He must think of some other method. He was on the fourth floor. He might throw himself out of the window onto the brick walk at the back of the building, and die. He shuddered as he thought of it. To jump from a twentieth story, or from the top of the Woolworth Tower, to a certain death is one thing. To contemplate a fall of three or four stories that may maim you without killing you, is another.
Nevertheless, he would do it. He pulled the paper out of the crevice between the window sashes, opened the window and looked down. He saw the back stoop and there was a dirty mop beside it; there was an ash can, and there were two garbage cans there. And there was a starved cat that sat and looked up at him. He had a tremor and drew back and covered his face with his hands as he thought of that cat--that knowing cat, that loathsome, that obscene cat.
He sat down on the edge of the bed to collect his strength and summon his resolution. The cockroach had crawled to the head of the bed and seemed to wish to partake of his thoughts.
"Damn you, Old Archibald Hammil!" he cried. And he scooped the cockroach into his hand with a sudden sweep and flung it out of the window. The insect fell without perceptible discomfort, and at once began to climb up the outside wall again, making for the window.
The door opened and Mrs. Hinkley entered, her face cleft with a grin, and a tray in her hands.
"Mr. Gooley," she said, setting it on the wash-stand, "I'll bet you ain't had nothing to eat today!"
On the tray was a bowl of soup, a half loaf of bread with a long keen bread knife, a pat of butter, a boiled egg and a cup of coffee.
"No, nor yesterday, either," said Mr. Gooley, and he looked at the soup and at the long keen bread knife.
"Here's something else I want to show you, Mr. Gooley," said the landlady, dodging out of the door and back in again instantly. She bore in her hands this time a surprising length of flexible gas tubing, and a small nickel-plated pearl-handled revolver.
"You see that there gas tubing?" she said.
"That is what that blondined party in the next room had on to her gas plate--the nerve of her! Strung from the gas jet clear across the room to the window sill. And when I throwed her out, Mr. Gooley, she wouldn't pay her rent, and I took this here revolver to part pay it. What kind of a woman is it, Mr. Gooley, that has a revolver in her room, and a loaded one, too?"
