"Well, Mrs. McTeague, you did scare me, for----"
"Oh, come over here quick." Trina put her hand to her neck; swallowing
something that seemed to be choking her. "Maria's killed--Zerkow's
wife--I found her."
"Get out!" exclaimed Heise, "you're joking."
"Come over here--over into the house--I found her--she's dead."
Heise dashed across the street on the run, with Trina at his heels, a
trail of spilled whittlings marking his course. The two ran down the
alley. The wild-game peddler, a woman who had been washing down the
steps in a neighboring house, and a man in a broad-brimmed hat stood at
Zerkow's doorway, looking in from time to time, and talking together.
They seemed puzzled.
"Anything wrong in here?" asked the wild-game peddler as Heise and Trina
came up. Two more men stopped on the corner of the alley and Polk Street
and looked at the group. A woman with a towel round her head raised
a window opposite Zerkow's house and called to the woman who had been
washing the steps, "What is it, Mrs. Flint?"
Heise was already inside the house. He turned to Trina, panting from his
run.
"Where did you say--where was it--where?"
"In there," said Trina, "farther in--the next room.
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