Murder in haste by John bhar one of the thousands of dentists in the city.
Detective Car chose to visit doctor Raymond K. Perry on East forty eighth
Street. A friend had recommended doctor Perry. That was the only reason for
the detective's choice. The doctor was a small, bald, roundish, amiable
gentleman with a pleasing personality. Harmless was the word which immediately occurred to you
the first time you saw him. Nevertheless, the detective's eyes contracted rather sharply
when he shook hands with the doctor, and a momentary expression of mingled doubt
and surprise clouded his face, but he resumed his nonchalance immediately. The detective's
teeth were in very bad condition. He had several cavities and a mild case
of pyorrhea. The doctor made an examination and took an X ray photograph.
An appointment for two days later was made. The intervening day was an extraordinarily
busy one for Detective Car. He spent the time running down the history and
official record of the Curved murder case, a crime which had been committed some
ten months previously. The details of this case with which he renewed his acquaintance
may be summed up briefly as follows. At about ten thirty in the morning,
mister Curvin was found dead in his room, with his throat cut from
ear to ear. A blood stained razor was lying beside him. The body
was discovered by his housekeeper, who had come to his house to do the
cleaning. That it was murder was plain, for there were signs of a
furious struggle, nor did the identity of the murderer remain long a mystery.
William Lesser, the business partner of min disappeared and for apparent reasons. The
books of the firm Curvin and Lesser Brokers appeared to be at first in good
order, but an investigation revealed that several transactions involving large amounts had not been
recorded. Bonds and securities which had been entrusted to Lesser by the firm's clients
never reached the bookkeepers for entry. It was estimated that Lester had absconded with
some two hundred thousand dollars. The direct cause of the murder was not known,
but it was assumed that Kervin had discovered his partner's treachery had accused or
perhaps threatened him, and had thus brought on the quarrel. The police,
in tracing Lesser's history, discovered that three years previous to the crime, he
had entered Kervin's office as a clerk. He made good so quickly that mister
Kervin took him into partnership. No clue to any fact of Lesser's life before
he entered the employ of mister Kervin could be found. The heirs of mister
Kervin, a sister and a nephew, offered a reward of five hundred thousand
dollars for the capture of Lesser, but months of zealous searching bore no results.
The police had only an old photograph found among mister Kervin's effects, and
the description given by employees and clients to guide them. After several months,
official interest in the case smoldered and finally elapsed altogether. Detective car was one
of the department's famous camera eyed men. No disguise had as yet fooled him.
He was able to penetrate almost immediately any artificial changes of appearance. He
had never met the missing Lesser personally, but he had of course seen the
pictures which had been published in the papers. His first glance had convinced him
that the man who was running a dental office on forty eighth Street under the
name of doctor Perry was the man who had disappeared under the name of Lesser,
and this in spite of the fact that doctor Perry's appearance differed from Lessers
in several important respects. Lesser, to judge by his picture and the descriptions
of him, was a man about five feet six in height, normal weight,
clean shaven, light complected, with a thick crop of blonde hair.
This description corresponded with doctor Perry's in only one respect. The height. Doctor
Perry was stout and at least thirty pounds above normal weight. He had a
black mustache and a goatee, and was dark complexed. Further, the hair
on his head consisted only of a black fringe which ran around his temples and
the back of his neck. Under the circumstances, it was not strange that
Detective Carr's conviction was a bit shaken, and that he decided to keep his
suspicions to himself until he made a thorough investigation on his own account. Neither
of mister Kervin's heirs had ever seen the missing Lesser. However, the detective
dug up two Curvin and Lesser employees and two of the firm's clients who had
met Lesser personally a number of times. One of these men agreed to go
up to doctor Perry's office and have his teeth cleaned. The other three were
posted by the detective at different times in a restaurant where the doctor took his
lunch. Three of the men were positive that mister Lesser and doctor Perry were
not the same person. The fourth said, well, the shape of his
head is a little like Lesser's, but you couldn't get me to swear in
court that they were the same person, No, sir, not me.
Detective Carr then tried to get at the mystery from a different angle. He
looked into doctor Perry's past history. He discovered that doctor Raymond K. Perry
had graduated from the Horn Dental College in New York in nineteen fourteen. The
doctor, in accordance with state law, had renewed his license every year,
all of which was perfectly regular. But the doctor had rented his office on
forty eighth Street ten months ago, or at just about the time that mister
Lesser disappeared, and Detective Carr could find no record of his having practiced his
profession any time before that. Further, the records in the city Bureau of
Taxes disclosed that doctor Raymond K. Perry owned real estate to the value of
one hundred and forty one thousand dollars on East one hundred and fifty seventh Street,
and that the property had been purchased at about the same time the doctor
opened his dental office. Doctor Perry lived on Claremont Avenue. No one at
his address could shed the faintest light on his past career. He had rented
the apartment ten months ago and had always been prompt in the payment of his
rent. He never had visitors when he rented the apartment. He had remarked
that he was living in Yonkers, but desired to live in the city in
order to be closer to his office. The detective consulted the city directories and
the phone books for the last seven years. He examined membership lists of all
the city and state dental societies. He telegraphed the national organization. He visited
all the dental supply houses and manufactures of dental instruments. The investigation yielded the
name Raymond L. Perry, but twice, and these Perrys proved to be
senior and junior with an office in Brooklyn. The Raymond k on forty eighth
Street was not related to them all. This would not have been unusual if
there had been evidence that doctor Perry had lived in another state before opening his
office on forty eighth Street, but the doctor had said he moved down from
Yonkers. That a man practicing the profession of dentistry and worth upward of one
hundred and forty thousand dollars could leave an absolutely recordless existence did not seem probable.
And yet the most painstaking search had revealed but one fact in the career
of doctor Perry previous his opening the forty eighth Street office. That fact,
as has been stated, was his graduation from the dental college in nineteen fourteen.
Detective Carr's weakness did not include the lack of persistence. He had great
faith in his camera eye quality, and doctor Perry's past or seeming absence of
past only stimulated his activities. The detective began the tiresome task of canvassing those
dental offices of New York City, which were large enough to employ additional dentists.
Carr spent eight hours each day for seven weeks at this work, but
finally his quest bore fruit. The payrolls in doctor Kirkbush's office showed that,
in January nineteen eighteen, a doctor Raymond K. Perry had been discharged for
drunkenness. Nobody in the Kirkbush office recalled the appearance of doctor Perry. Detective
Car, however, considered it significant that only one month later, February nineteen
eighteen, mister William Lester had entered the employ of mister Kervin. The chain
of evidence, though circumstantial, removed all doubt from the detective's mind. Still,
although Detective Carr was perfectly convinced of doctor Perry's guilt, he knew that
his evidence was not conclusive enough to persuade a jury. The fact that he
could offer no direct identification was the weakness of his case. He felt that
he had two lines of attack open to him. There was a chance that
he could find some person or persons whose memory for faces was good enough to
enable them to identify doctor Perry as mister Lester. His other hope lay in
a direct attack upon the doctor himself. This attack, of course, would
have to be subtle. The doctor would have to be squeezed, prodded,
and annoyed by a series of seemingly innocuous questions and insinuations into betraying himself by
some word or act. The work on the detective's teeth was to be finished
in three weeks. There were two appointments, each of an hour's duration.
Each week, Detective Car was to have six hours more of personal contact with
the suspect. Two. Detective Car was keeping his last appointment with doctor Perry.
The doctor was putting a root canal filling into the first molar on the
upper left hand side. The nerve or dental pulp had been removed, and
it remained only to seal the cavity with guttapercha and insert the amalgam filling.
The detective was seated comfortably in the dentist's chair. Doctor Perry was standing nearby,
preparing his instruments. Not at all, doctor, said Carr, in
answer to a question by the dentist. Detective work is not nearly as exciting
as it is commonly supposed to be. Its mostly dull, routine labor of
course, there are exceptions. I was working on a case not so long
ago, quite an ordinary affair. A murder had been committed and the suspect
had disappeared. My job was simply to tramp the streets and keep my eyes
open. Hard work, doctor, and not exactly exciting. I met the
fellow by accident and arrested him. But when at headquarters the man removed his
hat, I received the shock of my life. The prisoner was almost completely
bald, and yet it had been definitely proved that five days previous, when
the crime had been committed, he had a crop of long, thick brown
hair. But this circumstances, which at first seemed to ruin our case.
The prisoner, of course denied he was the wanted man eventually proved his undoing.
Men don't usually lose a thick crop of hair in five days. We
were sure of that. We consequently deduced that the prisoner had made himself bald
by some artificial method. Rather unique. Eh. You frequently hear of men
disguising themselves by putting on wigs, but they seldom affected disguise by pulling out
their natural hair. Well, while the entire department was trying to puzzle out
a way of proving that the suspect had removed his own hair. Nature herself
solved the mystery for us. The man was held in jail without bail.
After three weeks, the entire top of his head blossomed out like grass in
the spring that clinched it. Of course, he confessed that he had first
cut his hair short and then move the hairs with an electric needle. This
process required a couple of days, but his trick would have worked if he
could have applied the needle again on his hair as soon as it grew.
The doctor, keeping his back turned to the detective, replied, a unique
case, mister Carr. You might call it a bald murder. The detective
laughed, then, after a pause, we were talking last time of the
murder of mister Kervin. Have you changed your mind and accepted my theory that
the missing mister Lester he, in all probability, remained in the city and
made the bold stroke of adopting some mode of life which brings him into contact
with many persons daily. The doctor stiffened perceptibly. An ingenious theory, mister
Carr, But to judge from the newspaper accounts of mister Lester, he was
probably not clever enough to work out so subtle a scheme. There was little
conversation after that. Doctor Perry worked in almost complete silence on the tooth until
the task was completed. The detective noticed that the dentist's hands were a trifle
unsteady. Detective Carr left the office determined to proceed quickly and openly against doctor
Perry. He had reached the conclusion that he had succeeded in tormenting the doctor
into such a state of nerves that he would be unable to stand up under
a grilling at headquarters. It was Carr's intention to consult the district attorney about
the advisability of obtaining a warrant for doctor Perry's arrest. While Carr was on
his way to the District Attorney's office, both of his shoelaces became loosened.
He bent over to tie them. He held his head down for several minutes.
Then, just as Detective Car entered the District Attorney's office, a strange
phenomenon occurred. The detective was suddenly seized with a convulsion. He fell to
the floor and his body became rigid. A doctor was immediately summoned, but
although Karr lived for almost an hour and a half, he could not be
again brought to consciousness. The symptoms, the rigid muscles, the stiffness in
the back of the neck, the asphyxia, the wide open and fixed eyes,
the rhesus sardonicus drawn aside mouth convinced the doctor that Detective Car had been
poisoned with strychnine. The post mortem investigation, however, only added another element
of mystery to the tragedy. A chemical analysis of the stomach contents showed positively
that no strychnine was present. If the doctor's diagnosis proved to be correct,
it followed that strychnine must have been injected by a hypodermic syringe, but no
needle was found on the dead man. It was also not clear why Car,
assuming it was suicide, had gone about it in this queer fashion.
Symptoms of strychnine poisoning usually appear within twenty minutes or less after the poison is
taken. Where had Detective Car been before he came to the District Attorney's office.
Before the mystery could be solved, that question had to be answered Three
doctor Raymond K. Perry experienced a queer feeling even during the first visit of
Detective Car. He had a premonition that the detective had penetrated his disguise.
When a few days later the denis was visited by a former client of Lesser
and Curvin, who came ostensively to have his teeth cleaned, Perry's fears increased.
A short time after three of the former our clients of Lesser and Curvin
were in the restaurant in which the detective took his lunch. Doctor Perry was
then certain Detective car had identified him as the missing William Lesser. Doctor Perry
knew that his arrest was eminent. Had any doubts remained, the actions of
the detective himself would have cleared them away. The detective began referring casually to
the curving case. He somehow managed to bring up this matter during every consultation,
and he spoke of artificially induced boldness as an effective means of disguise.
The doctor was aware that in the beginning the detective was a trifle uncertain,
but with each visit the uncertainty gradually resolved itself into conviction. Doctor Perry was
in a continuous state of suspense. It became obvious finally that the detective would
arrest him. The dentist knew that an arrest would be his ruin. He
would be unable to account for any of his actions previous to the last ten
months. And if they held him in jail without bail as his customary and
murder indictments, his hair would start growing and that would expose him. The
dentist, of course, could have fled, but that would be equivalent to
a confession of guilt. He would invite a man hunt. Also, he
would have to sacrifice all the money he had gained by the murder of Curvin.
This money was tied up in real estate. If he attempted to make
a sale, he would be merely inviting immediate arrest. There seemed to be
but one other alternative from the fact that he was never shadowed. The dentist
reasoned that Detective Car had not mentioned his suspicions to any other police officials.
There was every indication that only the detective Car was privy to the secret.
If therefore a way could be found to dispose of Detective Car, the status
quo would be maintained and doctor Perry could keep living in comfort the rest of
his life. As the dentist figured it, nothing could be lost by a
second murder. They can't do more than electrocute a man. During the detective's
last visit, the dentist made him an amalgam filling for the first moller on
the upper left hand side. The dental pulp or nerve had been killed with
arsenic and removed previously. It remained only to put in a guttapercha point,
seal it with liquid gutapercha, and close the top of the cavity with amalgam.
But the dentist did not use gutapercha. Instead, he inserted a paste
made of strychnine and rammed it into the root canal. Strychnine acts rather rapidly,
especially when it may be absorbed easily into the blood. The dentist was
consequently in somewhat of a hurry when he put in the amalgam. He was
a trifle nervous and anxious. Cold blooded murderers exist for the most part only
in fiction. He managed, however, to get the detective out of the
office alive, and when that was accomplished, most of his worries were over,
for there seemed to be not the slightest chance that the murder could be
proved against him. There would indeed be no way of proving that it was
murder, and not even the most careful autopsy would be likely to probe into
the cavities of Detective Car's teeth. The X ray pictures which doctor Perry had
taken of Detective Car's mouth showed that the apex of the root of the mueller
in question extended into the antrum, which is a pocket extending from the nasal
cavity into the bone. This was not at all unusual condition. Doctor Perry
knew that the strychnine would be absorbed into the blood by way of the intrum.
Death would then be a matter of minutes. Under normal conditions, it
would take several hours for the action to start. By then, the detective
would no longer be near the dental office, and the chances were that,
even if he lived long enough to give information, he would not associate the
tooth filling with the poison. The next morning's paper perhaps would have the news
of the detective's death. It looked safe, absolutely safe. Four As doctor
Perry expected, the next morning's paper contained the news of Detective Carr's strange death,
and, according to accounts, headquarters was at a loss to explain the
mystery. It was difficult to reconcile the known facts with either a murder or
a sad suicide theory. The doctor smiled as he read the reports. They
were very satisfying to him. He had been in his office about an hour
when three men who introduced themselves as Detective Sergeant Elm, Detective Mosure, and
medical examiner Richard called upon him. From one of Detective Carr's friends, we
learned that you have been treating Car's teeth, said Detective Sergeant Elm. Was
Car in here yesterday for an appointment. Doctor Perry, afraid that a trap
was being laid for him and that he would betray himself by lying, was
slow to reply why. I'm not sure that is he may have been.
I'll have to consult my records. Never mind. The point is you have
been treating Detective Car, and in that case it is extremely unlikely that Carr
was receiving treatment from another dentist. Also, then, after a pause,
do you know the detective Car died yesterday from strychnine poisoning. No, well,
I did read something in the papers. It was very mystifying at first,
he interrupted, Detective Sergeant Elm. A most careful chemical analysis discovered no
strychnine in the stomach. However, we found the strychnine. Does that interest
you? The dentist flushed. It evidently does, said Elm. You're a
mighty clever man, doctor Perry. However you overlook the fact that strychnine poisoning
causes convulsions. You made a mighty sloppy job of filling car's upper molar murder
in haste and repent at leisure. That will be a good proverb for you
too. During cars fit of convulsions, the amalgam filling was jarred, loose,
and fell out of his mouth. Detective Moser found it this morning under
the desk in the District Attorney's office. Detective Sergeant eld took a small glass
vial out of his pocket and held it out toward doctor Perry. Your amalgam
filling is in this bottle, doctor, and there are traces of strychnine on
it. Also, the medical examiner here afterwards found traces of the poison in
the root canal of the tooth. That makes it pretty conclusive, doesn't it.
Five. Detective Carr's story of the man who had disguised himself by artificially
inducing boldness was a myth. However, the official records now include the case
of one doctor Raymond K. Perry alias William Lesser, who grew a beautiful
crop of hair while awaiting his execution. Furthermore, the doctor's dark complexion paled
noticeably under the regular prison baths. As for his stoutness, he had been
one of those not altogether uncommon men who can put on or take off an
appreciable amount of weight by change of diet. It was thus that Perry,
after murdering mister Kervin, was able to effect a great change in his appearance
within a week. He had then made the bold stroke of opening a dental
office and practicing the profession right under the eyes of the police. Perry,
it must be explained, was actually a dentist. After graduating from a dental
college. He failed to make good with Docker Kitbush and was discharged. He
then applied for a position as clerk in the office of mister Kervin and assumed
the name Lesser. Because he intended to re enter the dental profession again and
did not want it to be known that he was an ex clerk. Detective
car it transpired had not mentioned his suspicions concerning doctor Perry at headquarters, but
after the doctor had been convicted for murdering the detective, he confessed his former
crime the end of murder in haste