But passing into that darker stretch, he again
stood still. A policeman had also turned into that street on the other
side. Not--surely not! Absurd! They were all alike to look at--those
fellows! Absurd! He walked on sharply, and let himself into his house.
But on his way upstairs he could not for the life of him help raising a
corner of a curtain and looking from the staircase window. The policeman
was marching solemnly, about twenty-five yards away, paying apparently
no attention to anything whatever.
IV
Keith woke at five o'clock, his usual hour, without remembrance. But
the grisly shadow started up when he entered his study, where the lamp
burned, and the fire shone, and the coffee was set ready, just as when
yesterday afternoon Larry had stood out there against the wall. For a
moment he fought against realisation; then, drinking off his coffee, sat
down sullenly at the bureau to his customary three hours' study of the
day's cases.
Not one word of his brief could he take in. It was all jumbled with
murky images and apprehensions, and for full half an hour he suffered
mental paralysis. Then the sheer necessity of knowing something of the
case which he had to open at half-past ten that morning forced him to a
concentration which never quite subdued the malaise at the bottom of his
heart.
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