”
But he paused on the lowest step of the three leading
from the porch to the driveway, a frown banishing the
grin. Was he giving too much time to the Morse mystery,
and thereby neglecting the major mystery of the psychia-
trist's murder? But ''the voice of God” intrigued and tor-
mented him. Roland Morse had had ample time to wail
sepulchrally and disastrously under his wife's windows
and incidentally beneath Howard Salter's windows; pay
that first actual or fictitious visit to the reception room;
then bide his time until the mysterious and importunate
woman visitor had left Koenig's office; then return
and-
"But why the devil should he murder the doctor?"
Dundee puzzled. "That fiendish wailing was amply suf-
ficient to accomplish his purpose—or would have been, if
Salter had not heard the fatal words, too. . . . Motive
enough, God knows, if Morse is the schemer I'm making
him out. A wife rich in her own right, who conveniently
goes crazy enough for the courts to adjudge her incom-
petent and appoint her husband guardian of her person
and her property. ... The old lady let that cat out of the
bag! . . . But why murder the doctor? Unless, of course,
Morse's whole yarn about the sobbing female in Koenig's
office is an out-and-out lie, the truth being that Koenig, on
his way to pay a professional call on Mrs. Morse, caught
Morse in his wailing act, and-
"
140


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 141
this one, if I had it. the hat, won't wash! 251 him? ...
But the detective's frown deepened. "That won't
wash,” he told himself disgustedly. "Leaves too many
things unexplained. If Koenig caught Morse in the wail-
ing act, why didn't he immediately reassure Mrs. Morse?
And what did Morse do between nine o'clock and nine
forty-five, when Koenig was killed? Furthermore, would
Koenig go on calmly working at his typewriter and let a
dangerous man like Morse wander about the office until
he maneuvered himself into a position to kill him? ...
No, Bonnie, my lad, that won't wash! But I'd wager a
fortune, if I had it, that 'the voice of God is mixed up in
this murder—somehow!"
He was about to cross the driveway when he caught
sight of a boy in overalls industriously polishing the hood
of one of the parked cars-a trim little coupé next to his
own roadster, which was sadly in need of the youth's
ministrations.
"Neat little car,” Dundee remarked idly, as he reached
into his pocket for a dollar bill. "How about shining up
my boat, young man?”
""Sure thing?" the boy beamed, his eyes on the bill.
"Soon as I finish with Dr. Harlow's. . . . I like to keep it
looking like new— "
"It is new, isn't it?" Dundee asked, stepping upon the
running board and peering in at the speedometer, which
showed a mileage of 9,066.
"Had it nearly a year, she has,” the boy informed him
proudly. "I take care of it for her-gasoline, oil, tires, and
everything. Had to have the crank case drained yesterday.
She'd never remember to, not even with that sticker on the
dashboard— ”
Suddenly Dundee leaned farther into the car, his eyes
fixed incredulously upon the oil-change sticker the boy was
referring to. He read: "Drain oil at 10,055 miles," and,
beneath, the name of the garage which had applied the
sticker.


142 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
113 Ilead.
From experience, Dundee knew that a car owner was
adjured, by all that was holy in motordom, to drain his
crankcase every thousand miles.
"Well, young man, you won't have to worry about that
crankcase for another thousand miles,” the detective said
casually, as he withdrew his head.
The boy peered in his turn, then, grinning at his own
conscientiousness, he corrected his new client: "Gotta
change again after 989 miles. She's drove eleven miles
since yesterday.”
"Right you are!” Dundee agreed heartily, but there was
no satisfaction or triumph behind the words. “Give my
bus a good rub, won't you? I'm afraid you'll have to use
a little elbow grease on it.”
So the little doctor had been lying when she said she
had taken a long drive the night before! That innocent-
looking sticker on the dashboard had betrayed her. Eleven
miles in two hours!
Dundee's almost stunned brain had hardly begun to
wrestle with all the implications of Justine Harlow's lie
when he crossed the threshold of Sunflower Court. Lur-
line Doty looked up from her desk and cocked her hen.
naed head coquettishly.
"Aren't we the dreat big sheik, though?" she accused
him playfully. "A certain booful young lady is just dying
to see you. • . . 'Course I haven't breathed a word about
who you really are
"Then don't begin now," Dundee interrupted rather
curtly, for his stomach never reacted kindly toward baby-
talk." "You mean Miss Rambler, I suppose? . . . May I
see her now?"
"You may!" The nurse bit off the words and buttoned
her mouth into a thin streak of rouge.
"Ni-ize nursie!” Dundie forced himself to say in a
coaxing voice as he passed her, and was rewarded by flut-
tering eyelids and smile-curved lips. Silly, he told himself,
to antagonize anyone who might be of help. ...
Ceak of forced hind reward
himse


144 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
I may have to go, and I want you to promise to help
me-
"To run away?” Dundee asked gently, ashamed of the
rôle he was forced to play. "Hadn't you better tell me all
about it?”
The girl stopped smiling and a wary look came into the
deep blue eyes. "Oh!” she shrugged. "Just call it a-
complex. A very popular word around here. . . . Tell
me! Did you have an interview with Dr. Koenig last
night?”
"I saw him,” Dundee evaded, watching her intently.
"But it was Dr. Harlow who admitted me.”
"Isn't she a darling?” Enid Rambler exclaimed enthusi-
astically. "She is my friend. . . . But what did you think
of Koenig?”
"A great man, I've been told,” Dundee replied care-
fully. “Do you like him?"
The girl dropped her eyes, her fingers nervously pluck-
ing at the ostrich feathers about her throat. '"I hardly
know him," she said in a low voice, "but he looks—fasci-
nating. And I thought he looked kind, but — ” Her
voice broke, and she was silent for a long minute. Then,
lifting her head, the blue eyes met Dundee's bravely
through a film of tears. "He isn't kind. He's cruel. He's
going to—to have me taken away- ”
"But, if you want to leave anyway,” Dundee began,
when her voice had choked so that she could not go on.
"At least I'd be free if I ran away!” the girl interrupted
passionately. "I won't be locked up Oh, my God! Who's
that?”
Her terror was a sickening thing to see, but before Dun-
dee could find words she was sitting up and clutching at
his coat sleeve. "If it's Dr. Koenig, would you mind leav-
ing us alone? I'm going to get down on my knees to
him
There was the sound of a door opening, footsteps in the


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 145
little hall. Then into the living room strode Captain
Strawn of the Homicide Squad. At sight of his uniform
the girl uttered a strangled cry, then collapsed against the
pillows, her face as rigid and white as it would be in death.
Dundee turned his back upon the pitiful spectacle, and,
winking at his one-time chief, demanded indignantly:
"What's wrong, Officer? What do you want here?"
Strawn took his cue. "Who are you, sir? ... One of
the patients? . . . Well, then,” he commanded sternly,
"stay where you are, and answer when you're spoken
to. . . . Now, young lady! Get a-hold of yourself, and
speak lively. Your name is Rambler, ain't it?"
The girl's eyes flew open and stared incredulously at
the police officer. After a moment she answered, and her
voice was stronger than Dundee had expected it to be.
"Yes! Enid Rambler. . . . And who are you?”
"I'm Captain John Strawn, Chief of the Homicide
Squad of the Hamilton Police Department,” Strawn in-
formed her grimly.
"Homicide?” she breathed, and fell back upon her
pillows, her eyelids closing.
"Don't like the sound of that word, eh?” Strawn gibed.
"Well, maybe you like the sound of murder a little better!"
"I say, Captain!” Dundee protested sincerely, and he
did not wink this time. “Miss Rambler is not well, and I
beg you— "
"All right, all right! Keep your shirt on!” Strawn
growled. "Now, young woman, I haven't any time to
lose. Dr. Carl Koenig was murdered in his office last
night- ”
"Dr. Koenig!” The words brought the girl upright.
Her blue eyes seemed to be starting from her head, but, to
Dundee's amazed bewilderment, the expression that slowly
dawned in them was relief. “But what—why—I don't see
what I have to do with it- "
"That's what I'm here to find out!" Strawn cut in


146 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
sternly. "After he was murdered last night, you ran away
from the sanitarium,
The girl's laugh was hard for Dundee to bear. "And
you're here because you think 1-1 killed him?" she cried
hysterically. "Why, that's funny! Oh!" And her jangling
laughter filled the room.
"Funny as hell!” Strawn agreed grimly. “Come on in,
Brede!”
The anemic-looking young man who held the job of
police stenographer sidled into the room from the little
hall, notebook in hand.
"I want a statement from you, young woman,” Strawn
told the girl, "and I'll warn you that we're already in pos-
session of a good many facts about your movements last
night, so you'd better talk fast and talk straight.”
"What do you want to know?" Enid Rambler asked,
almost coolly.
"Your movements from nine o'clock last night until you
were brought back here, after trying to escape."
Only then did the girl seem to realize the seriousness of
the situation. The flush which had risen with her laughter
died out of her cheeks. "From nine o'clock?" she repeated,
as if sparring for time. “Why, at nine o'clock I was in the
O. T. Shop, attending a motion picture show for the
patients. I left when the feature picture was about half
finished "
"Why?” Strawn shot at her.
The girl drew a quick breath. “Because I was nerv-
ous. And I didn't like the picture-
"Because it was named "Manslaughter'?” Strawn sugo
gested.
"I didn't like it; that's all!” Enid Rambler retorted
crisply. "I'm here for nerves, and I became too nervous to
sit still any longer. I left the shop about half-past nine,
and tried to find someone who had authority to give me a
dose of bromide. I got it every night until about a week


148 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
"No. I supposed he was interviewing a new patient, or
an old one, and I did not dream of disturbing him by
knocking."
"Did you hear anything to make you think he was busy
with a patient?" Strawn asked craftily.
"Why, no—” the girl faltered. "I just saw the door
was shut- "
"Come clean, Miss Rambler!” Strawn interrupted with
sudden viciousness. “You know damn well the doctor was
dead at ten minutes to ten— "
"Dead—then?” the girl scarcely breathed the words,
and Dundee was afraid she had fainted when she fell back
upon the couch, her right arm dangling till the lax fingers
almost touched the floor.
“Just a minute, Captain!" he pleaded, as he sprang to a
table, snatched a sheaf of roses from a vase, and hurried to
the couch with the water.
"She's just stalling for time," Strawn muttered, but he
waited until Dundee had dabbed at the girl's bluish lips
and drawn cheeks with a water-soaked handkerchief.
When she spoke at last, without opening her eyes, her
voice was a thin thread of sound: "I'm sorry. ... The
shock. . . . I didn't know—he was-dead "
"Then, Miss Rambler!" Strawn almost thundered.
"Why did you run away?”.
The ghost of a laugh came from her pale lips. “There
wasn't any reason why I should run away,” she said
strangely.
"But you did try to escape—and might have got away
with it, too, if you hadn't sprained your ankle,” Strawn
reminded her relentlessly.
“I—can't explain,” she answered colorlessly. "I'm a
patient here. As Luke Chester says, none of us is here for
flat feet. We're all ill, in one way or another. Dr. Harlow
will tell you that I'm not-responsible for the way my
nerves behave. Last night,” she went on, more


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 149
strongly, and with a wary, calculating look in her dark
blue eyes, “I acted on an uncontrollable impulse—_"
"So you're going to frame up the good old 'insanity
plea,' are you?" Strawn cut in brutally. "Well, let me tell
you it won't work. Dr. Koenig knew you were stalling-
that you didn't have any business to be here "
"How do you know that?" the girl cried sharply.
"Because Dr. Harlow told me so," Strawn obliged.
"Just yesterday she and Koenig had a run-in over your
case. She contended you were sick, and Koenig said there
was nothing the matter with you; that you'd simply pulled
the wool over the little lady doctor's eyes, in order to stay
on here.”
"Did he trouble to tell her why anyone would insist on
staying in a place like this, if she was well?” Enid Ram-
bler asked, her voice strangely cold and measured.
"I reckon you know the answer to that question better
than Koenig did,” Strawn accused. “I can make a pretty
good guess myself, young woman. You stayed on here,
biding your time! Koenig was nobody's fool. He sensed
that you had some evil purpose, caught a look of hate in
your eyes "
"What are you talking about?” the girl interrupted
scornfully. "I scarcely knew Dr. Koenig. I respected him
highly, and knew that he did a great work here. Why on
earth should I kill him?”
"I admit that we've got to find the motive,” Strawn told
her magnanimously. "Where's your home?”
The girl wilted visibly. "I-have no home. I am—an
orphan
"Oh, yeah?” Strawn sneered. "Then where were you
living before you came here?”
"Ăt the_Randolph Hotel,” she answered, but the
pause was long enough to convince Dundee as well as
Strawn that she was lying.
"And before that?"


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 151
couch. “Come along, Brede. . . . You understand, Miss
Rambler, that I'm not through with you yet. And if you
try to make another getaway you land in jail! . . . Say,
wait a minute, Brede. ... Miss Rambler, you say you
roamed around the place, inside and out, for about twenty
minutes, between half-past nine and ten minutes to ten,
and then lit out for town. . . . See anybody during any
of them strolls of yours?”
Color flamed in the girl's cheeks. "You haven't believed
a thing I've told you yet, so I don't expect you to believe
this: I saw no one. No one at all, at any time, except Dr.
Koenig sitting in his office at shortly after half-past nine."
Strawn, who had come close to the couch, was about to
wheel toward the door, when he caught sight of the pair
of crutches.
"Haven't lost any time, have you?” he grinned at the
girl maliciously. "Now, you listen to me, young lady!
Either you give me your word of honor that you'll stay
right where you are, or I'll station one of my men outside
that door to see that you do! Which will it be?”
"I'll make no promise!” Enid Rambler cried, and to
Dundee's profound amazement there was a ring of exulta-
tion, rather than of defiant anger, in her clear voice. And
now there was no fear in her beautiful eyes. ...


CHAPTER THIRTEEN
"WHEW!" Strawn whistled and mopped his brow, as
Dundee joined him on the lawn in front of Sunflower
Court. "What a girl! . . . But I didn't think she'd let you
go so quick.”
"In effect, Miss Rambler told me to run along and roll
my hoop,” Dundee laughed. “But not until she made
sure that you had actually stationed a man outside her
door.”
"I swear I don't know what to make of that dame,”
Strawn worried. "First time I ever got mixed up with a
bunch of nuts, and they're getting my goat. . . . But I
called her bluff. Barney won't even let a mouse get past
him.”
"Which is exactly what the girl is counting on,” Dun-
dee retorted.
"What do you mean?” Strawn scowled.
"Isn't that rather obvious?” Dundee shrugged. “That
girl was in a perfect lather of fear that she'd follow Dr.
Koenig to the grave—until you kindly offered her the pro-
tection of a six-foot plainclothes man. She knows some-
thing she doesn't dare tell, and yet”—he hesitated, his
black brows drawn together in perplexity—"and yet,
Chief, I'm absolutely convinced Enid Rambler did not
know, until you told her, that Carl Koenig had been
murdered.”
"Then why the hell did she run away?" Strawn
demanded angrily.
152


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 153
: "Ask Enid Rambler. And she won't tell. . . . By the
way, I'll feel safer about that girl if you keep a man there
day and night until this business is cleared up."
"Wasting a couple of good men, probably," Strawn
grumbled.
"Then you don't think Miss Rambler is the murderess?"
Dundee smiled.
"Don't ask me what I think!” Strawn growled. "I'm
already fit to be tied. Before the day is over I'll have the
police commissioner and the mayor and the chief of police,
to say nothing of the newspapers, ganged up on me yelp-
ing for an arrest. . . . Coming along?"
"What's the program?"
"I'm gonna use a little of this here psychology you high-
brows are always spieling about,” Strawn grinned.
"Gonna quiz Rowan and Webster right on the scene of the
crime, and see which cracks first. My own money's on
Rowan. . . . By the way, we checked that Lacey dame's
alibi and it's watertight. But I'd still like to know why
she's down in the doctor's will for half his estate.”
"Then I wonder," Dundee mused, "why she gave a
fake alibi the first time.”
"Search me!” Strawn shrugged. “But old lady Satterlee
and her daughter, Mabel, both swear she got to their house
trawn shrugged. but old lady batteriee
about eight o'clock and did not leave until exactly ten.
So that's that. But if you want to hear me go for Rowan
and Webster, sneak into Cantrell's office by the back door,
and leave the connecting door ajar so's you can hear and
not be seen, provided you still want to swank around here
as a patient rich enough to afford a suite in Sunflower
Court. . . . Here's a morning paper if you haven't seen
it.”
Automatically Dundee accepted both the invitation and
the newspaper, but remained stockstill as Captain Strawn
struck off across the lawn, trailed by a couple of his squad
and by Brede, the stenographer.


154 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
When he did follow, skirting the main building to
reach the back door of Cantrell's office, the heaviness of
his heart made his feet drag. However much he wanted
to, he could no longer dodge coupling the sickening dis-
covery that Justine Harlow had lied with Morse's story of
an hysterical woman pleading with Dr. Koenig just before
nine o'clock. If that woman had not been Justine Harlow,
then who could she have been? For Enid Rambler, as well
as Norah Lacey, had an alibi—as yet uncorroborated except
by Nurse Caplan–for the hour and a half between eight
and nine-thirty. But apparently Norah Lacey, as well as
Justine Harlow, had been lying. ...
"Come in, boy!" It was Strawn, holding the door open
for him. “The show hasn't started yet, and I'm fixing you
up a reserved seat. . . . See? I've hung this mirror so you
can sit behind the connecting door and see what's going on
in the other office. Cantrell and the little doctor both
insist on listening in, too, to see that the mean old police-
man don't third-degree their precious patients, so you'll
have company in here."
The two doctors, who were seated opposite each other
at Cantrell's desk, did not smile at or answer the captain's
sally. The medical man was wearing a crisp, spotless suit
of white linen, and a still-bleeding cut on his cheek testi-
fied to a recent shave. But that was the extent of his
morning freshness. He looked like a man who had not
slept for a week, and who feverishly doubted his ability
ever to sleep again. Justine Harlow sat grave and still, but
to Dundee's quick eyes she seemed less worried than at
any time since Dr. Koenig's murder had been discovered.
" 'Bout time for that secretary to show up, ain't it?"
Strawn asked.
"Miss Horne telephoned about half an hour ago, just
after she'd read the morning paper," Dr. Harlow an-
swered. "I told her to report for duty as usual, at nine
o'clock.”


156 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
Dundee could not see the speaker but heard the answer,
in a puzzled but still cheerful voice: "Yes, sir. I was told
Dr. Koenig wanted to see me "
"You were told,” Strawn corrected grimly, "that you
were wanted in Dr. Koenig's office—and you are! . ..
Come on in! Sit down!”
The mirror showed a man advancing on slow feet to the
chair Strawn was pointing at. Samuel Rowan was thin
almost to emaciation, and stooping shoulders minimized
his height to a bare average. Thick, slightly curling gray
hair was matched in a short, stubby mustache, and con-
trasted sharply with the sunburned swarthiness of his lean
face. Brown eyes, one of them clouded over with a
cataract, were shielded by old-fashioned, steel-rimmed
spectacles. His clothesman old sweater and a pair of gray,
baggy trousers, were marked with the unkempt shabbiness
of a man who takes no interest in his personal appearance.
Either the man was a consummate actor and had had
ample time to prepare himself for the ordeal he was about
to endure, or he was genuinely puzzled but not frightened
at finding himself face to face with a police captain, Dun-
dee concluded, his eyes riveted upon the mirrored face of
Samuel Rowan
"Well, Rowan!” Strawn snapped. "You know why
you're here, don't you?”
"I suppose I do,” Rowan answered, surprisingly, "and
I guess the sooner we get it over, the better. . . . I have
to appear in court in person, don't I?”
"You're damned right you do! ... Pretty cool, ain't
you, Rowan? Well, don't kid yourself you're going to
sneak out of this on an insanity plea-
Rowan half rose from his chair, his cheeks flushing
darkly. "What the devil are you talking about? I'm as
sane as you are ”
"That's swell!” Strawn cut in. "Now, come clean,
Rowan! What did you do it for?”.


158 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
youded to let medler to have a
told him I was cured, and wanted to get out and get to
work. He seemed to think I'd better stay on here for
a while, to make an adjustment, as he put it, before I tried
to take my place in the outside world. But when I saw
you here instead of Dr. Koenig I thought he had con-
cluded to let me go, and that you were to take me before
the court, in order to have my status as a mentally com-
petent person restored.”
"So that's what you thought, eh?" Strawn sneered.
"Had a powerful weight on your mind for two years,
didn't you, Rowan?"
"I did,” the man answered simply.
"Your conscience hurt you so bad that people thought
you were crazy, didn't it?”
"Yes. I was put in the psychopathic ward of the county
hospital for observation because I tried three times to com-
mit suicide.”
"And it felt pretty good to spill the beans to Koenig,
didn't it?"
“Yes. But it was the fact that Dr. Koenig convinced me
that I had nothing to blame myself for that cured me."
"Then why”—and Strawn leaned forward and shook
an accusing forefinger in the man's face—"did you have
to kill Koenig to make sure he'd keep his mouth
shut?”
"Kill-Koenig?” the man echoed blankly, and his hand
slowly released its clutch of Justine Harlow's fingers.
"You don't mean ?"
"Yeah! Murdered! In this office last night!" Strawn
Aung the words at the charity patient. "And the man that
did it tore up your case history! You weren't taking any
chances, were you, Rowan?”
"You mean you're accusing me ?"
"You got me, Rowan!... And I've got you!” Strawn
assured him grimly.
"But you—you can't the man stammered, his


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 159
tanned face turning yellow. "My God! I can't realize
these things you're saying—When was the doctor killed?"
"You know damned well when he was killed," Strawn
retorted. “And I have to hand it to you, Rowan, for
choosing your time well. With everybody, including the
night head nurse, shut up in the O. T. Shop watching the
movies
"But I was there, too,” Rowan cut in.
"Oh, sure! You took good care that everybody'd see
you and hear you in the shop before the lights went off,
and that you'd be seen coming out with the rest of the
patients when the show was over,” Strawn agreed, his
voice heavy with sarcasm. “But who can you find to swear
you didn't sneak out about half-past nine and in again just
before ten? Answer me that, Rowan!"
The man's pallor deepened. He seemed incapable of
answering.
"Think, Mr. Rowan!” Dr. Harlow urged. "Whom did
you sit beside?"
The man turned his head and stared up at her dumbly
for a moment. Then he shook his head, and passed his
hand across his spectacled eyes.
"Nobody," he admitted lifelessly. "I stood. The shop
was crowded. I was talking to some of the patients until
the lights went out, and then I couldn't find a seat easily,
so I just stood, leaning against the wall.”
"Which wall?” Strawn demanded.
"The back wall, near the door," Rowan confessed. "But
I swear I did not leave the room between eight o'clock and
ten, when the show was over.”
"Near the door,” Strawn repeated, with satisfaction.
"Near the back door that was open all the time. ...
Now, Rowan, I want to know what you told Koenig
yesterday.”
"I won't tell you!” the patient retorted flatly.
And for ten minutes Dundee had to sit silently in his


160
ONE DROP OF BLOOD
Lite defeat of camp wreck, but he wamuel Rowan
chair behind the door and listen to Captain Strawn batter
at the man's amazing will power. He saw Samuel Rowan
reduced to a pitiful, shivering wreck, but he also witnessed
the complete defeat of Captain Strawn. Not one syllable
regarding his past life would Rowan utter, and there was
a dicker of triumph in his exhausted voice as he informed
Strawn that he had drifted, an aimless, friendless wan-
derer, into Hamilton only a few weeks before he had been
made a ward of the county. But as to who he had been
before those dark two years, and where he had come
from—not one word.
And at last Strawn had been compelled to let him go,
followed by a plainclothesman, who was charged with
seeing that the suspect did not escape.
"I'll find out what crime he's hiding if I have to send
his fingerprints and description to every chief of police in
the country,” Strawn vowed savagely, as Dundee joined
him in the murdered man's office. "He had motive and
I'll prove it. Motive and opportunity. That's enough!"
The word "motive” rang a bell in Dundee's mind. He
turned to Dr. Harlow: “Do the patients sign for the books
they take out of your library?"
"Why, yes.”
"Then may I see the library card for Murder Without
Motive?"
"Miss Horne has charge of the library," Dr. Harlow
told him. "I'll ask her to bring in the card. I'm sure she's
in the reception room now."
"Ring for her!” Strawn commanded. "I want to see
that young lady anyway. Chances are she's familiar with
Rowan's case history as it was before Koenig made a
report on yesterday's session, and can tell us where he
came from."
Dundee rose, but Strawn remained sitting when the
door opened and a girl hesitated upon the threshold, note-
book in a hand that was visibly trembling.


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 161
She was a pretty thing, Dundee noted with swift appre-
ciation. Plump and dimpled and pink-and-white as a baby.
A chemical blonde, perhaps, but the short, brassy ringlets
that rioted all over her round head were in complete har-
mony with those round, baby-blue eyes and that funny
little button of a nose. Her soft, too-small mouth was
quivering like a grief-stricken child's.
"What's your full name?" Strawn began with cruel
abruptness.
"Maizie Horne. . . . I mean, it used to be Mary, but I
changed it to Maizie
"All right; Maizie it is,” Strawn cut in, grinning
slightly. "You know what happened here last night?”
"Yes, sir,” she quavered, the blue eyes filling instantly
with tears.
"What do you know about it?”
"Nothing! I don't know anything at all about it!" she
denied frenziedly, the big eyes rolling an appeal to
Dr. Harlow.
"How long have you worked for Dr. Koenig?"
"Nearly five years.”
"How old are you?”
"Twenty-two—I mean," the girl corrected her auto-
matic lie, Alushing scarlet, “I'm twenty-four.”
"You were here all day yesterday?" Strawn continued.
"From nine o'clock until five,” she answered eagerly.
"I don't even go out to lunch, except on special occasions.
"Dia the staff dinino lunch, exceptie answered eagers
"Did anything unusual happen yesterday? Any mys-
terious visitors or telephone calls or telegrams, or anything
of that sort for the doctor?"
"No, sir.”
"Did Dr. Koenig seem to have anything on his mind-
anything that worried or upset him?"
"Oh, no, sir! He was awfully busy, but then he always
is was


162
ONE DROP OF BLOOD
"Has anything at all unusual, anything you did not
understand, for instance, happened here since Dr. Koenig
returned from his trip Monday?"
"No, sir."
"Now, Miss Horne, I want you to give me the name of
everyone that came into this office yesterday to see Dr.
Koenig."
"Let me think-Do you mean everybody, including the
staff?”
"Everybody."
"Well, of course I was in and out all day," the girl
began slowly. "And Dr. Harlow and Miss Lacey were in
and out, too, and so was Dr. Cantrell. . . . Oh, yes! And
Mrs. Cantrell. She came in during the morning to wel.
come the doctor home from his trip, and to ask him to
dinner at her house on Thursday night—why, that would
be tonight!” she discovered in awe, and the babyish mouth
puckered.
"All right! Who else?” Strawn prodded impatiently.
"Let's see. ... Oh, yes! Just after we'd finished
lunch—that was about half-past twelve-old Mr. Powell
came to get Clyde's suitcase "
"Powell? Clyde?" Strawn repeated. "Who are they?"
It was Dr. Harlow who answered. "Clyde Powell was
a patient here for years. A hopeless case-advanced
stages of dementia praecox, with epileptiform seizures.
Lately he had required day and night attendants, and his
family was unable to pay for them, so they had him trans-
ferred Monday to the State Hospital for the Insane. I
telephoned his father yesterday to ask him to call for a
suitcase full of old clothes and worthless possessions that
was not sent on with Clyde.”
"And Powell saw Koenig, eh?" Strawn turned back to
the secretary. “What was his attitude? Friendly?”
"Why, yes,” the girl answered. “Of course he was all
Lately he dementia years. A hoed. "Clyden are they?"


ONE DROP OF BLOOD
163
here med et De Koeng for having her
cut up over Clyde's having to go to the State Hospital, but
he wanted to thank Dr. Koenig for having kept Clyde so
long at a reduced rate. They only talked for a few
minutes.”
"All right. Who else?"
"Well, about one o'clock Dr. Koenig sent for Mrs.
Morse, one of the patients," the secretary continued con-
scientiously. “She stayed about half an hour, and then
Archie Webster's father came. Archie is another of the
patients, and his father came to see him, and to ask Dr.
Koenig how he was getting along "
"Friendly, was he?” Strawn interrupted.
"Of course!" the girl retorted with some indignation.
"Everybody thought the world of Dr. Koenig-
"One somebody didn't!" Strawn reminded her grimly.
"But go on! How long was Mr. Webster with the
doctor?”
"About fifteen minutes. When Mr. Webster left, Dr.
Koenig went with him through the reception room where
I was working, to the outside door, and I heard Dr.
Koenig say, 'Don't worry, old man. She won't be here
much longer 'n
"'She'?" Dundee repeated. “Are you sure Dr. Koenig
said 'she,' not 'he,' referring to Archie Webster?”
"I'm positive he said 'she,' because I said to myself, 'If
they could see how Enid treats Archie, they wouldn't have
any cause to worry about his marrying her.'”
"So you felt sure 'she' was Enid Rambler?” Dundee
went on thoughtfully.
"Isn't it quite possible,” Dr. Harlow suggested quietly,
"that Dr. Koenig was referring to me?"
Now why the devil had she brought that up, Dundee
wondered. Did she enjoy rubbing salt into the wound
caused by the revelation that Dr. Koenig had planned to
replace her?


164 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
the doctor's Worated the muthe truth. And
"To you, Dr. Harlow?" Maizie Horne cried incredu-
lously. "Why, Dr. Koenig thought the sun rose and set in
you, and you know it!"
“Then Dr. Koenig said nothing to you yesterday or
before then about replacing Dr. Harlow with a male
psychiatrist?”
"Of course not! I've heard him say a dozen times he
couldn't do without Dr. Harlow!"
Dundee studied the girl through half-closed eyes.
Apparently she was telling the truth. And what she said
merely corroborated the mute but powerful testimony of
the doctor's will. But had Justine Harlow introduced the
subject cunningly, for the purpose of eliciting this whole-
hearted corroboration? And what had happened to change
Dr. Koenig's heart and mind so suddenly and so com-
pletely? For that change of heart had corroboration, too
in the scribbled notation "Sandlin” on the doctor's desk
calendar, and in his direct statement to Roger Baldwin.
... Eleven miles in two hours! ... The voice of a
woman pleading with Carl Koenig not to send her
away. ...
There was something else, a question that had been
demanding an answer.
"Miss Horne,” he asked, "who gave those roses”-and
he pointed to the now sadly faded flowers on the dead
man's desk—''to Dr. Koenig?”
"Roses?” the secretary repeated blankly. "I don't know!
They weren't there when I left yesterday afternoon!"


CHAPTER FOURTEEN
An hour later—a crowded but strangely fruitless
hour—Dundee and Captain Strawn parted company tem-
porarily, the chief of the Homicide Squad setting out
with his stenographer and Dr. Harlow to make the
rounds of those patients who had not yet been questioned,
and the younger detective to report in person to the bed-
ridden district attorney.
But Dr. Cantrell detained Dundee. “My wife wishes
very much to speak with you. I'd appreciate it if you
would pay her a brief visit. You'll find her in the sun
parlor."
"You've discussed the case fully with her, of course?"
Dundee asked casually.
"Naturally,” the doctor replied curtly. “As I told you,
she was asleep when I was summoned here last night, and
still asleep when I got home after one o'clock. I did not
disturb her, but waited until after she had had her break-
fast this morning to tell her the bad news. She's very
much upset, of course. My wife and I were Dr. Koenig's
closest friends—except Dr. Harlow, of course."
There was so much tenseness and constraint in the doc-
tor's jerky, almost defiant words that Dundee was very
thoughtful as he took the path that connected the Cantrell
home with the main building of the sanitarium.
A middle-aged maid, whose eyes were puffed and red
with weeping, conducted Dundee into the sun parlor. He
found Claire Cantrell seated at a little wicker desk, her
great brown eyes staring steadily at a large, leather-
framed photograph. A beam of sunlight lay in a broad
165


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 167
hunge
re le opere i mlade
watch as I picked up the receiver—there came three short
buzzes, our call on the sanitarium telephone. It was
Carl- "
Dundee was startled into rigid attention. “Why didn't
Dr. Cantrell answer the call, since he knew you were
asleep?”
"My husband did go to the front hall to answer, but
hung up after a moment when it was evident that Carl
wished to talk with me, not with him," she answered.
"But Dr. Cantrell made no mention of this call!” Dun-
dee told her sharply.
"I know. He was very wrong, but his sole thought was
to protect me from being questioned last night, when I
was ill. Bruce—" and there was a throbbing note of
tenderness in the rich voice, “is a very devoted and con-
siderate husband, and he did not hear enough of the
conversation to attach any significance to it.”
"Just what did Dr. Koenig say?" Dundee tried gently
to hurry her.
"The first thing he said was, 'Feeling better now,
child?' Bruce had told him I had one of my headaches. Í
answered that I was, and he then asked if Justine was here :
with me. I told him she was not- '
“Did he say he wanted to see Dr. Harlow in his office?”
"No, but I inferred as much, of course,” Mrs. Cantrell
answered, with a trace of surprise at the question. “We
talked on for a minute or so, idly, as friends do, but his
voice seemed strained and tired and worried. I asked him
what he was doing, and he said, 'Working on case his-
tories, but not making much headway. The truth is, .
Claire, something happened this evening to shake my
faith in human nature, but just hearing your voice has
done a lot to restore it.'... I'm proud to say,” the girl
added, but without a trace of defiance, “that Carl was
almost as fond of me as I was of him.”
"I can believe that,” Dundee assured her gravely. "But


168 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
eran
did he explain, give you any clew as to what had
happened?"
"None at all, and I did not ask any questions. I sup-
posed, naturally, that a patient had made some revelation
that had shocked even Carl's understanding and tol-
erance.”
Well, it looked as if Strawn might be right after all,
and Rowan the one whose guilty secret must be protected
at all costs, Dundee told himself ruefully. But—it was
Justine Harlow the doctor had wanted to see. ...
"All this is extremely important, I am sure, Mrs. Can-
trell, and I thank you for telling it so freely and
clearly-
"But that is not all, Mr. Dundee,” the girl surprised
him by interrupting. "We talked on for a minute or so
more—he advised me to stay in bed today and cautioned
me to take care of myself—when suddenly he interrupted
something unimportant I was saying. He cried out, ‘Good
Lord!,' in a voice I can only describe as horror-stricken,
and added immediately: 'So that's where I've seen those
eyes before!'”
"Yes?” Dundee urged, as the girl paused. "What
else? Surely he explained so strange a remark?"
"I asked him what he meant, but he answered eva-
sively,” the girl told him. “As nearly as I can remember,
he said, 'I've just happened to stumble upon the missing
link in a memory chain. . . . But I'll say good-night now,
my darling girl. I've got a nasty job to do, without wast-
ing a minute's delay.' And he hung up the receiver. I
was puzzled and troubled. I started to call Bruce and tell
him about it, but my head had begun to throb violently
again, and I knew that if I excited myself by talking any
more, it would get worse.”
"Your husband did not come to inquire what Dr.
Koenig wanted?”
"No. Why should he?” Mrs. Cantrell asked. “It was


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 169
the most natural thing in the world for Carl to call me, to
ask how I was feeling.”
"Can you recall, Mrs. Cantrell, at just what point in the
conversation your husband replaced the receiver of the
extension?”
"Not exactly, but very early—as soon as it was obvious
that the call was for me only."
"May I ask, Mrs. Cantrell, if you and Dr. Harlow are
good friends?”
"The best of friends,” she answered emphatically. "I
have known and loved Justine ever since I first came
to Mayfield for psychoanalysis. She is an utter darling
of a girl, and a splendid psychiatrist."
"Then it would be natural for Dr. Koenig to assume
that Dr. Harlow would come straight to you, if she were
in serious trouble?”
"Quite natural.”
"Will you tell me this, Mrs. Cantrell: was Dr. Harlow
in love with Dr. Koenig-or he with her?”
"You have no right to ask me that question,” she
replied with dignity, but I will answer it. The answer is
no. Dr. Harlow worshiped Dr. Koenig, but I am abso-
lutely sure she did not love him, in the usual sense of the
word. And Carl loved Justine only as a colleague and as
a friend. . . . I don't believe Carl was ever in love. He
was an almost Christlike ascetic.”
"Do you know personally of any woman who was in
love with him?"
"I cannot answer that,” she said, with dignity. “But I
can tell you clumsily what Justine could express much
more scientifically. Women patients are prone to fall in
love with their analysts, at a certain stage of psycho-
analysis. They make what is called a 'transference of an
unhealthy love from its previous object to the doctor. He
encourages such a transference, but does not take advan-
tage of it, if he is a reputable analyst. When the cure is
wordend. ... chistlike ascetice any woman


170 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
Manost lealations of those than has
completed, the patient is no longer in love with the doctor,
but is ready for a normal life. I can assure you that Dr.
Koenig was the soul of honor where his women patients
were concerned. . . . And in every other respect. For
instance, a practicing physician who is financially inter-
ested in a sanitarium is exposed to countless tempta-
tions "
"Such as?" Dundee prompted, when the girl paused, as
if she feared she was talking too much.
"It would be very easy for a doctor in Carl's position at
Mayfield to retard rather than hasten the recovery of rich
patients, or even of those who pay for moderately priced
accommodations,” Mrs. Cantrell explained quietly. "Carl
almost leaned backward to escape any such accusation.
Many women, and some men, too, find a place like May-
field a heavenly refuge from life and all its demands and
perplexities. After they are really well enough to be out,
they want to stay on and on. Carl literally pushed them
out, back into the world again. Naturally my husband,
financially interested also, as you know, was in complete
accord with Carl's principles
"But Business Manager Baldwin was not always so
cheerful about seeing a well-paying patient leave?” Dun-
dee prompted, as she hesitated again.
"Roger Baldwin is not a doctor; he is a business man,
and a very good one,” Claire Cantrell reminded him.
"But I admit that the difference of viewpoint did cause
some friction—nothing serious, of course. For instance,
Carl was quite upset when I saw him yesterday morning
over the fact that poor Clyde Powell, who had been a pay-
ing patient for seven years, had been transferred to the
State Hospital on Monday, all arrangements having been
made before Carl returned. In fact, I am sure that if Carl
had got here before Clyde's train left he would have got
him back and kept him here as a charity patient.”
"I see," Dundee nodded, then asked abruptly: "Did Dr.
dee recoger Balood on
Stare patient for at poor Clyde saw him use. For


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 171
Koenig say anything at all to you or to your husband about
his intention of replacing Dr. Harlow with a male
assistant?"
"Not a word!" the girl flashed. "Bruce has told me
what Roger Baldwin said, but I am sure Roger misunder-
stood something Carl said about taking on a second assist-
ant. I am positive Carl had not the remotest intention of
dismissing Justine."
"Not even if he discovered yesterday some serious error
on her part, in the treatment of a patient?" Dundee
persisted.
"He would have condemned the error itself, but not
Justine's intentions," the girl assured him warmly. "He
knew that Justine's principles were as high as his own.”
"Candidly speaking, you believe Roger Baldwin lied?"
"I believe he is mistaken as to just what Carl said," she
answered firmly.
"Your friends should prize your loyalty very highly,
Mrs. Cantrell,” Dundee said, sincerely, as he took her
hand.
Her revelation of the telephone conversation had given
the young detective so much food for thought that he was
scarcely aware of the path he took as he left the Cantrell
house. But when he almost stumbled against the foot-
rest of a canopied lawn chair he discovered that he was
cutting across a small rose garden which lay between the
sanitarium driveway and the Cantrell home.
He was about to apologize for his clumsiness when he
saw that the frail old man in the chair was fast asleep, his
repose guarded by a white-clad male attendant.
"It's Dr. Mayfield, sir,” the attendant whispered.
Dundee halted and stared down at the sleeper with
intense interest. Every line and contour of the face and
head spelled nobility, high intelligence, thoroughbred
ancestry and gentleness. But as the detective gazed down
upon the old doctor, something like nausea clutched at the
rest of a canopiesmall rose gardentrell home.css when he


172 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
pit of his stomach. The unfairness of the tricks that life
could play seemed suddenly more than he could bear.
Why live decently, finely, cleanly—he asked himself—if
at the end life could rob a man of the thing he held most
dear, that which distinguished him from the beasts of the
field?
"How is he today?” he asked the attendant, whom he
beckoned to a safe distance from the sleeper.
“Seems to be in his right mind, when he's awake,” the
attendant answered. “But something's bothering him. He
keeps demanding to see Dr. Koenig, and to humor him,
I've told him Doctor's away on a trip.”
Dundee nodded and walked on, but his lips silently
formed the bitter words, "To humor him.” Better a gang-
ster's bullet in his spine, he decided, than that he should
live on and on, until ultimately a paid caretaker of his
body should murmur those words about him. ...
But the zest for life was again strong within him when
he reached the bedside of the pleurisy-stricken district
attorney.
"Time you were remembering you've got a boss, young
fellow,” Sanderson chided good-naturedly. "What luck
so far?”
"Swell luck!” Dundee grinned. "Within twelve hours
I've met three of the prettiest women I've ever seen in my
life. . . . Unfortunately one of them—and I'm not sure
she isn't my favorite—insists on wearing horn-rimmed
spectacles to add to her dignity- "
"What the devil are you talking about?” Sanderson
interrupted.
"Dr. Harlow, naturally—Justine Harlow," Dundee
obliged. "A charming name, don't you think? Really,
she's the cunningest little trick, especially when she's being
the learned doctor-
"If it won't bore you too much,” Sanderson again inter-


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 173
morder you're wundee laugh that I'm afrzold with ha
rupted acidly, "I'd like to hear a few details about a certain
murder you're supposed to be investigating."
"Oh, that!” Dundee laughed and shrugged. “The truth
is, I know so much about it that I'm afraid I don't know
anything at all. . . . Does your doctor hold with having
his patients told long, involved mystery stories?”


CHAPTER FIFTEEN
"Wait a minute, Bonnie. My head's spinning," the
district attorney pleaded, three-quarters of an hour after
Dundee had begun his recital.
"So is mine," Dundee admitted, and stretched pro-
digiously, his blue eyes twinkling as they rested on his
chief's disturbed face.
"If it hadn't been for that damned movie in the what-
d'ye-call-it shop
"O. T. Shop,” Dundee contributed helpfully. "But if
it hadn't been for that damned movie, as you call it, think
of the fun we'd miss playing 'Button, button, who's got
the button?' with a whole squad of suspects. All of the
patients would have been peacefully abed, since bedtime
at Mayfield is nine o'clock.”
"I'm not the glutton for suspects that you are," Sander-
son reminded him testily. "Well, get along with it. You'd
finished with Rowan, and I'm inclined to agree with
Strawn that that bird'll bear checking up on."
"No doubt of that,” Dundee agreed cheerfully. "I'm
sure his story is an interesting human document, and one
that quite possibly would complete a dossier in some police
department, but- '
"All right, all right! What did Archie Webster have to
say for himself when Strawn got hold of him this
morning?"
"Oh, he's playing the same sort of game the Rambler
girl is up to,” Dundee told him. “Knows something he's
not telling. But his story is straight enough, believe the
story or not. He says he was sitting in the same row of
174


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 175
seats at the movie as Enid Rambler, and that he noticed
she was getting more and more nervous. Says he passed
the word along to her that he had some first-class whisky,
which was exactly what she needed to brace her up. He
says he also sent along the word that he'd be in a sort of
little summerhouse in the northwest corner of the grounds,
beyond the locked ward cottage. He left, went to the
summerhouse, and waited for her to join him. He says she
didn't come and he drank the whole pint himself, going
back to the main building only in time to see the patients
leaving the shop. He says his intention was to ask her to
take a turn about the grounds with him before she went to
bed, but that, tipsy as he was, he got into the mix-up with
Rowan, and did not even know she had ever left the
movie.”
"And I suppose the summerhouse is too far away from
the main building for Archie to have seen anything?"
"It is."
"Then what the devil does he know that he's not
telling?"
"I don't know," Dundee assured him plaintively. "I
don't know a lot more than that, if you ask me
"And what about that mystery yarn-Murder Without
Motive, that had the rubber gloves tip in it?" Sanderson
asked irritably.
"Another washout. Miss Horne, the secretary, says
Koenig, who read nearly every mystery he could get his
hands on, presented that book to the sanitarium library,”
Dundee told him. “And the library card shows that prac-
tically everyone whose name has been mentioned in the
case so far has read the book. And I thought I was lucky
to find that hot clew!” he gibed at himself.
"That fat man!” Sanderson ejaculated. "He'd stand a
lot of explaining!"
"Strawn's got the ‘dragnet,' as the papers call it, out for
our fat friend,” Dundee assured him. "Description: age,
Motive, that 12. let Mis Hornystery he cium librapeace


176
ONE DROP OF BLOOD
tell becshe's afraid she did it, or hpplied. "You
about forty; height approximately five feet five; weight no
less than two hundred pounds, mostly under his belt; hair,
scant, pepper-and-salt; eyes blue or gray. But unless he
was kidding Archie Webster, the fat man's chief interest
was in Enid Rambler, to whom he did not speak— "
"Met her outside,” Sanderson supplied. "You say your-
self the girl knows who did it, or has strong suspicions, so
strong she's afraid she'll get hers next, and that she won't
tell because the murderer has something on her.”
"Guess I'm stubborn,” Dundee admitted ruefully, “but
I can't approve of this mystery story unless the 'voice of
God is tied up nice and tight with the solution of
Koenig's murder.”
"Oh, don't bother about that voice," Sanderson advised.
"Some nut with a religious complex, baying at the moon.
Remember the place is full of nuts.”
"Ye-es.”
"If you want my theory, here it is,” Sanderson went on,
with increasing zest. "Claire Cantrell says—and I think
we can bank on what she told you—that the doctor sud-
denly remembered where he'd seen somebody before, and
that he was horrified. Now consider. Get the picture.
The doctor's talking over the phone, sitting at his desk.
His eyes rove, and light on something. All right! What
was that something likely to be?”
"A case history, I suppose,” Dundee admitted. "He
told her he was working on case histories,”
"Sure!” Sanderson was becoming jubilant. "The doc-
tor sees a name name of a person or a place—that makes
his memory click. Now what is his memory most con-
cerned with?”
"His work,” Dundee answered dutifully. "And with-
out your prompting I can deduce that the phase of his
work that horrified him most was murder trials, where he
testified as to the defendants' sanity. And I agree that if
he suddenly realized that one of his patients was an


178 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
shas dead whene runs away. away to him. uto
down a murshook his head, he said he'd kills office, and
"Swell!” Dundee applauded feebly. "But—how does
Enid Rambler fit into the picture?"
"That's easy!” Sanderson exulted. "She's got onto
Rowan's trail. A relative of his first victim, probably.
Unknown to Rowan, of course. So she leaves the movie to
spill the beans to Koenig. She waits around, thinks he's
busy. Then she hears or sees something that scares the
wits out of her. Probably Rowan comes out of the doctor's
office and she gives herself away to him. He threatens to
kill her, and she runs away. Today she learns that Koenig
was dead when Rowan came out of Koenig's office, and
she knows he meant it when he said he'd kill her."
Dundee shook his head. "I don't believe she'd track
down a murderer and then let him scare her off--not even
after she found he'd killed Koenig," he said. “But it's the
best theory so far, Chief, and I'll work on it."
"Yes, sir! You can't get away from the fact that
Rowan's case history was torn up; that he'd had a long talk
with Koenig; that no one can swear he didn't sneak out of
the O. T. Shop; that he was still wrought up enough at ten
o'clock to knock Webster down; and that he won't tell the
police a thing concerning his past doesn't dare tell! . i.
And you can't get away from the fact that Koenig didn't
consider Enid Rambler a mentally sick girl—thought she
was shamming in order to stay on.”
"And I also can't get away from the fact that Dr. Har-
low believes she is sick," Dundee cut in. "My personal
conviction is that she is using Mayfield as a hide-out, that
she has done something which has given her a very real
claustrophobia-in other words, that she's afraid of being
hauled off to jail. Strawn's trying to get a line on her
before she came to Mayfield.”
"Poor Bonnie!" Sanderson mocked, not unkindly. “One
of his three beauties is married, one is a prospective jail-
bird, and the bespectacled one tells him a lie that he
promptly catches her in!"


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 179
Not only thathat the murdee admisten demandesach ha
"Not only that, but two of my beauties have some of the
identical roses that the murderer thoughtfully placed at the
dead doctor's nose,” Dundee admitted gloomily.
"Not-Claire Cantrell?" Sanderson demanded, startled.
"No. Justine Harlow and Enid Rambler. Each had a
vase of those roses in her room this morning," Dundee
told him. “I checked up with the Mayfield gardener, but
he told me they're hothouse roses, a new variety, and very
expensive. I'd hoped to find them growing on a hundred
bushes about the grounds, but no such luck.”
"What's eating on you, my boy, is that you're con-
vinced it was Justine Harlow who paid that tearful visit to
Dr. Koenig around nine o'clock last night-and you won't
admit it. . . . If she had pimples and greasy hair, you'd
be a powerful lot quicker at putting two and two together,
Bonnie. Face the thing! Koenig had suddenly made up
his mind to discharge the little doctor. Why? Because she
was in love with him, and making a nuisance of herself!
He'd been so fond of her that he'd put her down in his
will for half his estate, and undoubtedly she had some
cause to think he cared for her in a marrying way- '
"So now you're suggesting she killed him because he
wouldn't marry her?" Dundee asked, in a dangerously
calm voice.
"Keep your shirt on, boy!" Sanderson laughed. "I'm
suggesting no such thing. All I'm trying to do is to
explain why the girl drove only eleven miles in those two
hours. You could hardly expect her to admit she'd had
that kind of interview with a man who had just been mur-
dered. But I don't believe for a minute she had anything
to do with his death.”
"That's a help anyway," Dundee admitted, more cheer-
fully. "Well, I'll be getting on. I intend to be a model
'patient' all afternoon-sit around on the lawn and gossip
with all the biddies, male and female. Out of a ton of dirt
I may winnow one small nugget of gold. . . . By the way,


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 181
that kid—and a cute brat he is—reminded me of someone.
I've seen eyes like his somewhere recently— "
"Koenig?" Sanderson cut in sharply.
But Dundee shook his head. "Not Koenig, but — ”.
“But Koenig left Norah Lacey half of his estate," San-
derson reminded his subordinate grimly.
"I know," Dundee agreed dubiously. "Maybe I'm just
a gullible, hero-worshiping young fool, but without more
positive evidence than we have so far, I'm not going to
believe Carl Koenig seduced a nurse in his employ and
then refused to 'do right by her.'”.
"Got any idea whose baby it is, then?”
"Not the ghost of an idea," Dundee admitted hope-
lessly. "Another mystery. Just one of the half dozen that
are sure to enter into the investigation of any murder. All
of us have secrets in our lives, but fortunately most of us
don't get mixed up in murders and have to see our secrets
dragged into the limelight. . . . No use broadcasting this
particular secret, is there, sir?”
"None that I can see so far,” Sanderson replied. "No
use slinging mud at a dead man, unless it becomes abso-
lutely necessary in clearing up his murder. But bear this
in mind, boy. Koenig had some good reason for leaving
Norah Lacey—probably a good enough head nurse but
easily replaced one-half of all he died possessed.”
It was on that somber note that the conversation ended,
and Special Investigator Dundee took his seat in his road-
ster, a well-filled suitcase beside him. He began to drive
rather slowly, but suddenly his scalp pricked in a way that
always presaged disaster, and his foot bore down hard
upon the accelerator. ...


CHAPTER SIXTEEN
"I've been holding back your tray for you, Mr. Dun-
dee,” Nurse Lurline Doty told him archly, as he strode,
suitcase in hand, into the reception room of Sunflower
Court. "I've got a lovely lunch for you-breast of
chicken, fresh asparagus, tomato aspic-
"Thanks!” Dundee interrupted curtly. "Everything
chicken, fresh got a lovel reception Techly, as he stron
quiet?"
"Quiet!" the nurse echoed dramatically. "With all the
patients knowing about poor Dr. Koenig, and having
hysterics
"Has anything serious happened?"
"No one has committed suicide or confessed to the
murder, if that's what you mean," she answered, a little
sulkily.
In his suite at last, Dundee unpacked his suitcase, made
sure that the precious trayful of case history scraps gath-
ered from the floor of the dead doctor's office was still in
the drawer where he had placed it, then gave hasty and
rather unappreciative attention to his excellent luncheon
tray. . . . Was he developing an appropriate neurasthenia,
to fit his rôle of patient? And if not, why the devil should
his scalp go on prickling in that way it had of warning
him of approaching disaster?
Ready to go out and make the acquaintance of his fel-
low guests, Dundee suddenly felt a curious reluctance to
play the rôle he had elected. Himself completely sound
mentally, he felt a shrinking aversion to contacting those
whose brains were warped and whose faces betrayed the
disintegration of their minds. There was shame, too, in
182


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 183
the fact that he was about to deceive unfortunates who had
not the power to match wits with him. But duty was
duty. ...
He found that the largest number of patients out for
air and exercise had chosen the wide expanse of lawn that
lay between Sunflower Court and the main building. A
man and two women were playing croquet, the silly,
unprovoked laughter of one-the very fat girl he had seen
that morning-shrilling out an almost constant accom-
paniment to the crack of mallet against ball. Her shots
were wild, never making a wicket....
"Play bridge, buddy?” a blithe voice hailed him, and
Dundee turned gratefully to accept the invitation of the
jolly attendant, Happy Day.
There were two tables of bridge. One foursome was
made up of Samuel Rowan; a majestic, white-haired
woman with protruding eyes, who was introduced as Mrs.
Asbury, and who immediately assured Dundee she was at
Mayfield merely for a "rest cure”; a silent, homely girl
whose name was Helen Rand; and Howard Salter, the
writer, who seemed to be completely recovered from his
attempted suicide.
"Needed a fourth pretty badly," Happy Day assured the
detective, as Dundee took the vacant seat at a table where
the attendant, his patient, Archie Webster, and a dignified,
thin-haired, erect old man were already sitting.
"And this is Mr. Hepple, Dundee,” Happy Day con-
cluded the introductions, indicating the elderly man.
"Used to be a banker-responsible for the depression,
ain't you, old sport?”
The ex-banker bowed with grave and exquisite courtesy
to acknowledge the introduction. "We are very glad to
have you with us, sir. . . . Yes, Mr. Day, it was my sad
destiny to bring about this world-wide catastrophe, which
is euphemistically referred to as the 'depression.' The
gigantic scope of my unwise manipulations
as Dundeecient, Archie, ready sitting oy Day com-


184 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
"Tell him all about it some other time, grandpa,"
Happy Day interrupted, tossing a merry, significant wink
Dundee-wards. "Let's cut for deal. ... Hi! Ace of
Spades. And you and me's pardners, Dundee. How's that
for a break? ... Archie, I wish you luck with grandpa.”
"My name is Hepple, sir,” the gentle old man re-
minded him, still with beautiful courtesy.
"Excuse me for living!" Happy apologized gleefully.
“The old boy doesn't play contract, Dundee, so auction it
is, if you can bear it. . . . Oh, Lord!”
"Got a pain in your tummy?” Archie Webster asked
hopefully.
*Worse'n that,” the attendant groaned. “Look who's
coming.”
Dundee looked, too. Across the driveway and toward
them he saw a tall woman striding purposefully, and wav-
ing a raffia knitting basket from which trailed yards of
purple wool. Her height was accentuated by the Grecian
tunic of pale yellow silk which, sleeveless and girdled by
a silver snake, hung in voluminous folds from shoulders
to ankles. Long curls of gleaming black hair hung below
her shoulders, escaping from a floppy leghorn hat
weighted down with pink roses. At a distance she looked
like a great beauty, but as she drew near Dundee saw
before him what could only be called the caricature of a
beautiful woman. The lines and coarseness of middle age
were smeared over with heavy, theatrical makeup. The
once-glorious black eyes were thickly mascaraed and
deeply shadowed with blue grease paint. Yellowish teeth,
some of them false, spoiled the calculated effect of the
scarlet Cupid's bow. But Dundee's eyes, after a fleeting
summary of her appearance, riveted themselves upon a
long-stemmed rose that bobbed above the silver girdle.
For it was an exact mate of the rare and expensive flower
that had adorned the dead doctor's desk, as well as the
rooms of both Enid Rambler and Justine Harlow. ...


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 185
Did he say rare? Why, the damned flower seemed to be
an epidemic!
"Don't tell me you've already got a fourth!” she sang
out, in a vital, throaty voice—the voice of a concert stage
contralto. "Why, bullo, darling!"
And Dundee was amazed to find that the happily sur-
prised and loving greeting was for him.
"Archie, my own true love, where did this gorgeous
male thing come from?" she demanded of young Webster,
as she bent to kiss him on the cheek.
"Quit smearing me up with your damned lipstick,"
Archie commanded ungallantly. “This is Marjorie Mer-
rick, Mr. Dundee. . . . At least that's her story and she
sticks to it."
"A stage name, darling,” Miss Merrick assured Dundee
tenderly. "I am the world-famous contralto. Of course
you've heard of me. ... What eyes! What a noble
brow! What a chin! What a head of hair— " and she
suddenly ran her thin fingers through Dundee's crisp
black mane.
"In short, what a man!” Archie laughed. “Don't mind
her, Dundee "
"Jealous, my pet?" the odd creature crooned, encircling
the young man's neck with a freckled arm. “He simply
can't bear to have me pay the slightest attention to another
man, darling-Oh! To think I nearly forgot!" and she
fixed Archie Webster with glittering black eyes, a red-
nailed forefinger tapping warningly against her pursed
lips. "Not a word, Archie! For God's sake, not a word!"
"I'm not saying anything!” the boy almost shouted.
"But dry up yourself, Marjie. We want to play bridge.”
"Take my place, Miss Merrick,” Dundee insisted, rising.
"No, really,” as his three table mates protested vigorously,
"I'd rather look on.”
"Sweet!” Marjorie Merrick breathed, as she slipped
into his chair. "He's head over heels already, Happy!"


186 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
she confided in a gusty whisper. “Sit right here by Mama,
darling. . . . Well, can you bear it, children? . . . My
sweet old Carl—murdered!” She turned swiftly to Dun-
dee. "He always called me Marjorie and I called him
Carl. . . . Madly, hopelessly in love with me, the poor
dear. ... And now—now he's dead! Oh, God, why
should I be cursed with this terrible power—But not a
word!” and again the forefinger tapped the scarlet mouth.
Again Dundee felt the hair rise pricklingly on his
scalp, but this time he knew the cause. Weird and horrible
to hear this scatter-brained caricature babble on. ...
"I bid two spades—no, I mean I bid three hearts!" she
announced triumphantly. "Not my bid? . . . Well, what
difference does it make? I'm going to bid three hearts
anyway when it gets around to me."
And although she played the hand to a running, rapid
accompaniment of relevant and irrelevant chatter, the
amazing woman made a little slam in hearts, with a
dummy that seemed to promise not a single quick trick.
"That's bridge!" she applauded herself, with justice,
her eyes beaming fondly upon Dundee. "Listen, darling!
Be a lambkin and run and get Enid Rambler for me.
There's something I simply have to tell her-
"She has a sprained ankle,” Dundee told her.
"Then bring her in a wheel chair, idiot!" she com-
manded imperiously. "Run!"
"I'll go," Happy Day offered. “You take my hand,
Dundo. I'll chance to
them s
"No. I'll go along with you,” the detective offered,
glad of the chance to ask a few urgent questions of one
who knew his status. . . . "What a woman!" he breathed,
with awe, as the two of them set off across the lawn.
"What ails her?”
"She's a manic,” Happy Day explained, proud of his
knowledge. “Not a maniac-a manic. You know—up in
the air all the time, happy as hell, and impulsive as a wild


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 187
mare. Makes her nuts on men, poor girl! But I don't see
why we should pity her. She's having a swell time—all
the time!”
"A nymphomaniac?” Dundee asked interestedly.
"Sure! But not when she's herself. Awful decent sort,
really," the attendant assured him, in a suddenly assumed
English accent, at which he himself grinned. "She thinks
every man that lays eyes on her is dippy about her. Has
a tall story to tell about a man getting a job here as
attendant in order to kidnap her. ... That sort of
thing."
"And Archie Webster is her present choice?”' Dundee
asked.
"Until you came along," Happy Day laughed. “Sure!
She thinks Archie is insane about her, and only pays atten-
tion to Enid to make her jealous. Matter of fact, the kid's
honestly dippy over Enid. ... Swell girl, Enid Rambler.
You were the lucky guy that found her last night and
brought her back, weren't you?”
"Yes,” Dundee assented curtly, for the attendant's
blithe familiarity with himself and all the patients did not
particularly please the detective.
"Yeah, Archie'd marry her in a minute if she'd have
him. But she's not taking on any drunks, thank you
kindly.”
"Any truth at all in Miss Merrick's story that Koenig
was in love with her?” Dundee asked, knowing the ques-
tion to be a foolish one.
"Hunh! Are you crazy, too?" the attendant gibed. “She
called him Carl, all right, and he humored her by stand-
ing for it. ... Greatest guy that ever lived—Doc
Koenig! ... Wonder what she wants Enid for?”
To Dundee's amazement, the crippled girl readily
agreed to be taken out upon the lawn in a wheel chair.
And as he lifted her slender body from the couch to place
it in the chair he told himself, with a catch at his heart,


188 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
that here was the real thing-beauty incarnate. She was
wearing a sleeveless tennis dress of turquoise crepe de
chine and a crocheted silk beret of the same color enchant-
ingly set off the chestnut curls and vivid blue eyes.
"Hello, Precious! Did Muvver's baby hurt its poor little
foot?" Majorie Merrick greeted the invalid, her voice rich
with real tenderness.
"It did,” Enid Rambler laughed. "And did Muvver
want to see her baby?"
"God! I'll say I did!” the ex-singer breathed fervently,
dramatically. "Listen, Enid " and she briskly wheeled
the chair to a safe distance, bending low and speaking
in an urgent, rapid voice.
"Always cooking up something," Archie Webster
laughed. “Enid's an angel to humor her as she does.”
"Miss Rambler is indeed an angel of beauty and good-
ness,” the elderly banker intoned solemnly. "But may I
again remind you, gentlemen, that Miss Merrick was, in
her day, a shining ornament of the concert stage? It was
my good fortune to hear her sing, back in 1914
""Tell us some other time," Happy Day interrupted
rudely, with another wink at Dundee. "Let's shuffle.
They're coming back now.” .
And again Marjorie Merrick took her place at the
bridge table, her forefinger tapping a warning of silence
to Enid Rambler and Archie Webster alternately.
As the strange, hectic play progressed, Dundee watched
the game, first at one table and then at another. Samuel
Rowan was a clumsy but thoughtful player, his whole
mind apparently upon the game. Mrs. Asbury played a
shrewd, pitiless, aggressive game, brooking no conversa-
tion and rigidly enforcing the rule, “A touched card is a
played card.” She was not popular.
"Grand sweep!” Marjorie Merrick announced with
loud triumph, as she showed down the last four cards in
her hand. Then, with eyes narrowed and voice throarily


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 189
significant, she asked of the table in general: “Has any
one seen Justine? How's she taking it? ... The poor,
poor darling! Of course I forgive her, but she never quit
trying to keep Carl and me apart.”
“Of course we've all seen Dr. Harlow," Archie Web-
ster frowned at her. "She's been as busy as six doctors in
a smallpox epidemic. And so has Cantrell. . . . And
you'd better bite your tongue to keep it from saying any-
thing against the little doctor, Marjorie."
"Go roll your hoop!" the strange woman derided him.
“As if it wasn't plain enough for a blind man to see that
she was simply mad about Carl. To say nothing of Norah
Lacey and Rose Caplan— "
"Are you crazy?" Webster cut in angrily.
"Sure! What do you think I'm here for?-ingrown toe-
nails?” and Marjorie Merrick laughed loudly. "And so
are you, you sweet old alcoholic, you! ... What's the
matter with your attic, Big Boy?”
"Nothing, I hope," Dundee answered, flushing.
"That's what they all say at first,” the woman laughed.
"But you'll get so you think it's funny. . . . How's your
stomach? Strong?"
"Fair to middlin'," he answered. “Why?"
"Because Jack Hubert's going to throw a fit,” she told
him calmly, and pointed toward the croquet field.
Dundee looked, then hastily averted his eyes.
“That's nothing," she assured him, almost gleefully.
"You ought to have seen Clyde Powell when he was
going good. Jack's a true epileptic-can't toss a fit when-
ever he wants to, but Clyde was a D. P. with epileptiform
seizures. Just let him catch sight of anybody he was
afraid of or hated, and-pfft! Perfect artist at fits, Clyde
was, before he got too bad to come out on the lawn. ..
Have you seen Roy White? Our sleeping-sickness exhibit,"
she explained, and distorted her face and crooked her
fingers in a perfect imitation of the paralytic Dundee had


190 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
voiceown three its silver lintleman, anave saved
seen that morning. "Staggers along as if he can hardly
take a step, but one day I saw him run a race with Jack-
and win!”
Dundee did not comment, and the ex-singer began to
shuffle the cards. Suddenly, however, she threw them
down and beckoned Webster imperiously. Reluctantly the
young man followed her, and another mysterious conversa-
tion ensucd, Marjorie talking rapidly and earnestly, her
finger frequently at her lips, and Webster nodding his
head in impatient agreement with everything she said.
To conceal his interest in this by-play Dundee strolled
to the other table. Mrs. Asbury was announcing in a calm
voice, as she reached for pencil and score pad:
"Down three tricks doubled. . . . Sorry, partner. But
every cloud has its silver lining, Mr. Rowan. Just because
you took that set like a gentleman, and didn't try to show
me how a couple of finesses would have saved the game,
I'm going to do you a big favor. . . . That stupid police
captain thinks you murdered Dr. Koenig, doesn't he?"
Samuel Rowan flushed darkly, but did not answer.
"Well, the next time he has you on the grill, you just
tell him that Josephine killed the doctor. She promised
me she would kill him if he didn't let me go away with
her yesterday.”
Before Dundee could speak out of his amazement,
Happy Day twisted about in his chair at the other table,
clapping his hands. “So Josephine did it, eh, Mrs.
Asbury? ... Good old Josephine! What a load off the.
captain's mind that will be!”
Very calmly, and without a word, Mrs. Asbury rose,
overturning her chair. With one sweep of her large right
arm she scattered the cards and upset the bridge table.
Then, very politely, she bowed to her bridge partner and
opponents. Thank you for a very pleasant game," she
said, and strolled off across the lawn.
“Good Lord!” Dundee breathed. “Who is Josephine?"


192 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
Dundee rose hastily, excused himself, and almost ran
across the lawn to where Norah Lacey stood on the steps
of the main building. And as he ran a concerted shout of
laughter-blending the contralto notes of Marjorie Mer-
rick with the sweet voice of Enid Rambler and the deeper
rumbles of the men—followed him mockingly.
He clenched his hands. Had they discovered who he
was and plotted this whole mad afternoon to tantalize and
confuse him? What—whom—could he believe?
"What's happened?” he panted, as he reached the steps.
The nurse's face was drawn and ashen. "It's Dr. May-
field. nurse's face ed?" he pan


CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
"Well, thank God, it wasn't murder!" Captain Strawn
ejaculated, mopping his heavy, flushed face. “We've got
enough trouble on our hands as it is.”
"I'll say we have,” Dundee agreed gloomily. “No need
of an inquest, I suppose?”
The two detectives were temporarily alone in the small
sitting room of Dr. Mayfield's suite on the second floor
of the main building. Beyond, in the bedroom, with the
newly dead body, were Drs. Harlow and Cantrell and
Miss Lacey.
"No doubt of its being a natural death, according to
Cantrell and the little doctor,” Strawn answered. "Just
died in a fit- "
"Senile delirium," Dundee corrected. “Best get it right
when you tell the reporters. . . . Wonder what's keeping
Baldwin? . . . There he is! . . . Come in!”
Roger Baldwin, the business manger, stepped into the
room, followed by Dr. Mayfield's attendant, who had
been sent in search of him.
"Another bad break for the sanitarium,” Baldwin com-
mented sourly. "I hope to God the traditional third blow
falls quickly, so all three will make the same nine days'
wonder."
"You were with Dr. Mayfield when the attack seized
him, I believe?” Dundee asked abruptly.
"I was. Granger here asked me to see him, thinking
perhaps I could pacify him," Baldwin explained. "He
couldn't have made a poorer choice, as it happens. The
old doctor hated the sight of me, and 'fired' me every time
193


194 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
to M. couldn', !, "bunuch atteo Koenie,
he saw me. He believed he was still head of Mayfield
Sanitarium, and that I was only a salaried cashier.”
"How did you happen to call Mr. Baldwin, Granger?"
Dundee asked the attendant.
"Gosh! I didn't know what to do," the attendant pro-
tested plaintively. "The old doctor was in his right mind,
and raising the roof because I wouldn't get Dr. Koenig.
He told me flat I was lying when I said he was out of
town, because he'd seen Dr. Koenig yesterday and knew
he was just back from a trip."
"What did he want of Dr. Koenig?” Strawn cut in.
"I didn't pay much attention,” the attendant evaded
uncomfortably, "but he kept saying something about that
man couldn't stay here another day, that he was a 'menace
to Mayfield-
"Meaning Mr. Baldwin?” Dundee asked sharply.
"No, sir. It sounded like he meant-like he was refer-
ring to Dr. Koenig!” the attendant blurted miserably.
"I got the same impression,” Baldwin said drily. "Not
that it means a damned thing. The old doctor was always
turning against one of us and ordering us off the
place-
"Just what happened when you came up?" Dundee
interrupted
"Granger stayed in this room and I went into the bed-
room,” Baldwin answered. “I knew it was unwise for me
to go, but Granger was afraid to handle the situation
alone, and everyone else-Dr. Harlow, Dr. Cantrell and
Miss Lacey-was busy with patients. ... The whole
place is at sixes and sevens, now that the patients know
about the murder
"And Mr. Baldwin is one of the bosses here," Granger
justified himself.
"I found Dr. Mayfield in bed,” Baldwin went on. "He
recognized me and ordered me to get out. Said he wanted
Koenig and no one else. I tried to soothe him—told him


ONE DROP OF BLOOD
195
Koenig was away, but he told me I was lying. Said I was
trying to shield Koenig, but that he was still head of this
institution, and he'd see that 'that man' didn't stay here
another day. But before he finished the sentence the
attack came on. I called Granger and then hurried off to
find Cantrell or Dr. Harlow. Both were with him when
he died about ten minutes after the attack started. ...
I've been getting off a cable to his daughter, Madame
Arnaud, in Paris."
"Do you think she will come?"
"I doubt it. On her last visit she made all arrangements
for his funeral, his death having been expected for more
than a year.”
"Why did Dr. Mayfield hate you, Baldwin?" Strawn
asked abruptly.
The business manager shrugged, and grinned wryly.
"He got an idea that I was extravagant, wasting the insti-
tution's funds. My colleagues accuse me of erring on the
other side.”
An hour later Dundee was concluding a detailed recital
of his own day to Captain Strawn. The two men sat
facing each other at the murdered psychiatrist's desk.
"By the way, Captain, when you questioned Hepple and
Mrs. Asbury this morning, were you satisfied with their
alibis?” Dundee asked, when he had finished his account
of the mad bridge games on the lawn.
"The Asbury dame said a friend of hers, name of
Josephine, sat in the seat where the old boy, Hepple,
swears he was sitting,” Strawn grinned.
"Just as I expected,” Dundee groaned. "I'll be crazy
myself before this case is finished. . . . Come in!"
It was Dr. Harlow. Spectacles could not hide the violet
shadows beneath the gray-green eyes. But the little doctor
scorned to droop with fatigue or to abate one whit her
professional briskness.
Asbeat in ing.,, Durished: Guld out the one


ONE DROP OF BLOOD
197
"Then you and Miss Lacey were with the child all
evening?"
The girl doctor hesitated, then her eyes met his bravely.
"I can't lie again. It would be no use. ... Norah asked
me to stay with Sonny while she went out on an errand.”
"When did she leave and how long was she gone?”
"She left about eight-thirty and returned at ten minutes
to ten. Sonny was asleep, had been asleep for nearly an
hour, and I was waiting outside the house in my car,
anxious to be back here. The house is set almost flush
with the sidewalk and the nursery is a front room, so I
should have heard him if the child had cried out. As
Norah drove up, I drove off, waiting only to assure her
that Sonny was better. I drove home very fast, arriving
at ten o'clock, as I said last night.”
"Do you know where Miss Lacey was during all that
time?"
"I do not,” she answered with flat finality, then turned,
with obvious relief, as Maizie Horne appeared in the
doorway from the reception room. "What is it, Maizie?”
"A telegram for you,” the secretary said, and handed
over the yellow envelope.
The little doctor tore it open and read, then she
frowned. “They're in an awful hurry," she said, with the
first note of querulous complaint Dundee had heard in
her lovely voice. "It's from the State Hospital, asking me
to rush them a résumé of Clyde Powell's case history. ...
Will you get his history for me, Maizie? I suppose I'll
have to attend to it this afternoon.”
“Dr. Koenig had a special delivery letter from Dr.
Wiggin the first thing yesterday morning, asking for
Clyde's history," the secretary explained in a subdued
voice as she tiptoed across the room to the file cabinet.
"Then Dr. Koenig must have attended to it, and his
letter simply hasn't reached them yet,” Dr. Harlow said.
"No, doctor. He had so many interruptions yesterday


198 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
that he hadn't got to it by five o'clock," the secretary
excused her dead employer. "He told me to get the history
from the file for him, and I did. I clipped Dr. Wiggin's
letter to the folder, so's Dr. Koenig could see just what
Dr. Wiggin wanted—Why, it isn't here!" the girl broke
off to exclaim.
"Missing?” Dundee sprang to his feet.
"It's not in the files," the girl quavered, "but I suppose
Dr. Carl hadn't finished with it when he—when he
was "
"Have you sorted out those letters that were scattered
over the floor?” Dundee slashed across the girl's hysteria
sharply.
"Yes, sir. I smoothed them out and filed those that
didn't require an answer,
"Was Dr. Wiggin's letter among them?"
"No, sir.”
"And did you find any letter from Dr. Koenig to
Dr. Wiggin?”
"No, sir.”
"It seems quite clear, Mr. Dundee," Dr. Harlow inter-
rupted, "that whoever destroyed the other two case his-
tories that are missing tore up Clyde Powell's too.”
"Sounds reasonable,” Strawn commented. "Convenient
to the murderer's hand it must have been, right out here
on the doctor's desk. Just more dust in our eyes.”
"I've had a hunch all along that the one case history
that was a menace to the murderer's safety was not
torn up, but completely destroyed later,” Dundee told
them, his eyes burning with new hope. "What we've got
to find out is—which history that was!"
"How?” Strawn demanded, but Dundee, without paus-
ing to excuse himself, dashed out of the office and across
the lawn to Sunflower Court.
Within five minutes he was back, carrying the glass tray
the doctof a hunch ad the mured later, that we've gº


ONE DROP OF BLOOD
199
into which he had piled the precious scraps gathered from
the office floor.
"I need help,” he announced briskly. "Everybody rally
'round! First, I want to verify my suspicion that only two
case histories have been torn up. Begin by sorting the
scraps-manila folder scraps in one pile, white-paper
scraps in another.”
He dumped the tray of paper fragments upon the rug,
and a moment later four pairs of hands were swiftly busy
at the task. When the two piles were complete, Dundee
rose from his knees and, his voice crisp with excitement,
asked of Dr. Harlow:
"Have you a scales—very delicate and accurate?"
The girl doctor frowned thoughtfully, then nodded.
"Gram scales, used in the diet kitchen. i'll get them.”
She returned very quickly, carrying a pair of white-
enamel scales, whose pointer was set at zero.
"Good!” Dundee cried, and, after placing a light wicker
letter-tray upon the flat top of the scales, he transferred
the small pile of cream-colored manila scraps from the
floor to the tray.
"Hocus pocus!” Strawn growled, as Dundee made a
note of the weight of the scraps in grams.
"Yeah?” Dundee grinned. "Now, Miss Horne, if
you'll be good enough to bring me three manila folders—
the exact kind you use for case histories "
The girl obeyed, wonderingly. From the wicker tray
Dundee removed the scraps, replacing them with the three
new folders.
"See that?” he cried, pointing to the indicator on the
face of the scales. "Three untorn folders weigh exactly
one third more than these scraps!”
"Proving?" Strawn asked.
Dundee looked at his old chief in amazement. “Prov-
ing, Captain, that, while three case histories are missing


200 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
st a single plaustilat least its folderup: The third
from this office, only two have been torn up. The third
is completely missing—or at least its folder is, and if you
can suggest a single plausible reason why the folder alone
should have been removed by the murderer, and the case
history torn up-
"I getcha," Strawn conceded. "But looks like we're no
forrader "
"Down on our knees again!" Dundee cried happily.
“What we're looking for now are scraps of paper bearing
the typewritten names of Samuel Rowan, Archibald Web-
ster, and Clyde Powell—the whole names or any recog-
nizable part of those names.”
It was Maizie Horne who made the first discovery, as
her nimble fingers picked up and rejected scraps from the
sizable heap.
"Here's a scrap that has ‘owa' on it!" she exulted. "And
I can't think of any word in common use that has those
three letters together-except Iowa.”
"Neither can 1,” Dundee assured her approvingly.
"Looks as if Sam Rowan's in the clear, doesn't it? But
let's try to find more corroboration.”
Dr. Harlow announced the next find. "Here's the top
left-hand corner of page two of Archie's history," she
said quietly. "Look!” and she exhibited a scrap that
read: # 2—Webs-
"That's right!" Maizie Horne clapped her hands. “We
always put the last name of the patient after the number
of each page of his history. I knew it wasn't Archie-
"And here's additional proof that Rowan's history was
torn up,” Dundee interrupted. “Look, Captain!” and he
showed a fragment bearing the letters, "amu.” “It's a
safe bet that the complete word was Samuel. . . . Well?”
Captain Strawn sat back on his haunches, his heavy
face sadly puzzled. “That leaves only the Powell boy's
history, Bonnie,” he deduced worriedly. “Looks like
you've run into a blind alley, boy."


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 201
"Clyde Powell,” Dundee repeated, frowning.
"Clyde Powell?” Dr. Harlow echoed incredulously.
"Then the captain's right, Mr. Dundee. We've wasted
our time. Clyde was transferred to the State Hospital on
Monday, before Dr. Koenig returned. He left here with
a guard and a nurse.”
"Do you know that he actually arrived at the State Hos-
pital, that he did not escape en route?” Dundee asked
sharply.
"If anything had happened, I am sure we should have
been notified,” Dr. Harlow assured him.
The young detective whirled upon Maizie Horne. "Did
Dr. Wiggin's letter to Dr. Koenig, received yesterday
morning, actually state that the patient had arrived?"
The girl's baby-blue eyes narrowed in concentration.
"I can just see the letter, as if I were looking at it now,"
she answered proudly. "It began, 'Relative to the patient,
Clyde Powell, transferred to this institution on Monday
from your private sanitarium—' That proves he really
got there, doesn't it?".
"You say you can 'see the letter,” Dundee countered
eagerly. "Anything distinctive about it—the paper, I
mean?"
"Why, yes, there was," the secretary answered readily.
"It was a bright canary yellow, and both the printing and
the typing were in green ink!"
"That clinches it!" Dundee struck a fist into a palm.
"You say no such letter was found among the crumpled
correspondence found on the foor. Well, there's been
no such letter torn up, along with the case histories! You
can see for yourselves that there are no yellow scraps in
the whole lot! Just to make sure, however, that the letter
is actually missing, I want you, Miss Horne, to search the
correspondence fles and your own desk, while I go
through Dr. Koenig's desk from top to bottom.”
Ten minutes later there was no blinking the fact that
no sugee for yoursest to make sur Miss Horne, while I go


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 203
be long—and at the minimum rate, with no charges for
attendants. Carl was going to pay the attendants out of his
own pocket. And that's the reason poor old Mr. Powell
had tears in his eyes when he left here yesterday! He had
refused the charity—too proud!—but he was touched by
Dr. Carl's offer."
Dundee's mind had registered the unconscious slip
the one time she had referred to the dead man by his first
name without a prefix, but there was no indication of the
fact in his deferential manner as he asked her:
“Dr. Harlow, did Dr. Koenig ever say anything to you
about Clyde Powell's reminding him of someone?”
"Why, of course not!"
"Perhaps I'd better put it this way: did Dr. Koenig ever
wonder aloud to you 'where he'd seen those eyes before?"
" 'Those eyes'?" the girl doctor repeated blankly. "Cer-
tainly not!"
"I getcha, boy!” Captain Strawn exulted, slapping his
thigh. “I knew Mrs. Cantrell's story was the biggest step
forward we've made yet. Clear as day, ain't it? The doc-
tor's talking along to the little lady on the phone. His
eyes light on Powell's case history, lying open on his desk.
Suddenly something clicks in his brain. Funny how the
good old memory works, ain't it? . . . Well, he remem-
bers where he has seen Clyde Powell before-
"He'd seen him here almost daily for five years,” Dr.
Harlow cut in acidly. "Clyde was here when Dr. Koenig
took charge.”
"That makes no never-mind,” Strawn assured her.
"He'd been puzzled for five years as to where he'd seen
Clyde Powelſ before, and suddenly he remembers. And
he's horror-stricken. That's the very word Mrs. Cantrell
used to express the way his voice sounded, ain't it,
Bonnie?”
“Correct,” Dundee agreed.
"All right, then!” Strawn went on vigorously. "It's


204
ONE DROP OF BLOOD
pretty easy to dope out what happened. The doctor
remembers where he'd seen this Clyde Powell before
and it was in a courtroom! A boy criminal on trial for
some pretty nasty offense—criminal assault or murder.
Under some other name, of course. All right! The boy
has either been acquitted or has escaped from prison.
But Koenig knows that he's dangerousought to be in
jail, or certainly in the asylum for the criminally
insane- "
"And for seven years he was a docile, obedient, harm-
less patient in this institution,” Dr. Harlow reminded
him sternly.
"But the Big Doctor knows damned well there ain't
no telling when he'll bust out, and there'll be hell to
pay,” Strawn retorted. "Well, then! He's got to act and
act quick. He telephones his lawyer for advice. The
lawyer ain't at home. Then the doctor thinks it only fair
to warn the Powell family what he's on to and up to. So
he telephones Powell to come down for an interview.
Old Powell comes, realizes his son is doomed to spend
the rest of his days in the asylum for the criminally
insane, disgracing not only himself but his family, or that
he'll be hauled back to the prison he escaped from.
So ” and Strawn shrugged his massive shoulders.
"It fits, all right,” Dundee assented, but without joy.
A nasty job, this of his "But before we get out a
warrant for Powell senior's arrest, I think we'd better get
him and his wife here for questioning.”
“Oh, I'm sure you're wrong!” Dr. Harlow wailed,
wringing her hands in the first abandonment to distress
that she had shown.
"How can we reach Mr. Powell by telephone, doctor?"
he asked gently. "I'm going to give him a chance to come
without being brought in.'
"The Powells own a grocery store on Hubbard Street,
he warn the per home ones his


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 207
the telephone. That's why he did not see and possibly
did not hear the approach of his murderer. Which
broadens the scope of our investigation, I admit, since it
leaves room for doubt that the murderer was someone
privileged to enter this office without knocking. While
the doctor is still absorbed in his telephone conversation,
the murderer secures the bronze statue and crashes it down
upon his head. The doctor is facing the desk, although
the base of the telephone is on the typewriter table to his
right. As the doctor's head is crashed down, the combi-
nation receiver and transmitter is pinned between the
head and the desk. As the coroner and Dr. Cantrell
assured us, the blow caused a slight hemorrhage from the
ear. The blood oozed into the receiver, which must have
stayed in that position for several minutes, while the mur-
derer was engaged in faking his stage-setting and tearing
up case histories "
"Just a minute,” Strawn interrupted. “Why didn't the
person the doctor was talking to hear the sound of the
blow, and make a fuss when the conversation was cut
short?”
"I believe that the murderer pressed down on this
bar," Dundee answered, pointing to the telephone base
on the typewriter table, "before the blow was struck. It
was the work of a second, and his action could not be
observed by the doctor, whose back was turned. Dr.
Koenig must have thought he was accidentally discon-
nected, if he heard the resulting buzz above the sound of
his own voice, but before he could reach for the dial, he
was struck down.”
"O. K.!” Strawn grunted.
"Therefore," Dundee continued, "the murderer was
safe in leaving the instrument pressed against the doctor's
ear and mouth until he had time to remove it—or he
thought he was safe to do so. He could not reckon with
that one betraying drop of blood. At his leisure, he raised


208 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
Flotter, and is the deskt. Hefore he kne whought been
the head and removed the instrument, swabbing out the
receiver, which, to his horror, dripped blood upon the
blotter, and, as he was carrying it back to its base, upon
the corner of the desk. It was natural for the murderer
to invert the instrument, before he knew there was blood
in the receiver. He did his best. He thought he wiped
away all traces of the fact that the doctor had been killed
while he was telephoning. Which brings us to the most
significant deduction yet. It seems to me that it was
vitally important to the murderer that no one ever know
the truth—that the doctor was telephoning at the very
moment he was killed. ... Why?"
"Because the telephone conversation concerned the mur-
derer, I presume,” Dr. Harlow answered, in a dazed voice.
"Exactly!” Dundee cried eagerly.
"He was telephoning the Powells,” Strawn cut in, "and
spilling the beans about this Clyde-to the mother, prob-
ably. And in walks old man Powell. He's reconsidered
his refusal to let Koenig get the boy back, and has come
to tell the doctor so. But the first thing he hears when
he steps into the office is what Koenig is saying to Mrs.
Powell about having the boy turned over to the authorities.
The old man goes berserk and kills the doctor."
"Please!” Dr. Harlow interrupted, her face pale and
drawn with distress. “I'm sure Mr. Dundee is right about
the telephone, but I'm absolutely positive you are wrong,
Captain, about Clyde Powell.”
"It is his case history that is missing, the letter concern-
ing him that is also missing—not torn up,” Dundee
reminded her, to Strawn's obvious satisfaction. "Are
you familiar with Clyde Powell's case history, doctor?”
"In a general way only,” she admitted. ""I've read it,
and have made additions to it, but I have not gone over it
carefully for years. The poor boy's condition was not
interesting, psychiatrically. It changed in expected ways,
growing steadily worse. He is a dementia præcox, with


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 209
epileptiform seizures. That is, he is not a true epileptic,
but is subject to attacks which resemble epilepsy. For
more than a year he has been increasingly helpless. His
mind is hopelessly gone."
"Any distinguishing or unusual aspects of his case?”!
Dundee asked.
"No," she answered. "Like many cases of dementia
præcox, he had ideas of persecution, delusions of grandeur,
and occasional hallucinations. States of depression and of
excitement alternated, sometimes accompanied by epilepti-
form seizures."
"How long had he been ill?"
"About eleven years, I believe. He came to us from
a private sanitarium near Los Angeles, seven years ago
two years before Dr. Koenig and I came to Mayfield.”
"Do you remember anything in his case history that
would account for its being destroyed by his father or
anyone else?”
"Nothing whatever!" she answered emphatically.
"Do you remember whether there was a record of
Clyde's having been involved in any serious trouble before
he was committed to a sanitarium?”
"There was positively nothing of the sort! He was con-
sidered entirely harmless, both because of his past history
and because of his behavior here."
"I see,” Dundee said slowly.
"Well, I don't see, and I'm going to get the Powells
here in short order,” Strawn declared in no uncertain
tones. “Give me that phone!"
"I think it would be wiser if no one else touched this
instrument until Dr. Price has had a chance to make an
analysis," Dundee suggested. "I'm positive it's blood,
but I want official confirmation.”
"O. K. Guess it's better to send one of the boys after
the Powells, anyway," Strawn agreed, and strode out of
the room.
"I think it me that phone”, declared in no


210 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
“May I see Miss Lacey, please?” Dundee asked of Dr.
Harlow, when the older detective was gone.
"Will you call her, please, Maizie?” Dr. Harlow asked
wearily. "Then I'll join you in the reception room.
There's work to be done.”
When the white-faced head nurse arrived, Dundee was
grateful for the little doctor's tact which had made it pos-
sible for him to conduct the interview privately.
“Please sit down, Miss Lacey," he directed gently.
"You've seen the morning paper? You know that Dr.
Koenig's will, unless he has changed it without Dr. Can-
trell's knowledge, leaves one-half of his estate to you and
one-half to Dr. Harlow?"
"Yes,” she quavered, and a thin, work-wom hand
strayed nervously to her silver-threaded black hair. “I was
dumfounded— ”
"Then you know of no reason why Dr. Koenig should
have been so generous to you?”
"No. I couldn't believe my eyes ” she faltered, but
those eyes did not meet the detective's.
"Did it not occur to you, Miss Lacey, that Dr. Koenig
wanted to help you provide for-Sonny?” Dundee asked,
and again he hated his job.
"Sonny?” she repeated, in a voice that was scarcely more
than a gasp for breath.
"He's a remarkably handsome little boy,” Dundee
assured her sincerely.' "Whose child is he?” he added
with startling abruptness.
Strength came back to her. "He's mine!” she cried pas-
sionately. “That's all you need know! He's mine!"
"Did you-give birth to him, Miss Lacey?"
She collapsed again, and Dundee was afraid she was
going to faint. "I've said he's mine. That's enough. You
can think what you like.”
"Then I'm afraid I'll have to think you are his 'natural
mother,” Dundee said gently. "Wouldn't it be much


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 211
choir
wiser and simpler for you to tell me the whole truth
about the child?"
“I'd rather die!” she assured him with terrible intensity.
"Again you force me to draw my own conclusions,
Dundee told her soberly. “My guess is not a pleasant one,
but-here it is. Sonny's father is a man you love more
than you love yourself—a man you would die to protect
from scandal. Either that, or”—and he shrugged,—"to
save yourself now you must protect him!”
"What on earth do you mean?" she cried starting up
from her chair.
"What is Sonny's name, Miss Lacey?” he countered.
"His name is Lacey!" she cried. “I told you he's mine!"
"What is his first name, Miss Lacey?” he insisted.
Her knees were shaking as she sank back into her
chair. "I suppose you'd dig it up somehow,” she accused
him bitterly, so I may as well tell you. ... I named
Sonny after—after Dr. Koenig. His name is Carl.”
"I see. . . . Carl-Lacey. And you wanted him to
have the right to be called-Carl Koenig, Jr.?"
She sprang to her feet again, her gray eyes blazing wide.
"No, no! That's a lie—a terrible, vicious lie!"
"If it is not true that Dr. Koenig was little Carl's
father," Dundee persisted quietly, "will you tell me who
the father is?"
"Never! I've told you I'd rather die!"
"I'm sorry. . . . Miss Lacey, last night you were so wor-
ried over Sonny's illness that you called Dr. Harlow,
begged her to come to see him "
"So she told you, did she?" the nurse interrupted bit-
terly. "I thought I could trust her-of all women!”
Her emphasis and bitterness surprised the detective.
"She told only after I'd learned the truth from a visit to
the Satterlees,” he assured her. "She obeyed your sum-
mons. She went to see Sonny. And almost as soon as she
reached the Satterlee house you left-on an errand. What


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 213
Had Koenig been so oblivious to scandal? Was not that
the explanation of the divided estate? If two women were
named in his will, to share equally—two respected and
capable colleagues—would not the possibility of scandal
be reduced to a minimum? But somehow the deduction
did not cheer Dundee. He was young enough to be still
something of a hero worshiper, and his ideal of Dr.
Koenig, whose stature had increased hourly since his mur-
der, was sadly tarnished. ...
He was still sunk in gloom, still alone, when, ten min-
utes later, Captain Strawn burst into the room, his heavy
face red with excitement.
“Looks like it's all over, boy! Here's a confession.
After all this hullaballoo, it was a patient all the time!"
"A patient?” Dundee grinned. “Didn't Dr. Harlow
warn us to expect a raft of confessions from upset
patients?”
"But this one's no nut," Strawn protested. “The little
doctor swears she's legally as sane as you or me—just
flighty."
"All right! I bite! Who killed Carl Koenig?” Dundee
laughed.
Strawn scowled at his levity, but he shouted the answer
triumphantly:
"Marjorie Merrick!"


216 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
"You're insulting, sir!” she stormed. “In good faith,
and with a heart heavy-laden with grief and remorse, I
come to you "
"All right, all right! Play out the comedy and get it
over with?” Strawn interrupted helplessly. “But speed it
up, lady! I'm a busy man."
"Comedy!” the woman cried bitterly, a black lace hand-
kerchief dabbing at her mascaraed eyes. "I come to you
with the terrible truth of how Carl Koenig was murdered
by poor, irresponsible Archie Webster— ".
"Websterpy Strawn shouted. “Say, begin all over again
and tell your story in plain American, without gestures
if you please!"
"I find that I must sit after all,” the woman gasped
weakly, and sank into the chair Strawn had first offered. "I
shall try to be brief,” she promised, with forlorn dignity.
"Archie Webster loves me madly. That is the secret of his
frequent returns to Mayfield. Separated from me, he
drinks himself nearly to death, but behind his debauches
is the definite plan that they shall land him here again,
where he can be with me!"
"Yeah?” Strawn grinned wryly. "I've heard it hinted
around that it's the Rambler girl he's stuck on.”
"Ah, you know so little of the subtleties of love!" she
assured him tragically. "To make me jealous, Archie pre-
tends to be interested in Enid—and a dear, sweet child she
is, although God has not seen fit to curse her with the
power over men which "
"Sure! I getcha,” Strawn interrupted rudely. "Get along
with this yarn of yours.”
"'Yarn'!” she repeated, more in sorrow than anger;
then she shrugged. "Very well! . . . Last night I dropped
in on Enid and asked her to forget her fear of crowds and
strangers—to go to the movies with me. She consented at
last, and, in a burst of affection for me, presented me with
a sheaf of lovely roses which, she said, some unknown ad-


218 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
full well that Archie Webster would follow, would listen,
would—Oh, God! No! I did not dream that he would kill
for my sake-
"What time did you come to this office last night?"
Strawn cut in, thoroughly interested at last.
"Let me think! . . . Ah, my poor head!” She closed
the blue-shadowed eyes and suffered visibly. "It was just
after the comedy ended, and just before the feature pic-
ture, ‘Manslaughter,' came on. About ten minutes to nine,
I should say
"Ah!" Strawn grunted the syllable that was so often
breathed by his witness, and behind the door Dundee
echoed it with startled amazement. So it was this voice
that Roland Morse had heard pleading hysterically with
the doctor last night! Good-bye to his own theory that it
was Norah Lacey who, desperate with anxiety for her
illegitimate child, had come to plead with Koenig. ...
"What was Koenig doing? Was he alone?” Strawn
asked.
"Alone, yes," the vibrant voice assured him somberly.
"And working as always. I shall never forget how swiftly
his thin, brown fingers flew over the typewriter keys
"Did you see what he was writing?”
"He was working on Sam Rowan's case history,” she
told him, more matter-of-factly. "I saw Rowan's name at
the top of the paper in his machine. ... Well, I gave
him the roses, then found a vase and filled it with water.
As I set the vase of roses before him I heard footsteps-
someone entering the reception room. I knew it was
Archie, come to spy upon us. Swift as a bird, I sprang to
the door leading into the hall and closed it. Carl told me
to open it, but I ignored him. For Archie's benefit I be-
gan to babble hysterically to Carl about my great love for
him and his love for me. He, the poor dear”- and she
broke off to laugh richly— "looked as if he thought I'd
gone crazy!”


ONE DROP OF BLOOD
219
"I can just imagine!” Strawn assured her.
"Suddenly I forgot I was playing a rôle. It became real
to me. The man's restraint was remarkable-simply in-
credible! Instead of taking the riches that were offered
him, he forced himself to spurn my love. And no man had
ever looked at me like that before. . . . It did something
strange to me, drove me to saying and doing terrible
things that I would never have dreamed of doing if he
had behaved differently — ”
"You accused him of betraying you, of making him love
you?" Strawn suggested.
"Ah!” she breathed. “So you knew all the time! I told
you I felt the net closing in upon me—and poor Archie!
... As if I were indeed a woman scorned, a woman be-
trayed, I pleaded with him for his love, charged him, as
you've said, with having made me love him, only to spurn
me. He tried to soothe me. Once his love broke through,
the love professional ethics could not let him show to a
patient. He called me his ‘darling girl.' . .. Ah! I'll
never forget that he died loving me!"
"Yeah?”
"But Archie, listening to my wild charges, could not
know the truth,” she went on mournfully, "that I was only
playing an accursed rôle in a fiendish drama of my own
writing! He listened, thought the woman he adored had
been foully betrayed. ... Of course he killed him," she
bedded simpStrawn, he deed?"ied indignaone. 11e
"Sure!" Strawn agreed. "Guess you hung around and
watched him do the deed?”
"Certainly not!” she denied indignantly. "Not then did
I realize what a terrible thing I had done. I left Carl, and
before I had reached the front porch I was laughing. ...
I shall never laugh again!"
"Did you see Webster?” Strawn asked heartlessly.
"No! - How could I? He was—in here! I wandered out
onto the lawn, waiting for him to join me and protest his


220 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
undying love and his fierce jealousy. . . . He did not
come. After some minutes I realized that I had been cry-
ing and that my makeup I use only a bit of rice powder
and the merest brushing of rouge, but—" and she
shrugged her thin shoulders. "I did not want the effect of
a moonlight reconciliation to be spoiled by a tear-streaked
face. I went to my room in Aster Cottage, renewed my
makeup, changed my frock, wandered about the lawn
again, and finally returned to the O. T. Shop, my heart
heavy with forebodings. My worst fears were justified.
Archie was not there!"!
"What time did you go back to the shop?" Strawn
prodded.
"About half-past nine. I came in right in the middle of
‘Manslaughter. I left and returned by the back door of
the shop."
"Was Miss Rambler still there when you got back?”
"No. The horrid little fat man, Archie and Enid were
all gone. And there I sat, heavy-hearted but still not
knowing "
"Have you talked with Webster today?" asked Strawn,
remembering Dundee's account of Marjorie Merrick's
mysterious behavior on the lawn that afternoon.
"Yes!” she cried. “And I don't believe the poor boy
remembers one thing that happened last night! I warned
him not to breathe a word, and he seemed not to know
what I was talking about. How could he remember? He
was drunk—had gulped down that whole pint of whisky
the fat man gave him, to screw up his courage to avenge
my betrayal—as he thought!”
"I see,” Strawn commented drily.
"Tell me!” she pleaded, clasping her knuckly, thin
hands. “Ease the pain in my heart! Tell me that you, too,
believe he cannot be held responsible!”
"I don't think Archie will ever be hanged for this mur.


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 221
der,” Strawn assured her, with a grin he could not
suppress.
Clyde Powell's parents, to receive whom Strawn sum-
marily dismissed the ex-singer and called in Dundee, were
a striking contrast to Marjorie Merrick. They routed
melodrama from the dead doctor's office and quietly
brought real drama into it. One of those stark tragedies
which love to happen to people like the Powells. ....
Because of the possibility—now looming large—that
this man was the murderer, Dundee gave his attention
first to John C. Powell, grocer. A small-boned, thin old
man, who peered diffidently out of pale gray eyes through
steel-rimmed spectacles. A man whose cadaverous face
seemed to Dundee to be the living graveyard of hope and
ambition and interest in life. But there was something in
it that was not dead—a sort of dogged tenacity, or perhaps
it was that pride which had made him refuse charity for
his mindless son. Like an ancient and docile child he
looked frequently toward his wife-obviously the man of
the family. A big, soft-fleshed but iron-nerved woman,
whose brown eyes were stern and uncompromising toward
long-endured sorrow. ...
Captain Strawn bridged over the strain of the meeting
with two or three routine questions, then, with an almost
imperceptible gesture, delivered the couple into Dundee's
hands.
"You saw Dr. Koenig yesterday, I believe, Mr. Powell,”
he began gravely.
"Yes, sir. A great and good man—the doctor. His
death is a personal sorrow to the wife and me,” Powell
answered, in his meek, apologetic voice.
"What was the nature of your interview with the
doctor?”
"They had telephoned me to come for a suitcase full of


222 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
odds and ends that Clyde had left behind when he was
transferred Monday to the—the State Hospital,” the old
man explained, with difficulty. "I got the suitcase and
thought I'd like to thank the doctor for all his kindness to
our poor boy. The doctor seemed to feel pretty bad over
Clyde's transfer—said if he'd been here he'd not have let
them take him away. But I explained as how the wife and
I couldn't afford the added cost of day and night at-
tendants, and that since the poor boy wouldn't realize
much now—" His voice broke and he coughed to hide
the shame of his weakness. "Well, the doctor said that,
with our permission, he'd try to get Clyde back, and take
care of him for the rest of his life, at a nominal cost to
the wife and me. I telephoned Susie from the doctor's
office "
"And I said no!” the woman who was incongruously
named Susie interrupted emphatically. “Me and John ain't
taking charity—not as long as I've got breath to say no.
We pay our taxes regular, and we've got a right to take
what the State can do for our boy, but charity-no!"
"I understand," Dundee assured her sympathetically.
"How long has Clyde been ill, Mrs. Powell?”
"Eleven years come Christmas," she answered promptly.
"He was terrible bright in school, was going to be valedic-
torian of his class when he graduated in June. Just eight-
een he was then.”
"How did the illness start?”
"Well,” the woman hesitated, “he got all wrapped up
in religion suddenly, and we all thought it was kinda nice
-him wanting to be a preacher and all. Read his Bible
all night long many's the night, but on Christmas Day he
marched up to the pulpit in church and began to preach
something awful-wildlike, and wanting to fight the reg-
ular preacher because he wouldn't come out flat-footed
against kissing and dancing. Couldn't bear the sight of a
girl, hardly,” she added, and sighed heavily.
all night lopeo the piltlike, and he to come


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 223
"Did he create a very great disturbance then?" Dundee
asked.
"It was terrible embarrassing, but the deacons—the dea-
cons overpowered him, and nothing bad happened. Our
pastor advised us to put him in the insane asylum then,
but we was too proud. We was living in California then
and was doing well with our own store out in Glendale. So
we put our poor boy in a private sanitarium near Los An-
geles—the Good Hope it was called.”
"Before you put him in the sanitarium there did he get
into any serious trouble?” Dundee persisted.
"Oh, no!” old Mr. Powell assured him earnestly. "We
didn't let him out of our sight from Christmas Day till
we put him in the sanitarium.”
"And while he was at Good Hope?"
"A good biddable patient he was there, except when he
got to arguing about religion. He always wanted to fight
then, and he got what the doctors call a persecution com-
plex, but of course they watched him too careful for him
to hurt anybody," the old man confessed sadly. "Dr. Sand-
lin used to say the boy had a chance to get well- "
"Sandlin?" Dundee interrupted sharply.
"Yes, sir. A young doctor that worked there,” Powell
explained. "He was in charge of the mental cases. There
wasn't many of 'em; it was a general hospital.”
"Then in 1924 we moved to Hamilton,” Mrs. Powell
took up the story, oblivious to the fact that Dundee was
only half listening. “My oldest daughter, Phronsie, mar-
ried a Hamilton man and she begged us to come here. So
we transferred Clyde to Mayfield and opened up a little
store here."
Dundee forcibly pulled himself out of a riot of specula-
tions, induced by the name of Sandlin. “Circumstances
have arisen, Mr. Powell,” he said courteously, "which
makes it necessary for us to check up on the movements
last evening of every person who came in contact with


224 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
WAMEHAMILA
Dr. Koenig yesterday. A matter of routine, you under-
stand.”
"You want our alibis, don't you?" Mrs. Powell de-
manded, in her downright manner. "I'm glad to see the
police are on the job. You don't know us from Adam. Far
as you know, me or my husband might have had a grudge
against the doctor. Of course we didn't, but you can't
know that. . . . Well, Papa and me was in the store all
day, except when he come here to see the doctor. I wait on
trade, right alongside my husband. After supper my
youngest daughter, Belle, was having a little bridge party
in our rooms up over the store. I don't play bridge-I
used to be quite a shark at 'Forty-two' and 'Five Hun-
dred,' but bridge—anyway, I was in and out of the parlor
all evening, watching the game and scolding Belle for
grouching over bad cards, and fixing a little snack for the
party. Downstairs in the store, Papa was fixing up his
books—we do a credit business—and writing up bills for
our customers. Our youngest boy, Johnny-he's in third-
year high—was helping his Papa from seven o'clock till
ten o'clock, when both of 'em come upstairs for the re-
freshments. Of course there was customers in and out of
the store all evening,” she added.
"Thank you, Mrs. Powell,” Dundee said, with real ad-
miration. "I wish all witnesses had your gift for telling'a
straightforward story without resentment.”
"You've got your work to do, and I'm not blaming you
for doing it, though it's a work I wouldn't choose myself,"
Mrs. Powell answered frankly.
"It has one advantage,” Dundee smiled. "I do get to
meet a lot of nice people," and he bowed. "Now, Mr.
Powell, one other question: at just what time did
Dr. Koenig telephone you last?"
"Telephone me?" Powell echoed. “There's a mistake
somewhere. The doctor didn't telephone me or the wife
last night at all, neither did we phone him.”
When they had gone, Strawn turned toward Dundee
she ad as cus
204 Mrs.
Stralation


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 225
and shrugged hopelessly. “So that's that! . . . Got it all
down, Brede? .:. A fat lot of good it'll do. Ain't a
doubt in my mind that their alibis will check. . . . An-
other blind alley, Bonnie boy. I feel like I was lost in a
Mirror Maze. ... What did you think of that Merrick
scream's yarn?”
"She was telling the truth, according to her lights,"
Dundee answered, with a reminiscent twinkle. “Naturally
it's all the bunk about Dr. Koenig's being ‘madly, hope-
lessly in love with her and the same holds true of Archie
Webster. I'll lay you a wager it was Archie who sent the
roses to Enid Rambler and that she gave some of them to
Dr. Harlow as well as to Marjorie Merrick.”
"That Rambler baby again!” Strawn caught him up dis-
gustedly. "Whichever way we turn we get back to her,
sooner or later. If your hunch is right, Bonnie, and that
girl knows who killed the doctor, I'm ready to put the
screws on her— ".
"Not while she's a patient in this sanitarium!" a lovely
voice with a hard edge to it cried from the doorway into
the reception room.
"Yeah, Dr. Harlow?" Strawn turned upon her almost
savagely. “There's such a thing as conspiring to obstruct
justice-
"Then book me on that charge now!" the little doctor
challenged defiantly. "For I warn you that if you resort
to third-degree methods with Enid Rambler, whom I con-
sider to be in a precarious state nervously, I'll put her in
'Ten,' and nothing short of a troop of militia will get her
out of her locked room!"
"Be reasonable, Doctor!" Strawn pleaded, with sudden
humility. “The girl's mixed up in this like a fly on fly-
paper. Not only does she know something about the mur-
der she ain't telling, but she's hiding something pretty
smelly in her own past— "
"Bosh!" the girl doctor interrupted inelegantly. "Enid
Rambler is as clean and decent and sweet as-as


226
ONE DROP OF BLOOD
fully. Support herself, and self to him
fat man. She n't tell her namin sign during time,
"As you are," Dundee finished for her, under his breath.
"Well, there's such a thing as striking a bargain,"
Strawn told them, his eyes grim with purpose. "I'll find
out what that young beauty is hiding, and then I'll make
her a proposition-immunity in exchange for information
about Koenig's murder."
"How are you going about it, Captain?” Dundee asked
respectfully.
"First I'm going to find that fat man,” Strawn answered.
"In my opinion, him and the girl was working in
cahoots
"But according to Archie Webster, the fat man didn't
know her name," Dundee objected.
"Ever hear of a hired assassin?” Strawn asked scorn-
fully. “Suppose she'd got cold feet on the idea of murder-
ing the doctor herself, and got in touch somehow with this
fat man. She describes herself to him over the phone or in
a note, but don't tell her name. ... All right! He looks
her up. She gives him the high sign during the movie to
meet her outside. Both leave about the same time, the girl
having fixed it with Webster to be waiting for her some-
where else—at a safe distance. ... Check? . . . Sure!
Then the deed is done. But the fat man ain't satisfied with
the bargain he's made and tries to hold the girl up for
five or ten times the amount she'd agreed to pay him—
either that or the girl welches. Hasn't had a chance to get
hold of the dough she'd promised him. He ain't having
none of that-says he'll kill the girl too and make a good
night's work of it. The girl runs away, you find her crip-
pled on the highway, Dundee, and today she's holding on
to the coat tails of a plainclothesman for dear life! ...
How's that?”
"Very diverting, Captain,” Dundee smiled. “But if you
honestly believe in that theory, how can you promise her
immunity? In the eyes of the law, Enid Rambler would
be more guilty than her pot-bellied hireling!"
"Aw, go to hell!” Strawn sputtered feebly.


CHAPTER TWENTY
LURLINE DOTY posed, hand on hip, in the doorway,
after depositing Dundee's well-filled dinner tray upon a
table drawn up to his sitting-room couch.
"Ain't you the Miracle Man, though?” she kidded, hen-
naed head tilted, eyebrows arched provocatively,
"And I've just been telling myself that, as a detective,
I'm a washout,” Dundee retorted wearily, his interest in
the food before him rather than in the nurse.
"But, oh boy, as a doctor!" she smiled archly. “Mrs.
Morse is so well that Dr. Harlow says she can go home
tomorrow_if you will let her! And Mr. Salter has bor-
rowed a typewriter from Mr. Baldwin. He told me just
now he'd already written five hundred words on the first
chapter of a new novel. I asked him if I was going to be
in it, and he said yes, and so I said I could tell him a story
that would be a best seller, if he'd split fifty-fifty- "
"And he snatched at the offer like a starving dog at a
bone, I suppose?” Dundee grinned.
"Well--anyway" -the nurse evaded— "it's the most
thrilling story you ever heard—all about a girl who goes
wrong, and gets 'that way' and dies, and her sister says the
baby is hers, so her poor little dead kid-sister's name won't
be disgraced
"Un hunh?” Dundee grunted, without interest, knife
and fork busy upon the excellent filet mignon this silly
creature had broiled for him.
"And the beauty of it is, it's a true story!” the nurse
went on, her voice sinking to a thrilling whisper.
"True?'' Dundee repeated, and lost interest in his steak.
227


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 229
aggrievedly. "You already knew, and I was going to make
up new names when I told Mr. Salter-
"Of course!" Dundee soothed her for the sake of further
information. "And I'll bet you had a good idea who the
man was, didn't you? Otherwise,” he added craftily, “it
wouldn't be much of a story."
"In my story I was going to have it that it was the fa-
mous doctor that had betrayed the poor, little innocent
stenographer, because that would make it a good story, but
I don't think it was really Dr. Koenig, although Norah
named the baby Carl, and a blind man could see that Doc-
tor thought Colleen was simply the cutest, prettiest, sweet-
est little thing that ever lived —
"And why don't you think Dr. Koenig was the man?"
Dundee cut in sternly.
"Why, he was too good!” the girl answered simply.
"He'd have put out both his eyes rather than let them lust
after a virgin "
Dundee laughed. “I'm afraid you've been reading books
that tell more than a young girl ought to know!”
"Oh, I'm old enough to know my way around," she
assured him, immensely flattered.
"You're also old enough, Miss Doty,” Dundee caught
her up grimly, "to realize that the story you've just been
telling me should be kept a sacred secret! . . . Don't
worry about giving plots to Salter! Keep that story under
your white linen cap!”
"You go to the devil!” the nurse cried, in a strangled
voice, before fleeing the room in a starchy rustle.
Condemned to the nether regions for the second time
that afternoon, Dundee cheerfully concentrated upon his
excellent dinner. Perhaps he'd been rather rough on the
nurse, he reflected ruefully, as he drained his cup of its
superb coffee. True, she was a malicious little scandal-
monger, but she'd given him valuable information. While
he had made no progress toward solving the murder, the


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 231
Hope Sanitariumame of Clydaat name have been
ing memory to click? Could that name have been Sandlin,
which—as the name of Clyde Powell's doctor at Good
Hope Sanitarium—undoubtedly appeared on the first page
of Clyde's case history?
4. Why was Clyde Powell's case history completely
missing, along with the Wiggin letter?
5. Who was the mysterious fat man? What was his
connection with Enid Rambler?
6. What was Enid Rambler concealing? Was she really
mentally ill, or shamming, as Koenig believed?
7. Who was the father of Carl Lacey?
8. Where was Maizie Horne on Wednesday evening?
(Probably unimportant, but should be checked up on.)
9. What had Koenig wanted of his lawyer, that could
not wait until morning?
10. Why had Koenig suddenly determined to dismiss
Dr. Harlow?
11. Why had Dr. Mayfield demanded, almost with his
last breath—and while lucid, according to all evidence-
to see Dr. Koenig?
12. Had Dr. Mayfield meant Koenig when he said that
"that man" must leave Mayfield? If so, what had Koenig
done to incur the old doctor's hatred?
There came a knock on the door, and a woman's white-
sleeved arm appeared, a newspaper extended.
"Here's the afternoon paper," came a strangled voice
from behind the slightly opened door.
“Just a minute, Miss Doty!" Dundee called. "I'll bring
you my tray."
"Set it down outside,” the choked voice answered.
"No! Please wait!" the contrite young man begged, and
sprang toward the door. “I'm terribly sorry I hurt your
feelings, Miss Doty. Won't you forgive me?"
The door opened slowly. A tear-stained face reproached


232 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
him. "You—you aa like I was a leper or something, just
because I'm only an attendant, and not a baby-doll beauty
like Enid Rambler — ”
"No, no!” Dundee protested, genuinely shocked at the
effect of his rudeness. "You've been awfully good to
me- "
“I'd do simply anything for you, and—and to help you
solve the murder,” she sobbed. “My boy-friend says he's
already jealous of you, because I've raved so about
you
Dundee was acutely embarrassed. "Who is your boy-
friend?” he asked hastily and without caring in the least
what the answer might be.
"Happy—you know, Happy Day," she confided, souf-
fling miserably. “But we had a fight last night, because a
woman had the nerve to call him up at my house, and he
had the nerve to leave me flat. . . . And now today he's
sore because I've been raving about you—and it wasn't
just to make him jealous, either-
Dundee's cheeks burned. Cooks and policemen—nurse-
maids and policemen, comic-strip combinations. ...
"He's a fine chap! Jolly, and quite the sheik, for a fat
man
"He isn't fat!” the nurse flared angrily, and Dundee
grinned happily as she snatched his tray and flounced out
into the patio with it.
Picking up the paper she had dropped in the doorway,
the detective, his work mood broken, scanned the murder
story headlines.
"PATIENTS QUIZZED IN SAN MURDER,” he
read. Smaller head type, pyramided above the two-column
front page story, announced:
"SECOND DEATH IN 24 HOURS AT MAYFIELD SANITA-
RIUM CLAIMS FORMER HEAD; DR. MAYFIELD FOLLOWS
COLLEAGUE TO MORGUE; MURDER THEORY SCOUTED.”


234 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
"Heis carryin accept be in a wore she Lets
her resignation to the surviving partners, Dr. Cantrell and
Business Manager Roger Baldwin, effective upon the ar-
rival of psychiatrists to take her own and Dr. Koenig's
place. Dr. Harlow stated, however, that at this time she
has no intention of selling her share of Dr. Koenig's finan-
cial interest in Mayfield Sanitarium, bequeathed jointly to
herself and Head Nurse Norah Lacey in the famous doc-
tor's last will and testament. No reasons for the resigna-
tion were vouchsafed the writer by the charming little doc-
tor, but it is safe to surmise that she wishes the new psy-
chiatric head, whoever he may be, to have a free hand, un-
influenced by the doctor's will, in choosing his assistants.
The resignation has not yet been acted upon by Dr. Can-
trell and Mr. Baldwin.”
"Hell's bells!" Dundee ejaculated, in deep disgust.
"That's carrying loyalty a bit too far! If Cantrell and that
ass, Baldwin, accept her resignation, they deserve to have
Mayfield go bankrupt in a year. . . . And why the devil
didn't the little spitfire tell me she was going to take such
a step?" he grumbled aggrievedly. "Lets me first learn a
thing like that from the papers "
That there was no earthly reason for Justine Harlow to
take him into her confidence, in such a personal and heart-
wrenching matter, did not occur to the indignant young
detective.
Those annoying paragraphs completely ruined his eve-
ning, which he had intended to devote to a painstaking
résumé of the Koenig case, from every angle.
"Damn me for a susceptible young fool!” he swore at
himself more than once, but his profanity did not pre-
vent his heart's aching for the girl who was undoubt-
edly tossing upon a sleepless bed, stricken by two grievous
blows-the death of the man she had worshiped, and
the knowledge that, if he had lived, he would have
discharged her. How her pride must be suffering, too,
Dundee told himself bitterly. Forced to be a beneficiary


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 237
"Oh, you're so lovely!” Dundee's heart called out to
her. "Can any creature as lovely and gentle as you have
done any wrong?”
As if she had heard him, Enid Rambler turned her soft,
shining gaze upon him, and smiled. ...
"Well! There's life in the old girl yet, Archie, what the
hell!” Marjorie Merrick cried, the instant she had finished
her song, and the patness of the quotation from Don
Marquis' Archie and Mehitabel surprised and delighted
Dundee.
"One more, Miss Merrick, please!" Samuel Rowan
begged, one of his rough brown hands making an awk-
ward movement toward the singer.
"Gawd! Here's another victim of my accursed charms!"
the singer laughed stridently, but her eyes were kind, and
her thin fingers fell again upon the piano keys.
"Not till we've had tea, please,” Enid Rambler called.
"I'm afraid it will be as strong as lye if we don't drink it
now. . . . Rally 'round, boys and girls! ... Oh, Mr.
Dundee, it's sweet of you to come! And will you call in
my darling plainclothesman? I'm spoiling the man dread-
fully, but I want to make sure he likes it here and will
stay."
"You wouldn't have to feed me cakes and tea to keep
me around,” Dundee assured her gallantly, but sincerely.
"Nor me!” Archie Webster joined in. "Send the dick
about his business, Enid, and let me and my attendant
watch you—you foul murderess, you!—to see that you
don't escape.”
Not even the presence of the awkward, blushing plain-
clothesman and of Webster's sissy-looking night attend-
ant—very different from the irrepressible Happy Day-
could dampen the gayety of Enid's impromptu tea party.
In addition to a pot of tea and a tall, Wedgewood pitcher
of chocolate, there was a silver basket heaped with tiny
sandwiches, a glass plate overflowing with Viennese petit


238 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
fours of a dozen varieties, and a bonbon dish filled with
expensive candies.
"Pretty swell having a Rockefeller-Vanderbilt heiress
in our midst, ne c'est pas, Laddie darling?” Majorie Mer-
rick challenged Dundee, as she cuddled close against him
at the tea table. "What a break for us poor nuts that you
picked on Mayfield, Enid. For God's sake, don't be in
any hurry to get well. We'll be sunk without you."
"I don't think I'll ever have to leave now," Enid an-
swered happily, apparently oblivious to the sinister inter-
pretation which could be put upon the words.
"I feel another song coming on!” Marjorie Merrick set
down her cup and strolled toward the piano. “I'm going
to warble Always this time. ... Just an old-fashioned
girl—that's me! And listen, boy-friend," she turned
threateningly toward Archie Webster, "keep those Don
Juan eyes on me while I'm singing, not on Enid, or I'll
smash one of your curly locks clear down into your med-
ulla oblongata."
But not even this threat could keep Archie Webster's
eyes off Enid Rambler as the sentimental song soared
richly from the singer's throat. And Dundee's own eyes
were so occupied in watching lovely Enid Rambler that
they almost missed the fact that Samuel Rowan was gazing
in the same direction, doglike devotion shining in the
brown eye that was not obscured by a cast.
But he did recall that fact later, with a cold chill of
shock. In that room that evening were two men-one
young, eligible, rich, accustomed to a reckless flouting of
the law, the other oldish, life-beaten, freshly unburdened
of some dreadful secret—two men who, judging by the
love that shone from their eyes, would have stopped at
nothing to protect Enid Rambler from Dr. Koenig's deter-
mination to cast her out of Mayfield against her will. ...
But that realization came later. As Marjorie Merrick
sang. "I'll be loving you always,” Dundee's own infatuated


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 239
written Archie Wee, who ch hercely, wock-bed
eyes scarcely left the young girl. So it was that he saw the
storm brewing, from the moment the first quiver passed
over her delicate face and the first tear féll from her
bronze eyelashes, until she covered her convulsed face with
her hands and chokingly begged her guests to leave. ...
Dazed, the detective stumbled out of the room, his offers
of assistance and comfort rejected along with those of all
the others.
"Strike me dead for an idiot!" Marjorie Merrick ex-
ploded. "I know damned well the poor kid's eating her
heart out for some black-hearted wretch that's done her
dirt, and here I go and babble the sloppiest love song ever
written! Kick me, somebody!"
And Archie Webster obeyed, with too much earnestness
to suit the singer, who chased him vengefully across the
lawn, then embraced him fiercely when she caught him.
Although it was nearly nine o'clock-bedtime for May-
field Sanitarium-Dundee felt so restless in spite of his
fatigue that his extremely comfortable suite in Sunflower
Court seemed like a prison cell. There was nothing to read,
no more work he could do before morning. ...
Finally, in desperation, for he felt the need of some-
thing, anything to lift him out of the slough of despond
into which Enid Rambler's tears had plunged him, he
gathered up the scattered sheets of the afternoon newspa-
per. Might as well cast a stony eye over the comics, and
dare them to make him laugh
Then he uttered a sharp exclamation as a brief, boxed
item on page two leaped at his attention.
MYSTERIOUS MIDNIGHT VISITOR AT MAYFIELD was the
two-line, italic head over the blackface type of the boxed
story. Swearing under his breath the detective began to
read:
"Characteristically unable to see farther than the nose on
his face, Captain John Strawn, Chief of the Homicide
Squad, will first learn from this issue of The Evening Sun
leaped of VISITOR face tyy


CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
KNOWING the enterprise and efficiency of American city
editors, Dundee was prepared to find a front-page story
with a Chicago date-line in his Friday morning paper, but
The Star's revelations were more important than he had
guessed they would be. He read as he breakfasted off his
tray:
"Chicago, June 4 Dr. Horace Sandlin, when inter-
viewed late today at the Howard Memorial Hospital,
where he is a member of the staff, confirmed Hamilton,
- newspapers reports that Dr. Carl Koenig, psychiatric
head of Mayfield Sanitarium, who was murdered in his
office at that institution Wednesday night, had opened
negotiations to bring the Chicago doctor to Mayfield.
"'I am indeed sorry,' Dr. Sandlin said to this reporter
this evening, "that the news of my negotiations with Dr.
Koenig had to come to the Howard Memorial Hospital
board in this way, but the report is true. On his recent
visit to Chicago, for the purpose of delivering a lecture at
Northwestern University, Dr. Koenig did me the honor to
extend me an invitation to join his staff at Mayfield Sani-
tarium near Hamilton. It was agreed at that time that I
should call upon him at Mayfield, and go further into the
question of salary, duties, etc.'
"At this point the psychiatrist laughed ruefully. 'I see
by dispatches from Hamilton in the evening papers that a
mysterious midnight visitor' is likely to be a favorite sus-
pect in this baffling murder mystery. I am sorry to have to
furnish so prosaic an explanation of that mysterious mid-
241


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 245
minutes. Then: "At seven-twenty, you say? ... Leaving
Chicago when?”
When the answer came he thanked the information clerk
and slowly replaced the receiver. If it could be proved
that Dr. Sandlin had not been on duty at Howard Memo-
rial Hospital on Wednesday afternoon-
The telephone rang. Captain Strawn's unmistakable
voice came over the wire: "Lemme speak to Mr. Dundee!”
"This is Dundee, Captain,” the younger detective
"Pleted. “Anything. Captain," speak to Mr. Dist
"Just got a funny telegram from Chicago,” Strawn's
voice replied. "Listen and you might make a copy of it
if you've got a pencil handy. . . . All right! Here goes:
"PUZZLED BY SANDLIN STORY IN MORNING PAPERS
STOP DR. KOENIG MY GUEST WHILE IN CHICAGO ON
LECTURE TOUR STOP KOENIG WITH ME CONSTANTLY
ENTIRE TWENTY-FOUR HOURS HIS VISIT HERE STOP
AM POSITIVE HE DID NOT CONFER THIS TRIP WITH
SANDLIN RELATIVE MAYFIELD STAFF POSITION STOP
DOCTOR DID ASK MY ADVICE REGARDING ASSISTANT
PSYCHIATRIST STOP SPOKE HIGHLY OF DR. HARLOW'S
WORK WANTED TO FIND YOUNG MALE PSYCHIATRIST
WHO WOULD WORK CONGENIALLY WITH HER STOP
HAVE NO DESIRE TO INTERFERE BUT AM OFFERING
ABOVE IN INTERESTS OF MAYFIELD STOP PLEASE
KEEP CONFIDENTIAL.
"Got all that? . . . It's signed Edward Livingstone,
Professor of Abnormal Psychology, Northwestern Uni-
versity.”
"Whew!” Dundee whistled. "Nigger in the woodpile
somewhere, Captain!”
"You said a mouthful,” Captain Strawn's voice retorted
gloomily. "But what's all this got to do with the price
of eggs?"


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 247
the instrument and dialed so hastily that the operation had
to be repeated.
"Hello! Western Union? ... Let me speak to the
manager, please!"
Five minutes later, not even taking time to get his hat
from Sunflower Court, Dundee hurled himself into his
roadster, which was still parked in front of the main build-
ing. His hurry and excitement were due to no specific in-
formation which the Western Union manager had given
him. He was merely playing a hunch, which, as he had
talked with the telegraph manager, had grown to lusty
proportions.
He made one brief stop on his way into the business
section of Hamilton, a visit which the district attorney
vainly tried to prolong. And within twenty minutes after
he had hung up the receiver in the murdered doctor's of-
fice he was shaking hands with a brisk young man who
made no effort to conceal the fact that he was almost as
excited as the detective himself.
"I followed your suggestion, Mr. Barrow," Dundee told
the Western Union manager. "Here is a note from the dis-
trict attorney, asking you, as a personal favor to himself
and to his office, to waive formalities.”
"Well, I hope I shan't get into trouble," the man-
ager smiled, as he accepted the note and read it. "But
when it's a case of murder, I believe it is the duty of every
citizen to extend whatever aid lies in his power— "
"Absolutely!” Dundee assured him heartily. "Now, you
were saying over the telephone, Mr. Barrow, that a file is
kept of uncompleted messages "
"That's right. 'Bust' messages, we call them,” the West-
ern Union man explained, with a trace of superiority.
"There are several such messages in the course of a day's
business here, but not enough of them to file separately.
We keep each day's 'bust messages in a single folder, bear.
ing the date. Naturally, these messages are all received
made no erbe detective hims Mr. Barrow, from the dis-
"There a here, but "Buse' m


248
ONE DROP OF BLOOD
over the telephone. Accidental disconnections are respon-
sible for most of the 'busts, of course. The client calls
back, and is usually pretty sore because he has to repeat the
message from the beginning. He does not realize that it
would be a truly remarkable coincidence if he should get
the same operator who was taking down his telegram be-
fore the connection was broken. We have ten girls who do
nothing but receive telegrams, night letters, etc., over the
telephone.”
"Yes, yes, I understand,” Dundee fretted, for he had
heard all this on the telephone twenty minutes before.
"Now, if you could show me the file of 'bust' messages
for Wednesday night "
But the manager hesitated. "I'm afraid I can't do that,
not even with this request from the district attorney. But
I can read off the names and addresses of those mes-
sages-
"Have you looked through Wednesday's file since I
called you?” Dundee interrupted. "I had hoped you
might have found one with either the doctor's name or the
Mayfield telephone number
"In that case, it would not have been a 'bustº message,”
the manager reminded him, with a smile of superiority.
"Consider how a telegram is sent by telephone. You call
or dial Western Union. One of our operators answers.
You say: 'I want to send a night letter, please that is,
if you are polite!” and the manager chuckled at his own
wit. “The operator's first query is: 'To whom is the night
letter going?”—Not, 'What is your telephone number or
your name?'- "
"Of course!” Dundee acknowledged, a trifle chagrined.
"And it is not until the complete message has been taken
down by the operator that she asks, 'What is your tele-
phone number, please?' and then, 'In whose name is this
telephone listed?' Naturally, if any of this information
appeared on the message it would be complete, or so nearly
ca remindegram is.se of our er, please at his own
the midler how a chion. One


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 249
complete that, if the line was disconnected, the operator
herself could get the client back on the telephone."
"Correct!” the manager applauded. “And that's exactly
why it will be no easy matter to point to a 'bust message
and say with any certainty, 'Dr. Koenig was telephoning
this message to Western Union when the line was discon-
nected.'”
"When he was killed,” Dundee corrected grimly. "But
if my hunch is right, and Dr. Koenig was sending a tele-
gram at the moment he was murdered, the name of the
addressee or the nature of the beginning of the message
should be quite sufficient.”
"Perhaps you're right,” the manager answered, very
respectfully. "I'll read the names and addresses of Wed-
nesday's bust messages
"Just a moment,” Dundee begged. "Have these mes-
sages been checked against Wednesday's completed mes-
sages? My point, of course, is that only those which were
never completed need concern us.”
"Completed messages are filed only under the names of
the senders,” the manager informed him, and he began to
read off the names and addresses from a small sheaf of
telegraph blanks.
And at each of the first three names Dundee shook his
head. For one was the name of a girl whose address was
a sorority house at the State University; another belonged
to a firm of stockbrokers in New York, and the third
"bust” message had been intended for the room reserva-
tions clerk of a Detroit hotel.
But the fourth name, even before the address was read
off, brought a sharp exclamation of triumph from Bonnie
Dundee.
" 'Buron Fitts, District Attorney of Los Angeles
County, Los Angeles, California,'” the manager was in-
toning in his slightly sing-song voice.
“That's the one!" Dundee cried. "Surely you will let


250 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
me see that message? It fits a number of known
facts-
"Very well,” and Barrow surrendered the half-filled
blank.
Dundee read the incomplete night-letter avidly:
PLEASE CONSULT YOUR RECORDS YEAR NINETEEN
NINETEEN AND WIRE ME COMPLETE DESCRIPTION
OF E-D-I
PLEASE CO
UR RECORD
YEAR NINETEE
And there, as if Fate chuckled at the detective's annoy-
ance, the message ended.


252 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
I tell you I n while he was to light on someo
"Don't toss the wet blanket so blithely, Chief,” Dundee
pleaded. "I tell you I never had a stronger hunch! The
way I dope it is this: While he was talking to Claire
Cantrell, Dr. Koenig's gaze happened to light on some-
thing—a name, probably—that caused his memory to
click. Now, that name must have appeared in Clyde
Powell's case history, because, for no other reason that we
can even remotely imagine, Clyde's history is completely
missing—not torn up like the others, which were destroyed
merely as a blind "
"Yeah, I know all that,” the sick man interrupted
peevishly.
"Sorry, Chief,” Dundee grinned. "Well, the good old
memory suddenly functions, and Dr. Koenig remembers
where he has seen those eyes before. Before-he said to
Claire Cantrell! That means, in my opinion, that the
owner of those mysterious eyes was either somewhere
about or that the doctor had seen them very recently.
Right?"
"Go on,” the district attorney agreed obliquely.
"As we've said all along, the doctor's horror was such
that he had to get busy without a minute's delay. Why?-
Because the owner of those eyes was a possible menace
either to himself or to Mayfield Sanitarium. Right?”
Again Sanderson commanded, but less irritably: "Go
on!"
"Dr. Koenig calls his lawyer. Whatever it is, it's the
sort of mess that the law must deal with. Attorney Forrest
isn't at home, and Koenig says he'll have to handle the
matter himself. What then?' He telegraphs the district
attorney of Los Angeles-
"Yeah, I see—where Clyde Powell used to live,” San-
derson supplied, as Dundee paused impressively.
"Not only where Clyde Powell lived, but where he was
confined in a sanitarium of which Dr. Horace Sandlin was
psychiatric head!"
"You're off the track there, my lad," Sanderson cut in


254 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
place while Koenig was in Chicago,” Dundee pointed
out.
"Livingstone is probably mistaken," Sanderson decided
reasonably. "It is unlikely that the good professor was
actually with Koenig 'constantly,' as he says in this wire,
and even so, the first negotiations might have been made
over the telephone, and a personal appointment arranged
for Tuesday night. That would explain Sandlin's coming
along so soon after Koenig's return."
"Probably you're right," Dundee agreed, but with no
conviction. "At any rate, it's pretty obvious that some-
thing clicked in Koenig's memory on Wednesday night
that made him get busy in such a manner that his murder
had to take place before that telegram could be finished
and on its way to Los Angeles!"
"And what possible connection could there exist be-
tween 'E-d-i' and Sandlin?" the district attorney insisted.
"I don't know," Dundee confessed frankly. "There's
this possibility: Koenig, in the rôle of alienist, served as
an expert witness on some case in which Sandlin also
testified, as an alienist. The defendant was this 'E-d-i.'
In 1919, let us say, since Koenig himself gives us that
year in his wire to the district attorney. 'E-d-i' has eyes
that Koenig remembers, but the rest of his features fade
from the doctor's memory. Before him, on Wednesday
night, was Clyde Powell's case history, joining Los
Angeles with the name of Sandlin. The juxtaposition of
the town and the doctor's name brings about one of those
freaks of memory. Koenig remembers where he has seen
a pair of eyes that have puzzled him. For he and Sandlin,
in Los Angeles, both looked upon the owner of those eyes.
The whole case flashes back into Koenig's memory.
'E-d-i' is a dangerous person—and 'E-d-i' is where Koenig
can lay hands on him, if the police still want him.”
"Well, who is 'E-d-i'?” Sanderson demanded, irritable
again.


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 255
"I can't read a dead man's mind,” Dundee admitted,
shrugging. “My guess is that he was either the relative
of a patient or a patient at Mayfield.”
"Meaning that he may be our mysterious 'fat man,' or
Rowan, or Roland Morse," Sanderson deduced. "Or—to
change the pronoun, she may be-Enid Rambler!"
Dundee Aushed, but his hot protest died out before it
had made a good beginning.
"Keep your shirt on, boy!" Sanderson advised, pater-
nally. “But you see where idle speculation can lead us.
Suppose you put that wild imagination of yours on a
leash and keep it there until we've at least had confirma-
tion from Fitts in Los Angeles that that 'bust' message
never reached him. If it didn't get through—and I admit
that anyone starting a message like that would naturally
finish it, in spite of disconnections, if it was humanly pos-
sible to do so—we can go on from here. Wire your query
to Fitts, then possess your soul with patience until you get
an answer.”
Rather subdued, Dundee obeyed. But he had better use
for the next two hours than to devote them to attaining
a Buddha-like calm.


CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
pool, roof Sanified old ded beyond thes. A Frenchhe city
ALTHOUGH he was sure that Enid Rambler had lied
when she had said she had been staying at the Randolph
Hotel before going to Mayfield, Dundee made inquiries
there as the first step in his investigation into the girl's
"past.” The blank he drew there did not at all discourage
him.
The city of Hamilton boasted two excellent hotels: the
Randolph, the newer and more fashionable-swimming
pool, roof garden, radio in every room; and the Hamil-
tonian, a dignified old house, whose noble spaciousness
and graciousness extended beyond the lobby and public
rooms into the guests' accommodations. A French chef,
who made the only real croissants to be found in the city;
hospitable and more than efficient service, and an air of
leisured dignity seldom found in a Middle-West hotel,
made the Hamiltonian exactly the sort of temporary home
which a girl of Enid's obvious breeding and apparent
wealth would have chosen. But faced with the necessity
of lying to protect herself, nothing could have been more
natural than that she should have given the Randolph as
her last address.
The manager of the Hamiltonian was Francis Drake
Littleton, an Englishman, who had spent many hours talk-
ing London with the young detective, one-time holder of
a lowly job at Scotland Yard. He received Dundee cor-
dially.
"An interesting case—the Koenig affair,” Littleton
began, with relish. "Scotland Yard would make short
work of it. A great institution, sir—nothing like it in this
country. You should have prolonged your training there.”
256


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 257
"Oh-we blunder along and find the criminal occa-
sionally,” Dundee grinned. "By the way, sir, I need your
help
"Anything I can do ” the hotel manager assured
him, vastly pleased.
"Thanks!—It's just a side issue to the main case, I'm
fairly sure, but we can't ignore it,” Dundee told him,
lighting one of the English cigarettes his host had offered.
"There's a devilish pretty girl at Mayfield, who says that,
before going to the sanitarium, she was stopping for a few
days at the Randolph. My hunch was that she was exactly
the sort of young woman who would demand only the
best-hence that she was lying; that she really stayed at
the Hamiltonian.”
The Englishman bowed, and his very mustache regis-
tered pleasure in the compliment. “Her name?”
"Oh, she lied about that, too,” Dundee laughed. "But
I don't think she's at all expert about lying, or really an
adept at choosing aliases on the spur of the moment,
However, on the off-chance that she was not lying, the
name she goes under now is Enid Rambler.”
The manager shook his white head slowly. “I'm sure
no young person of that name has been a guest here, yet
it has a vaguely familiar ring to it. . . . On what day did
she enter Mayfield?”
"The evening of Wednesday, April second,” Dundee
told him. “May I suggest that you look over the hotel
register sheets for a week preceding that day, to see if a
Miss E. R. was a guest here.”
The manager reached for a telephone and was soon
relaying the request to an assistant manager. Within five
minutes the seven sheets from the hotel's loose-leaf regis-
ter were in front of the detective, and his quick eyes were
racing down the topmost page of legible and illegible,
neat and bold signatures.
Not until he reached the third sheet—the register


ONE DROP OF BLOOD
259
"Young man?” Dundee repeated, with a premonitory
twinge in his heart.
"Oh, yes!” the manager assured him. "A most esti-
mable young man. One of America's aristocrats, I should
say. Family-money- "
"His name?" Dundee interrupted the eulogy.
"Paul Van Twing—the Dutch Van Twings who were
among the earliest settlers of New York," the manager
answered, with relish. "The young man seems to be the
worthy scion of a fine family-distinguished in appear-
ance, with a grace of bearing that one so seldom sees in
this "
"There was a party, you say?"
"Only Mrs. Van Twing, a schoolgirl daughter who was
ill, the son Paul, and Miss Ramsey," the hotel manager
answered, with a faint air of reproach for these curt inter-
ruptions. "It was quite obvious that the young couple
were in love. In fact, Mrs. Van Twing confided to me
that they were to be married after the party reached Cali-
fornia, their objective, toward which they were traveling
by easy stages, due to the child's illness. . . . Tubercu-
losis, I'm afraid.”
"And what happened Wednesday night?"
"The young couple went for a drive in one of the cars
in which the party was making a luxurious cross-country
tour," Littleton went on wordily. “Mr. Van Twing dis-
missed the chauffeur and drove himself. Just before mid-
night the young man returned alone in quite a dreadful
state. I happened to be in the lounge when he arrived.
He asked immediately if Miss Ramsey had returned. I
said I had not seen her, but made doubly sure by asking
the night clerk and by ringing her room. The young man
almost collapsed then, and I urged him into my office here
and braced him with a spot of brandy. . .. . Very decent
brandy, too! Would you like a sip?"


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 261
Van Twingan was able to ul. At my suge for five hun
"That is, about the accident. I myself went with young
Van Twing to the receiving hospital, and there we found
that the man was able to leave. Had been stunned, but
not seriously injured at all. At my suggestion the young
man gave the accident victim a check for five hundred
dollars, which made the unfortunate man glad that he'd
been bowled over. Of course Van Twing reported the
affair to the police, but a word from me kept it out of the
papers."
"I see,” Dundee repeated, dazedly.
"When we returned to the hotel, Miss Ramsey was still
not in her room, and had not telephoned,” the manager
continued. “Young Van Twing was in a traty pitiable
state. I suggested that he tell his mother—a fine, capable
lady—and it was Mrs. Van Twing that took charge then
and carried on. She telephoned every person with whom
the party had become friendly during their brief stay
here, but not one of them had seen or heard from Miss
Ramsey. And three times during the remainder of the
night she made telephone inquiry of every hospital in
Hamilton.”
"Did she ring up Mayfield Sanitarium?” Dundee asked.
"I rather think not," the manager told him. "Mayfield,
you see, is quite remote—at least five miles from the city,
I understand. And even if Mrs. Van Twing had inquired,
she would have been told that no young person named
Ramsey had been received there."
"And so the party shoved off?” Dundee asked.
"Not for several days,” Littleton answered. “But the
little girl-Alicia, her name is—became worse, and it was
necessary finally for the party to move on toward the
West, where the child was to be put in a sanitarium.
Young Van Twing was in a dreadful state, but he had
apparently done all he could, and his mother needed him
badly. Mrs. Van Twing, however, did arrange with the
society editors of both morning and evening newspapers
to display prominently, with headlines, a social note to the


262
ONE DROP OF BLOOD
visits Ramsey but nothing was to cancisco; believe
effect that the Van Twings were to conclude their visit to
Hamilton and go on to California, as soon as Miss Edith
Ramsey, a member of their party, had returned from a
visit with friends in a near-by city. Her hope was that
Miss Ramsey would see this item and realize that the coast
was clear. But nothing developed. In case Miss Ramsey
returned to the hotel, I was to give her a message, and
also wire Van Twing in San Francisco."
"You mentioned private detectives, I believe."
"Right you are! A few days ago a person came here,
making inquiries about Miss Ramsey. I asked him if he
were a private detective—a rather neat deduction as it
turned out, for that was exactly what the fellow was,”
Littleton commended himself. "A rum sort of codger
-expert at pumping me, but quite the clam when it
came to answering my questions-
"What did he look like?” Dundee interrupted, but he
was sure of the answer before it came.
"Disgustingly fat little bounder,” Littleton told him.
"Middle-aged, fairish sort of hair and light eyes—most
ord'n'ry, really."
"Has he been here more than once?"
"No. I particularly asked him to return and relieve my
own anxiety, if he discovered Miss Ramsey's whereabouts,
but I have not seen him since."
After ten minutes or so, during which the hotel man-
ager plied the detective with questions concerning the
Koenig case, which Dundee answered with apparent
frankness, the young detective made his escape.
District Attorney Sanderson listened to the story with
only an occasional exclamation by way of interruption, his
brown-flecked gray eyes fixed very intently upon the nar-
rator.
"Hard lines, old man," he said surprisingly, when the
narrative was concluded.


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 263
Dundee flushed, shrugged, but did not deny the insinu-
ation behind the kindly words.
"I suppose you've wired the Van Twings?” Sanderson
asked.
Dundee flushed more darkly. "No. And I asked Lit-
tleton not to. There's practically no doubt that Enid Ram-
bler and Edith Ramsey are one and the same, but I can't
have her snatched away before the mystery is cleared up.
She may be a material witness against the murderer-
"If your first theory about her is correct,” Sanderson
asked reasonably, "why don't you simply swap informa-
tion with her? Tell her it's all a mistake, that she didn't
kill any man in an automobile accident, and ten to one
she'll be so grateful that she'll tell anything she's been
hiding about Koenig's murder."
But Dundee shook his head. "No, Chief, if you don't
mind, I'll work this thing out before I try to make use of
the girl. Her testimony might be practically worthless if
I had no case built up against the murderer. You know
how much it takes to convince a jury that a man is a
murderer. . . . Besides, the girl may be mistaken. Her
story may be entirely worthless, the product of hysteria.”
"Wonder why that fat private detective hasn't wired
Van Twing?” Sanderson suggested thoughtfully.
"The way I dope it out is this: Fatty saw Enid all right,
after she left the movie. Met him on the grounds prob-
ably. He made the mistake of spilling the beans first
that he was a detective, I mean. The girl thought he had
come to arrest her for manslaughter—we understand now,
of course, why the movie of that name scared the poor
kid half to death!—and she played her part so well that
the fat bloke was completely taken in—thought he had
the wrong girl, in spite of the fact that the description
tallied. Of course she didn't give him time to tell her
what it was all about. . . . Lord! No wonder the blessed
little idiot has claustrophobia, and an anxiety neurosis


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 265
with E-d lookin
it has a whale of a lot to do with the Koenig case," he
said into the receiver, "and I'm counting on you to help
us, Mr. Boykin.”
"Delighted, Dundee! We've heard about you, even
’way out here. Better come to the land of sunshine and
flowers
"Maybe I'll get a vacation on pay if I can clean up this
mess," Dundee answered. “Los Angeles is a great town
for big-time murders, too ”
"Hey!" Sanderson pleaded, in agony. "Cut it short!"
But there was no need for the admonition, since the
man at the other end of the wire, the amenities attended
to, was swinging whole-heartedly into the business at hand.
"Told you I was curious over that wire, Dundee," he
said. "I took the trouble to dig into the 1919 files, looking
for both first and last names beginning with E-d-i- "
"Stout fella!” Dundee applauded. "Find anything hot?"
“Plenty!” the genial voice came back clear and strong.
“Funny coincidence, too. Dr. Koenig's name figures in
two separate and distinct cases
"What!” Dundee shouted in his excitement. “In two
cases where the defendants' names begin with 'E-d-i-'?"
"One case never got to the point of the person involved
being a defendant,” the Los Angeles attorney corrected
him. “A flapper by the name of Edith Ramsey "
"Edith Ramsey?"... My God!” Dundee groaned, and
Sanderson jerked upright in bed, regardless of pleurisy.
"Know her? She must be quite a gal by now. I remem-
ber seeing her in 1919, when she was only fifteen, but
pretty enough then to launch at least a small fleet. ...
Say! She isn't mixed up in this, is she?"
"She's a patient at Mayfield Sanitarium," Dundee an-
swered dully. "What have you got on her?”
"Well, I'll be the man at the other end of the wire
marveled. "Say, I'll sketch her story briefly. It sort of
stuck in my mind, but I read up on it a bit, just to refresh
idence hal voice lauded


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 267
"I get you!” Dundee assured him grimly. "I'll be a
manic depressive myself if this keeps up. ... Well?
How did the girl get into the court records?"
"Merely a guardianship matter," the clear, friendly
voice assured him. “She wasn't old enough to come into
her parents' money, of course, and this Mrs. Henderson,
the girl's maternal aunt, was appointed guardian until the
girl was twenty-one. I understand the Hendersons took
her abroad to finish her education, and that she has lived
abroad nearly ever since. At any rate, she's never been
back to Los Angeles.”
"I see,” Dundee said, and used one of the precious
minutes that were being marked up against the call to
brood hopelessly.
"Don't be so down in the mouth, old man," Boykin,
two thousand miles away, advised sympathetically. “After
all, what possible motive for murdering the doctor could
that kid have?”
"Thanks, Boykin," Dundee answered tonelessly.
"What's the other case?—though I suppose it's useless to
look further for the subject of Koenig's inquiry to Fitts."
"I'm not so sure of that," the Los Angeles man retorted
over the wire. “I've been saving the hot stuff. ... Lis-
ten to this, young fellow, and get an earful!"
hier for at case? Dundee


CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
San Right! -trict attos nails. Los like Koblet Fugl of Ed
"SHOOT the works, Boykin, but make it snappy,” Dun-
dee advised, a sympathetic eye upon District Attorney
Sanderson's distress over the leaping toll bill.
"Right!” heartily agreed the voice of the Los Angeles
assistant district attorney. “Sanderson's listening in, is he?
—and chewing his nails? ... Well, tell him there's a
bare possibility he can bill Los Angeles County for half
this toll call, for it looks to me like Koenig was ready to
slip us the dope on one of our own pet fugitives from
justice. Have you seen a bad boy by the name of Edinger
out at Mayfield?”
"Edinger?” Dundee repeated blankly. "Never heard of
this toll calling he can bill in. Well, teltching in, is he?
him."
You rece?" Boykin ages of conspira Jury met,
"Then I guess Koenig bumped into him on this trip
the papers say he'd just returned from when he was mur-
dered," the voice from Los Angeles surmised, with its
first trace of gloom. "And Koenig's dead. ... Too
bad!”
"You say the name is 'E-d-i-n-g-e-r?” Dundee asked.
“Correct!” Boykin assured him. “Wanted to answer to
an indictment on charges of conspiracy and misappropria-
tion. Skipped out before the grand jury met, and never
been heard from since. In 1919 that was.”
"What's the story?" Dundee asked. "Just the bare
facts, of course," he added hastily, as Sanderson groaned.
But it was not Boykin's money that was being burned
up by telephone wires, and he was not going to have his
yarn spoiled. "In 1918, a youngster by the name of
Marvin Cooley-only seventeen years old-lied about his
268


270 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
was later reported killed in action," Boykin explained.
"Edinger got his paws on the whole fortune by one of the
lousiest schemes ever pulled in our fair city. He conspired
with a woman who called herself a nurse, although she'd
had no training, to get his wife adjudged mentally incom-
petent— "
"What!”' Dundee shouted.
"Stop that, fellow! You'll bust my ear-drum,” Boykin
pleaded. "Didn't I tell you I had a hot tip for you? ...
Well, once she was tucked away in a sanitarium-
"Good Hope Sanitarium, of course?” Dundee inter-
rupted again.
"How'd you guess it?" Boykin laughed. “As I was say-
ing, once he'd got her stowed away in Good Hope, he
made ducks and drakes of her fortune, or—as everyone
believes and no one can prove—he salted most of it away,
in a good safe place where it would wait for him if things
got too hot for him here—as they did. You see, the kid,
Marvin Cooley, blew into town one day, all hot and both-
ered because his mother, whose name was no longer
Cooley, of course, and who had moved from the old
Cooley home, hadn't answered his letters. He got on her
trail somehow, and found she was supposed to be crazy.
He located her at Good Hope, without paying a call on
his step-papa, and then the fat was in the fire sure
enough. The old lady was no more crazy than I am!”
"How did the son find that out?” Dundee asked, a
little skeptically.
"Easy!" Boykin retorted over a wire two thousand miles
long. "That's where the conspiracy comes in. You see,
Edinger had ribbed up the nurse to work a ouija board
with the old lady-
"How old was she?”
"Fifty or so,” Boykin answered impatiently. "Just the
right age to be roped in by a fortune-hunter. Well, when
she went into a real nervous prostration over the news that
ered be cooley, blen here as would wait mo


ONE DROP OF BLOOD
271
her boy was killed in action, Edinger ribbed up the nurse
to work the ouija board with her, getting messages for the
old lady from the 'Beyond-supposed to be from the
kid, of course. The poor old lady got so she wanted to be
at the ouija board all the time. Then Edinger played his
trump ace-
"Not a voice from the Beyond?” Dundee interrupted
quickly.
"Say! Who's telling this yarn?” Boykin demanded,
aggrievedly. “But you're right-
“Ah!” Dundee breathed, and paid no more attention to
Sanderson's agony over the telephone bill.
"Ain't it hot?” Boykin boasted. “The nurse—dame by
the name of Whitson—swore it was Edinger that stood
under the old lady's window late at night and pretended
to be the ghost of the dead boy. She squealed, of course,
to save her own hide. . . . But I'm getting ahead of the
story. The old lady told everybody how her son not only
came to her by way of the ouija board, but that she heard
his voice. After that, it was pretty easy to get her adjudged
incompetent and put away. *'Auditory hallucinations,' the
alienists said, and you've got to remember the poor old
lady was pretty well shot, nervously, anyway.”
"My God!" Dundee breathed.
"Yeah! Pretty rotten!” Boykin, in Los Angeles, agreed.
“Of course the jig was up when the boy returned, safe
and sound, and madder'n hell at finding his mother in
such a fix. The kid had grown into quite a lad, and he
made short work of taking the matter of her 'incompe-
tence' into court. There was a swell battery of alienists
lined up on each side, Edinger calling in Dr. Sandlin from
Good Hope, along with two or three other big shots, in a
desperate effort to make the first ruling stick. But the kid
got hold of Dr. Koenig as his big gun, along with Dr.
Edwards, and finally the nurse squealed, and it was all
over. But as I said, before the grand jury could indict or


272 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
a temporary warrant could be clapped on Edinger, he'd
skipped—and hasn't been heard of since."
Another precious minute was consumed by Dundee's
thanks and his request that a copy of the grand jury pro-
ceedings in the Edinger case be rushed to him by air mail.
Then he hung up the receiver and faced his chief.
"Whạt a yarn!” he gloated, and himself spun the
amazing tale for the district attorney's benefit.
"It ought to be," Sanderson grumbled. "It cost us at
least ten cents a word. But as far as I can see, it doesn't
butter any parsnips for us.”
"You wouldn't kid me, mister, would you?” Dundee
pleaded. Then, seriously, “Of course it may be, simply,
one of those astounding coincidences that are always pop-
ping up in real life. But — Looky, Chief! Koenig was
killed when he was telephoning that night letter to Los
Angeles, before he could finish spelling a name that
begins with 'E-d-i.' The reason he sent that telegram is
that, while talking on the phone to Claire Cantrell, his
eyes lit on something on his desk—and we can safely
guess it was Clyde Powell's case history—that made him
remember where he had seen a certain pair of eyes before.
Now, in Powell's case history appeared two names that
appear in the Edinger story—Dr. Sandlin's name and the
name of Good Hope Sanitarium- ”.
"Wait a minute!" Sanderson interrupted. "If Koenig
was figuring on hiring Sandlin as his assistant at Mayfield,
he knew Sandlin was formerly connected with Good
Hope Sanitarium. Nothing in the juxtaposition of those
two names to make him have a brain wave. And no
reason that I can see why this chap, Edinger, would have
to destroy Powell's case history, just because Sandlin's
name and the name of the Los Angeles sanitarium were
in it.”
"You're right!” Dundee assured him eagerly. "I admit
there's a missing link—something else in Clyde Powell's


274 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
history, I believe. Will you ask her if the name of Edinger
appeared in it, in any connection whatever?"
"Hold the line,” Dr. Harlow directed.
As Dundee waited, Sanderson spoke, frowningly:
“Even if Powell got a persecution complex against this
Edinger, through meeting him at Good Hope, when he
was visiting his wife, I don't see why it was so damned
necessary for Edinger-supposing he was the murderer-
to destroy the case history. The history had been on hand
at Mayfield for years, and it's hardly likely his name
occurring in the early pages of it would have meant a
thing to anyone but Koenig.”
"You forget that the first three letters of that name
were spelled out in Koenig's wire," Dundee reminded
him, his hand cupping the transmitter of the telephone.
“This murderer was the most cautious, cold blooded, far-
seeing bloke I ever heard of. He left absolutely nothing
to chance-except that one hidden drop of blood! He
foresaw that there was a bare possibility that the 'bust'
message would be traced to Dr. Koenig. Any scrap of
paper left in Koenig's possession, which would give the
remaining letters of the name, Edinger, had to be de-
stroyed. He couldn't simply file Powell's case history, in
the hope that it would not be read again, for there was the
letter attached, from the State Hospital, asking for excerpts
from it. . . . See? ... Hello! Yes, Dr. Harlow?"
He listened for a moment, thanked the little doctor,
and slowly replaced the receiver.
"No luck," he admitted gloomily. "Miss Horne is as
positive as Dr. Harlow that the name of Edinger was not
in Clyde Powell's history. She says she skimmed through
it when she got it out of the files for Dr. Koenig on
Wednesday, and had handled it several times before, when
additions were made to the record.”
"Too bad,” Sanderson sympathized. “Looks like an-
other blind alley.”


276 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
tell you, sir, ide all these dich Ramsey, eld at the
person. I tell you, sir, there's a solution to this case which
will explain and include all these apparent coincidences,
leaving only the coincidence that Edith Ramsey, under the
name of Enid Rambler, was a patient at Mayfield at the
time Edinger turned up to murder Dr. Koenig. An
unlucky coincidence for her, poor girl, for it puts her in
danger of her life.”
"Then we'd better make sure that her guard isn't a
victim of sleeping sickness," Sanderson said grimly.
"Right!” Dundee agreed heartily. "And I'll rest easier
tonight if I know our friend, Roland Morse, is also under
the watchful eye of an uninvited guest.'
"How does he fit into Edinger's description?" Sander-
son asked.
"Fairly well,” the special investigator answered. "He's
heavy, rather than fat, but diet and a medicine ball could
have taken care of that. I'd say he's a couple of inches
over the average in height, but police descriptions are not
apt to be astonishingly accurate, especially when they con-
cern the height of a very fat man. You've noticed that a
wide girth apparently takes inches off a man's height.
Morse's eyes are brown, all right, but I wouldn't call his
nose pug. It's quite a nose, in fact, but the nostrils are
rather noticeably wide. And it is an easy enough matter
to change one's nose, plastic surgeons being what they are
today. Morse's hair is pepper-and-salt, Edinger's was
black in 1919. In fact, Morse fits the bill so well that I'd
very much like to know exactly where he was during the
latter half of 1918 and the first half of 1919.”
"Odd, isn't it, how a criminal repeats himself,” San-
derson mused with satisfaction. "The voice of a dead
son offering ghostly comfort to his mother in 1919, the
voice of God wailing 'too late! under a bereaved mother's
window in 1931—with the same fiendish purpose: that of
driving a rich wife crazy."
"Yes,” Dundee agreed soberly. "And by a criminal's
repetitions ye shall know him—and hang him!"


CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
It was a very thoughtful young detective who, after a
lengthy conference with Captain Strawn of the Homicide
Squad, drove slowly the five miles from Hamilton to
Mayfield Sanitarium.
One question, which seemed rather irrelevant, per-
sisted in annoying Special Investigator Dundee: Why had
Dr. Koenig, so outstanding a man in his field, planned to
bring Dr. Horace Sandlin to Mayfield, if, as Professor
Livingstone of Northwestern University broadly hinted in
his telegram, Sandlin had a none too flattering reputa-
tion among his colleagues? Certainly Koenig had had
first-hand opportunity for judging Sandlin, since the two
psychiatrists had been opposing expert witnesses in the
Edinger case.
. The twin to that question also buzzed like a persistent
gnat at his ear: Why had Koenig determined, quite sud-
denly, it seemed, to dismiss Justine Harlow, who had
served him so faithfully and so well that he had willed
her half of his estate?
Even if Morse should prove to be Edinger—and who
else came anywhere near fitting that description, except
possibly Samuel Rowan?-how should he ever learn the
answer to those two questions? And Dundee wanted them
answered. A solution with loose ends was no solution,
to his type of mind. ...
Mayfield's lawn looked like the pleasure grounds of a
fashionable resort hotel, as Dundee drove in and parked
near the main building. In the warm late-afternoon sun,
patients were playing croquet, miniature golf, and bridge.
her halbim so faithio dismiss his determin
277


280 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
and Enid Rambler were one and the same person?”
Dundee asked.
"No! Why should it?”
"Was the handwriting similar?”
"Not similar enough to attract my attention, certainly!"
Baldwin retorted. “Let me think. I'm pretty good at
remembering details of that sort. . . . I've got it now!
The Edith Ramsey check was written in a bold, large
hand, that slanted sharply toward the right. Miss Ram-
bler's signature is always written in a very round back-
hand.”
"Exactly what I should have expected,” Dundee mur-
mured.
"Look here, Dundee!" Baldwin commanded sharply.
"I don't know what you're driving at, but if you've got
any wild notion that that girl is mixed up in Carl's mur-
der, you're crazier than any patient we've got here. She's
as fine and straight a girl as I ever met—and I'm not
speaking now as Mayfield's business manager, out to pro-
tect a rich patient from scandal. If, for some reason of
her own, Miss Rambler is here under an assumed name,
I'd stake my life that it's an innocent reason.”
"I'm sure you're right, Mr. Baldwin,” Dundee assured
him, and again set off across the lawn toward Sunflower
Court.
It was obvious, he reflected, that Enid Rambler—as he
still called her to himself—had managed to open a bank
account in Hamilton, by mail. Easy enough to send in a
large check, made out to Enid Rambler, signed by the
name of Edith Ramsey, and endorsed by Enid Rambler,
with a request that the money be deposited, when collected,
to the account of Enid Rambler. Even if a handwriting
expert had detected that payor and payee were the same
person, it was no legal offense to open a bank account in
an assumed name. But that first check, given to Baldwin,
had wiped out the last vestige of doubt that Enid Rambler


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 281
n saw in a formiche, girl Shoes
was Edith Ramsey. In this business, Dundee congratulated
himself, it paid to be sure~not "practically certain.”
“Yes, Enid's in her rooms,” Miss Doty assured him,
when he entered the reception room of Sunflower Court.
"Now, don't blush! I just knew that was what you were
going to ask!”
Having given up hope for herself, the day nurse had
apparently decided magnanimously to sponsor a romance
between this handsome young detective and the girl she
had previously acknowledged as a formidable rival.
Though what all the men saw in her, beyond the fact
that she was pretty "in a way,” Lurline Doty for the life
of her could not say. ...
Barney Flynn, the plainclothesman on duty outside the
door that led from Enid Rambler's suite into the patio,
showed a grateful inclination to talk when Dundee paused
to greet him.
"Yep! Everything's swell!” Flynn told him enthusiasti-
cally. *Say, Dundee, I don't care if you never solve this
here murder. It's the softest job I've struck in a coon's
age.”
"No trouble at all, I take it?" Dundee asked, smiling.
"You mean, does she try to make a get-away?” Flynn
asked. "Not that baby! She peeps out a dozen times a
day just to make sure I am here-cautions me not to
budge an inch. Pretty as paint, ain't she? ... And
sweet? Umm!” and the plainclothesman smacked his lips.
"But at that, I'm kinda sorry for the poor little thing.
Acts gay and chipper all the time, but she's scared, Dundee
-scared stiff. Why, today she made Miss Lacey, the
head nurse, have a set of heavy, barred screens put before
all her windows. Seems like they keep sets of 'em on
hand, to stick 'em in the windows of patients that sud-
denly go off their nuts.”
"Is anyone with her now?”
"Sure! They's always somebody running in and out,"


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 283
night out, like I had,” Rowan told them, sincerity vibrat-
ing in his uncultured voice. “Mr. Baldwin gave me that
little book, not dreaming what a miracle it would work
in me-
"But I'm sure he said it was 'good business' to give it
to you!” Enid laughed, but Dundee's quick ear caught a
note of hysteria in her voice. Probably old Rowan had
been boring her intolerably. . ..
"Then I reckon he'd be right,” Rowan told her, in
nowise offended by her laughter. “Good business for the
sanitarium to get rid of a charity patient, and good busi-
ness in a larger sense to set a man on his feet and put
him back into the world.”
"You really want to go back into the world, don't
you?” Enid asked softly. "I envy you, Mr. Rowan. But
I'm afraid I- "
"Afraid! Afraid!” the old man repeated solemnly.
"If I can get rid of that 'Old Man of the Sea'—that's
what the little book calls Fear—a young girl like you,
with every grace that God ever endowed a woman
with-
“But you don't know!” Enid interrupted, and tears
filled her eyes.
"If there's anything I do know, it's what fear can do
to a body," Rowan corrected her gently. “That big police-
man has been pestering me to tell him my story, but I
don't see no call to tell it to people it wouldn't help
He paused uncertainly, and Dundee cut in, gravely,
without too much eagerness: "I think you're right, Mr.
Rowan, but I'm sure both Miss Rambler and I would be
greatly helped by your experience.”
"Of course we should, Mr. Rowan,” Enid agreed
kindly, and Dundee saw that not even the prospect of
being bored could dim the fine luster of her courtesy.
The older man settled himself a bit more easily in his
chair, and Dundee waited, scarcely daring to breathe.
"Young people like you,” Rowan began, "with the


286
ONE DROP OF BLOOD
myself a murderer, and lots of other people think I'm
a murderer, too. That little book there, and Dr.
Koenig,
"But I don't understand!” the girl protested hotly. “It
was simply a terrible accident!”
"You see, little girl," Rowan told her gently, and with
no hint of familiarity, "if I'd acted soon as I saw that
rock coming down the mountain side, I could have saved
Melcie. And the rock would have killed me."
"But you couldn't-one can't think as quickly as all
that— " she cried brokenly, and Dundee knew that her
defense of Rowan was also a defense of herself.
“Melcie's brother, Curtis, found us there next morn-
ing,” the quiet voice went on. "I'd waited till dawn, not
knowing what to dohalf crazy— "
"Of course!" the girl agreed passionately.
"Well, Curtis told the folks he was with—a couple
giving him a hitch-all about the quarrel between me
and Melcie," Rowan continued very quietly. "The three
of 'em got their heads together and Curtis didn't have
much trouble making 'em believe I'd pitched the rock
down on my wife. They took me in to the nearest town
in the county, and turned me over to the sheriff.”
"Oh! Oh!” the girl moaned.
"I didn't much care what happened to me," Rowan
comforted her obliquely. "I stayed in jail till the grand
jury met, but they refused to indict, for lack of evi-
dence.”
"I should think they would!” Enid cried.
“They might as well a-hung me," Rowan said soberly.
"I knowed I was the biggest coward that ever-
"No! No!”
"They let me go, but I didn't seem to take no interest
in living," Rowan went on. "Finally, by the grace of
God, I got sent to Mayfield. Wednesday, after I'd read
that little book about casting out fear, I felt like I owed


ONE DROP OF BLOOD
287
it to Dr. Koenig, being as how he was so good to me, to
put the thing up to him fair and square. He asked me if,
deep down in my heart, I wanted my wife to be killed by
that rock. And I said no, she's been a good wife to me,
and I didn't bear no malice after that tiff we had at the
auto camp. Then he asked me—and there he hit the nail
on the head—whether I'd ruther it would a-been her than
me. And I told him, God being my witness, I'd ruther a
thousand times that rock had cracked my own skull wide
open than to a-seen it hit Melcie.”
"Of course you would!” Enid championed him almost
hysterically.
"Then he asked me what was eatin' on me,” Rowan
went on. "I said I couldn't get over it that I'd been a
coward—laying there like a lump oʻmud and letting it hit
her. Then he told me that the way I'd 'reacted,' as he
called it, was exactly what a psychiatrist would have ex-
pected. 'Suspended between the dream world and the
real world,' he said, my brain refused to differentiate'
between them. He said I'd been locked in a paralysis of
horror, just as real as if I'd been actually paralyzed. He
said I couldn't a-moved to a-saved my own life. He said
I wasn't to blame,” Rowan summed up simply.
“Oh, he was good!" Enid Rambler sobbed, hiding her
face behind convulsed hands.
"I just thought I might help you to get a new light on
your own little troubles,” Rowan said awkwardly, and
bent to touch one of her clenched hands. “I don't want to
see you old before your time, child. ... How old would
you take me to be?”
The girl dropped her hands and stared blankly at
Rowan with drowned eyes. Then her beautiful courtesy
asserted itself.
"Why—why, I wouldn't take you to be a day over
fifty-five,” she quavered.
"I'll be forty-three years old, come August," Samuel
face benie waren or Rowan susaved in


294 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
record he dictated during the five years since his retire-
ment,” Dr. Harlow assured him. "Such a precaution was
necessary, since Dr. Mayfield's memory was very erratic.
A year after he had dictated his comments on an interview
with a patient he might demand a transcription of the
record, sure that the interview had taken place only the
day before."
Maizie Horne spoke up. "Sometimes I'd have a simply
terrible time finding the one he wanted,” she said indul-
gently. “But I always humored him—no matter how busy
I was. Then maybe after all my trouble he'd have forgot
all about it by the time I handed him the typed copy."
"Did you keep these occasional transcriptions that
Dr. Mayfield asked for?” Dundee asked the secretary.
"Oh, yes. In a folder all by themselves," Maizie Horne
told him.
Two minutes later Dundee was in possession of the
small collection. It was a pitiful exhibit. Crisply phrased,
masterly commentaries on all sorts of psychopathic cases
either ended abruptly, on an unfinished note, or trailed off
into incoherencies that were, in themselves, indisputable
evidence of the writer's own mental condition. Not only
was Dundee disappointed to find nothing referring to
Clyde Powell, but he was inexpressibly saddened.
That feeling of rebellious sadness continued with him
after the young and mentally proud detective was admitted
to the old doctor's private apartment on the second floor
-primly neat now that its puttering old occupant was
dead—and left alone with the dictaphone and the huge
box of wax cylinders.
Dr. Mayfield had kept his dictaphone on a table beside
his bed. Resting there after the fatigue of interviewing
his "patients," he had recorded those facts and opinions
so important in his own eyes and so worthless in the eyes
of all others.
Now Dundee sat beside that table, listening to the rec-
evidencendee dibut he wellious s


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 295
know was de had died tryin Earl Koenige to my mem
Dr. Mayfielindum for Difa has just come
ord which contained the last words Dr. Cyrus Mayfield
had ever dictated. The wax of that cylinder had not been
called upon to immortalize a great many of Dr. Mayfield's
last utterances, but as Dundee listened to that reedy,
quavering, but dignified old voice, the hair stirred on his
scalp. During the last hours of his life the old doctor had
tried valiantly to get an audience with a man he did not
know was dead, and now Dundee was to know what
Dr. Mayfield had died trying to tell.
"Memorandum for Dr. Carl Koenig,” announced the
thin voice in his ear. "It has just come to my memory,
which I am afraid is not so good as it once was, Carl,
that I am by accident in possession of certain facts which
require immediate attention.”
Dundee held his breath as the record, blank for a few
revolutions, spun in silence. Then:
"A few nights ago when my attendant, 'Happy' Day-
and let me here register another protest against the useless
expense to my establishment of having attendants idling
about me—I repeat, when my attendant, Day, believed me
to be asleep he was visited in the sitting room of my
apartment by a young woman whom he called-ah-ah-
Mavourneen. ... No, another Irish word—Ah! Colleen!
That's it! Colleen! The old man's memory is pretty good
after all, eh, Carl?"
And while the ghostly chuckle spun the wax cylinder,
Dundee whistled softly in awe and astonishment. “A few
nights ago!" Good Lord! Colleen Lacey had been dead
three years!
"Without eavesdropping intentionally I learned that
the young woman, whose voice I recognized as belonging
to the stenographer who takes Miss Horne's place occa-
sionally, is about to become a mother. She demanded of
Day that he keep his promise to her to marry her, but he
told her that he was already married to a Catholic who
would not divorce him.
abpinse to my esegister another attendant, 'Happr'r


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 299
he looked something like a faithful mastiff, watching the
suffering of an adored mistress with dumb sympathy.
Dundee remained where he was until Strawn and
Brede, as noiselessly as Indians, had reached the guarded
door of Enid Rambler's suite. He saw them pass in, the
greased hinges of the door making no sound. Then,
walking normally, the young detective crossed the patio.
“Is there anything I can do, Miss Rambler?” he asked
softly, when he had reached her side.
The girl raised her head, then strained away from him,
cowering as if she expected him to strike her.
“Go away!" she panted. "I can't talk to you—I
mean— " Her hoarse whisper tripped over a terrible
fear that blighted her beauty. "I mean,” she repeated, "I
don't feel well. I don't feel like talking to anyone.”
"You mean,” Dundee corrected her gently,"that some-
one has just told you who I am—why I am here."
For a dreadful moment Dundee thought she was going
to faint, and that his carefully planned climax would
have to be delayed. But after that moment she opened her
dark blue eyes and looked at him with a hopeless sort of
courage that tore at his heart.
"You want me?" she said, and the words scarcely
moved her white lips.
"I want to talk with you—yes,” Dundee again cor-
rected her, very gently. "Shall we go into your sitting
room? . . . Let me help you!"
"No, thank you!" she refused his offer, struggling
with her crutches.
And Dundee, although his heart was nearly bursting
with pity for her, noted with keen satisfaction that, as she
swung herself painfully ahead of him, awkwardly manipu-
lating the crutches, her eyes darted terrified glances in
every direction, as if her supreme fear now was that she
be seen in his company.
Still preceding him, and avoiding even an accidental


300 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
contact with him as if he were a leper, the girl passed
through the little hall of her suite and on into the sitting
room. Dundee, following her, glanced quickly toward the
bedroom door. It was slightly ajar, but no carelessly
planted boot or protruding elbow hinted at the presence
of Strawn and Brede, who, he knew, were stationed in the
bedroom, impatiently awaiting developments.
In spite of the girl's repugnance Dundee drew up a
chair and relieved her of her crutches.
"I don't want to sit down!” she told him, bracing her-
self against the arm of the chair. “There's no need to talk.
... Shall we go now?"
“Go where?” Dundee asked, as if great surprise.
"To jail, of course!" she cried passionately, scornfully.
"There's no use pretending any longer-
"Really, Miss Rambler, there's no reason in the world
why I should take you to jail,” Dundee assured her, in a
reasonable, soothing voice. "Of course, material wit-
nesses”—he stressed the words, and paused to let them
sink in,—"are frequently held in technical custody, but in
this case "
"Wait!” she cried, and sank weakly into her chair.
And Dundee knew that, as he waited obediently, she
was trying to adjust herself to an incredible hope.
When she began, it was with a smile, a ghastly but gal-
lant smile. "I-I thought you were going to arrest me for
—for Dr. Koenig's murder, which would have been ridicu-
lous, of course," she babbled. “But detectives do make the
most absurd mistakes- ” Her voice broke on a sob of
relief, and again Dundee waited patiently for her to go
on. "I see now that you merely think I know something
about the murder that I've been concealing. I don't know
anything!” She concluded in a suddenly loud and ringing
voice.
"Is that so?” Dundee asked mildly, his face and voice
giving no sign that he understood for whose benefit that


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 303
He did not try to restrain her as she snatched up her
crutches, let her swing herself strongly, head high and
eyes blazing, from the room. For she was carrying out the
part he had devised for her as exactly as if she had read
the lines.
"No! Don't come in yet!” Dundee called in a low voice
to Strawn, who was edging into the room. “But have your
gun out—and ready!”
He himself waited in the sitting room until he heard the
tapping of crutches in the little hall. Then, noiselessly,
he joined Strawn and Brede in the sitting room.
"There's one difficulty," Dundee whispered to the older
detective. “She may be terrified to face him alone, when
he gets here."
"You're pretty sure she telephoned him, ain't you?"
Strawn asked skeptically. “But don't worry about her
being afraid! She's so damned sore she'd face him if he
was a man-eating tiger.”
And he was right. The girl was still in such a towering
rage that she did not seem even to notice that Dundee was
no longer there. She did not sit down, but stood, swung
between her crutches, her blazing eyes fixed upon the door
which Dundee confidently expected the murderer of Dr.
Koenig to open. For if the murderer did not come of his
own accord, after receiving that telephone message, Dun-
dee had made sure that he would be brought forcibly. ...
The sounds of an arrival came, however, before Dundee
expected them. How had he got here so soon?
With their eyes at the door crack Dundee and Strawn
heard the knock upon that other door, heard the girl's
ringing "Come in!” saw the door flung wide and a man's
figure framed for an instant before it leaped forward.
"Who's that?" Strawn hissed into Dundee's ear.
And Dundee muttered, blankly, "I don't know!"
But he knew in the next instant, for the newcomer, far
from assaulting the girl who, her crutches dropped, was
was And he was did not seeid not sit do
h-eating the The Seven to Tomis, but


CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
"WHAT do you want?"
From his place of concealment behind Edith Ramsey's
bedroom door Dundee's very flesh felt the blight of the
quiet, deadly coldness of Roger Baldwin's voice.
But apparently it had no power to chill the girl's terrific
anger. She was magnificent as she faced him, head high,
blue eyes blazing, her crutches forgotten.
"I want the joy of seeing your face when I tell you that
I am going to have you arrested for the murder of Dr.
Koenig!" she told him, her voice vibrating with a terrible
exultation.
Roger Baldwin smiled, but no light gleamed in the
strangely cold opaqueness of his brown eyes. Weird eyes
they were! No wonder Dr. Koenig had been haunted by
the certainty that he had seen them somewhere before. ...
Braced upon Dundee's shoulder, its muzzle thrust into
the crack of the partly opened door, was Captain Strawn's
revolver, and behind it was Captain Strawn's steady
trigger finger and steadier eye. Otherwise the young de-
tective would have been in a sweat of fear as the business
manager of Mayfield Sanitarium walked slowly, but with
deadly purposefulness to where the girl stood.
"You are insane, Miss Rambler,” Baldwin said unemo-
tionally, “You are suffering from a suicidal mania "
"Suicidal?" she laughed scornfully. "You know I saw
you come out of Dr. Koenig's office! You know I heard
you tearing up papers-
"~from a suicidal mania,” Baldwin repeated, in his
flat, unemphatic voice. "It will always be a great grief to
tective Woof Mayfield San where the gif doin said unen,
305


ONE DROP OF BLOOD 307
Edinger, alias Roger Baldwin, I arrest you for the murder
of Dr. Carl Koenig, and it is my duty to warn you that
anything you say may be used against you.”
The silence was profound for a long minute. Baldwin
closed his eyes in token that Dundee's warning was
superfluous.
Won't you please take him away now, out of my
rooms?” Edith Ramsey broke the silence, her voice sound.
ing very small and pitiful, but there was no hysteria in it.
Paul Van Twing's arms were around her. ...
"I'm sorry, Miss Ramsey,” Dundee answered sincerely,
"but I want to submit you to one more ordeal. I want
you to tell your story in this man's presence."
Brede, the police stenographer, automatically opened
his notebook.
"I shall be glad to!” the girl cried, righteous anger re-
turning to give her strength. "I've been sure for two days
- ever since Captain Strawn talked to me Thursday morn-
ing—that I was shielding Dr. Koenig's murderer, but I
didn't dare-Oh, I can never forgive him for making me
hate myself so!”
"Will you begin by telling how you happened to come
to this sanitarium, Miss Ramsey?” Dundee suggested
soothingly.
"Paul and I were driving on a lonely road. A man
stepped from the bushes right into the path of the car,"
she answered obediently. "I was driving. The suddenness
of it paralyzed me. I—it's happened to me before. ... I
couldn't think, I couldn't act. I-hit him. Paul and I both
thought he was dead. I seemed to go crazy. I must have
been crazy, or I shouldn't have run away when Paul, who
understood me, told me to. He said he would take all the
blame, that no one need ever know I'd been in the car.
I was a coward. I ran away. But I took my own automatic
that I've always carried on motor tours. It was in the
pocket of the car. Paul didn't know I took it. I meant to


ONE DROP OF BLOOD
311
Mr. Baldwin came to my suite and told me to go to the
movie. He said I'd enjoy it particularly. He didn't tell me
the name of the picture, said it would be a 'pleasant sur-
prise.' I knew it was a command I did not dare disobey,
so I went, along with Marjorie Merrick. It was— 'Man-
slaughter,'” she added, in a horrified whisper. "He'd got
it because he knew what effect it would have on me. It's
about a girl who kills a traffic policeman, and is put in
prison. I couldn't bear it. I thought I was really going
crazy. It was horrible. . . . But I meant to tell you some-
thing else he said to me when he ordered me to go to the
movie,” she interrupted herself. “He said Dr. Koenig
was 'suspicious,' that the doctor didn't believe there was
any real reason why I should be here. Of course I was ter-
rified at the thought of leaving my 'sanctuary.' I didn't
know that Mr. Baldwin had got the picture with the ex-
press purpose of making me so hysterical that Dr. Koenig
would let me stay on.”
Her voice shuddered to a pause, and Dundee took ad-
vantage of the opportunity to glance at the girl's audience.
Little Dr. Harlow sat very still and very straight, her eyes
disks of horror set in the chalky whiteness of her face. Dr.
Cantrell was listening with head bowed and shoulders
slumped, the image of despondency. Norah Lacey was
weeping silently and apparently unconscious of the tears
that trickled down her thin, freckled cheeks. Only Roger
Baldwin seemed unmoved by the girl's story of an incred-
ible inquisition.
"So you left the movie, Miss Ramsey?" Dundee prodded
gentles. Abo I tried to Koenigo wait up
"Yes. About half-past nine. As I told you, I was in a
terrible state. I tried to find someone to give me a bromide.
Finally I went to Dr. Koenig's door off the main hall, but
it was closed. So I decided to wait until he was not busy.
I sat down in the reception room. I heard some strange
noises, but they were not loud at all. Then I heard some-


314 ONE DROP OF BLOOD
him for protection. The temptation was too great. Possibly
there have been other patients here whose recovery Bald-
win has cunningly retarded. Certainly we know of one
other. . . . But let that rest for the moment.
"Tonight, after I was sure that Edinger was Baldwin,
I asked Dr. Harlow if Baldwin had been away on a busi-
ness trip recently. She told me that he had been to Chi-
cago, to confer with architects, during the month of May.
I knew, then, that the Sandlin mystery was solved.”
"Sandlin?" Cantrell echoed incredulously, and Dr. Har-
low lifted her eyes, which seemed suddenly to come alive
again.
"Of course it was Baldwin who negotiated with Dr.
Sandlin,” Dundee assured them impatiently. "I feel sure
that Baldwin ran into Sandlin by accident, when looking
over the Howard Memorial buildings with an architect.
Sandlin recognized Baldwin. And Sandlin, being as big a
crook if not so clever a one as Baldwin, threatened ex-
posure, if a suitable price for his silence was not forthcom-
ing. Baldwin could not face trial on the Edinger indict-
ment in Los Angeles, and he was much averse to turning
over hard cash to the man who had helped him in his
scheme against his wife. But he could—and would-pay
another price.”
"Get Sandlin into Mayfield and split the crooked profits
with him,” Strawn deduced happily.
“Right!” Dundee smiled. "But Koenig, when Baldwin
broached the subject to him, was not having any Sandlin,
thank you. That doctor wasn't good enough for Mayfield!
Baldwin, who had had a long conference in his own cot-
tage with Sandlin on Tuesday night-for of course it was
Baldwin and not Koenig whom Sandlin came to Hamilton
to visit-could see no way out. He insisted, as a partner,
on Koenig's considering Sandlin as an assistant psychia-
trist. Koenig made a note of the name on his desk calen-
dar, intending, no doubt, to investigate Sandlin thoroughly


316
ONE DROP OF BLOOD
Baldwin had slipped out of his own office just before nine
o'clock, and had staged that dreadful 'Voice of God' farce
beneath Mrs. Morse's windows.
"Shortly before half-past nine Dr. Koenig remembered
that Mrs. Cantrell was not well. He interrupted his work
of typing the excerpts from Clyde Powell's case history,
wanted by the State Hospital doctors, and telephoned Mrs.
Cantrell. As he talked, his eyes roamed idly. Then they
were arrested by a line in Clyde Powell's history that had
seemed unimportant before. That line was to the effect
that, at the sight of Roger Baldwin, the patient showed
fear, and suffered epileptiform seizures."
"Has the case history been found?” Dr. Harlow asked.
"No, it must have been completely destroyed,” Dundee
assured her. "But Baldwin did not know that a senile,
feeble old man had recorded the same interesting fact.”
"Did that doddering old fool- ?" Baldwin began,
then his lips snapped to.
"Exactly,” Dundee assured him. “It would have been
'good business' to clean out Dr. Mayfield's rooms thor-
oughly, wouldn't it, Baldwin? ... But possibly you were
saving those useless old dictaphone records of his, plan-
ning to have them shaved for future use?”
Baldwin did not reply.
"But how did that sentence in Powell's case history tip
the doctor off?” Strawn demanded, sorely puzzled. "It
wouldn't have meant anything to us if we'd seen it!”
"Right you are!" Dundee agreed triumphantly. “Bald-
win's guilty conscience made him a little too far-sighted.
Without the fact of that completely destroyed case his-
tory But to answer your question. The sentence con-
cerning Baldwin would have meant little to Koenig, even
troubled as he was about Baldwin's attitude toward the
sanitarium, if it had not occurred on the same page with
two other names—Good Hope Sanitarium and Dr. Horace
Sandlin. Those three names leaping into his vision almost









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