It was a clear, crisp morning in January—sixteenth of the month—and we were at breakfast. Himself had just got in from Cleveland, where he'd been sent to write up the Cheney graft prosecution. It took some minutes to say "How d'ye do"—he'd been away two whole days—and after we'd concluded the ceremonies I lit into the kitchen to get his breakfast while he sat down at his end of the table and dived into the papers. His egg was before him and I was setting the coffeepot down at my end when he gave that "Hello," loud and startled, with the accent on the "lo."
"What's up now?" said I, looking over the layout before me to see if I'd forgotten anything.
"Hollings Harland's committed suicide," came out of the paper.
"Lord, has he!" said I. "Isn't that awful?" I took up the cream pitcher. "Well, what do you make of that—the cream's frozen."
"Last night at half-past six. Threw himself out of his office window on the eighteenth story."
"Eighteenth story!—that's some fall. I've got to take this cream out with a spoon." I spooned up some, all white spikes and edges, wondering if it would chill his coffee which he likes piping hot. "Darling, do you mind waiting a little while I warm up the cream?"
"Darn the cream! What rotten luck that I was away. I suppose they put Eddie Saunders on it, sounds like his flat-footed style. Listen to this: 'The body struck the pavement with a violent impact.' That's the way he describes the fall of a man from the top of a skyscraper. Gee, why wasn't I here?"
"But, dearie," I said, passing him his cup, "Saunders would have done it if you had been here. You don't do suicides."
"I do this one. Hollings Harland, one of the big corporation lawyers of New York."
"Oh," I said, "he's an important person."