Page:Richard Marsh--The goddess a demon.djvu/48

36 "Yes," I replied; "that's Lawrence—what's left of him."

He was kneeling by the dead man on the floor, his usually impassive face all alert and eager.

"How has this happened—and when?"

"That is what has to be discovered."

"Who found him?"

"Atkins and I."

"Was he lying in this position?"

"No; he was on his face. We turned him over."

"The man's been cut to pieces."

"It almost looks to me as if he had been scratched to pieces."

"I fancy these wounds are too deep for scratches—in the ordinary sense. It looks as if several narrow blades had been used, set in some kind of frame, or a row of spikes. The flesh has been torn open in regular layers. This is interesting—very." This was the kind of remark which I should have expected he would make; it came from him sotto voce. "He's been dead some time, he's quite cold. Very curious indeed."

While he spoke he had been unfastening, with deft fingers, the dead man's clothes, laying bare his neck and chest. Now he called to me, with an accent of suspicion.

"Look at that!"

I looked. I saw that the body was almost as