The following evening, when the last visitor's bell had sounded and the patients were bedded down for the night, Dr. Smith was staring unblinkingly into the dark shadows of his room. He had been given a sleeping pill at 9:30, but had held it under his tongue until the nurse left, and then had put it on the night table behind his thick-rimmed glasses. He seemed to be struggling with a problem. Once he turned on the night light, put on his glasses and made several rapid sketches that vaguely resembled a spider web.
A half hour later, his eyes began to droop. He picked up the sleeping pill, rolled it between his thumb and forefinger, then put it back on the table. His breathing became deeper.
A sound startled him awake. It was an odd sound, not a part of the subdued hospital noises. It was a persistent, metallic, scraping sound, and it came from outside his window.
Dr. John O'Hara Smith grabbed his glasses and rolled out of bed. He bunched up his pillow under the covers and crawled into the deeper darkness of the corner to the left of the window, which was open several inches. He crouched there, knees quivering from weakness.
There followed an interval of almost inaudible prying at the screen, broken by periods of silence as someone outside the second-story window apparently paused to listen. Finally, the screen was released with a faint pop. The lower half of the double-hung window eased upwards.
Again there was silence, save for the distant clatter of the self-service elevator.
Abruptly, a pencil-thin beam of light shot through the room, toward the bed. It focussed on the mound made by the pillow.
Short tongues of flame leaped out three times, with soft, spitting sounds. The pillow and the tangle of blankets twitched realistically.
The beam of light winked out; the screen plopped back into place. There were a few hasty, sliding noises of retreat, and that was all.
John O'Hara Smith's breath came in short, strained gasps, as though he were choked up with asthma. When he got control of himself, he eased back the edge of the drape and looked out the window. It was nearly twenty feet to the ground. A car turned off the boulevard, and came up the side street. The glow of its headlights briefly silhouetted the ladder angled against the side of the hospital.