The suspects against whom nothing could be proved were released and kept under surveillance. Pol Akkra, and all the proved Naturists, were sentenced to prefrontal lobotomies. Margret Akkra, in return for her help in solving the mystery, secured permission to take her father home with her. A purged and docile man, he was quite capable of the routine duties of housekeeping.
The killing of Madolin Akkra was solved. But one question remained: how and why had she been in Central Park at all?
The answer, when it came, was surprising and embarrassingly simple. And this is the part that has never been told before.
Pol Akkra, a mere simulacrum of the man he had been, no longer knew his living daughter or remembered his dead one. But in the recesses of his invaded brain some faint vestiges of the past lingered, and occasionally and unexpectedly swam up to his dreamlike consciousness.
One day he said suddenly: "Didn't I once know a girl named Madolin?"
"Yes, father," Margret answered gently, tears in her eyes.
"Funny about her." He laughed his ghastly Zombie chuckle. "I told her that was a foolish idea, even if it was good Nat—Nat-something theory."
"What idea was that?"
"I—I've forgotten," he said vaguely. Then he brightened. "Oh, yes, I remember. Stand barefoot in fresh soil for an hour in the light of the full moon and you'll never catch cold again.
"She was subject to colds, I think." (About the only disease left we have as yet no cure for.) He sighed. "I wonder if she ever tried it."