e did not answer,
only leaning there and staring down.

"You'd better come, Bill," the woman said. "There's something wrong up
'ere."

The woman came up the stairs followed by two men; they moved cautiously
as though, they expected to find something terrible round the next
corner.

"What is it?" said the woman again when she came up to Maggie. But
Maggie made no answer. They pushed past her and went into the room.
Maggie followed them. She saw the room obscured by mist; she heard some
whispering and fumbling, then a match was struck; there was a bead-like
flare followed suddenly by the flaming of a candle. In the quick light
the room was bright. Maggie saw her uncle hanging from some projection
in the rough ceiling. A chair was overturned at his feet. His body was
like a bag of old clothes, his big boots turning inwards towards one
another. His face was a dull grey and seemed cut off from the rest of
his body by the thick blue muffler that encircled his neck. He was
grinning at her; the tip of his tongue protruded at her between his
teeth. She noticed his hands that hung heavily like dead fish.

After that she knew no more save that the sea seemed to rush in a great
flood, with a sudden vindictive roar, into the room.

CHAPTER IX

SOUL OF PAUL

Nothing so horrible had ever happened to Paul before, nothing ...

He felt as though he had committed a murder; it was as though he
expected arrest and started at every knock on the door. Nothing so
horrible ...

It was, of course, in all the Skeaton papers. At the inquest it
appeared that Mathew Cardinal had imitated the signature of a
prosperous City friend; had he not chosen his own way out he would have
discovered the arduous delights of hard labour. But he had chosen
suicide and not "while of unsound mind." Yes, the uncle of the Rector's
wife ... Yes, The Rector's Wife's Uncle ... Yes, The Rector's Wife's
Uncle!

Sho discovered him, bumped right into him in the dark. What a queer
story--like a novel. Oh, but she had always been queer--Trenchard had
picked her up somewhere in a London slum; well, perhaps not a slum
exactly but something very like it. Why did he marry her? Perhaps he
had to. Who knows? These clergymen are sly dogs. Always the worst if
the truth were known ...

So it went on. For nine whole days (and nights) it was the only topic
in Skeaton. Paul caught the fringe of it. He had never known very much
about his fellow-beings. He had always