“Warner Pearcy?” asked Craig. “Was he here last night?”
“Nearly every night,” replied Josephson, now glib enough as his first excitement subsided and his command of English returned. “He was a neighbor of Mr. Minturn’s, I hear. Oh, what luck!” growled Josephson as the name recalled him to his present troubles.
“Well,” remarked Kennedy with an attempt at reassurance as if to gain the masseur’s confidence, “I know as well as you that it is often amazing what a tremendous shock a man may receive and yet not be killed, and no less amazing how small a shock may kill. It all depends on circumstances.”
Josephson shot a covert look at Kennedy. “Yes,” he reiterated, “but I cannot see how it could be. If the lights had become short-circuited with the bath, that might have thrown a current into the bath. But they were not. I know it.”
“Still,” pursued Kennedy, watching him keenly, “it is not all a question of current. To kill, the shock must pass through a vital organ—the brain, the heart, the upper spinal cord. So, a small shock may kill and a large one may not. If it passes in one foot and out by the other, the current isn’t likely to be as dangerous as if it passes in by a hand or foot and then out by a foot or hand. In one case it passes through no vital organ; in the other it is very likely to do so. You see, the current can flow through the body only when it has a place of entrance and a place of exit. In all cases of accident from electric light wires, the victim is touching some conductor—damp earth, salty earth, water, something that gives the current an outlet and—”
“But even if the lights had been short-circuited,” interrupted Josephson, “Mr. Minturn would have escaped injury unless he had touched the taps of the bath. Oh, no, sir, accidents in the medical use of electricity are rare. They don’t happen here in my establishment,” he maintained stoutly. “The trouble was that the coroner, without any knowledge of the physiological effects of electricity on the body, simply jumped at once to the conclusion that it was the electric bath that did it.”
“Then it was for medical treatment that Mr. Minturn was taking the bath?” asked Kennedy, quickly taking up the point.
“Yes, of course,” answered the masseur, eager to explain. “You are acquainted with the latest treatment for lead poisoning by means of the electric bath?”
Kennedy nodded. “I know that Sir Thomas Oliver, the English authority who has written much on dangerous trades, has tried it with marked success.”
“Well, sir, that was why Mr. Minturn was here. He came here introduced by a Dr. Gunther of Stratfield.”