Free The Cases of Hildegarde Withers by Stuart Palmer Page B

smile.
    “You see, he’s upset because he’s so fond of uncle!”
    The Inspector and Miss Withers exchanged a long and dubious look, as the girl’s light slippers clicked on the stair.
    “If she was asleep in her bedroom,” said Miss Withers, “she slept in a bureau drawer! Because when I went upstairs looking for the medicine her room was empty!”
    They came out onto the landing just in time to catch a glimpse of Dr. French as he took a quick kiss from the lips of the lovely Maida, and then came hurrying down toward them.
    “I’ll be back first thing in the morning!” he called to the girl on the third floor. “And tell Miss Marvin to go to bed, we’ll let ourselves out.”
    “Well, doctor?” Piper queried. But the doctor placed his finger to his lips, and led them out of the house.
    “I asked you to wait because for some weeks I’ve had a suspicion that Johan Wurtz was in danger of his life — ”
    “You mean — murder?” cut in Piper.
    “I mean murder,” said the doctor.
    “But who’d want to murder him?” Mis s Withers put in. “Is he rich?”
    The doctor shook his head. “On the contrary, he has very little except this mortgaged house. The only heirs are Maida and her brother, and they’d get everything anyway in the course of a few months. With his heart, Johan Wurtz cannot live to see another Spring, which makes it all the more damnable that some one wants to murder him.”
    “Yeah,” objected Piper, “but how do you know that some one wants to bump him off?”
    “I’ll tell you,” said Dr. French. “While he was convalescing from his last attack the old man’s appetite was pickish. He complained that some calf’s foot jelly had a funny taste and put it aside. Just for fun I took it to the laboratory and tested it. The stuff—” Dr. French paused for dramatic effect — “the stuff contained about half a gram of digitalis!”
    “But that’s not poison!” objected Piper.
    “Not unless you’ve got the kind of heart that Johan Wurtz has,” said the doctor. “I didn’t dare to tell him, naturally. But I warned the Marvin woman not to give him anything more to eat that had been sent in by the neighbors … ”
    “What?” interrupted Piper. “Now we’re getting somewhere.”
    Dr. French indicated a narrow building which stood next door to the Wurtz brownstone, wall to wall. “I think the jelly came from there,” he said. “A Mr. Alison lives there, I believe; his cook sent it over as a friendly gesture.”
    Piper snapped his fingers. “Hildegarde! Remember my telling you I knew who lives in the brownstone? It happened ten years or so ago, before I got on the Homicide Squad. There was a big lawsuit between Wurtz and his next door neighbor.”
    “That was the elder Mr. Alison, now dead,” said the doctor. “Wurtz is a stiff-necked old chap, and he got indignant about the damage dogs were doing to his two foot square of lawn here. So he put up an iron fence and charged it with electricity, just enough to give the pups a sharp shock when they paused here … I and Alison caned him for it.”
    Piper nodded. “Wurtz won the suit, with damages of six cents. But Alison had to pay the terrific costs, and the blow hastened his death.”
    Dr. French moved toward his neat little roadster. “If anything happens to Johan Wurtz I’m not going to sign a death certificate until we know darn well what killed him!”
    He whirled away with a roar of gears.
     
    It was at precisely seven-fifteen next morning that Miss Emmy Marvin, the Wurtz housekeeper, hurried to answer a ring at the front door. She was positive about the time, and not even the cross-examination which she was destined to face in a certain court room ever shook her certainty.
    She opened the door, and the worried look left her fat face. “Good morning, doctor! I’m so glad you’re here — not that the master isn’t looking better this morning, but what I say is, you never know.”
    “True, Miss Marvin,” said