“Put him down there,” said the doctor.
They stretched Paul Pry out on the table.
“Which leg?” asked the doctor.
“Right.”
He passed exploring fingers over it.
“Something seemed to happen and all the strength went out of it. It’s pricking like pins and needles now,” said Paul Pry.
The doctor frowned, flexed the leg.
“Humph.”
The cab driver grinned cheerfully at Paul Pry.
“Well,” he said, “I’ll run along.”
“Better drive the cab up and wait,” said Paul Pry.
“O.K., boss.”
The two men ambled awkwardly out of the room. The doctor drew the bathrobe about him and regarded Paul Pry speculatively.
“Any peculiar feeling about the heart?” he asked.
“None,” said Paul Pry.
“Notice any sudden pain just above the leg when it gave out?”
“None.”
“Nervous?”
“Very. I can’t sleep. I got all sorts of strange symptoms.”
The doctor felt the leg again.
“I’ll go get some clothes on,” he announced, “and we’ll give you a once-over.”
“Sorry to bother you,” said Paul Pry. “I’m feeling better now. The circulation seems to be coming back.”
“In any pain?” asked the doctor.
“Just the pins and needles.”
The doctor crossed to a cabinet, took out a bottle, poured a few drops into a glass of water.
“Drink this,” he said. “I’ll dress and come in again. I won’t be three minutes.”
“O.K.,” said Paul Pry and sipped at the glass.
The doctor left the room.
Paul Pry got up and dumped the mixture down the sink, crossed on swift, silent feet into the office which was next to the surgical room, and stared at the flat-topped desk, the bookcase, the card index of files.
He opened the files. The light which came from the surgical room enabled him to pick out the letters of the index. He consulted the “B’s” and pulled out a card marked “Beeker, Laura.”
Then Paul Pry noticed a day book on the desk. He opened it and consulted the current date. It appeared that, between eleven and twelve, Doctor Manwright had treated a gentleman who gave the name of Frank Jamison.
Paul Pry went to the card index, and pocketed the card of Frank Jamison. Then he went back to the surgical room and stretched out on the operating table, closing his eyes and breathing regularly.
The doctor came into the room within a few minutes, looking gravely professional. The depression had undoubtedly hit the medical business, and Paul Pry felt certain that the doctor would at least lay a foundation for a stiff charge for a night visit.
Nor was he wrong. For twenty minutes the doctor examined him. At the end of that time, there was doubt and a certain suspicion in the doctor’s eyes.
“You’d better come back tomorrow afternoon. What’s the name?”
“George Inman.”
“Where do you live?”
“Billington Hotel.”
“Age?”
“Twenty-six.”
“Ever had any heart trouble, dizzy spells, rheumatism?”
Paul Pry nodded gloomily.
“I feel dizzy every once in a while,” he said, “and I used to have rheumatism in my right shoulder.”
The doctor sucked in a yawn.
He pulled a card from a drawer, filled it out, yawned again.
“Come tomorrow afternoon at any time between two and four. The charge for this visit is — twenty dollars.”
Paul Pry produced his wallet, took out the bills, peeled off a twenty. The doctor glimpsed a couple of the hundreds and one that seemed even larger in denomination. He ceased to yawn.
“I may want to put you in a hospital for observation,” he said. “It’s a baffling case.”
“Nothing serious?” asked Paul Pry.
“I can’t tell — yet.”
Paul Pry tested the leg.
“Feel all right?”
“Yes, sorta numb, but all right. I can walk.”
“Go to your hotel and go to bed,” said Doctor Manwright.
Paul Pry hobbled to the door. The cab driver was waiting to assist him to the cab.
“Billington Hotel,” said Paul Pry.
“O.K.,” said the driver.
The doctor bowed, said good morning, and closed the door. Paul Pry hobbled into the cab.
4
At the Billington Hotel Paul Pry registered as George Inman and was given a room.
“There’s a telephone call for you,” said the clerk. “The party seemed very anxious to have you call as soon as you came in.”
He handed Paul Pry a number.
“O.K.,” said Paul Pry.
He went to his room, tipped the bellboy, pocketed the key and went out.
“Did you call the number?” asked the clerk.
“I called it,” said Paul Pry.
The clerk nodded, snapped the lock on the safe, yawned. Paul Pry boarded a cruising cab. The address which he gave was within a block of the place where the girl had driven him into the private driveway which terminated in the mysterious garage at the rear of the apartment house of such unconventional design.
Paul Pry told the cab to wait, walked the block, climbed a fence, and found himself in the cemented courtyard in the rear of the apartment house. He opened the back door, climbed the carpeted stairs.
He paused at the door of the girl’s apartment long enough to go through the formality of pressing the button of the door signal. As he had expected, there was no answer, no sign of life from within.
Paul Pry produced a flat leather receptacle which contained some two dozen keys, chosen for general efficiency. He opened the door with the third key, boldly switched on the light and walked in.
He closed and bolted the door, lit a cigarette, hummed a little tune, and walked into the bedroom.
The young woman had left her evening clothes, crumpled into a careless wad, and thrown on the bed. She had evidently donned a plain street suit which would be inconspicuous. The white fur coat was hanging in the closet.
Paul Pry looked on the top of the dresser, frowned, prowled about the drawers, paused to consider, and then went to the closet and put his hand in the pocket of the fur coat. His face lit with a smile of satisfaction as his questing fingers closed on a folded sheet of paper. He pulled it out.
It was the typewritten note that the woman had taken from the messenger boy.
Paul Pry read it.
All right, Lola, we’ve got Bill Sacanoni. He goes for a ride unless we get what we want and get it in a hurry. First, we want ten grand stuck in a bag and delivered at the place we told you. Second, we want George Inman put on the spot. You’ve stuck up for him and shielded him long enough. We know all about him. You’ve got until daylight to do your stuff. Then Bill gets his. We know you can get the coin, but we want to be sure about Inman.
The note was unsigned.
Paul Pry thrust it in his pocket, paused, halfway to the door, then returned and put it back in the pocket of the fur coat. He clicked off the lights, opened the door and slipped out into the corridor.
He walked to the cab, and told the driver to take him to a certain street corner near the wholesale district. That corner was near the spot where Paul Pry maintained a secret apartment, a place where he could live and be reasonably safe from danger while he formulated his plans, rested between coups.
He discharged the cab, made certain that he was not followed, and entered the apartment. Mugs Magoo blinked glassy eyes at him.
“You still here?”
“Sure. Where’d you think I was going?”
“To keep an appointment with the undertaker.”
“Not yet.”
Mugs Magoo grunted, reached for the bottle of whiskey that was at his elbow.