II
Detective Carr was keeping his last appointment with Dr. Perry. The doctor was putting a root canal filling into the first molar on the upper left-hand side. The “nerve” or dental pulp had been removed and it remained only to seal the cavity with gutta percha and insert the amalgum filling.
The detective was seated comfortably in the dentist’s chair. Dr. Perry was standing nearby preparing his instruments.
“Not at all, Doctor,” said Carr in answer to a question by the dentist. “Detective work is not nearly as exciting as it is commonly supposed to be. It’s mostly dull, routine labor. Of course there are exceptions.
“I was working on a case not so long ago — quite an ordinary affair. A murder had been committed and the suspect had disappeared. My job was simply to tramp the streets and keep my eyes open. Hard work, Doctor, and not exactly exciting. I met the fellow by accident and arrested him. But when at headquarters the man removed his hat, I received the shock of my life. The prisoner was almost completely bald and yet it had been definitely proved that five days previous — when the crime had been committed — he had a crop of long, thick, brown hair.
“But this circumstance which at first seemed to ruin our case — the prisoner of course denied he was the wanted man — eventually proved his undoing. Men don’t usually lose a thick crop of hair in five days, we were sure of that. We consequently deduced that the prisoner had made himself bald by some artificial method. Rather unique, eh? You frequently hear of men disguising themselves by putting on wigs, but they seldom effect a disguise by pulling out their natural hair.
“Well, while the entire department was trying to puzzle out a way of proving that the suspect had removed his own hair, nature herself solved the mystery for us. The man was held in jail without bail. After three weeks the entire top of his head blossomed out like grass in the spring. That clinched it, of course. He confessed that he had first cut his hair short and then removed the hairs with an electric needle. This process required a couple of days, but his trick would have worked, if he could have applied the needle again on his hair as soon as it grew.”
The doctor, keeping his back turned to the detective, replied:
“A unique case, Mr. Carr. You might call it a bald murder.”
The detective laughed.
Then after a pause:
“We were talking last time of the murder of Mr. Kirven. Have you changed your mind and accepted my theory that the missing Mr. Lesser in all probability remained in the city and made the bold stroke of adopting some mode of life which brings him into contact with many persons daily?”
The doctor stiffened perceptibly. “An ingenious theory, Mr. Carr. But to judge from the newspaper accounts of Mr. Lesser, he was probably not clever enough to work out so subtle a scheme.”
There was little conversation after that. Dr. Perry worked in almost complete silence on the tooth until the task was completed. The detective noticed that the dentist’s hands were a trifle unsteady.
Detective Carr left the office determined to proceed quickly and openly against Dr. Perry. He had reached the conclusion that he had succeeded in tormenting the doctor into such a state of “nerves” that he would be unable to stand up under a grilling at headquarters. It was Carr’s intention to consult the district attorney about the advisability of obtaining a warrant for Dr. Perry’s arrest.
While Carr was on his way to the district attorney’s office both of his shoe laces became loosened. He bent over to tie them. He held his head down for several minutes.
Then, just as Detective Carr entered the district attorney’s office, a strange phenomenon occurred. The detective was suddenly seized with a convulsion; he fell to the floor and his body became rigid.
A doctor was immediately summoned, but although Carr lived for almost an hour and a half, he could not be again brought to consciousness.
The symptoms — the rigid muscles, the stiffness at the back of the neck, the asphyxia, the wide open and fixed eyes, the risus sardonicus (drawn aside mouth) — convinced the doctor that Detective Carr had been poisoned with strychnine. The post-mortem investigation, however, only added another element of mystery to the tragedy. A chemical analysis of the stomach contents showed positively that no strychnine was present.
If the doctor’s diagnosis proved to be correct, it followed that strychnine must have been injected by a hypodermic syringe. But no needle was found on the dead man. It was also not clear why Carr — assuming it was suicide — had gone about it in this queer fashion. Symptoms of strychnine poisoning usually appear within twenty minutes or less after the poison is taken. Where had Detective Carr been before he came to the attorney’s office? Before the mystery could be solved that question had to be answered.
III
Dr. Raymond K. Perry experienced a queer feeling even during the first visit of Detective Carr. He had the premonition that the detective had penetrated his disguise. When, a few days later, the dentist was visited by a former client of Lesser & Kirven — who came ostensibly to have his teeth cleaned — Perry’s fears increased.
A short time after, three of the former clients of Lesser & Kirven were in the restaurant in which the detective took his lunch. Dr. Perry was then certain.
Detective Carr had identified him as the missing William Lesser. Dr. Perry knew that his arrest was imminent. Had any doubts remained, the actions of the detective himself would have cleared them away. The detective began referring — casually — to the Kirven case. He somehow managed to bring up this matter during every consultation. And he spoke of artificially induced baldness as an effective means of disguise.
The doctor was aware that in the beginning the detective was a trifle uncertain, but with each visit the uncertainty gradually resolved itself into conviction. Dr. Perry was in a continuous state of suspense.
It became obvious finally that the detective would arrest him. The dentist knew that an arrest would be his ruin. He would be unable to account for any of his actions previous to the last ten months. And if they held him in jail without bail — as is customary in murder indictments — his hair would start growing and that would expose him.
The dentist, of course, could have fled. But that would be equivalent to a confession of guilt. He would invite a man hunt. Also he would have to sacrifice all the money he had gained by the murder of Kirven. This money was tied up in real estate. If he attempted to make a sale, he would be merely inviting immediate arrest.
There seemed to be but one other alternative. From the fact that he was never shadowed, the dentist reasoned that Detective Carr had not mentioned his suspicions to any other police officials. There was every indication that only Detective Carr was privy to the secret.
If, therefore, a way could be found to dispose of Detective Carr, the status quo would be maintained and Dr. Perry could keep living in comfort the rest of his life. As the dentist figured it, nothing could be lost by a second murder. They can’t do more than electrocute a man. The murder certainly seemed to be an absolute necessity...
During the detective’s last visit, the dentist made him an amalgum filling for the first molar on the upper left-hand side. The dental pulp or “nerve” had been killed with arsenic and removed previously. It remained only to put in the gutta percha point, seal it with liquid gutta percha and close the top of the cavity with amalgum.