Page:Lawrence Lynch--The last stroke.djvu/317

Rh the shadow of a woman, who paced the floor with her bare arms tossing aloft in a pantomime of agony, or shame."

He glanced about him. The two lawyers were standing side by side near the door, erect and stern. The man in the chair opposite was affecting an incredulous indifference. The room was intensely still when the voice ceased and no one stirred or spoke.

"Next morning, early, I viewed the scene of the crime, and I saw how easily the destroyer might have crept upon an unsuspecting victim, owing to the formation of the shore, the shelter of the trees and shrubs, and the protection of the curving Indian Mound. There had been showers two days before, and in certain spots, where the sun did not penetrate, the earth was still moist. Under a huge tree, just where the slayer might have stood, I found the print of a dainty shoe, or rather, the pointed toe of it. In two other sheltered places I found parts of other footprints, and, a little off the road, in a clump of underbrush, I found two well-formed footprints, all alike, small, and pointed at the toe. But I found something more in that hazel thicket. I found my first convincing, convicting clue. It was just a shred, a thread of a black mourning veil, such as widows wear. Later I found a poor simpleton who had been in the wood on the morning of the murder,