I arrived at the German hospital just as the clock on a nearby church was striking three. That gave me one hour to see my mystery girl and then get back to the theater. I inquired which ward she had been taken to and found her lying, as still and white as the first time I had seen her, in a bed at the far end. For a moment I wondered if she had died, but as I stood beside her those clear blues eyes opened and focused on me. I thought I saw some recognition there.
“Hello.” I gave her my warmest smile. “Do you remember me from yesterday? I was the one who found you in Central Park. How are you feeling today? Recovered from your ordeal?”
She continued to stare at me, but didn’t say a word. Nor did her expression change.
“Have they managed to contact your relatives yet?” I asked.
Again, not a glimmer of anything in her eyes.
I saw a nurse coming down the ward with some medicine on a tray. “Has this young lady spoken at all yet?” I asked.
“Not a word,” the nurse said.
“Do you think she doesn’t understand English?”
“We’ve tried several languages but she just stares blankly.”
“So you obviously haven’t managed to contact her family.”
“Not as far as I know. How are you connected with her?”
“I was the one who found her in a snowbank yesterday.”
“Mercy me. The poor child. Well, maybe she’ll come around soon with loving care and nourishing food.”
She continued on her way. I went to seek out the doctor we had seen yesterday and found him coming out of a ward down the hall. He recognized me right away.
“The young lady. You have seen for yourself, no? She does not respond to anything. Maybe the blow to her head?”
“She did receive a blow to the head then?”
“We had to sedate her before we could examine her properly, and yes, there was a bump on one side of her head, and some bruises and scratches on the same side of her body. But nothing that seemed severe enough to cause such deep amnesia.”
“If she was hit on the head in the park, and presumably knocked out, then how did she manage to walk to the spot where I found her on her own?” I said, speaking more to myself than the doctor. “And why bruises and scratches just on one side of her body?”
“A tricky puzzle,” the doctor said. “I wish I knew the answers.”
“And that was the extent of her injuries?” I asked. “No signs of other—uh—kinds of assault?”
“No sign at all.”
“Well, that’s one piece of good news, isn’t it?” I said. “So, is something being done to locate her next of kin?”
“We have informed the police about her. We can’t do any more,” he said. “Physically she’ll be strong enough to leave us any day.”
“And if they don’t manage to locate her family?”
“If her mental condition doesn’t improve, then she’ll have to be placed in an institution. We need our beds here for the sick.”
“You’re sure this isn’t just a language problem?”
“My dear young lady, we have tried,” he said. “If you don’t understand a language, there is always some way of communicating, isn’t there? Gestures and smiles and words that languages have in common, like mama, papa.”
“Yes, I suppose you are right,” I agreed. “Oh dear. I had hoped for better news today. I’ll come back tomorrow and bring her some good broth—something nourishing. Maybe you’ll have better news by then.”
“Let us hope so,” he said. “Goodbye, Fraulein.” He nodded gravely and moved on.
I was in deep gloom as I walked down the long tiled hallway. Nurses drifted past in crisply starched pairs. Loud moans came from a ward on my right. I hate hospitals, I decided. Maybe it was that smell of disinfectant that doesn’t really mask the sweeter odors of sickness and death. Then I noticed a figure I thought I recognized coming toward me. The meticulous outfit, the neat blond beard, the homburg, the silver-tipped cane—I couldn’t be mistaken. It was the young German alienist I had encountered on several occasions previously.
“Dr. Birnbaum,” I called and waved, making the nurses turn toward me and frown.
His face lit up as he saw me and he clicked his heels smartly. “Miss Murphy. What an unexpected pleasure. What brings you here?”
“Visiting a patient,” I said. “And you?”
“I’m here to consult with an old friend from my student days in Vienna,” he said.
“Of course, how silly of me. This is called the German hospital, isn’t it? You’d feel right at home here.”
“Although I am Austrian, not German. There is a difference, you know.” He smiled. “And I treat the mind and here they only treat the body.”
A magnificent idea was forming in my head. “You’re an absolute godsend, do you know that?”
“Am I? In what way?”
“There is a patient here, a young girl, who doesn’t seem to be able to speak or understand anyone. I found her yesterday unconscious in a snowdrift in Central Park. We brought her here and she has recovered, but still won’t speak.”
“Has it occurred to anyone that she might be deaf?” he asked.
I felt really stupid. “What an obvious thing to have overlooked,” I said. “But would you take a look at her yourself? I’d feel much happier if I knew that everything was being done to communicate with her. And if she really were suffering from a disease of the mind, then you’d be the very person, wouldn’t you?”
“I can’t examine a patient here uninvited,” he said, “but I can ask my friend to make an introduction to her attending physician.”
He always was one for correctness, I remembered.
“Thank you, Dr. Birnbaum. That’s a load off my mind. And if you could possibly let me know what you find, I’d be most grateful.”
I thought he might say that divulging such information would also be unethical, but he nodded and said, “I’ll pop a note through your front door when I return home this evening. It’s good of you to take such an interest in a stranger.”
“Oh, you know me.” I laughed. “I never could keep my nose out of other people’s business.”
I came out of the hospital and stood breathing deeply, filling my lungs with the cold, smoky, familiar New York air to rid my nostrils of the cloying hospital smell. Then I walked back along Central Park, making my way to the Fifty-eighth Street El station. As I walked I found that my brain was buzzing. Daniel and I should have taken more trouble to examine the site where we had found the girl yesterday. We should have retraced her footsteps and seen if we could have located her coat, or the place where she was attacked. We might have seen the footprints of her attacker. We may even have been able to see where she entered the park and where she encountered him, or them.
I decided I probably had a little time to spare. When my business began to show a healthy profit, I’d buy myself a watch. A good detective needed to know the exact time. I was dying to take another look at the spot where she had lain. If I hurried I’d be able to see if we had overlooked any clues. I entered the park through the same gate through which we had carried her out yesterday, retraced our steps along the path, over the East Drive and into the central wilderness area, and there it was. I could still see exactly how she had lain in the snow and where I had knelt beside her. I stood looking down at her imprint in the snow, trying to picture how she had fallen, and how long she had lain there. I found that I was shivering in the cold as the sun had dipped behind the horizon. If I couldn’t stand here for long, dressed warmly in stout boots and a woolen cloak, then how could she have survived at all, if she had lain there for any length of time?
I examined the site closely for any telltale clues—a locket or a handkerchief with her initials on it would have done nicely, but alas, there was nothing. Our footsteps had disturbed the snow around her, but on the other side of the dell her neat little trail of footprints was still clear. With mounting excitement I followed them, around a little hill, across a stretch of flat lawn, until they joined a path and were lost among countless other footprints. I followed the path for a while, hoping to see if a footprint might be recognizable, but after a while I had to give up. Still, I had learned one thing: she had not been attacked anywhere near the spot where we found her. She had not been carried to the spot. She had walked there under her own steam and had come from the north. Not, therefore, from any of the polyglot ghettoes of lower Manhattan.
The same clock chiming the three-quarter hour reminded me that I had a job to do and I’d be late if I didn’t hurry. I slithered and skidded my way through the park until I reached Columbus Circle and the end station of the Sixth Avenue El. It was four o’clock on the dot when I stepped into the hallway at the Casino Theater. I was red-cheeked and gasping for breath because I had run all the way from the train, and had to stand in front of a very surprised Henry while I caught my breath.
“Well, fancy seeing you again,” he said. “Anything wrong, miss?”
“Nothing. I just thought I was going to be late and that would never do on my first day,” I said.
“First day?” He looked suspicious.
“I’m going to be joining the company,” I said.
“As what?”
“I can’t say yet, until I’ve met with Miss Lovejoy. Is she in her dressing room?”
“No, miss, she went front of house, meeting with Mr. Barker and Mr. Haynes. And that young songwriter guy, whatever his name is.”
“So who are Mr. Barker and Mr. Haynes?” I asked.
“They’re the men that count,” Henry said. “Mr. Barker is the director. He’s got money in the show as well. And Mr. Haynes—he’s the choreographer. He’s the one with the creative talent, at least according to himself, of course.”
I laughed, but I didn’t rightly know what a choreographer was and didn’t like to show my ignorance by asking. I also didn’t think it would be wise to barge into a meeting and maybe put Blanche Lovejoy in a spot, especially if she hadn’t yet managed to come up with a good reason for explaining my presence in the theater.
“I think I’ll go up to her dressing room and wait for her there,” I said. “Will you tell her that I’m here if you see her?”
“I will indeed, miss,” he said. “So you’re really an actress! That baloney about bringing a message from Oona Sheehan was just a ruse to meet Miss Lovejoy, wasn’t it? Come on, now. You can’t fool Old Henry. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve seen that trick played before.”
“No, I really was brining a message from Oona Sheehan. Honestly.”
He touched the side of his nose with a knowing grin. “And that message was that Miss Lovejoy should give you a job in her production?”
“Something like that,” I said, trying to look sheepish.
“I’m surprised she fell for it at this stage,” he said. “I know Miss Lovejoy. She likes order. She likes everything to be perfect. Changing things at the last minute just isn’t like her. You must be mighty talented, or a really big draw.”
“Neither, I promise you. I’m sure I’m going to play the most minor of parts and disturb things the least possible.”
“Chorus, you mean?” Henry looked puzzled now.
“I’m really not sure, yet,” I said. “Wait until I’ve spoken to Miss Lovejoy.”
“Let’s hope the other girls don’t resent you,” Henry said, going back to his newspaper. “Most girls would kill to get a part in a production like this one.”
I left him with those words echoing through my head. Had somebody not been awarded the role she felt she deserved? Was somebody maybe trying to get even with Miss Lovejoy? But then surely it wasn’t one of her cast members. If Blanche got so spooked that she decided to close the show, then they’d all be out of work.