"Jest you listen close and hear me before you come back. I seen in the papers that Miss Hesketh that was murdered had one glove lost. Do you mind what the one that wasn't lost looked like?"
"Sure I do—why shouldn't I? Didn't I see it at the inquest?"
"Will you be answering me instead of tellin' me what you saw?"
"Ain't I doin' it? It was a left-hand glove, light gray with three pearl buttons and a furrener's name stamped in the inside."
"Well, then, I got the feller to it—right hand. I found it on the wharf at the lake, in front of the bungalow. Seeing that there's ten thousand dollars reward offered, I thought I'd be a blowin' in the price of a call to tell you, though it's so ungrateful ye are for the news I'm sorry I done it. But I'll not bother you no more, for it's in to the District Attorney I'll be goin' with the evidence."
That was what he did, that very afternoon. By the next day everybody in Longwood knew how Pat Donahue had found Sylvia Hesketh's missing glove on the wharf just in front of the Reddy bungalow. There was a person who didn't close an eye that night, and I guess you know what her name was.
Gee, those were awful days that followed! When I think of them now I can feel a sort of sinking come back on me and my face gets stiff like it was made of leather and couldn't limber up for a smile. Each morning I'd get up scared sick of what I was going to hear that day, and each evening I'd go to bed filled with a darkness as black as the night outside.
I couldn't believe it and yet—well, I'll tell you and you can judge for yourself.
The police went out to Hochalaga and made a thorough examination of the house and its surroundings.
The bungalow stood at one end of the lake right on the shore, with a little wharf jutting out in front of it into the water. The door opened into a big living-room, furnished very pretty and comfortable with green madras curtains at the windows, a green art rug on the floor, and wicker chairs with green denim cushions. At one side was a big brick fireplace with a copper kettle hanging on a crane and over in a corner was a desk with a telephone on it. Along the walls were bookcases full of books and in the center was a table with chairs drawn up at either side of it.