"Is there any brandy here--anything
like that, Mr. Piper?"
"K-kitchen," said Mr. Piper with a sniff and one of his hands came away
from Mrs. Severance to fumble for a key.
"I'll go get it," said Oliver, still rather loudly, and took one step
away. Then he bent down again swiftly and poured the whole contents of the
tumbler he was holding into the little hollow of Mrs. Severance's throat
just above the collar-bone. _"Oh!"_ said the dead Mrs. Severance in the
tone of one who has turned on the cold in a shower unexpectedly, and she
opened her eyes.
"Rose!" said Mr. Piper snifflingly. "You aren't dead? You aren't dead,
dear? Rose! Rose!"
"Oh," said Mrs. Severance again, but this time tinily and with a flavor of
third acts about her, and she started to relax rather beautifully into a
Dying Gladiator pose.
"I'll get some more water, Mr. Piper," said Oliver briskly, and Mrs.
Severance began to sit up again.
"I--fainted--silly of me," she said with a consummate dazedness. "Somebody
was firing revolvers--"
"I tried--I tried--I--t-tried to s-shoot you, Rose," came from the damp
little heap on the floor that was Mr.
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