Arthur B. Reeve Crime & Mystery Boxed Set. Arthur B. Reeve
of fatigue in the latter. Extracts from unfatigued muscles give no such results. More than that, the production of this toxin of fatigue by the exercise of one set of muscles, such as those of the legs in walking, greatly diminishes the amount of work obtainable from other unused muscles, such as those of the arms."
Kennedy went on, looking at the sleeping guinea-pig rather than at us:
"Weichardt has isolated from fatigued muscles a true toxin of a chemical and physical nature, like the bacterial toxins, which, when introduced into the blood, gives rise to the phenomena of fatigue. This is the toxin of fatigue—kenotoxin. Those who have studied the subject have found at least three fatigue substances—free sarcolactic acid, carbon dioxide, and monopotassium phosphate, which is so powerful that, after the injection of one-fifteenth of a gram, the poisoned muscle shows signs of fatigue and is scarcely able to lift a weight easily lifted in normal conditions. Other fatigue products may be discovered; but, if present in large quantity or in small quantity for a long time, each of the substances I have named will cause depression or fatigue of muscles.
"Further than that," continued Kennedy, "the depressing influence of these substances on what is known as striated muscle—heart muscle—is well known. The physician at the Idlewild might very well have mistaken the cause of the relaxation of Murchie's heart. For German investigators have also found that the toxin of fatigue, when injected into the circulation of a fresh animal, may not only bring on fatigue but may even cause death—as it did finally here." Kennedy paused. "Lady Lee," he said, looking from one to the other of his audience keenly, "Lady Lee was the first victim of the fiendish cunning of this—"
A shrill voice interrupted.
"But Lady Lee won the race!"
It was McGee, the jockey. Kennedy looked at him a moment, then tapped another beaker on the table before him.
"Weichardt has also obtained, by the usual methods," he replied, "an antitoxin with the power of neutralizing the fatigue properties of the toxin. You thought Lady Lee was not friendly with strangers that morning at the track. She was not, when the stranger jabbed a needle into her neck and pumped an extra large dose of the antitoxin of fatigue into her just in time to neutralize, before the race, the long series of injections of fatigue toxin."
Kennedy was now traveling rapidly toward the point which he had in view. He drew from his pocket the little bottle which he had picked up that night in the cabaret saloon.
"One word more," he said, as he held up the bottle and faced Cecilie Safford, who was now trembling like a leaf ready to fall: "If one with shattered nerves were unable to sleep, can you imagine what would be a most ideal sedative—especially if to take almost any other drug would be merely to substitute that habit for another?"
He waited a moment, then answered his own question.
"Naturally," he proceeded, "it might be, theoretically at least, a small dose of those products of fatigue by which nature herself brings on sleep. I am not going into the theory of the thing. The fact that you had such a thing is all that interests me."
I watched the girl's eyes as they were riveted on Kennedy. She seemed to be fascinated, horrified.
"This bottle contains a weak solution of the toxin of fatigue," persisted Kennedy.
I thought she would break down, but, by a mighty effort, she kept her composure and said nothing.
"Someone was trying to discredit and ruin Murchie by making the horses he trained lose races—somebody whose life and happiness Murchie himself had already ruined.
"That person," pursued Kennedy relentlessly, "was defeated in the attempt to discredit Murchie when, by my injection of the antitoxin, Lady Lee finally did win. In that person's mind, Murchie, not the horse, had won.
"The wild excitement over Murchie's vindication drove that person to desperation. There was only one more road to revenge. It was to wait until Murchie himself could be easily overpowered, when an overwhelming dose of this fatigue toxin could be shot into him—the weapon that had failed on the horses turned on himself. Besides, no one—not even the most expert physician or chemist—would ever suspect that Murchie's death was not natural."
"That—that bottle is mine—mine!" shouted a wild voice interrupting. "I took it—I used it—I—"
"Just a moment, Miss Safford," entreated Kennedy. "That person," he rapped out sharply, picking up the pedigrees O'Connor had handed him, "that person gave the toxin to a poor dope fiend as a sleeping-potion in one strength, gave it to Lady Lee in still another strength, and to Murchie in its most fatal strength. It was the poor and unknown pharmacist described in this pedigree whose dream of happiness Murchie shattered when he captivated Cecilie Safford—her deserted lover, Ronald Mawson."
Chapter XIX
The X-Ray Detective
"I want to consult you, Professor Kennedy, about a most baffling case of sudden death under suspicious circumstances. Blythe is my name—Dr. Blythe."
Our visitor spoke deliberately, without the least perturbation of manner, yet one could see that he was a physician who only as a last resort would appeal to outside aid.
"What is the case, Doctor?" queried Craig.
The Doctor cleared his throat. "It is of a very pretty young art student, Rhoda Fleming, who returned to New York from France shortly after the outbreak of the war and opened a studio in the New Studio Apartments on Park Avenue, not far from my office," began Dr. Blythe, pausing as if to set down accurately every feature of the "case history" of a patient.
"Yes," prompted Craig.
"About a week ago," the Doctor resumed, "I was called to attend Miss Fleming. I think the call came from her maid, Leila, but I am not sure. She had suddenly been taken ill about an hour after dinner. She was cyanotic, had a rapid pulse, and nausea. By means of stimulants I succeeded in bringing her around, however, and she recovered. It looked like acute gastritis.
"But last night, at about the same time, I was called again to see the same girl. She was in an even more serious condition, with all the former symptoms magnified, unconscious, and suffering severe pains in the abdominal region. Her temperature was 103. Apparently there had been too great a delay, for she died in spite of everything I could do without regaining consciousness."
Kennedy regarded the Doctor's face pointedly. "Did the necropsy show that she was—er—"
"No," interrupted the Doctor, catching his glance. "She was not about to become a mother. And I doubt the suicide theory, too." He paused and then after a moment's consideration, added deliberately, "When she recovered from the first attack she seemed to have a horror of death and could offer no explanation of her sudden illness."
"But what other reason could there have been for her condition?" persisted Kennedy, determined to glean all he could of the Doctor's personal impressions.
Dr. Blythe hesitated again, as if considering a point in medical ethics, then suddenly seemed to allow himself to grow confidential. "I'm very much interested in art myself, Professor," he explained. "I suppose you have heard of the famous 'Fête du Printemps,' by Watteau?"
Kennedy nodded vaguely.
"The original, you know," Dr. Blythe went on hurriedly, "hung in the château of the Comtesse de la Fontaine in the Forest of Compiegne, and was immensely valuable—oh—worth probably a hundred thousand dollars or more."
A moment later Dr. Blythe leaned over with ill-suppressed excitement. "After I brought her around the first time she confided to me that it had been entrusted to her by the Comtesse for safe-keeping during the war, that she had taken it first to London, but fearing it would not be safe even there, had brought it to New York."
"H'm," mused Kennedy, "that is indeed strange. What's your theory, then,—foul play?"
Dr.