"Did you go alone?"
"Yes, I did. And I spent the afternoon in there, drinking. It was very unwise. The barman eventually kicked me out at about midnight. He called a cab for me."
May nodded. This effectively meant that the nurse would not have been able to murder Jenna Brand. While she had been getting hunted down, he'd been drowning his sorrows, with the barman as witness.
"And yesterday?" May asked, just to confirm his actions in full.
"I woke up with a terrible hangover. I went to get some headache tablets and thought I would stock up on sleeping tablets too, as I haven't been sleeping well. I then had a call with my lawyer. Then I put my resumé out there and applied for a few jobs. I called around to a few agencies, wondering if I should move out of state. That took basically the whole afternoon. I mean, the calls, the emails, the information they needed. I even called a few estate agents."
"Go on?" May asked. Undoubtedly, these phone records and emails could be confirmed, and they would prove that the nurse hadn't been hiding out in a barn, waiting for his next victim.
"I wrapped up at about eight p.m. and then I started feeling sorry for myself."
"Why is that?" Owen asked.
"I got very depressed. I always do after I've had too much to drink. So I unfortunately wrote that note, and took too many sleeping tablets. I never intended for it to get so out of hand. I thought it would be more of a gesture. But then I found I couldn't stop."
Now, finally, Nurse Keyes looked at May with a flicker of gratitude.
"I'm thankful to you for saving my life. I really am."
"I'm just glad we were able to help you," May replied, deciding to be honest. “And I'm sorry that you were feeling so down. I know what it's like to have a bad day. Next time, you should call a friend or else one of the help lines." Privately, she also thought the nurse needed to focus on anger management, and if he couldn’t do that, then he might need to look at a different job, but that was a conversation for another time.
Nurse Keyes was silent for a moment, then he nodded.
"I know. And I'm going to take your advice. I'm going to start calling my friends more, and maybe go out with them more. Yes, that's what I'll do. I'm going to make a real effort to do that.I think with everything that's happened, I haven't been paying enough attention to my own mental state."
May nodded, feeling glad that whatever the future would hold for the nurse, he was going to try harder to get some support in facing up to it. She handed the patient files to him, and he took them with a nod of thanks.
This final gesture meant she was sure their strong suspect was not guilty. And that meant they were all out of leads.
It was now ten a.m. and they had nowhere to turn.
And then, an idea occurred to May.
"Owen, I've thought of another angle," she said, as they walked out of the ward.
"You have? What's that?" he replied in a muttered voice.
"The victims have all escaped death, and even though Nurse Keyes was not involved, it still meant that two of them ended up being treated at the hospital," May said.
"Correct," Owen said.
"Perhaps we could take that idea forward. And find out who this man might be planning to kill."
"By finding out who else has recently been in the ICU and survived?" Owen asked.
"Yes. If we could get an idea of who he might target next, it would help us a lot. The hospital would have records of women who live locally and who have spent time in the ICU recently, and survived events where they could have died."
"May, that's a great idea." Owen looked suddenly doubtful. "If they'll give us the records, of course."
"It's a matter of life and death, surely?" May said. "Let's go back to the hospital administrator and ask him what information he's prepared to share. Given that it might save the lives of future victims, surely, he'll realize it's important?"
"I think we must try," Owen said.
Instead of heading out of the hospital, May took a turn and followed the route she'd done before, going in the direction of the hospital administrator’s office.
There, she hoped, they could get answers — from the future victims themselves.