Burn, Witch, Burn!

Condettieri, his wits and sword for hire. I wondered what were his antecedents. He had paid me several

visits since the death of Peters, and quite plainly my liking was reciprocated. On these visits he was

guarded by the tight-lipped man who had watched by the hospital window. This man's name, I learned,

was McCann. He was Ricori's most trusted bodyguard, apparently wholly devoted to his white-haired

chief. He was an interesting character too, and quite approved of me. He was a drawling Southerner who

had been, as he put it, "a cow-nurse down Arizona way, and then got too popular on the Border."

"I'm for you, Doc," he told me. "You're sure good for the boss. Sort of take his mind off business. An'

when I come here I can keep my hands outa my pockets. Any time anybody's cutting in on your cattle,

let me know. I'll ask for a day off."

Then he remarked casually that he "could ring a quarter with six holes at a hundred foot range."

I did not know whether this was meant humorously or seriously. At any rate, Ricori never went anywhere

without him; and it showed me how much he had thought of Peters that he had left McCann to guard him.

I got in touch with Ricori and asked him to take dinner with Braile and me that night at my house. At

seven he arrived, telling his chauffeur to return at ten. We sat at the table with McCann, as usual, on

watch in my hall, thrilling, I knew, my two night nurses-I have a small private hospital adjunct-by

playing the part of a gunman as conceived by the motion pictures.

Dinner over, I dismissed the butler and came to the point. I told Ricori of my questionnaire, remarking

that by it I had unearthed seven cases similar to that of Peters.

"You can dismiss from your mind any idea that Peters' death was due to his connection with you,

including the tiny globes of radiance in the blood of Peters."

At that his face grew white. He crossed himself.

"La strega!" he muttered. "The Witch! The Witch-fire!"

"Nonsense, man!" I said. "Forget your damned superstitions. I want help."

"You are scientifically ignorant! There are some things, Dr. Lowell-" he began, hotly; then controlled

himself.

"What is it you want me to do?"

"First," I said, "let's go over these eight cases, analyze them. Braile, have you come to any conclusions?"

"Yes," Braile answered. "I think all eight were murdered!"

CHAPTER III: THE DEATH AND NURSE WALTERS

That Braile had voiced the thought lurking behind my own mind-and without a shred of evidence so far

as I could see to support it-irritated me.

"You're a better man than I am, Sherlock Holmes," I said sarcastically. He flushed, but repeated

stubbornly:

"They were murdered."

"La strega!" whispered Ricori. I glared at him.

"Quit beating around the bush, Braile. What's your evidence?"

"You were away from Peters almost two hours; I was with him practically from start to finish. As I

studied him, I had the feeling that the whole trouble was in the mind-that it was not his body, his nerves,

his brain, that refused to function, but his will. Not quite that, either. Put it that his will had ceased to care

about the functions of the body-and was centered upon killing it!"

"What you're outlining now is not murder but suicide. Well, it has been done. I've watched a few die

because they had lost the will to live-"

"I don't mean that," he interrupted. "That's passive. This was active-"

"Good God, Braile!" I was honestly shocked. "Don't tell me you're suggesting all eight passed from the

picture by willing themselves out of it-and one of them only an eleven-year-old child!"

"I didn't say that," he replied. "What I felt was that it was not primarily Peters' own will doing it, but

another's will, which had gripped his, had wound itself around, threaded itself through his will. Another's

will which he could not, or did not want to resist-at least toward the end."

"La maledetta strega!" muttered Ricori again.

I curbed my irritation and sat considering; after all, I had a wholesome respect for Braile. He was too

good a man, too sound, for one to ride roughshod over any idea he might voice.

"Have you any idea as to how these murders, if murders they are, were carried out?" I asked politely.

"Not the slightest," said Braile.

"Let's consider the murder theory. Ricori, you have had more experience in this line than we, so listen

carefully and forget your witch," I said, brutally enough. "There are three essential factors to any

murder-method, opportunity, motive. Take them in order. First-the method.

"There are three ways a person can be killed by poison or by infection: through the nose-and this

includes by gases-through the mouth and through the skin. There are two or three other avenues.

Hamlet's father, for example, was poisoned, we read, through the ears, although I've always had my

doubts about that. I think, pursuing the hypothesis of murder, we can bar out all approaches except

mouth, nose, skin-and, by the last, entrance to the blood can be accomplished by absorption as well as