tions for Krajiek to murder him, would he?
It don't hang together. The gun was right
beside him when Ambrosch found him."

"Krajiek could 'a' put it there, couldn't
he?" Jake demanded.

Grandmother broke in excitedly: "See here,
Jake Marpole, don't you go trying to add mur-
der to suicide. We're deep enough in trouble.
Otto reads you too many of them detective
stories."

"It will be easy to decide all that, Emma-
line," said grandfather quietly. "If he shot
himself in the way they think, the gash will be
torn from the inside outward."

"Just so it is, Mr. Burden," Otto affirmed.
"I seen bunches of hair and stuff sticking to
the poles and straw along the roof. They was
blown up there by gunshot, no question."

Grandmother told grandfather she meant
to go over to the Shimerdas' with him.

"There is nothing you can do," he said
doubtfully. "The body can't be touched until
we get the coroner here from Black Hawk, and
that will be a matter of several days, this
weather."

"Well, I can take them some victuals, any-
way, and say a word of comfort to them poor

[[112]]

p111 _ -chap- _ toc-1 _ p112w _ toc-2 _ +chap+ _ p113

v?