"I was scairt. I didn't want to. I kep' dreamin' of it at night and I didn't know what to do. And this mornin' when Paw and Maw was gassin' about the suicide I just busted out. I—I——" his lips trembled and the tears welled into his eyes.
"It's thrue what he says, every word," said Mrs. Meagher. "It's sick he's been ever sence, and me crazy not knowin' what was eatin' into him. And this mornin' he breaks into a holler and out it comes."
As she was speaking the old man patted the thin hand, eyeing the child with a deep, quiet kindliness.
"You're a wise boy, Dannie," said he. "And you want to keep on being a wise boy and not tell anyone. Will you answer a question or two, saying when you don't know or don't remember? I'll see that you get something pretty nice afterward, if you do."
"Yes," says Dannie, "I'll answer."
"Could you see what the man looked like, the man that was alive?"
"No—I wasn't near enough. They was like—like"—he paused and then said, his eyes showing a troubled bewilderment—"like shadows."
"He would have seen the figures in silhouette," George explained, "black against the lit window."
"That's it," he turned eagerly to George. "And it was acrost the street and the houses on Broadway."
"Um," said the chief, "too far for any detail. Well, this man, the one that went on his hands and knees, was he a fat man?"