On a tiny meadow that lay as a crescent of green along the border of cove where the current of the river sweeps in as an eddy, something was drawn up from the water and lay covered in an unrecognizable mass, which none the less had a strange repulsiveness about it. Back of the meadow great trees rose toward the early June sky; before it the river flashed in the June sunshine, and across its waters, the brown earth, dotted with the young corn, stretched away in the beauty of early summer. A few men and boys stood about the covered thing in strange silence, that seemed almost of fear; yet all pressed nearer when, by order of the coroner, the covering cloth was removed.
Trafford and the doctor stooped and made a close examination of the hideous thing. No one spoke above his breath as they waited the report, yet by some strange magic the story of the finding went from man to man. At last the two men rose and went down to the river to wash their soiled hands. The coroner followed them:
“What do you make of it?” he asked.
Trafford waited until the doctor was forced to speak:
“Plainly a Canuck, and I should say a log-driver. Certainly a working man. Been drowned a week and has come from above the Falls. You can see that by the way he’s battered up. That’s when he was whirled round under the Falls. Several bones broken, probably by the rocks, but that smashing of the collar bone came from a blow from above and before he was dead. It may have been that that knocked him into the water. Unless you find some particular mark on him, you won’t be able to identify him, he’s so smashed up. Better send up the river and see if any driver has been missing about a week. Beg pardon, Mr. Trafford, I fear I’m taking the words out of your mouth.”
“Not at all,” the other answered. “I couldn’t have covered my findings better myself, excepting I was less certain about the breaking of the collar bone, whether it was before or after death. If he had gone over the Falls, for instance, head first, might he not have struck a rock and broken his collar bone, so as to give the appearance of its being shattered by a blow dealt from above?”
“It’s not simply that,” said the doctor. “There’s the swelling of the living flesh that could not take place if the blow occurred after death. The injury must have occurred long enough before death to produce this effect.”
“Then it could hardly have been the blow that knocked him into the water?”
The doctor started at the question and, without answering, walked back to the body and re-examined the broken bone and some of the other bruises. Then he came back to where Trafford and the coroner waited him.
“There can’t be any question that the broken clavicle antedates death, and antedates it some few hours. The man may have been injured at some distance from any one and have taken a boat to go for assistance and not been able to control it.”