Compared to Central Hospital, it was elegant. The reception room was thickly carpeted and tastefully decorated with some Christmas ornaments. The receptionist was dressed not in white, but in a soft pink smock. She called John Murphy’s room and announced that Jupiter Jones was in the hospital and would like to see Murphy. She then smiled, and gave Murphy’s room number to Jupe.
Murphy’s room was a big one in a corner. Sunlight streamed through two windows. Murphy was in bed, his usually ruddy face as white as the pillow. His nephew, Harley Johnson, sat in an armchair at the foot of the bed, looking at Murphy with a mixture of amusement and disapproval.
Murphy almost glared at Jupe when he appeared in the room. “If you’ve come to lecture, too,” he snapped, “please don’t. I’ve had all I can take from Harley for one day.”
“I always said smoking would kill you,” declared Harley. “I didn’t expect it would be so soon!”
“I was tired,” said Murphy. His voice was sulky. “I was tired, that’s all. I’m usually very careful. I don’t even keep cigarettes in the bedroom.”
“Then you should sleep in the bedroom and not on the sofa,” said Harley.
Murphy groaned. “There is nothing more terrible than a righteous nephew.”
“Is that what happened?” asked Jupiter. “You fell asleep on the sofa and dropped a cigarette?”
“I suppose so,” admitted Murphy. “I can’t think what else might have happened. I remember coming in–after Mrs Bortz’s car exploded–and sitting down. I was going to have one last cigarette and go to bed. I must have dropped off. The next thing I knew the room was full of smoke. I tried to find the door. Then I passed out.”
“You went in the wrong direction,” said Jupe. “You headed for the bedroom.”
Murphy nodded. “You got me out,” he said.
“We all did,” Jupe told him. “Bob and Pete and Sonny Elmquist. He was the one who saw the fire.”
“Creepy little guy,” muttered Murphy. “Never liked him much. Now I owe my life to him.”
“Mr Murphy,” said Jupiter, “did you know about the dog Mr Prentice was going to get?”
“Dog?” Murphy raised his head from his pillow. “Now, what would Prentice do with a dog? I understand he’s got an apartment loaded with antiques. A dog? You must be kidding!”
“Mrs Bortz was rather upset about it,” said Jupiter.
“She upsets easily. Anyway, who listens to Mrs Bortz? Her tongue’s tied in the middle and wags at both ends.”
He stretched out as if very weary. “I may move,” he said. He looked at Jupe. “You kids ought to get out of that building, too. Place isn’t safe.”
Harley stood up and came to the foot of the bed. “Don’t worry about it now,” he advised. “The doctor said you need rest. I’ll go around to your place and get things back in shape for you. When you’re feeling better, we can look for a new apartment.”
Murphy smiled. “You’re a good kid, Harley. Sometimes I think you’ve been a better guardian to me than I’ve been to you.”
Harley and Jupiter left together.
“My uncle smokes too much,” said Harley. “He also works too hard and he worries a lot. In a way, I’m almost glad that fire happened.”
Jupe shot a look at the young man.
“I don’t mean I’m glad he’s in the hospital or anything like that,” said Harley quickly. “But he’s been very nervous lately, and he doesn’t sleep well. I noticed that when I was with him over Christmas. He got up a couple of times and paced around when he thought I was asleep. I’m not sure his business is going well. The smoke inhalation wasn’t much. You guys got him out in time. But his doctor wants to keep him in bed for a couple of days and run some tests and just make sure he gets some sleep.”
“I’m sure he can use it,” said Jupe as they left the clinic and headed down Wilshire to Paseo Place. “Things have been pretty wild in that apartment house recently. You weren’t there the night of the burglary, were you?”
“You mean when the burglar ran through the courtyard from the next street? No, I missed it. I was out having an early dinner with friends before catching a show. Uncle John told me about it afterwards. And now I hear that there was a poisoning and a bombing, too Uncle John’s right. The place isn’t safe any more.”
“Did anyone tell you that Mr Prentice was getting a dog?” queried Jupe.
“Nope. But nobody would except my uncle. I mean, I don’t hang around in the courtyard when I visit him. I can’t stand listening to Mrs Bortz.”
Harley whistled when he saw his uncle’s windows. A few shards of glass still protruded from the frames, and the burned curtains hung in tatters.
“Guess I’d better call the glazier first,” he said as he pulled a set of keys out of his pocket. “I’ll bet the inside is a mess, too. I sure picked the wrong time to leave my uncle.” He squared his shoulders and disappeared into Murphy’s apartment.
Jupe paused a moment before going upstairs, trying to sort out everything in his mind. Was Gwen Chalmers truly an innocent victim? Was Murphy really ignorant of the Carpathian Hound? Was Harley the innocent bystander he seemed to be?
If so, then Sonny Elmquist was the only person unaccounted for. Elmquist was the only neighbour left who might know of the crystal dog. And Elmquist was the only neighbour remaining in the apartment house.
Then Jupe thought of something else. Someone was using violence to get people out of the building. Would the Three Investigators be next?
16
The Invisible Dog
WHEN JUPITER RANG Mr Prentice’s doorbell, Charles Niedland opened the door. “Come on in,” he invited. “Your friend Bob just got back from Ruxton, and he’s bursting to tell us something.”
Bob was sitting on the sofa, his notebook open in front of him. Mr Prentice perched on a small antique chair.
“How is Miss Chalmers?” he asked.
“She’ll be fine,” Jupe reported.
“Thank goodness,” said Prentice. “And Mr Murphy? Did you see him?”
“I did. He wasn’t badly injured. Did you get the money to ransom the Hound?”
Charles Niedland pointed to a brown paper grocery sack on a lamp table. “I have seldom been so nervous in my life,” he said. “I usually carry about three dollars in my wallet and a few credit cards. Fenton Prentice wanders around the city with ten thousand in small bills in a grocery sack!”
Jupe looked at the sack and smiled. “Very clever,” he said. “It looks so unimportant, it’s practically invisible.”
The doorbell rang again and Charles Niedland admitted Pete.
“The market manager doesn’t like kids who come in and stand around and read magazines and don’t buy anything,” he reported. “He told me to beat it. I bought a copy of Los Angeles Magazine, but he still told me to scram.”
Pete threw himself down on the sofa beside Bob. “Doesn’t matter, I suppose,” he said. “We know that Sonny Elmquist is at the market right now. And Hassell did check into that motel.”
Bob hunched forward. “Good. Then let’s talk about Sonny Elmquist.”
“What did you find out?” asked Jupiter.
“That some people can be in two places at the same time!” said Bob. He went on to relate all that he’d learned at Ruxton about wanderers and astral bodies.
“In other words,” said Jupe when Bob had finished, “Elmquist possibly can walk through walls or ignore locked doors.”
“I guess he can transport himself wherever he wants to be–and maybe to some places he doesn’t even know he wants to be. How much control he has over it, I don’t know. We can’t even be sure that he does it. But if he’s like the wanderers Dr Lantine talked to, he can only do it when he’s sleeping.”
“Swell!” said Pete briskly. “So today we know he can’t be watching. He isn’t going to have any chance to doze off. The market manager will see to that!”
Fenton Prentice got up and put the grocery sack in a little cabinet, which he locked.
“I trust he won’t decide to stick his astral head through that door,” said Prentice.
“Even if he does, he won’t see anything but a paper sack,” Bob reported. “According to Dr Lantine, the wanderers who go roaming around in their sleep can’t really move anything.”
“That would explain why nothing has been disturbed since I took the door key away from Mrs Bortz,” said Prentice. “It was she who opened drawers and moved things around.”
“Yes,” said Jupe, “and it explains how Sonny Elmquist knows about your mandala. He could also know about the Carpathian Hound. He could have heard you talk to Mr Niedland on the telephone. But if his astral body can’t move anything, he can’t be the burglar. He was asleep when the burglary happened.”