by Helen Wells
She was deep in dreams when an insistent knocking at her door awakened her. Cherry blinked. It was still deep night, soundless except for the rustle of trees in the yard, and the knocking.
“Go away!” Cherry called.
“Telephone!” came a nurse’s muffled voice.
Cherry crawled out of bed and groped for her slippers and robe. “Didn’t hear a thing,” she said to the sleepy nurse, who had the room at the end of the hall where the phone was located. “I’m sorry you were wakened on my account,” Cherry managed to say sleepily. “What time is it?”
“Ten minutes after four,” the nurse yawned and went back into her room.
Four o’clock … ten minutes after … what was wrong? Cherry picked up the dangling receiver.
“Cherry! this is Dr. Joe! My new drug—my penicillin synthesis—it’s gone!”
CHAPTER XIII
Lex Is Proven
TWO EXTRAORDINARY THINGS HAPPENED TO CHERRY IN June. She was questioned by detectives, Army Intelligence and F.B.I. men. She was made a student head nurse and put in charge of a ward.
The investigators did not get very far in discovering who had stolen Dr. Joe’s drug. The thief had taken not only the drug but part of the highly complicated formula. Fortunately the second page of it had been in Dr. Joe’s pocket that night. Cherry wondered if the thief might sometime return for that second page. The F.B.I. posted a guard, day and night, around Lincoln Hall. But the thief made no further effort to obtain the rest of the formula. Cherry grew used to seeing the plainclothesmen around Lincoln Hall, though few others knew who they were. The questioning was over, the talk about the crime died down. Even Dr. Joe kept a resigned unhappy silence. Everything was peaceful again, on the surface.
The affair had one heartbreaking aftermath, at least half of the hospital suspected Lex. Several facts pointed to Lex’s possible guilt: he and Dr. Joe possessed the only two keys to the laboratory, and he was evasive and kept sullenly to himself. Dr. Joe ignored the gossip and kept Lex on at his laboratory. But Lex still avoided meeting Cherry there.
The bright June morning when Cherry went in as student head nurse on Men’s Surgical convalescent ward, the supervisor said, with obvious distaste:
“I want you to meet the doctor who will work with you these three months on this ward.” The door opened and the supervisor said ironically, “Dr. Upham.”
Lex and Cherry stared at each other. They would have to work together daily, whether or not they wanted to see each other!
Lex said stiffly, “I congratulate you, Miss Ames, on being one of the few in the senior class to merit the post of student head nurse.”
It was painful making the rounds of the patients, walking side by side with Lex daily, talking only when it was necessary. Lex looked thin and worried these days. In her heart Cherry knew that he was too decent to have had even the smallest part in such sordid business. But all around her people were shunning Lex, whispering about him and surrounding him in such an ugly atmosphere of suspicion that Cherry did not know what to think!
Little doubtful thoughts began to bother her. Why was Lex being so evasive and aloof? Also nagging away at the back of her mind was that scene in the laboratory when Lex told her he needed money but emphatically refused to tell her why. There was gossip, too, about how Cherry and Lex had quarreled because of the theft and it was said that Cherry had dropped Lex because she thought he was guilty. Nothing of the sort was true. But Lex heard this talk, and believed it. Cherry would have been glad to try to straighten out these lies. But Lex, taking the gossip seriously, kept her at arm’s length with the professional formality of a doctor to a nurse.
“I wish I’d never been made a student head nurse!” Cherry said miserably to Gwen one day after Lex had walked out, coldly aloof as ever.
“Never mind, Lex will be cleared yet,” Gwen said stoutly. Gwen had not been assigned to a head nurse post, but she said she did not mind, for she had had so much experience of this kind helping her doctor father. “I hate executive work, anyway,” she had told Cherry and Ann.
Cherry had no dislike for the work, but no particular liking for it either. It meant being ward planner and policeman over Gwen, another senior whom she barely knew, and two anxious first-year students. Cherry’s four subordinates worked under her willingly and pleasantly. It was quite a responsibility, seeing that twenty-three men in varying stages of health after operations received efficient care. There were smaller, nagging responsibilities, too, like seeing that the laundry went out and got back on time; that the first-year nurses’ mistakes were prevented or caught in time; that Dr. Upham’s orders were carried out; that special foods and drugs needed on the ward were requisitioned; that the endless reports and records were kept accurately. There were dozens of things which Cherry had to supervise, coordinate and organize, so that the ward would run smoothly. Besides this, Cherry was having classes in public health nursing and in ethics. It was a heavy program.
Cherry was quite a good manager, but she had two difficulties. One was her own lateness, which two or three times tangled up the ward schedule. Another was her unwillingness to discipline her nurses, especially when she could see that they were tired. She remembered only too vividly how she had felt when she was a ward nurse. However, when Cherry made an effort to be on time and forced herself to become a little stricter with her nurses, her detailed reports to the supervisor showed an improvement in how the ward was being managed.
Also on her mind these summer days was where she was going to nurse—here at home or on the war front. The term was nearly over, graduation loomed very close. She must decide, and soon.
In July the heat became oppressive and Cherry’s whole ward was moved out to canvas pavilions in the yard. It was pleasant working outdoors, especially in the fragrant summer evenings. But even summertime did not soften Lex’s attitude. His and Cherry’s tense, painful daily routine continued. The accusing gossip about Lex continued. The detectives had neither found the drug thief nor had they uncovered any clues. Dr. Joe was struggling to work out again the first, stolen page of the formula. Cherry received an anxious letter from Midge, asking her to keep an eye on her father.
“I wish I could do something for Dr. Joe and for Lex, both,” Cherry told Ann and Gwen. “They’re close to the breaking point.”
“I keep thinking of what the loss means to all those sick and wounded soldiers,” Ann said. “Oh, what’s the use of talking about it?”
“It doesn’t look,” Gwen said, “as if Dr. Joe is going to get it back.”
Cherry was forced to agree. She had thought and thought, until her mind ached, about how she could help. There were so many people working in this huge hospital, so many patients, so many visitors, delivery men—out of several thousand people, and no clues, it was nearly hopeless to sift out the criminal. Government authorities ordered the story kept out of the newspapers, but it was common knowledge around the hospital that the thief had made a successful getaway. It was enough to embolden him to a second attempt. Cherry was furious, depressed, and hopeless. She felt it was only a question of time before gossip would drive Lex from the hospital and Dr. Joe would be dismissed.
It was with affairs in this state that Mom returned to Spencer, and her new job. Cherry went down to the train to meet her. The old lady was in good health now and elated about her job. She was to be in charge of the cleaning women at Lincoln Hall. She even had a key to Lincoln Hall.
“But there’s one thing I ought to tell you,” Cherry said as they rode back to the hospital. “There are F.B.I. men in and around Lincoln all the time.”
“F.B.I. men! G-men!” Mom exclaimed. “Oh, I see They’re there to make sure no one steals the drug.”
“To tell you the truth,” Cherry said reluctantly, “the drug has been stolen.” She told Mom the details of what had happened.
Tears stood in Mom’s eyes. “It’s my fault! I—talked! Don’t say otherwise, Cherry. If it hadn’t been for me, blabbing——”
Cherry did her best to assure Mom that this was not so. But Mom could not be convinced. She felt horribly guilty and vowed that she would do anything she could to recover the drug.
“Cheer up, Mom,” Cherry said finally. “I have one nice thing to tell you. There was a vacant room in Crowley and I got it for you.”
“Well, that’s nice,” Mom said, “but that drug—it is my fault—I’ve got to make up for it.”
Cherry tried, on succeeding days, to lighten Mom’s terrible burden of guilt. But Mom seemed to have an obsession on the subject.
Cherry herself tried to stop worrying by watching another influx of beginning students. Spencer Hospital, like many other hospitals, now had three terms a year because of the war emergency, so that students could enter in the fall, spring, or summer. Cherry was glad and relieved to see these new seventeen- and eighteen-year old girls. She certainly could use an extra probationer on her own ward. Yet out of all this flow of nurses, Cherry saw that there were still not enough of them. Fortunately the U.S. Cadet Nurse Corps was opening the gates to nursing wider than they had ever been opened before.
Cherry went to bed early one night. It was hot. She had had a long, difficult day. Outside in the yard there were lively voices and footsteps for a while, then silence. Yet Cherry had difficulty in falling asleep. She could not explain an uneasiness which pervaded her. When she did sleep, it was a heavy fitful slumber. She woke from it more tired than before. Her clock said one. She turned the pillow over, and buried her warm face in the cool linen. The hot thick air was so still, the leaves outside hung motionless. You could hear a pin drop a block away on a night like this, Cherry thought, and drifted back to sleep.
Later on, much later on, Cherry became aware that someone was in her room. She could see a black figure outlined against the shadowy wall. Her breath came fast and hard. She wanted to scream, but she found her throat was too tightened to utter a sound.
“Sh! Don’t be frightened, it’s only me—Mildred.” She was panting as if she had been running. “I didn’t dare knock or make a sound. Don’t raise your voice.”
Cherry sat up, sharply awake. “What’s happened?”
Cherry could hear Mildred swallow hard before she was able to speak again. “There’s a light—in Dr. Fortune’s lab! I saw a man silhouetted up there—just for a moment. His flashlight keeps going on and off, in the same spot. Detectives or watchmen don’t behave like that. And Dr. Fortune—well, it’s not Dr. Fortune because he’d turn on all the lights. And—and, Cherry—” She clung to Cherry’s arm with cold hands. “There’s a man watching on the north side of Lincoln. He’s hiding in the doorway. And he doesn’t look like a watchman or a detective.” She leaned against Cherry, trembling. Cherry put her arm around the girl.
“But, Mildred, why did you take such a risk? You left your building—he could have seen you—must have seen you! What a dangerous thing for you to do! He could have tried to stop you. Why didn’t you phone me?”
“I didn’t think of the telephone. When I saw the light all I could think of was getting to you as fast as I could.”
“But how did you get past your supervisor?”
“She doesn’t know where I am,” said Mildred. “I didn’t ask for permission—I was afraid she wouldn’t let me go. And they may leave any minute!”
“Brave girl!” Cherry whispered back. She got out of bed and found her shoes and clothes. “What are we going to do? We’ve got to let the police know. Thank goodness the F.B.I. man is over there.” Cherry suddenly stopped dressing. “Mildred, perhaps something has happened to him—he may be in danger. We mustn’t let them get away! Come on!”
They stepped softly out into the corridor. “I’m going with you,” Mildred whispered. “I won’t let you go into that dangerous place alone. Don’t argue, there isn’t time. What are you doing?”
Cherry quickly and quietly entered Gwen’s room, a few doors down, and woke her. Gwen shook the sleep out of her eyes and listened.
“Go get Ann,” Cherry said very low. “Don’t make a sound. Somebody’s up to something in Dr. Fortune’s laboratory. Give us ten minutes to get over to Lincoln. Then call the police. Tell them there’s a lookout on the north side door. Got it? And hurry. Mildred and I will try to stall them there one way or another until the police get here.”
“Okay,” Gwen whispered. She already had her shoes on and stood up. “But don’t get yourselves killed! Got flashlights? Here, Mildred, you take mine.”
Cherry saw Gwen open Ann’s door. Cherry went to her own night supervisor’s office. It was empty. The supervisor must be making her rounds. But she could not wait for her to return. She and Mildred dashed down to Mom’s room.
Cherry gently opened Mom’s door. “Mom, wake up!” She shook her. “Mom, wake up!”
The old lady blinked and raised herself on one elbow. “Why, Cherry, honey, what do you want at this hour of the night?”
Cherry rapidly explained. “I want you to give me the key to Lincoln Hall.”
“The key to Lincoln!” Mom’s mouth stayed open. “But the F.B.I. man——”
“Exactly,” Cherry whispered firmly. “I’m sure something has happened in Lincoln. We’ve got to get in there somehow. You want to get the drug back, don’t you?”
“I sure do! I’d do anything to make up for my blabbing.” Mom grabbed the key from the purse under her pillow and thrust it at Cherry.
“But what are you going to do, child? How are you going to keep them there?”
“I don’t know yet,” said Cherry. “I’ll think of something!”
Mom suddenly got an idea. “I know what! Maybe you can get past the lookout dressed as cleaning women. There are clothes and buckets and mops downstairs,” she whispered. “For gosh sakes, be careful.”
“That’s it!” cried Cherry. “Now, not a word, Mom.” And with this word of caution, Cherry with Mildred close behind her, sped down to the basement.
There Cherry’s eyes fell on some buckets, mops, and rags. She poked around in a closet and came out with some faded old cotton dresses and aprons. The girls donned the outfits and hurried to the inconspicuous back exit. Cherry whispered:
“I think we’d better talk in loud voices all the way over, and go sailing in. You’ll see why in a minute. Come on! If only we can get in, we can worry then about what to do next. Just imitate everything I do and say. Understand?”
Out in the moonlit yard, in a direction opposite to the one Mildred had first taken, emerged two tattered blowsy figures, faces smudged. Their voices were shrill and their mop handles clattered and hanged against their tin pails, as publicly as if it were broad daylight. They must have wakened a number of people near by. They also had flashlights with which they seemed to be foolishly playing, whirling the long beams conspicuously around the yard and into the darkened windows of bedrooms.
As the two cleaning women drew close to the north side door of Lincoln Hall, chattering loudly, they were careful not to turn their flashlights on anyone who might be standing in the dark doorway. There was a rustle of movement in the doorway and the two girls quickened their footsteps. They made a sudden rush up the steps, found the door locked, used Mom’s key, and hurled themselves inside.
“Whew!” Cherry whispered. She was trembling all over. She felt Mildred’s cold hand groping for hers. They walked rapidly along the dark downstairs corridor. They reached a wall phone and Cherry looked at it longingly, but they passed on. They raced up the stairs, flashing their lights and peering closely. On the last flight, they made their steps loud and heavy and they talked loudly. They reached Dr. Joe’s floor, the fourth floor, and stopped.
Cherry could feel her heart thumping slow and heavy and hard. She had a sick feeling in the pit of her stomach. The F.B.I. man was nowhere around. At the stairs she switched on, by a central floor control, all the lights of the corridor. The whole floor blazed with lights which could be seen from all over the yard, since the hall had front windows, here and there, between
offices. Then Cherry walked down the corridor, almost dragging Mildred. Their mops and pails clanked, and their thumping footsteps echoed. But still there was no sign of the F.B.I. man. Cherry felt sure that something had happened to him.
The glass pane in the door of Dr. Joe’s laboratory was dark. The thief probably was still there. The lookout might have signaled him. But the elevator was locked, there was only one central staircase, and they had not met anyone on their way up. No, he was still in there.
“Well, what d’you know!” the black-haired cleaning woman exclaimed shrilly. “Dr. Fortune’s finally turned his light out! We won’t go in there ’cause he might of fallen asleep in there again, like he does, the old curiosity! No ma’am, we’ll stay out of Dr. Fortune’s office! But I sure hope he don’t come out here and track up our floor. We’re going to git it good and clean if it takes us all night! Don’t you forgit the janitor and Louie and Mr. Lane’re coming up to see how good we do our jobs!”
Cherry then went to a sink in the corridor and turned the tap on full flood. It sounded like activity, and it gave her a moment to plan her next move. The man in there probably would not dare to come out into the hall now—unless he were a killer. He would not want to be waylaid by two women with heavy mops, who would later remember his face, and by the three men she said were coming here. He would not want to kill five people, even for the second page of that formula, if he could avoid it.
The only other way he could get out of that room now would be by rope. But a rope long enough to drop down four floors would make a huge suspicious bundle. He probably had not risked bringing anything so conspicuous with him. Lincoln Hall had no vines, no rough stones, no balconies, nothing the man could climb down on. Cherry and Mildred had him trapped in there.
But suppose, Cherry thought, he had a gun.
Cherry again said loudly, “That Dr. Fortune! He sure does work late hours. Well, we ain’t goin’ to go in and bother him—he’s asleep for sure, in there. I hope he don’t wake up and come out here and track up our floor the minute we’ve got it clean!”
