In the laboratory, Kennedy quietly set to work. He began by tearing from the germ letter the piece of gelatine and first examining it with a pocket lens. Then, with a sterile platinum wire, he picked out several minute sections of the black spot on the gelatine and placed them in agar, blood serum, and other media on which they would be likely to grow.
“I shall have to wait until to-morrow to examine them properly,” he remarked. “There are colonies of something there, all right, but I must have them more fully developed.”
A hurried telephone call late in the day from Miss Sears told us that Mrs. Blake herself had begun to complain, and that Dr. Wilson had been summoned but had been unable to give an opinion on the nature of the malady.
Kennedy quickly decided on making a visit to the doctor, who lived not far downtown from the laboratory.
Dr. Rae Wilson proved to be a nervous little woman, inclined, I felt, to be dictatorial. I thought that secretly she felt a little piqued at our having been taken into the Blakes’ confidence before herself, and Kennedy made every effort to smooth that aspect over tactfully.
“Have you any idea what it can be?” he asked finally.
She shook her head noncommittally. “I have taken blood smears,” she answered, “but so far haven’t been able to discover anything. I shall have to have her under observation for a day or two before I can answer that. Still, as Mrs. Blake is so ill, I have ordered another trained nurse to relieve Miss Sears of the added work, a very efficient nurse, a Miss Rogers.”
Kennedy had risen to go. “You have had no word about your car?” he asked casually.
“None yet. I’m not worrying. It was insured.”
“Who is this arch criminal, Dr. Hopf?” I mused as we retraced our steps to the laboratory. “Is Mrs. Blake stricken now by the same trouble that seems to have affected Buster?”