CHAPTER III

THE WOUNDED HAND


"He was killed!" repeated Godfrey, with conviction; and, at the
words, we drew together a little, with a shiver of repulsion. Death
is awesome enough at any time; suicide adds to its horror; murder
gives it the final touch.

So we all stood silent, staring as though fascinated at the hand
which Simmonds held up to us; at those tiny wounds, encircled by
discoloured flesh and with a sinister dash of clotted blood running
away from them. Then Goldberger, taking a deep breath, voiced the
thought which had sprung into my own brain.

"Why, it looks like a snake-bite!" he said, his voice sharp with
astonishment.

And, indeed, it did. Those two tiny incisions, scarcely half an inch
apart, might well have been made by a serpent's fangs.

The quick glance which all of us cast about the room was, of course,
as involuntary as the chill which ran up our spines; yet Godfrey and
I--yes, and Simmonds--had the excuse that, once upon a time, we had
had an encounter with a deadly snake which none of us was likely ever