When Tom and Doc stepped off the elevator, they sought out the floor nurse.
Doc Simpson introduced himself and Tom to her and asked directions to the right room.
The nurse hesitated and glanced down the hall. “I believe I saw an intern go in there,” she
34 3-D TELEJECTOR
murmured. “He may be examining the patient. I’ll check. Please wait a moment.”
Tom and Doc nodded. The nurse went into a room a few doors away.
Suddenly there was a scream.
“Good grief!” Tom glanced in alarm at Doc Simpson. Both ran toward the room, brushing past several startled visitors.
Tom entered first. A window was wide open and a man in a white intern’s uniform was straddling the sill. The next moment, the man dropped into the darkness without a backward glance!
Meanwhile, the terrified nurse was aiding the patient-the dark, burly workman who had fallen from the sign mast. He was staggering woozily and a livid bump was rising on his forehead.
As he reeled back, he groped for a pencil and note pad on his bedside stand.
The workman scrawled something, then collapsed on the bed.
Tom dashed toward the window. The figure in white had landed on a narrow-roofed portico at the rear of the building and was about to drop to the ground.
Then Tom glanced at what the workman had scrawled. The pad bore a single letter-Q!
CHAPTER V
GOVERNMENT MISSION
THERE was no time to puzzle out what the Q might mean. In seconds the mysterious assailant would be gone. Doc Simpson and the nurse were busy attending the patient.
“I’m going after that fellow!” Tom cried. He dashed through the cluster of onlookers. The elevator signal pointed to the ground floor. To wait would lose precious moments. Tom saw a door marked exit and ran toward it. He sped downstairs to a ground-floor hallway which led to offices and the emergency ward.