The rhythmic tugging continued. Something dark appeared, quite abruptly, at the top of the hole. My nerves leapt in spite of me. but it was merely the top of the detective’s head—his dark hair. Something white came next—his pale face, with staring eyes. Then his shoulders, bowed forward, the better to support what was in his arms. Then
I looked away; but, as he laid his burden down at the side of the well, the detective whispered to us:
"He had her covered up with dirt—covered up. . . . ."
He began to laugh—a little, high cackle. like a child's—until the coroner took him by the shoulders and deliberately shook him. Then the policeman led him out of the cellar.
It was not then, but afterward, that I put my question to the coroner.
"Tell me," I demanded. "People pass there at all hours. Why didn't my uncle call for help?"
"I have thought of that." he replied. "I believe he did call. I think, probably, he screamed. But his head was down, and he couldn't raise it. His screams must have been swallowed up in the well."
"You are sure he didn't murder her?" He had given me that assurance before, but I wished it again.
"Almost sure," he declared. "Though it was on his account, undoubtedly, that she killed herself. Few of us are punished as accurately for our sins as he was."
One should be thankful, even for crumbs of comfort. I am thankful.
But there are times when my uncle's face rises before me. After all, we were the same blood; our sympathies had much in common; under any given circumstances, our thoughts and feelings must have been largely the same. I seem to see him in that final death march along the unlighted passageway—obeying an imperative summons—going on, step by step—down the stairway to the first floor, down the cellar stairs—at last, lifting the slab.
I try not to think of the final expiation. Yet was it final? I wonder. Did the last Door of all, when it opened, find him willing to pass through? Or was Something waiting beyond that Door?
Murderous Sheik Flees to Forest
After attempting to kill a woman who scorned his attentions, Mohammed Ben Asmen, a Moroccan sheik, fled to the Argenteuil Forest near Paris and there defied the efforts of the police to capture him. When the sheik first saw the beautiful Mme. Sophie Bolle he was smitten, and he followed her to her home and demanded that she leave her husband and flee with him. She ordered him away, whereon he attempted to kill her. He was frightened away, but returned and again tried to slay her. Then the police were called, but he eluded them in the forest.
