"I've got a brother in stir. All right. I'm a sap for falling for your
baloney. But make it fast."
"Thanks," I groaned, taking her into my arms.
"Hurry up."
* * * * *
In the morning I looked up Doctor Carpenter in the telephone directory.
I located a CARPENTER L. MD with an East 70th street address and I
called the number to ask the party's first name. It was Leo all right
but he wasn't at home. The girl--informing me that she was the doctor's
secretary--instructed me to call again at three o'clock. When she asked
me to please leave my name, I hung up. I was afraid that Carpenter
might not want to see me.
Thoroughly worn out, I walked along Eighth Avenue looking for a pawn
shop. Two places, when I entered and asked to see a revolver, demanded
that I produce my police permit; but in the third, the old fellow
beckoned to me to follow him to the rear. He sold me an old .38 Colt
automatic for six dollars and threw in a box of fifty cartridges to
boot.
"Now remember, mister, I never sold you that gun, see? You never saw me
before in all your life."
"I never saw you before in all my life," I assured him. "And thanks
loads. I won't forget it in a hurry."
The old fellow threw up his hands. "Forget it! Forget it! Never mind
remembering!"
Emerging from the shop with the pistol in my pocket, I found that I
still had four hours to kill before the doctor would be in. I wanted
to see him before I took the fatal plunge because there was ever so
faint a chance that he might know something which would throw light
onto Anita's death. Tom Murphy was not a person either to imagine or to
exaggerate. If he was telling the truth, there might be some reason
why Carpenter insisted that I was innocent. His remark, "They'll never
find the body," might have meant no more than a disdainful opinion of
the police.... But it was worth trying.
I don't think that I would have considered suicide had I in some way
managed to solve the question that had been worrying my mind for so
many years. Even if I had discovered myself guilty. For if I _had_
murdered Anita, it must have been done in a moment of insanity, during
which time I could not hold myself responsible for the deed. I loved
my wife. I had had nothing whatever to gain by her death. I had not
insured her life. I told the insurance agents who had called this to my
attention that, in the event of Anita's death, no amount of money could
possibly compensate me for her loss.
I spent the next three hours in a movie, trying my utmost to stay
awake. I no longer had enough for a hotel room, having given all but a
dollar of the money remaining for the gun. Although sleep would have
been welcome to me after the adventure of the night before, I reasoned
that if I dozed off, I might not awaken in time to see the doctor. If I
missed him at his home, it would mean a night of wandering the streets,
of dozing in subways or sleeping in the park. Hence, I stayed awake by
prodding myself each time my head drooped forward onto my chest. Also,
I am afraid that I made a nuisance of myself by asking someone next to
me the time every now and then.
Doctor Carpenter had an apartment in a neat, two-family brownstone
house between Park and Lexington. Entering the tiny vestibule on the
ground floor, I saw his name on a little white card under a brass bell.
I rang and in a few seconds, a uniformed maid ushered me into a foyer.
"Is Doctor Carpenter at home?"
"Is he expecting you?"