King's dis-
turbed intelligence could not rightly comprehend.
Groping in intellectual darkness for a clue to his
maze of doubt, his gaze, directed mechanically down-
ward in the way of one who ponders momentous
matters, fell upon something which, there, in the
light of day and in the presence of living companions,
affected him with terror. In the dust of years that
lay thick upon the floor--leading from the door
by which they had entered, straight across the room
to within a yard of Manton's crouching corpse--
were three parallel lines of footprints--light but
definite impressions of bare feet, the outer ones
those of small children, the inner a woman's. From
the point at which they ended they did not return;
they pointed all one way. Brewer, who had observed
them at the same moment, was leaning forward in
an attitude of rapt attention, horribly pale.
'Look at that!' he cried, pointing with both hands
at the nearest print of the woman's right foot, where
she had apparently stopped and stood. 'The middle
toe is missing--it was Gertrude!'
Gertrude was the late Mrs. Manton, sister of Mr.
Brewer.
JOHN MORTONSON'S FUNERAL [1]
JOHN MORTONSON was dead: his lines in 'the tragedy
"Man"' had all been spoken and he had left the
stage.
The body rested in a fine mahogany coffin fitted
with a plate of glass. All arrangements for the funeral
had been so well attended to that had the deceased
known he would doubtless have approved.
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