“Oh, Walter, on Broadway? No, of course not. But cobra venom has a medicinal value. It is sent here in small quantities for various medicinal purposes. Then, too, it would be easy to use it. A scratch on the hand in the passing crowd, a quick shoving of the letter into the pocket of the victim—and the murderer would probably think to go undetected.”
We stood dismayed at the horror of such a scientific murder and the meagreness of the materials to work on in tracing it out.
“That dream was indeed peculiar,” ruminated Craig, before we had really grasped the import of his quick revelation.
“You don’t mean to say that you attach any importance to a dream?” I asked hurriedly, trying to follow him.
Kennedy merely shrugged his shoulders, but I could see plainly enough that he did.
“You haven’t given this letter out to the press?” he asked.
“Not yet,” answered Dr. Leslie.
“Then don’t, until I say to do so. I shall need to keep it.”
The cab in which we had come to the hospital was still waiting. “We must see Mrs. Maitland first,” said Kennedy, as we left the nonplused coroner and his assistants.
The Maitlands lived, we soon found, in a large old-fashioned brownstone house just off Fifth Avenue.