He looks out the window for the duo of men out for him, then picks up his things, leaves the room, and walks toward and past the two men to call their bluff. His landlady (unaware of Charles' true identity) informed him that two men were asking for him, and when she left the room and lowers his blind, Charles raises up alertly.
The bedside table next to him has a pile of dollar bills carelessly stacked (some fell on the floor. We first see Charles inside an apartment house reclining on a bed during the day. He had earned a reputation as the "Merry Widow Murderer" due to his pattern and he was somehow able to successfully avoid sleuths and never got photographed or properly identified by anyone. Prior to the events of the film, Charles had developed a strong hatred for rich widowed women as he thought they carelessly profited off they husbands' hard earned wealth, and had strangled no less than three wealthy widowed women to death and stole their money, including a musical comedy star Bruce Matthewson (stage name: Thelma Schenley) whom Charles stole her emerald ring from. Either way, the film never attempts to make an sympathetic with the fracture so it's not a true redeeming quality. It's purposefully left ambiguous whether the skull fracture altered his personality, or he willingly choose to go down the dark path he did.
This is the movie's attempt to give an excuse for his sudden change in behavior. Then after the fracture, he would regularly "get into mischief" with a drastic personality change. Not to much is known about Charles' early life, although what is known is that he grew up with an older sister named Emma, and he used to be a quiet boy who loved to read and had a childhood incident one Christmas with his new bicycle which gave him a near-lethal skull fracture.
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