It was a mass of burns.
Before I could inquire further a negress keeper entered the room.
"You can't stay in here," she said angrily.
"What's the matter with the girl?" I asked.
"Oh, she got foolish the other day and took a dose of carbolic acid," was the answer. "She ain't burned bad—at least not as bad as I've seen lots of them. Don't give her any of that soft home talk and she'll get over it all right in a couple of days."
With this the woman held the door open and motioned for me to leave.
In the early morning, three days later, I happened to pass the same place. A wagon, painted black and without a name to designate its owner, was standing in the road at a side entrance.
I stood watching for a few minutes. Presently the door opened. Four men came out carrying between them an undertaker's stretcher. On it lay a body covered with a white sheet.
I approached and asked one who was dead.