"Three men," he finished grimly. "There's a kind of continuity to the thing. I'm going to watch the park, Joyce. I have the idea that what happened is going to happen again. I want to know just what was done to those men, just what sort of agency is at the bottom of it."
Her face was troubled. "Terry ... it frightens me! If something strange is really going on, you might get hurt--the way those men were hurt. I wish--" She broke off with a helpless gesture. "Be careful, Terry! Please be careful!"
Bryan sat on a stool in one corner of a small dimly lighted bar, frowning down at an envelope on which he had drawn a diagram of Grant Park. He had spent part of the afternoon checking on the locations where the three men had been found. These, it appeared, were concentrated roughly near the middle of the park, around a large sandstone memorial pavilion which was the center of numerous converging walks. He had visited the spot while daylight remained, familiarizing himself with it in preparation for his night vigil.
Glancing at his watch now, Bryan slid off the stool and went to a telephone alcove. He dialed a number quickly. There was a delay while an extension connection was made.
"Dave?" he said, then. "Terry at this end. How's the patient?"
"Dead, Terry. Not half an hour ago. We tried everything--oxygen, heart stimulants. It was no use. I knew it was going to happen all along and stayed to do what I could. I was just getting ready to go home."
"I checked up on the others who were found in the park," Bryan resumed. "They died, too. In about the same length of time as your patient."
"Good Lord, Terry! It ... it's horrible somehow. What in the name of reason could be back of it?"
"I'm working on that angle right now. I'll let you know if I turn up anything.... Thanks, Dave." Bryan hung up and went back to the bar. He finished his drink, lighted a cigarette, and strode outside.
Darkness had thickened along the street, a soft warm darkness, rich with the promise of approaching summer. A block's walk brought Bryan to the boulevard. Grant Park lay just across from him, lights shining fairy-like throughout its shadowed length.
He crossed with the traffic light, hands in his pockets, a man just strolling along on a pleasant evening. But his gray eyes were alert and grim. Vivid in his mind was the memory of a man in a hospital bed, a man who breathed and yet was not alive.