A DISTINGUISHED SCOUNDREL.
“Yes, my friend, I intend to earn my fee,” the cold voice declared to
the empty room. “The only difference is that the fee is somewhat larger
than I’ve given you reason to believe.”
Leaning back in his chair, Doctor Stephen Follansbee blotted the check,
then, taking a bunch of keys from his pocket, he unlocked the top
drawer of the desk and slipped the check into a small leather-bound
book which lay inside.
“Just to make sure that I receive my just dues,” he went on, “I’ll turn
this check in on Saturday instead of Monday. You’re mad enough on one
point, James Stone, but you’re a shrewd man outside of that, and it
might occur to you to stop payment on that check.” His short, cackling
laugh rang out anew.
Half an hour later he left his house. He did not seem to be in as much
of a hurry as he had said, as he made his way leisurely, and on foot,
to his destination.
He made a striking figure as he proceeded. His face alone would have
attracted attention anywhere, but his dress was eccentric in its
shabbiness. His arms were folded behind his back in a very unusual, but
thoroughly characteristic way, and his little, lashless eyes were bent
on the ground. Many passers-by stopped to stare at him as he passed,
and not a few recognized him.
“He’s the great Doctor Follansbee, the head of St. Swithin’s Hospital!”
they told one another. “You’d never think it to look at him, would you?
He looks more like a mummy than anything else.”
Careless of these comments and of the mild sensation his appearance
always created, Follansbee soon reached the hospital, passed through
the imposing entrance, and went on down the broad corridor to his
private room. As soon as he had seated himself at his desk and glanced
hastily through the few reports and other documents which lay there, he
pressed one of several buzzer buttons on a small switchboard attached
to his desk.
In response to the summons, the resident physician in charge quickly
entered. Follansbee spent half an hour listening to the reports of the
various cases and to matters of hospital routine. That done, he issued
a few instructions in his sharp voice, and the physician left the room.
Other heads of departments followed, and for two hours Follansbee was
constantly engaged. At the end of that time, though, he rose to his
feet and passed through into an adjoining room which was fitted up as a
private laboratory and workshop.
Crossing to one side of the room along which rows of shelves had
been placed, he opened a small, glass-doored cupboard, and, leaning
forward, took a small case of test tubes from one of the shelves, which
contained serum of various types. Going back to his desk, the doctor
seated himself and began to work. Evidently he was thinking something
out with the aid of pencil and paper. He had a pad in front of him,
and on it he scrawled a few lines of straggling writing. Then, after a
prolonged pause, he jotted down a few more words.
“Yes,” he said to himself presently, “I think that will be the best
way. There’s no reason why Crawford could not have been exposed to
disease before his arrival. He has just landed in New York, and if I
succeed in getting at him within the next day or so, there will be no
reason for any one to suspect.”
He leaned back in his chair.
“I’m sorry, though, that that mad fool attacked him,” he went on
musingly, “for, despite what Stone says, I feel sure that Crawford must
be on his guard now.”
That was the point in the case which baffled Follansbee for the moment.
He could not understand why Crawford, after no less than three attempts
had been made on his life, should still be willing to occupy a room
which connected directly with that of his would-be murderer. At last,
with a shrug of his shoulders, he dismissed the subject.
“After all, it doesn’t matter very much,” he mumbled to himself. “The
attempts which Stone has made are only known to four or five persons at
most. They are the two most concerned, young Floyd, and the stranger
who, according to Stone’s admission, separated him and Crawford on the
boat. His knowledge and that of Floyd would be dangerous if Crawford
were to be put out of the way in any ordinary fashion, but neither
would be suspicious if he succumbed to a tropical disease. It would
never occur to them to question his death under such circumstances, and
even if it did, they wouldn’t give Stone credit for so much ingenuity.
As for me, I’m above suspicion, except in the eyes of a very few
persons—notably Nick Carter’s. I shouldn’t like him to get wind of
this, but there’s little or no likelihood of his doing so.”
James Stone had not known of the detective’s identity, because the
latter’s name had not appeared on the passenger list of the _Cortez_,
and, strictly speaking, it had been a breach of confidence on the part
of the chief steward when the latter had revealed Carter’s name to
Crawford. Had Follansbee known more of the mysterious stranger whose
intervention had been so unfortunate from Stone’s standpoint, even his
cold, hard calm would have been broken up, and he would have cut off
his right hand rather than have anything to do with the affair. So far
as his knowledge went, however, it seemed sufficiently safe to venture
on what he had in view.
“Anyhow, I run no risk,” he concluded. “Both Stone and Crawford seem to
have no friends in the city, and if there should be a coroner’s inquest
the death would be put down as resulting from natural causes.”
He ran his fingers over the test tubes with a touch that was almost
caressing, and on his sallow, leathery face there rested a malevolent
smile.
“My first step in the career of crime,” he resumed, “was not very
successful, I’ll have to admit. It involved considerable risk, and I
was infernally lucky to have crawled out of it as well as I did. I was
a fool then, though, and I won’t take any such risks in future. I’ll be
the ‘man behind’ this time. Stone will execute the work, and when it’s
duly accomplished, the reward will be mine, and I think I can worry
along for some time on that amount.”
Floyd, in his misguided effort to be thorough, had sent a number of
details which might well have been omitted. They had enabled Follansbee
to make a great show of knowledge, and by his evasions in respect to
the source of it had greatly contributed to Stone’s bewilderment. They
had also made it possible for the unscrupulous head of St. Swithin’s to
fill in the check for the amount that was only fifty thousand dollars
short of the entire sum which Stone was supposed to have realized from
the sale of the Condor Mine. He would have liked to claim even more,
but he did not dare, for fear of overdrawing the miner’s account and
thereby creating a difficulty when the time came for the bank to honor
the check. Therefore he had shrewdly fixed his “fee” at that sum, in
order to allow for any reasonable withdrawals on Stone’s part.
In that and other ways Floyd’s letter had been of the greatest
assistance, and had served a purpose the nature of which its writer
had never dreamed. It would have seemed incredible to the young
physician, whose profession was sacred to him, and in whose eyes
Stephen Follansbee was everything that was desirable—except in external
appearances.
Well he might. Few would have been willing to believe for a moment that
the famous specialist could be guilty of such juggling with checks, and
much less that he would consent to engage in a criminal conspiracy, the
end of which was scientific murder, with any man—least of all one he
knew to be mentally diseased. Yet, such was the fact.
Now and then a physician—sometimes a really great one—goes wrong and
plays false to the tremendous responsibility which he has assumed.
Stephen Follansbee was one of the most conspicuous examples of this.
He had started out with the highest motives, and worked his way up by
hard work and sheer weight of ability. He had always been supremely
selfish, however, and had possessed little or no heart. He had won
fame in spite of his repellent appearance and his cold, unsympathetic
nature. But that fame, and the reward which followed it, had not been
enough for him. There was an evil streak in him, and it had become
more pronounced as the years passed.
He had begun by using his position to cover up indefensible experiments
on patients, especially those who were poor and obscure. Emboldened
by his freedom from penalty, he had gone on and indulged in more
daring and ruthless work. Most of it had been in the name of medical
knowledge, to be sure, and had had the sanction of not a few fellow
practitioners, but it was none the less criminal.
At length, a year or so before, he had dared to try a particularly
heartless experiment on a famous author, but while it was still in one
of its early stages, Nick Carter had learned of it—it doesn’t matter
how—and had effectually interfered. Incidentally, the detective had
prevented Follansbee from collecting fifty thousand dollars for his
services, as he called them.
It had not been an indictable offense, and so Follansbee went
unpunished. Carter had been obliged to content himself with a scathing
denunciation, and a warning to keep straight in the future. To the best
of the detective’s knowledge, Follansbee had done so. This chance,
however, had been too much for the distinguished scoundrel.