American Murder Mysteries: 60 Thrillers & Detective Stories in One Collection. Arthur B. Reeve

      Chapter XXVIII

      The Cancer House

       Table of Contents

      "You've heard of such things as cancer houses, I suppose, Professor Kennedy?"

      It was early in the morning and Craig's client, Myra Moreton, as she introduced herself, had been waiting at the laboratory door in a state of great agitation as we came up. Just because her beautiful face was pale and haggard with worry, she was a pathetic figure, as she stood there, dressed in deep mourning, the tears standing in her eyes merely because we were a little later than usual.

      "Well," she hurried on as she dropped into a chair, "that is what they are calling that big house of ours at Norwood—a cancer house, if there is such a thing."

      Clearly, Myra Moreton was a victim of nervous prostration. She had asked the question with a hectic eagerness, yet had not waited for an answer.

      "Oh," she exclaimed, "you do not, you cannot know what it means to have something like this constantly hanging over you. Think of it—five of us have died in less than five years. It haunts me. Who next. That is all I can think about. Who next?"

      Her first agitation had been succeeded by a calmness of despair, almost of fatalism, which was worse for her than letting loose her pent-up emotions.

      I had heard of cases of people in whom there was no record of hereditary predisposition to cancer, people apparently in perfect health, who had moved into houses where cancer patients had lived and died and had themselves developed the disease. Though I had, of course, never even remotely experienced such a feeling as she described, I could well fancy what it must be to her.

      Kennedy watched her sympathetically. "But why do you come to me?" he asked gently. "Don't you think a cancer specialist would be more likely to help you?"

      "A specialist?" she repeated with a peculiar hopelessness. "Professor Kennedy, five years ago, when my Uncle Frank was attacked by cancer, father was so foolish as to persuade him to consult a specialist whose advertisement he saw in the papers, a Dr. Adam Loeb on Forty-second Street here in New York. Specialist! Oh, I'm worried sick every time I have a sore or anything like this on my neck or anywhere else."

      She had worked herself from her unnatural calm almost into a state of hysterics as she displayed a little sore on her delicate white throat.

      "That?" reassured Kennedy. "Oh, that may be nothing but a little boil. But this Dr. Loeb—he must be a quack. No doctor who advertises—"

      "Perhaps," she interrupted. "That is what Dr. Goode out at Norwood tells me. But father has faith in him, even has him at the house sometimes. I cannot bear the sight of him. Since I first saw him my uncle, his wife, another aunt, my cousin have died, and then, last week, my—my mother."

      Her voice broke, but with a great effort she managed to get herself together. "Now I—I fear that my father may go next. Perhaps it will strike me—or my brother, Lionel—who can tell? Think of it—the whole family wiped out by this terrible thing. Can it be natural, I ask myself? Is there not something back of it?"

      "Who is this Dr. Loeb?" asked Kennedy, more for the purpose of aiding her in giving vent to her feelings than anything else.

      "He is a New York doctor," she reiterated. "I believe he claims to have a sure cure for cancer, by the use of radium and such means. My father has absolute confidence in him—visits him at his office and, as I told you, even has him at Norwood. In fact they are quite friendly. So was Lionel until lately."

      "What happened to shake your brother's faith?" asked Craig.

      "Nothing, I imagine, except that Lionel began thinking it over after someone told him about cancer houses. You must admit yourself that it is—at least strange. I wish you could see Lionel. He knows more about it than I do. Or Dr. Goode. I think he has made some kind of test. He could tell you much better than I can all the strange history. But they don't agree—Lionel and Gail. Oh—it is more than I can stand. What shall I—"

      She had fainted. In an instant I was at her side, helping Kennedy bring her around.

      "There, there," soothed Kennedy several minutes later as her deep eyes looked at him appealingly. "Perhaps, after all, there may be something I can do. If I should go out to Norwood with you as soon as you feel better, wouldn't that be all right?"

      "Oh—will you?" she cried, overjoyed. "If you would—how could I ever thank you? I feel better. No—don't stop me. I've been living on nerve. I can do more. Please—let me telephone Lionel that we are coming."

      Kennedy humored her, although I knew he had several important investigations going on at the time. It was scarcely an hour before we were on the train and in the early forenoon we were met by her brother at the station in a light car.

      Through the beautiful streets of the quaint old Connecticut town we rode until at last we stopped before a great stone house which had been the Moreton mansion for several generations.

      It was a double house, a gloomy sort of place, surrounded by fir trees, damp and suggestive of decay. I could not help feeling that if ever there were a house about which I could associate the story which Myra had poured forth, this was it. Somehow, to me at least, it had all the mystery of being haunted.

      Darius Moreton, her father, happened to be at home to lunch when we arrived. He was a man past middle age. Like his father and grandfather, he was a manufacturer of optical goods and had increased the business very well. But, like many successful business men, he was one of those who are very positive, with whom one cannot argue.

      Myra introduced Kennedy as interested in cause and treatment of cancer, and especially in the tracing down of a definite case of a "cancer house."

      "No," he shook his head grimly, "I'm afraid it is heredity. My friend, Dr. Loeb, is the only one who understands it. I have the most absolute confidence in him."

      He said it in a way that seemed to discourage all argument. Kennedy did not antagonize him by disagreeing, but turned to Lionel, who was a rather interesting type of young man. Son of Darius Moreton by his first wife, Lionel had gone to the scientific school as had his father and, graduating, had taken up the business of the Moreton family as a matter of course.

      Myra seemed overcome by the journey to the city to see Kennedy and, after a light luncheon, Lionel undertook to talk to us and show us through the house. It was depressing, almost ghastly, to think of the slow succession of tragedies which these walls had witnessed.

      "This is a most unusual case," commented Craig thoughtfully as Lionel went over briefly the family history. "If it can be authenticated that this is a cancer house, I am sure the medical profession will be interested, for they seem to be divided into two camps on the question."

      "Authenticated?" hastened Lionel. "Well, take the record. First there was my Uncle Frank, who was father's partner in the factory. He died just about five years ago at the age of fifty-one. That same year his wife, my Aunt Julia, died. She was just forty-eight. Then my other aunt, Fanny, father's sister, died of cancer of the throat. She was rather older, fifty-four. Not quite two years afterward my cousin, George, son of Uncle Frank, died. He was several years younger than I, twenty-nine. Finally my step-mother died, last week. She was forty-nine. So, I suppose we may be pardoned if, somehow, in spite of the fact, as you say, that many believe that the disease is not contagious or infectious or whatever you call it, we believe that it lurks in the house. Myra and I would get out tomorrow, only father insists that there is nothing in it, says it is all heredity. I don't know but that that's worse. That means that there is no escape."

      We had come down the wide staircase into the library, where we joined Myra, who was resting on a chaise-longue.