“That doesn’t explain your deduction that I am a nurse.”
“That was just a wild guess,” I admitted. “Sort of a hunch. Because the only girl I ever knew who wore a similar ring was a nurse, I guess I was guilty of a sophism that just happened to be valid.”
“Sophism,” she said. “I remember that from my one course in philosophy. A specious argument based on a false premise.”
“Yes. All R.N.s graduating from the University of Buffalo are entitled to wear school rings. Therefore all girls wearing U. of B. school rings are R.N.s.”
Diane giggled.
“I’ll concede it was nothing more than a lucky guess,” I said. “But my other deductions were based on sound enough evidence, weren’t they?”
“I think you’re wonderful,” she said with apparent sincerity.
Although by then I was reasonably sure that Diane liked me as much as I was growing to like her, she volunteered very little information about herself other than what I had deduced. For instance, she told me nothing about her ex-fiancé or what had caused their breakup, and naturally I didn’t pry. She did tell me that she lived with her parents in a two-family house on Fillmore in Buffalo, however, and when I asked if I might call her sometime, she consented and wrote her phone number on the inside of a matchbook.
We had left Los Angeles at 11:50 a.m. By the time we landed at Detroit at 5:50 p.m., Detroit time, we had become firm friends.
After the passengers who were getting off at Detroit had deplaned, the stewardess signaled for the rope at the loading gate to be removed and passengers began streaming toward the plane.
The plane took off, and as soon as the seat-belt sign was lifted I excused myself to go back to the rest room. In the last seat on the left, I noticed two men handcuffed together. Both men were in their late forties. It was easy enough to tell which man was the cop and which the prisoner. The man nearest the aisle had to be the cop, because his left wrist was cuffed to the other man’s right. He was a tall, very pale man somewhat resembling Abraham Lincoln without a beard. The other was also tall, but heavier-set and with a round, fleshy face, deeply tanned.
The stewardess was taking dinner orders, and I heard both men order coffee with their meals. I got back to my seat at the same time the stewardess got that far. Diane and I both ordered Swiss steak. Then I told her about the two men in the back seat.
“What does the prisoner look like?” she asked.
“Quite ordinary. Pushing fifty, I would guess.”
We dropped the subject then, because our dinners came.
When dinner period was over and the stewardess had collected everyone’s dishes, a buzz of excited conversation behind us caused us both to rise to our feet and peer toward the rear of the plane. The tall, pale police officer was in the act of lifting the limp form of his seatmate out into the aisle to lay him flat on his back. He had unlocked the cuff from his own wrist, but the other ring was still clamped about the prisoner’s wrist. He knelt next to the unconscious man, feeling his pulse.
The stewardess hurried along the aisle from the front to see what was going on.
Looking up at her, the detective said, “I think he’s having a heart attack. His pulse is very slow and weak.”
Like us, most of the other passengers toward the rear of the plane had risen to their feet to gaze back that way. A lean, rather distinguished-looking man in his mid-forties, who had been seated all alone across the aisle from as and one seat back, stepped out into the aisle as the stewardess started to kneel next to the prone man and said, “I’m a doctor, Miss.”
The stewardess immediately rose and stepped aside so that the doctor could squeeze past her. The detective introduced himself to the doctor as Sergeant Copeland, then got out of the way by reseating himself.
Kneeling next to the unconscious man, the doctor thumbed back an eyelid, peered into the eye, then unbuttoned the man’s suit coat, stripped off his necktie and unbuttoned his shirt. Looking up at the stewardess, he said, “My medical bag is beneath my seat. Will you get it, please?”
She brought him the bag, he drew a stethoscope from it and listened to the patient’s heartbeat. After a few moments he put the stethoscope away, zipped his bag shut and stood up.
“Coronary thrombosis, probably,” he said to the stewardess. “Fortunately you’re equipped with oxygen. How long before we land at Buffalo?”
Glancing at her watch, she said, “It’s seven, and we’re due in at quarter to eight.”
“Roughly three-quarters of an hour,” the doctor said. “I suggest you have the pilot radio to have an ambulance standing by to take the man to City Hospital. He can tell them no intern need come along with the ambulance, as I am on the City Hospital staff and will ride in with the patient. As a matter of fact, no one but the driver will be necessary, as the sergeant and I can act as litter bearers. As soon as you’ve delivered the message, bring a blanket to keep the patient warm.”
“Yes, sir,” the stewardess said, and hurried forward to disappear into the pilot’s cabin.
The doctor said to the detective, “Let’s get him up on the seat so that we can start giving him oxygen. If you’ll retract the armrests between seats, we can lay him on his back.” He glanced around and his gaze fell on me. “You look pretty husky, young man. Will you give us a hand?”
I went back and helped lift the inert form onto the seat. When the patient was on his back across all three seats, the doctor pulled out the seat’s oxygen mask and affixed it to the man’s face. Then he checked his heart with his stethoscope again.
“No worse, but no better either,” he said as he slipped the instrument back into his bag. “He might be more comfortable without that manacle dangling from his wrist, Sergeant.”
Sergeant Copeland took a key from his pocket, unlocked the cuff and dropped the handcuffs into his coat pocket.
“Incidentally, my name is Martin Smith,” the doctor said, offering the detective his hand.
Shaking it, the sergeant said, “Glad to know you, Dr. Smith. And I’m certainly glad you were aboard.”
“My name is Albert Shelton,” I offered.
Both of them looked at me. The doctor said politely, “Thank you for your help, Albert.”
“You’re welcome. Dr. Smith, my seatmate is a registered nurse, if you need her help.”
He gave me a surprised look. “Well, thanks, but there is nothing she could do at the moment.” Turning to the elderly man who was the sole occupant of the seat directly across the aisle from the patient, he said, “Sir, would you mind moving up to the seat I was occupying, so that I can sit here near the patient, in case he—”
“Not at all,” the man said, immediately moving forward.
“Want to sit next to the window, Sergeant?” the doctor asked. “I had better stay on the aisle so that I can keep an eye on him.”
“In a minute,” the detective said. “I just had a weird thought.” Leaning over the patient, Sergeant Copeland rummaged in the unconscious man’s coat pocket and withdrew a small bottle of liquid. He handed it to the doctor. Looking over the doctor’s shoulder, I read the label the same time he did. It said: Sweet-as-Sugar. Below that, in smaller print, was Concentrated Sweetener and No Cyclamates.
Looking up, the doctor said, “A common sugar substitute. What about it?”
“At dinner he wanted to put some in his coffee. After examining the bottle, I let him. It just occurred to me there might be something other than artificial sweetener in there. This could have been attempted suicide, since he was going back to New York to face twenty more years of hard time.”
“Hmm,” the doctor said. Unscrewing the cap, he sniffed at the bottle’s contents, then recapped it. “I really can’t tell, and I’m not about to taste it to find out. We’ll take it along to the hospital and have it analyzed.”