Эллери Куин - Dutch Shoe Mystery

“Ah! Then you mean you overheard no statement or question of any kind from Dr. Janney during the entire course of his visit to this room?” asked Ellery quickly.

“Not a syllable,” said Dr. Byers. Miss Obermann nodded in agreement.

“Do you remember hearing a door open and close in here and a voice say, ‘Pardon me!’?”

“I don’t believe I do.”

“You, Miss Obermann?”

“No, sir.”

Ellery whispered into the Inspector’s ear. The Inspector sucked his lip, nodded, motioned imperiously to a Swedish-looking detective of solid build. “Hesse!” The man slouched near. “Get this straight now, won’t you? Go out into the operating-room and ask the doctors and internes if any one of them poked his head in here between 10:30 and 10:45. And bring him back.”

While Hesse departed on his errand the Inspector dismissed Dr. Byers and the nurse. Janney watched them go with gloomy eyes. Ellery conversed with his father until the door reopened to admit a young dark-haired man of Semitic cast, dressed like the others in white Hospital regalia. Hesse herded him into the room.

“Dr. Gold,” said Hesse briefly. “He was the one.”

“Yes,” said the young interne at once, addressing himself to the diminutive Inspector, “I stuck my head in through that door—” he pointed to the door leading to the West Corridor — “about 10:35, I should say, looking for Dr. Dunning to ask about a diagnosis. Of course I immediately saw it wasn’t Dr. Dunning — saw it just as I opened the door — so I excused myself without going in and went away.”

Ellery leaned forward. “Dr. Gold, how far did you open the door?”

“Oh, just about a foot or so — enough to get my head in. Why?”

“Well,” smiled Ellery, “why not? At any rate, whom did you see?”

“Some doctor — don’t know who it was.”

“How did you know it wasn’t Dunning?”

“Why, Dr. Dunning is tall and thin, and this man was rather short and stocky — cut of the shoulders was different — I don’t know — simply wasn’t Dr. Dunning.”

Ellery polished his pince-nez vigorously. “And how was this doctor standing — tell me what you saw when you opened the door.”

“His back was to me, and he was slightly bent over the wheel-table. His body concealed whatever was on the table.”

“His hands?”

“I couldn’t see them.”

“Was he the only person in the room?”

“Only one I could see. Of course, the patient must have been on the table; but as for any one else, I can’t say.”

The Inspector cut in gently. “You said, ‘Oh pardon me!’, didn’t you?”

“Yes, sir!”

“And what did the man reply?”

“Why, nothing. Didn’t even turn around, although I saw his shoulders sort of twitch when I spoke. Anyway, I stepped back, closed the door and went away. The whole business didn’t take more than ten seconds.”

Ellery approached Dr. Gold, tapped him on the shoulder. “One thing more. Might this man have been — Dr. Janney?”

The young interne drawled, “Oh-h, I suppose so. But it might have been a dozen others, too, from what I saw... Anything wrong, Doctor?” He twisted his head to stare at the surgeon, who did not reply. “Well, I guess I’ll be going if that’s all...”

The Inspector cheerily waved him out

“Get Cobb — the doorman.” Hesse sauntered out.

“Good God,” said Janney quite tonelessly. No one paid the slightest attention.

The door opened to admit Hesse and Isaac Cobb, the crimson-faced ‘special.’ His cap was jauntily set on his head and he looked around expansively, as if he felt a kinship with these men of the police.

The Inspector wasted no words. “Cobb, stop me if I say something that isn’t so... You approached Dr. Janney while Mr. Queen and Dr. Minchen were talking with him in the corridor. You told him that a man wanted to see him. He refused at first, but when you handed him the man’s card — bearing the name ‘Swanson’ — he changed his mind and followed you down the corridor toward the Waiting Room. What happened then?”

“The Doctor says ‘Hello’ t’ this man,” replied Cobb in a conversational tone, “an’ then they went out of the Waiting Room, turned t’ the right — ye know Dr. Janney’s office is that way — an’ they went into the Doctor’s office. An’ they closed the door — I mean the Doctor. So I went back t’ my station in the vestibule an’ I stood there all th’ rest of the time until Dr. Minchen came along an’ said...”

“One moment, one moment!” said the Inspector testily. “Granted that you didn’t leave your post for a moment. Suppose—” he glanced at Dr. Janney, who was hunched up in his corner, suddenly tense, alert — “suppose Dr. Janney or his visitor had decided to leave Dr. Janney’s office to go toward the, let us say, operating-rooms, could he have passed without your seeing him?”

The doorman scratched his head. “Sure! I guess so. I don’t always face the inside. Sometimes I open th’ door and look out into th’ street.”

“Did you look out into the street this morning?”

“Well — sure! I guess so.”

Ellery interrupted. “You say Dr. Minchen came along and told you to lock the door. How long before this did Dr. Janney’s visitor — this man Swanson — leave the building? By the way, he left the building, didn’t he?”

“Oh, sure!” Cobb grinned broadly. “Even gave me — I mean wanted to give me a quarter. But I wouldn’t take it — against the regulations... Yes, I’d say this feller passed out into th’ street about ten minutes or so before Dr. Minchen gave me the order.”

“Did any one else,” continued Ellery, “go out of that front door between the time Swanson left and the time you locked the door?”

“Nary a soul.”

Ellery confronted Dr. Janney, who immediately straightened and looked off into space. “There’s a little matter, Doctor,” Ellery began softly, “that we haven’t had time to settle. You recall, don’t you? I believe you were about to tell me who your visitor was when the Inspector came in and...” He broke off with a tightening of his lips as the door banged open and Sergeant Velie stalked in, flanked by two detectives.

“Ah, well,” said Ellery with a slight smile, “we seem doomed to defer the fatal question... Carry on, sire. Messer Velie seems bursting with information.”

“Well, Thomas?” demanded the Inspector.

“No one left the Hospital since 10:15 except Dr. Janney’s visitor. Cobb told us about this Swanson a few minutes ago outside,” Velie growled. “Got a list of some people who came into the building during that time, but we’ve checked ’em over and they’re all accounted for. Got ’em all in the building too — we haven’t let any one go out.”

The Inspector beamed. “Excellent, Thomas, excellent! there you are, Ellery,” he exclaimed, turning to his son, “the Queen luck for you. Our murderer’s still in the building. Can’t get away!”

“Probably doesn’t want to,” said Ellery dryly. “I shouldn’t be too hopeful about that ... And, dad—”

“Well?” said the Inspector, suddenly glum. Janney looked up with a peculiar gleam in his eye.

“A persistent idea has been buzzing about in my conk,” said Ellery dreamily. “Let’s assume, for the sake of argument and—” he bowed toward the surgeon — “and I should hope for the sake of Dr. Janney, that the gentleman who perpetrated this plot was not Dr. Janney but a rank and nervy impostor.”

“Now you’re talking sense,” growled Janney.

“And let us go further in our supposition,” continued Ellery, rocking on his toes and gazing at the ceiling, “by assuming that our slippery criminal, having a dark but valid reason for putting as much distance as possible between himself and the clothes which he wore, divested himself of these figuratively bloody garments and hid them somewhere... Now we know that he hasn’t left the building. Is it too much to hope that by assiduously scouring the premises...”