“Why, yes,” I murmured idiotically. “Murder is unconventional.”
“So you see, the counts against Corole are interesting, to say the least. Then, there are the others at that ill-fated dinner party. We shall have to consider the possible culpability of every single one of them—even of you, Miss Keate.” He added this with a half smile but I did not relish his joke—if joke it was. I was inclined to think it was not.
“Corole Letheny,” he checked her off on his fingers. “Because her revolver was found in the closet of Room 18, because she knew of the radium being in use and of the hospital routine and of the door being left unlocked and because she benefits by Dr. Letheny’s death.”
“But I’m sure she did not know what had happened to the radium,” I said, going hastily on to tell him of her questions concerning it.
“She shows considerable interest, however,” commented O’Leary. “And at an inappropriate time, too. Yes, we must consider Corole.”
“But she—oh, she could not have done that!” I cried, revolted.
“We can’t be sure of anything, Miss Keate, until it is proved,” remarked O’Leary drily. “Then, there is Dr. Hajek; he was like the others, familiar with the circumstances, he had access to the morphine, being a doctor, and his coat was damp when, after some delay, you finally succeeded in rousing him, which, of course, leads one to believe that he was absent from his room and had recently been out in the rain.”
“But,” I objected, “Dr. Hajek was the only one of us who did not admit to wanting money—if we are to consider the radium as the motive.”
“That does not prove anything. Indeed, it was more natural to admit a desire that everybody experiences at one time or another. Then, there was Dr. Balman. He, too, was familiar with the circumstances. Of course there remains the important questions of how Dr. Letheny comes into the puzzle, and whether Dr. Balman could have had time to drive to his apartment in order to be there when the telephone rang to call him back to the hospital.”
“Why, yes,” I said thoughtfully. “He could have done so. You see, just as the storm broke and I was at the south door, closing it, I saw the lights of a car on the lower road. That could have been Dr. Balman. But the idea is absurd. Dr. Balman is too mild, too kind—too—— Oh! It is impossible!”