A Blueprint for Murder Page #3

- Lynne?

- Naturally.

Oh, sure, sure.

- Good-bye.

- Just a minute, Cam.

You'd better break it to Lynne tonight.

Good-bye.

Come on, Cam. What are you daydreaming about?

- What on earth's the matter?

- Nothing. Nothing.

What about this, Uncle Cam?

Oh, the driving rod?

Well, I suppose that hooks on

here with a couple of little pins.

But in the plans it says

it goes on with screws.

Well, let's find the screws.

- Dinner's served.

- Thank you, Anna.

- Lynne, I must talk to you.

- Can't it wait till after dinner?

No, I must talk to you right away. I'm

sorry, Doug. Why don't you go in and start.

This is very difficult for me.

Here. Please sit down.

I...

I don't know how to begin.

Lynne, I've just got word Polly was poisoned.

- What?

- It's true.

It just couldn't be.

There must be some mistake.

- I'm afraid not.

- But how?

How could it have happened?

- The police think it was murder.

- The police?

Yes.

It was their medical examiner

who performed the autopsy.

They want you and the servants down

for questioning tomorrow morning.

I'm bewildered by this whole thing.

What gave them the idea

of performing an autopsy?

Well, Dr. Stevenson wasn't certain

what caused Polly's death...

and there was a reason for

thinking it was strychnine...

and, well, the symptoms are identical.

You knew about this, Cam?

- Yes.

- And you didn't even mention it to me?

I didn't think they'd find anything wrong.

There was no purpose in upsetting you.

I know it's miserable being dragged down

to the police for a lot of stupid questions.

Can't be helped.

But there's one fact we can't get away from.

If Polly was poisoned, somebody did it.

It's up to us to find that somebody.

We're sorry we had to

cause you all this trouble.

I wish I could've been more helpful. I just

couldn't throw any light on this thing at all.

I know it's been very trying for you, Lynne.

Look, why don't we work together on this?

After all, I am in the best

position of anyone to help.

I'd be more than willing to hire private

investigators, anything you'd suggest.

- Thanks, Mrs. Cameron. We'll let you know.

- Please do.

- I want to see you and Mr. Sargent a minute.

- Oh.

I'll be along as soon as I can.

- This is Captain Pringle of Homicide.

- How do you do, Captain?

Fellas, this is Whitney Cameron,

his attorney, Fred Sargent.

They brought the case to our attention.

- We got nothing of any value from Mrs. Cameron.

- Nor the servants.

She apparently treated the children okay,

so there was nothing suspicious there.

- Send in Pierce.

- Didn't have any boyfriends.

Least they didn't know of any.

That, sometimes, is an angle in these cases.

Servants wouldn't buy any suggestion

Mrs. Cameron could be responsible.

That goes for the maid Anna. She

worked for the first Mrs. Cameron too.

Mr. Cole.

It seems to boil down to Mrs.

Cameron or one of the three servants.

Looks that way.

They were the only ones in the

house at the time the kid took sick.

They had dinner at 7:00.

Polly took sick about 11:30.

No one would admit giving her

anything to eat in the meantime.

Certainly, strychnine would have

started working in a half hour or so.

- Excuse me.

- That's about it.

- Does Cole mean this is where the case ends?

- No, we're going ahead.

But these poisoning jobs are always dillies.

I'm afraid it's gonna be plenty tough

to prove who gave that kid the poison.

So you don't have any false hopes...

there have only be two poisoning murder

convictions in New York in the last 50 years.

Both based on confessions.

- Maybe she got it accidentally.

- Strychnine?

Oh, Mr. Cameron, I think you ought to know

we're having your brother's body exhumed.

If they find he was poisoned too, it'll go a

long way toward pinpointing who the murderer is.

Mmm.

Do they have to go through

all that kind of mess?

You start on a case, you never

know where it's gonna lead.

- You wanna come along to court with me?

- Thanks, no.

Think I'll do a little sleuthing on my own.

Then how about meeting us at

the club tonight for dinner?

I'm Whitney Cameron. Where

can I find Fred Sargent?

- He left word for you to meet him in the bar.

- Thank you.

- There's a local crowd out there that...

- Where's Maggie?

- I've got to talk to you two.

- Just a minute, Cam.

Joe Cunningham, Whitney Cameron.

- How do you do? Where is she?

- She's around here someplace.

- Excuse me, Joe.

- Excuse me.

- What's up?

- I've just come from the library.

Oh, no. Not you too. It's catching.

I went through those books on toxicology.

I knew Lynne couldn't have

done it. Now I can prove it.

- How?

- The only way you can die

of strychnine is during a convulsion.

The victim dies of suffocation.

That's all very interesting, but what

does it prove? There she is over there.

It proves that somebody gave Polly

a second dose in the hospital.

- In the hospital?

- Exactly.

[Laughing]

- Hello.

- Hello.

- Maggie, Cam's here.

- Oh, Cam!

- I want you to meet some old friends of ours.

- Not right now, Maggie.

- Excuse me.

- Certainly.

- Something happen?

- Cam thinks Polly got a second dose

of poison in the hospital.

Well, the convulsions were all

over at 7:
00 or 8:00 in the morning.

That means her system must have passed

off the effects of the poison by that time.

- Cam's got something.

- How could the convulsions start again

nearly 20 hours later?

- I never thought of that.

- Nor did the police, nor anyone else.

Besides, I called the medical

examiner, and he had to agree.

Sure. In the strychnine cases we looked up,

they either died in a few hours or got well.

This definitely proves one thing.

Lynne is absolutely innocent.

But how could the hospital have

given her strychnine? By mistake?

- That doesn't make sense either.

- That's what I intend to find out.

Well, there it is. The only medicines

administered were ordinary things.

They'd have been supplied

by the hospital pharmacy.

The important point is, what was

given Polly the night she died.

Well, let's see.

She took nothing at 9:00.

- At 10:
00, an MFT-10 cap was given her.

- What's that?

Calcium chloride pepcin in capsule form.

We'd been giving her other

calcium preparations earlier...

but they have a disagreeable, chalky taste.

So, at, uh, 6:
30 I

recommended switching to these.

At 10:
30, she was given another capsule.

With no ill effects. That's right.

And there appear to be no

more entries until, uh, 11:30.

- And that's when she took the last capsule.

- Yes.

She apparently became nauseated,

but didn't lose the medicine.

Half hour later, the convulsions started.

At 2:
30, she died.

Well, perhaps the strychnine

was in this last capsule.

- But it came direct from the hospital pharmacy.

- Hmm.

- This is very confusing.

- It certainly is.

I'm sorry, but I have an operation

scheduled. I'll check with you later.

- I appreciate your help.

- Frankly, though,

I don't know what more I can add.

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