Unwise Child Read online

  22

  Captain Sir Henry Quill scowled and rubbed his finger tips over the topof his shiny pink pate. "Your evidence isn't enough to convict, GoldenWings."

  "I know it isn't, Captain," admitted Mike the Angel. "That's why I wantto round everybody up and do it this way. If he can be convinced that we_do_ have the evidence, he may crack and give us a confession."

  "What about Lieutenant Mellon's peculiar actions? How does that tie in?"

  "Did you ever hear of Lysodine, Captain?"

  Captain Quill leaned back in his chair and looked up at Mike. "No. Whatis it?"

  "That's the trade name for a very powerful drug--a derivative oflysurgic acid. It's used in treating certain mental ailments. A bottleof it was missing from Mellon's kit, according to the inventory ChiefPasteur took after Mellon's death.

  "The symptoms of an overdose of the drug--administered orally--arehallucinations and delusions amounting to acute paranoia. The finalresult of the drug's effect on the brain is death. It wasn't my blow tothe solar plexus, or the sedative that Pasteur gave him, or Vaneski'sshot with a stun gun that killed Mellon. It was an overdose ofLysodine."

  "Can the presence of this drug be detected after death?"

  "Pasteur says it can. He won't even have to perform an autopsy. He cando it from a blood sample."

  Captain Quill sighed. "As I said, Mister Gabriel, your evidence is notquite enough to convict--but it is certainly enough to convince.Therefore, if Chief Pasteur's analysis shows Lysodine in LieutenantMellon's body, I'll permit this theatrical denouement." Then his eyeshardened. "Mike, you've done a fine job so far. I want you to bring methat son of a bitch's head on a platter."

  "I will," promised Mike the Angel.