This conclusion, while interesting, was not really helpful. The fact was that Malone needed more clues—or, anyhow, more facts—before he could do anything at all. And there just weren't any new facts around. He spent the week wandering morosely from one place to another, sometimes accompanied by Thomas Boyd and sometimes all alone. Time, he knew, was ticking by at its usual rate. But there wasn't a thing he could do about it.
He did try to relax and have some fun, as Burris had suggested. But he didn't seem to be able to get his mind off the case.
Boyd, after the first little while, had no such trouble. He entered the social life of the city with a whoop of joy and disappeared from sight. That was fine for Boyd, Malone reflected, but it did leave Malone himself just a little bit at loose ends.
Not that he begrudged Boyd his fun. It was nice that one of them was enjoying himself, anyway.
It was just that Malone was beginning to get fidgety. He needed to be doing something—even if it were only taking a walk.
So he took a walk, and ended up, to his own surprise, downtown near Greenwich Village.
And then he'd been bopped on the head.
IV.
The patrol car pulled up in front of St. Vincent's Hospital and one of the cops helped Malone into the Emergency Receiving Room. He