Page:Levenson - Butterfly Man.djvu/261

Rh written to you. He was strangled by someone in that big place of his where you stopped for a while."

"Strangled?"

"With a silk stocking, a woman's stocking. Lucky for me—the executors of his estate never did come across the mortgage papers, and the bank that held them failed, so it looks as though Jim Winston, who's county clerk now, will do me a favor and I'll have the house free and clear at last."

His father continued to talk, small talk of the village, while Ken shuddered at the imagined scene; Mr. Lowell, clad in the velvet robe, black silk stocking garroted about his throat, swollen purple tongue protruding from his gaping mouth, dead eyes hideously open, the organ pipes high above him.

"I'm chilly," Ken interrupted his father. "I think I'll go home."

June was the month when Ken would go Back East. His leg was now thoroughly mended. He had begun to exercise it. To his relief, he found that the long period of enforced idleness had not seriously impaired his ability to kick high and true.

In late June, New York would begin stirring; new shows for the fall season would be announced. He would find an engagement within a month or two.

He had decided to dispense with Leon Shaw's managerial services. Leon was a producer's man. He had inveigled Ken into signing the contract with Howard. Ken preferred to make a fresh start under new auspices. He might look up Nellie Nasmuth and experiment with a vaudeville