Arthur Somers Roche

“ We sat down a few yards from the locked door behind which lay the major and waited the arrival of the physician and sheriff, whose promised coming Tony Larue announced a few minutes after the captain had sent him to telephone.
“You better go down-stairs and stay with the girls, Tony,” said the captain. “They’re cranky craft and might capsize if there ain’t a firm hand at the helium. Git down-stairs and chirk ’em up a bit.”
The Portuguese did as he was bid. At least, he disappeared down the stairs. A little later Nelly, the fat cook, came out to tell us that Miss Gilman was quieted. ”

“ Surely a clear case of suicide doesn’t necessitate harrowing a girl like that? Wait until tomorrow or the next day. Give her a chance to pull herself together. I suppose you want to know something about her uncle. But all that can wait, can’t it—until she’s stronger? ”

“ That would indicate that she knew he had a tendency toward self-destruction, wouldn’t it?”
“One can hardly be said to have a tendency that way unless one has made an attempt upon one’s life,” I retorted. “Miss Gilman may have known that the old gentleman was nervous, but I imagine that’s all.”
He raised his eyebrows. But what he might have said I was never to know, for Miss Gilman, supported on the arm of Nelly, the cook, appeared at the top of the stairs. ”

“ Indeed, the wash-stand, which directly faced the table-desk at which the major had been sitting, at a distance of about fifteen feet, had several of these circular depressions, some large and some small.
These depressions, or rather sockets—they are formed by putting a false top on the stand, in which holes are cut to fit whatever it is intended should go on it—are common to country hotel wash-stands. They are built so that no jogging of the stand will upset water-pitcher, basin or glass. ”

“ For the patter of stealthily running feet past my door that I had heard just after the shot was fired was temporarily forgotten in my immediate assumption—the assumption of the others, too—that the major had killed himself.
For Ruth Gilman, white, trembling, stood just inside the door, saying in a monotone:
“Why did he do it? Why did he do it? Why didn’t I take his revolver from him? It’s my fault, it’s my fault; I should have taken it from him.”
Captain Perkins knelt beside the body. He looked up and his eyes met mine.
“Oh, Brant! Keep them nosy critters outa the room. ”