The late afternoon passed. Five o’clock sounded. Lester Leith’s eyes were bright. His cheeks were flushed. The young woman was laughing with him now, joking, chaffing him in a manner which was well calculated to make Lester Leith forget that any evil impended.

  The spy glanced anxiously at the clock. The young woman frowned savagely at him. The shoe button eyes darted elsewhere. Lester Leith seemed oblivious of the time. He laughed and chatted. The minute hand of the clock hovered on the quarter hour.

  “That,” said Lester Leith, his cheeks flushed, eyes sparkling, “reminds me of a story which Don Kimball used to tell. Kimball is one of the greatest salesmen in the world. He’s the type that can get thrown up in the air and light on his feet anywhere. Well, one time Kimball had been staying at a hotel, San Mateo, I think it was, and—”

  Lester Leith broke off, a slight twinge of pain distorted his features.

  “As I was saying, the clerk at this hotel was a — “

  Once more the pain distorted his features. He clapped his hand to his side.

  “Funny, that’s a sharp, shooting pain…Good heavens! It’s quarter past five on the fifteenth day of July, 1931, the exact day and the hour that the astrologer mentioned—”

  The nurse placed a firm, cool hand upon his wrist. “That’s all nonsense,” she said firmly. “You have allowed yourself to become hypnotized. You were telling about a Mr. Kimball, I believe. Go on with the story.”

  But Lester Leith doubled up in agony. He placed his hand upon his right side. “Quick, Scuttle, a doctor!” The spy looked helplessly from master to nurse.

  “Nonsense,” said the nurse, “it’s just mental, a bit of hysteria.”

  Lester Leith shook an agonized head. “A doctor, Scuttle. Do as I say. Get a doctor. Call Dr. Paul Gromley. He’s as good as any. I remember hearing of him somewhere—at the club perhaps. Make it snappy! I’m dying! Something I’ve eaten. Maybe that last batch of whisky you used in the eggnog was bad.”

  The nurse got to her feet. “Now let’s be sensible—”

  “Scuttle, do you hear me?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Very well then. Get the doctor at once.”

  “But the nurse, sir. She says—”

  “Never mind the nurse. She can argue with the doctor about the diagnosis. I don’t think Miss Quinn will want to take the responsibility of diagnosing a poisoning case—will you, Miss Quinn?”

  That put the matter in a different light. The nurse clamped her lips together. “Get the doctor,” she said.

  The spy dived into the soundproof closet, telephoned. The nurse regarded Lester Leith with a cynical eye. She took his pulse, his temperature, looked at the pupils of his eyes, snorted.

  The doctor arrived twenty minutes later. Lester Leith was writhing in agony.

  Dr. Paul Gromley was a squat, spidery sort of man who wore massive spectacles rimmed with horn. He regarded the patient with that degree of satisfaction which he reserved for patients of wealth who might prove to be surgical possibilities.

  “Where is the pain?” he asked.

  “Right here,” groaned Lester Leith, pressing his hand over his right abdomen, then howling with pain from the mere pressure.

  Dr. Gromley rubbed his hands. “Vermiform appendix!” he said gloatingly.

  Miss Quinn eyed the doctor with cool, hazel eyes. “He hasn’t any temperature,” she said.

  The doctor stared at her.

  “Not necessary in the early stages!” he snapped.

  “And he has a perfectly normal pulse and respiration,” continued the nurse.

  “Thank you!” gritted the doctor in tones of icy disdain, “I will make my own diagnosis, Miss—er—”

  “Miss Quinn,” said the nurse.

  “Ah, yes,” said the doctor. “This is a hospital case, Miss Quinn, and that will relieve you of any further responsibility.”

  Lester Leith moaned and twisted.

  “No, no. She stays. She’s my special nurse. I won’t have any other. But I want to go to the hospital right away. I’ve got my room reserved. It’s five twenty-six in the Bethel Foundation Clinic.”

  Dr. Gromley started up with surprise.

  “A hospital I control,” he said. “How does it happen you have reserved your room?”

  “I knew this was coming, I knew it, I knew it!” groaned Lester Leith.

  The nurse touched the doctor’s arm. “Doctor, a word with you. It’s important.” The doctor glared at her.

  “Minutes may mean life and death to this man,” he said. “You, sir, I take it you’re the valet. Telephone the hospital and tell them to get the operating room right away.”

  Miss Quinn continued to stare meaningly at the doctor. “You had better hear what I have to say. It’s important.” The doctor glowered at her, muttered something under his breath, followed her to the other end of the room. The nurse whispered to him. Scuttle telephoned the hospital.

  The form of Lester Leith twitched and writhed.

  From the other end of the room came Dr. Gromley’s impatient voice, raised until it roared through the confines of the room.

  “Madam, I don’t care if he’s consulted a dozen astrologers. The man has an acute attack of appendicitis. He goes on the operating table within the next thirty minutes. Call an ambulance!”

  And Dr. Gromley, turning upon his heel, strode back to the side, of his patient.

  Lester Leith pushed his hand into his pocket, pulled out a sheaf of bills. The greedy eyes of Dr. Gromley feasted upon those bank notes.

  “Can I keep these with me?” asked Lester Leith.

  “Certainly. There’s a safe in the hospital.”

  Lester Leith groaned, sank back upon the couch, thrust the bills loosely into his trousers pocket. The diamond ring upon his finger caught the afternoon light and glittered. The tie pin coruscated blue fires. Dr. Gromley noted these things and rubbed his hands together.

  CHAPTER X

  The Private Guard

  There followed minutes of bustle. An ambulance came clanging to the door. Stretcher bearers came up the stairs and Lester Leith was trundled on a stretcher to the elevators, down the short flight of stairs to the street, into the ambulance.

  And the police shadows, watching with puzzled faces, saw Beaver, the undercover man, carrying two grips in his big hands, sprinting for Lester Leith’s roadster, saw a beautiful girl in the uniform of a trained nurse climb into the ambulance. They saw Dr. Gromley jump into a powerful coupe.

  Gongs clanged, a siren wailed. Motors barked and the procession tore out into the boulevard, flashed across the intersection and headed for the hospital at terrific speed.

  The police shadows gawked, decided to follow, opened up their own siren and tore through the afternoon traffic.

  Lester Leith was rushed from the ambulance to the room he had reserved. Busy nurses prepared him for the operation.

  Lester Leith beckoned to Miss Quinn.

  “See that my things are put in the safe, will you?”

  The hazel eyes smiled cool efficiency. “I have already done so.” Lester Leith squeezed her hand. Dr. Gromley, clad in white from head to foot, his enormous rimmed glasses looking like owl’s eyes of wisdom, thrust a head into the room.

  “I’ll make myself ready and then we’ll proceed.” Miss Quinn bent low.

  “Didn’t the astrologer say the first doctor would make a wrong diagnosis?” she whispered.

  Lester Leith’s eyes widened. “My lord! Yes! She did!”

  “Get Dr. Kaye,” she whispered.

  Lester Leith sat up in bed.

  “Dr. Gromley!” he bellowed, and there was that in the imperative resonance of the volte which ill became an invalid. The white-clothed doctor, halfway down the corridor, heard that call and paused.

  “Dr. Gromley!”

  He came back to the room.

  “A hypodermic,” he suggested to the nurse.

  Lester Leith waved his arms. “Hypodermic, hell! I want a consultation.”

  Dr. Gromley’s irritation was manifest in his manner, his tone and his glance.

  “My friend, you have no time for consultations. I am certain of my diagnosis. Minutes count. Seconds are precious. A matter of ten minutes may mean your life.”

  Lester Leith met the glowering eyes. “Have it your own way, doctor. Either I have Dr. Kaye called in in consultation, or I fire you.”

  The doctor’s face grew the color of a broiled lobster. “Sir!”

  Lester Leith grinned. “You said it. I feel better already.”

  Dr. Gromley turned on his heel.

  “Call Dr. Kaye,” he gritted. “Let me know when he arrives.”

  And the physician strode from the room, swishing his operating robes behind him.

  Fifteen minutes later Dr. Kaye bent over Lester Leith. The patient was strangely quiet now. In a weak voice he recited the interview with the astrologer. Dr. Kaye glanced at the nurse.

  “You saw him develop the—er— symptoms, Miss Quinn?”

  “Yes, doctor.”

  “Were they similar to hysteria?”

  The nurse shrugged. “They came on at the stroke of the clock, at once and violently.”

  Dr. Kaye glanced at Dr. Gromley, who was standing a little to one side, his chin up, his foot tapping the floor.

  “Perhaps,” suggested Dr. Kaye, “we had better consult.”

  Gromley cleared his throat.

  “Seconds,” he said, “are precious—”

  Lester Leith propped himself up on one elbow. “Dr. Kaye,” he muttered, “please take exclusive control of the case. I feel so—sleepy—Dr. Gromley — you’re fired— the astrologer—said — you’d— try to kill me.”

  And Lester Leith gave a deep sigh and became strangely quiet.

  Dr. Kaye laughed.

  “Plain case of suggestion,” he said. “Pulse normal, respiration normal, temperature normal—”

  Dr. Gromley strode from the room.

  Dr. Kaye glanced at Miss Quinn. There was the barest flicker of a smile passed between them. Lester Leith gave a gentle snore.

  Two hours later he awoke, apparently his normal self, but weak, nervous, fidgety. “Nurse!”

  Miss Quinn arose from the shadows and glided to his bedside.

  “It’s so restful here. My nerves feel as though I’d been through hell. I want to rest—rest—I want to stay here for a week. Will you see that I can stay here as long as I want?”

  “Certainly,” she said. “Go to sleep now.”

  “But doesn’t Dr. Gromley control the hospital? He won’t have me thrown out?” ‘

  “Certainly not. Go to sleep. You’ll have a nice rest. Here’s some medicine Dr. Kaye left for you.”

  She handed him a goblet filled with a cool, sweetly bitter fluid. Lester Leith drained it, fell back upon the pillows. A smile tilted the corners of his mouth, and he sank off to sleep.

  Through the long hours of the night his special nurse dozed upon a cot. The hospital attendants moved with noiseless efficiency through the hushed corridors with their smell of antiseptics. And the puzzled police guards patrolled every exit of the hospital, under strict orders to see to it that Lester Leith was not spirited away.

  But Lester Leith slept peacefully, awoke with the rising of the sun, was shaved, breakfasted, and following a call from Dr. Kaye, allowed to rise.

  “You’ll be all right now,” smiled the doctor.

  “Just nerves?” asked Lester Leith. “Just nerves and auto suggestion.” Lester Leith sighed. “Can I stay here for a week?”

  “If you wish. It might be beneficial, regular hours, proper food and all that sort of thing, you know.”

  Lester Leith nodded. “That.” he proclaimed, “is fine.”

  And by afternoon Lester Leith was his urbane self. He distributed gifts to the hospital attendants with a lavish hand. He started a bridge game in his room, and the nurses who were off duty were hired at a fabulous price per hour to come and play with him.

  He strolled out to the sun parlor, chatted with convalescents, beamed upon one and all, and by nightfall was easily the most popular man in the hospital.

  But he refused to crawl between the sheets at a decent hour. He insisted that he had been accustomed to sitting up until after midnight, and won his point. Ten o’clock found him anxious to get some money from his store of ready cash.

  Miss Quinn piloted him to the office on the fifth floor where there was a safe divided into compartments, each compartment numbered with the corresponding number of a room. She took a key from the girl in charge and signed a receipt. Then they opened the drawer numbered five hundred and twenty-six, and Lester Leith removed some of the bills from the large store.

  On his way back to his room, he motioned to a shadowy figure sitting just inside a half opened door.

  “Who’s that?”

  “Private guard. Mr. Samuel Milne, the one who was shot in the holdup, is in there. He fears an attack, and the doctor doesn’t want any reporters to interview him. They’ve got a guard there day and night.”

  Lester Leith grunted.

  They returned to Leith’s room. Leith grinned at the nurse. “Tomorrow,” he said, “is your birthday.”

  She started with surprise.

  “So it is.”

  Lester Leith handed her a hundred-dollar bill.

  “Get yourself a little present,” he said.

  She shook her head, pushed the bill back. “No, thank you.”

  The voice was cool. Leith grinned at her.

  “Don’t be foolish. You saved my life. Gromley would have sliced me up like a butcher slicing bologna. Go get yourself something and don’t think I’ll have an idea I’ve got a ninety-nine-year lease because I handed you a birthday present.”

  The hazel eyes studied Leith’s for a few moments, then she smiled her thanks and took the money.

  “Tomorrow,” promised Lester Leith, “we’ll stage a party, a whale of a celebration. We’ll smuggle in a birthday cake and have candles and all the trimmings!”

  And then he went to sleep, and once more he smiled in his sleep. The nurse studied him for some minutes before she retired. Her hazel eyes were puzzled, maternal, and there was a glint of tenderness in them.

  CHAPTER XI

  A Piece of Pasteboard

  Dr. Kaye called when the birthday party was in full swing. It was, of course, handled in a silent and surreptitious manner, and the physician received quite a surprise when he walked into the room filled with tittering nurses, shades pulled down, cake with candles on the table. But the shrewd-eyed doctor oriented himself without visible change of expression.

  “I dropped in for a piece of the cake,” he said.

  And Lester Leith, once more his genial, urbane self, bowed the doctor to a chair, made a little speech of welcome, saw that a plate contained a generous slice of cake.

  “My heavens!” exclaimed Lester Leith, a look of consternation upon his features. “We’ve forgotten something!”

  The nurses looked at him. Dr. Kaye continued to munch his cake.

  “The nurse on duty at the office— a good scout! I must get her. I have some little favors to distribute, and I want her to be here.”

  He took from his pocket a sheaf of bank notes, each in the denomination of one hundred dollars. Gravely, he handed one to each of the nurses.

  “Compliments of Miss Quinn,” he said, “and in recognition of perfect hospital service.”

  The nurses took their presents with astonished eyes. “I’ll get the nurse in the office to step in for a second,” said Lester Leith. “Perhaps one of you girls had better telephone her and tell her to come; sort of add weight to my entreaties.”

  And he slipped out into the hall, walked swiftly to the office where the nurse on duty regarded him with a smile. “You’re wanted at once in room five twenty-six,” said Lester Leith.

  She shook her head. “I can’t leave the office.”

  “I’ll watch it for you. You’ll be surprised at what’s going on in the room.” Lester Leith smiled, his winning smile.

  The red light on the telephone switchboard showed a call from room five twenty-six. The nurse plugged in, listened. Her eyes grew wide. She flashed Lester Leith one grateful glance.

  “Oh, you’re wonderful! I’ll be back. You watch the place!” And she was gone.

  Lester Leith moved with a swiftness of precision which was a marvel of graceful efficiency. His delicate fingers did things to the safe. A certain drawer popped open, disclosing some currency, a wallet, some papers, a watch, and a diamond stickpin.

  Lester Leith opened the wallet, ran through it rapidly. There was an oblong of pasteboard with some printing and a number on it. Lester Leith slipped that bit of pasteboard into his pocket, replaced the wallet, closed the drawer.

  The nurse came back, cake crumbs on the corners of her mouth, a happy smile in her eyes. She was folding a hundred-dollar bill in her hands.

  “You may not know it,” she said, “but you’ve just about saved my life!”

  Lester Leith bowed. “A slight token of perfect service,” he said.

  The nurse patted his hand. “The doctor wants you,” she said.

  Lester Leith returned to his room. Dr. Kaye regarded him with twinkling eyes.

  “You have a habit of discharging doctors,” he said, “so I thought I’d discharge you as a patient before you discharged me as a doctor. You can stay on here if you want to, but you’re completely cured. If you want to leave you can. But stay away from fortune tellers and astrologers. Don’t ever let anyone predict any misfortune for you. You’re too impressionable. Don’t ever let anyone hypnotize you.”

  Lester Leith grinned, shook hands.

  “Well, anyway, you showed up in time to keep my innards in place. Otherwise I’d probably have been minus a stomach or something.”

  Dr. Kaye departed, looked at Miss Quinn.

  “A good idea. I’m a well man again. Let’s check out. You have a bonus coming for saving my life.” He smiled, reached into his pocket, took out a check book, scribbled a check.