"The surgeon. Bear Sterling! I should say so!" Higgins responded. "Why is the head nurse antagonistic?"
"I do not know. Perhaps because she is getting old and is afraid of retirement if Sterling remains in charge."
"I see. Pretty ugly situation you have been in, sir."
"It isn't I, it's the hospital. Dr. Ethridge Sterling, Senior, is dying of a heart attack complicated by pneumonia brought on by this situation. One of our graduate nurses has been murdered.... Frankly, your coming shifts a great weight from my shoulders. And I should like to say if I have failed to make anything clear, question me. We are all a bit shell-shocked, I dare say."
"Yes, there is, Doctor. Did Dr. Sterling, Senior, see all of the murdered patients, too?"
"He did. He performed the autopsies on all except the last one. The nurse."
"Has any person been murdered since he has been out of the picture?"
Mr. Higgins' weight was behind his words.
"I don't believe I understand you, Mr. Higgins," Dr. MacArthur gripped his chair arms, and his sensitive mouth looked like blistered flesh.
Mr. Higgins ignored that and attacked his eyes.
"Sorry, Doctor, but that is exactly the reason you sent for us. To understand things. Please answer my question."
"He was taken with double pneumonia last night, and Rose Standish was murdered last night. The bed is empty now."
"But he saw her and left a sleeping potion of which you told Dr. Bridgman over the 'phone and after that was administered she was murdered?"
"Please, Mr. Higgins," Dr. MacArthur's knuckles were white against the desk, "I have learned that potion was ... bread-pills.... He had hoped to calm her nerves and yet leave her capable of catching.... I would swear before God that Dr. Sterling...."
"Of course you would, sir," there was admiration in Mr. Higgins' response, "but painful operations are often necessary, and since he is the only person who has retired from the case, since the beginning, I am obliged to know what developments have taken place since his retirement. It's like chess, Doctor, your moves depend upon your position."
Dr. MacArthur had regained complete control of himself and Miss Parkins had risen and poured out a glass of water from a thermos bottle upon the mantelpiece which she was holding out to him. She smiled and said: