g prostrate.
Stooping, he recognized the figure.

"Why--it's Underwood!" he exclaimed.

At first he believed his classmate was asleep, yet considered it strange
that he should have selected so uncomfortable a place. Then it occurred
to him that he might be ill. Shaking him by the shoulder, he cried:

"Hey, Underwood, what's the matter?"

No response came from the prostrate figure. Howard stooped lower, to see
better, and accidentally touching Underwood's face, found it clammy and
wet. He held his hand up in the moonlight and saw that it was covered
with blood. Horror-stricken, he cried:

"My God! He's bleeding--he's hurt!"

What had happened? An accident--or worse? Quickly he felt the man's
pulse. It had ceased to beat. Underwood was dead.

For a moment Howard was too much overcome by his discovery to know what
to think or do. What dreadful tragedy could have happened? Carefully
groping along the mantelpiece, he at last found the electric button and
turned on the light. There, stretched out on the floor, lay Underwood,
with a bullet hole in his left temple, from which blood had flowed
freely down on his full-dress shirt. It was a ghastly sight. The man's
white, set face, covered with a crimson stream, made a repulsive
spectacle. On the floor near the body was a highly polished revolver,
still smoking.

Howard's first supposition was that burglars had entered the place and
that Underwood had been killed while defending his property. He
remembered now that in his drunken sleep he had heard voices in angry
altercation. Yet why hadn't he called for assistance? Perhaps he had and
he hadn't heard him.

He looked at the clock, and was surprised to find it was not yet
midnight. He believed it was at least five o'clock in the morning. It
was evident that Underwood had never gone to bed. The shooting had
occurred either while the angry dispute was going on or after the
unknown visitor had departed. The barrel of the revolver was still warm,
showing that it could only have been discharged a few moments before.
Suddenly it flashed upon him that Underwood might have committed
suicide.

But it was useless to stand there theorizing. Something must be done.
He must alarm the hotel people or call the police. He felt himself turn
hot and cold by turn as he realized the serious predicament in which he
himself was placed. If he aroused the hotel people they would find him
here alone with a dead man. Suspicion would at once be