m to the bed, on which I laid him
so that his feet hung down over the edge. I had possessed myself of the
Malay creese, which I held in my right hand, while with the other I
discovered as accurately as I could by pulsation the exact locality of
the heart. It was essential that all the aspects of his death should
lead to the surmise of self-murder. I calculated the exact angle at
which it was probable that the weapon, if levelled by Simon's own hand,
would enter his breast; then with one powerful blow I thrust it up to
the hilt in the very spot which I desired to penetrate. A convulsive
thrill ran through Simon's limbs. I heard a smothered sound issue from
his throat, precisely like the bursting of a large air-bubble, sent up
by a diver, when it reaches the surface of the water; he turned half
round on his side, and, as if to assist my plans more effectually, his
right hand, moved by some mere spasmodic impulse, clasped the handle of
the creese, which it remained holding with extraordinary muscular
tenacity. Beyond this there was no apparent struggle. The laudanum, I
presume, paralyzed the usual nervous action. He must have died
instantly.

There was yet something to be done. To make it certain that all
suspicion of the act should be diverted from any inhabitant of the
house to Simon himself, it was necessary that the door should be in the
morning _locked on the inside_. How to do this, and afterwards escape
myself? Not by the window; that was a physical impossibility. Besides,
I was determined that the windows _also_ should be found bolted. The
solution was simple enough. I descended softly to my own room for a
peculiar instrument which I had used for holding small slippery
substances, such as minute spheres of glass, etc. This instrument was
nothing more than a long slender hand-vise, with a very powerful grip,
and a considerable leverage, which last was accidentally owing to the
shape of the handle. Nothing was simpler than, when the key was in the
lock, to seize the end of its stem in this vise, through the keyhole,
from the outside, and lock the door. Previously, however, to doing
this, I burned a number of papers on Simon's hearth. Suicides almost
always burn papers before they destroy themselves. I also emptied some
more laudanum into Simon's glass,--having first removed from it all
traces of wine,--cleaned the other wine-glass, and brought the bottles
away with me. If traces of two persons drinking had been found