"You're no doctor. Now call that ambulance like I told you. Jump!" I said. He jumped. I made a quick examination, meanwhile, and when Leo came back from the phone I pointed. "See, the blood. It's still coming out." "Corpses bleed, don't they?" "Not in spurts," I said. "The hole's tiny, but whatever's in there touched an artery. See that?" He looked and seemed convinced. "The ambulance will be here. Anything else I should do?" "Yes. Nothing. Don't touch a thing in this room ... or did you already?" "Just Calvin. I heard him fall, and when I came in he was on his face." "Why did you ask for homicide when you called the police? Or let's put it this way: What makes you think it wasn't an accident?" "Two reasons. First, because I couldn't see any cause of the accident. When I turned him over the floor was smooth and clean under his forehead except for the smear of blood. Reason number two: Because Calvin just doesn't have accidents. All his life he's moved in slow motion. I've never known him to stumble, or cut himself, or drop anything or even bump into anyone." I was checking around the room myself, and I had to admit that both reasons might be valid. A man the size of Calvin wasn't likely to be the skittish type. And by the time the ambulance arrived I was ready to admit that if the injury were an accident, Calvin Baxter had contrived to conceal its source. It took several of us to load the unconscious man onto the stretcher. I told his cocky little brother to stay on ice, while I rode downtown in the ambulance. Dr. Thorsen called me into the emergency ward. "How did this happen?" he wanted to know. Thorsen is a lean, learned old chap who normally gives more answers than he asks. I said, "Don't know, Doc. I found him in a sort of home workshop. No power tools, nothing dangerous in sight. The bench at one end had a couple of little gadgets on it--looked sort of electrical. Some wire, soldering iron, books, a few rough circuit drawings." "The gadgets. What did they look like?" I thought back and realized that what I had to describe would sound a little peculiar. "Sort of like flashlights with a pistol grip ... and no lens where the light should come out. Just blunt, flat ends." Thorsen shrugged. "Then I don't know. I expected you to report some kind of a blast or explosion." "No sign of one." "All right, then what else but a flying particle could drill a hole in a man's forehead the diameter of a piece of 16-gauge wire?" "What do the x-rays show?" "We'll know in a minute. What about the murder-attempt angle?" I said that I had nothing to go on yet. That was the whole truth and the final truth! When Doc's x-rays revealed _nothing but a blood clot_ deep in the brain at the end of the tiny tunnel piercing the skull, I was left without even a "modus operandi", let alone a substantial suspect. * * * * *