Would you like to see her?' Frank said.
'No, no!' Arthur answered, hastily. 'Let her stay where she is, I don't
like children as a rule. You know I can't abide the noise yours
sometimes make.'
He was leaving the room with the Bible in his hand, but Frank could not
suffer that, and he said:
'I suppose all these things must stay here till the coroner sees them;
so I will put the Bible where I found it.
Arthur gave it up readily enough, and then, as he reached the door,
looked back, and said:
'If forty coroners and undertakers come on this business, don't bother
me any more. My head buzzes like a bee-hive. See that everything is done
decently for the poor woman, and don't let the town bury her. Do it
yourself, and send the bill to me. There is room enough on the Tracy
lot; put her in a corner.'
'Yes,' Frank answered, standing in the open door and watching him as he
went slowly down the long hall and until he heard him going up stairs.
Then locking the door, which shut him in with the dead, he took the
photograph from his pocket and examined it minutely, feeling no shadow
of doubt in his heart that it was Gretchen--if the picture in the window
was like her. It was the same face, the same sweet mouth and sunny blue
eyes, with curls of reddish-golden hair shading the low brow.
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