“Yes,” she said. “Yes. I’ll call him immediately.”
I was too disturbed to worry over Maida’s aversion to telephoning to Dr. Letheny, although it was to recur to me later. I set the candle down again, wishing that the lights would come on and that my knees would not shake.
It was clear to me, even in those first terrifying moments, that the radium had been stolen. And a hideous conjecture was slowly settling upon me. It did not seem possible that my patient had died a natural death!
What had caused his death?
It is strange how one’s hair prickles at the roots when one is frightened. My hair stirred and I peered fearfully about the room. A curious sense of something evil and loathsome near at hand was creeping over me. The room, however, was as bare as any hospital room. I even took the candle in my hand, and holding my teeth tight together to restrain a disposition toward chattering, I made a circuit of the room, holding the candle into the corners. Of course, there was nothing there. Indeed, there was scarcely any place to hide in the whole room. There were the usual shallow closets, two of them, barely large enough for a patient’s travelling bag and clothes. I opened one closet which held a bag and a light overcoat. The other one was locked and the key gone, probably lost by some student nurse.
The candle was dripping hot wax on my hand so I placed it again on a saucer on the table.
Maida had been gone for some time, surely time enough to rouse the whole hospital staff. A thousand fears crossed my mind while I stood there waiting; my eyes kept travelling from one corner of the room to the other, and the feeling of a presence near me other than that of the dead man on the bed became stronger with the dragging seconds.
I was beginning to think that I could remain no longer in that fear-haunted room, with only the ghastly flickering of the candle-light for company, when there was a quick rush of footsteps and Maida was in the room, panting, her eyes black and frightened.
“Dr. Letheny is out,” she cried. “Corole didn’t know where he was. She said he wasn’t anywhere in the house. She thought he had gone for a walk in the orchard and got caught in the storm.”
“A fine time to go for a walk,” I cried, fright making me irritable.