Rice was sleeping soundly.
The colored woman who did the housework was absent for the day and the
rooms were deserted. He saturated a sponge with chloroform, constructed
a cone out of a towel, placed the sponge in the cone, put the cone over
the sleeping man's face and ran out of the room and waited thirty
minutes for the chloroform to complete the work. Waiting in the next
room he heard the door bell ring, and ring again, but he paid no
attention to the summons. In point of fact he was never quite sure
himself whether the bell was not the creation of his own overwrought
brain. At the end of half an hour he returned to the bedroom, removed
the cone from Rice's face and saw that he was dead, then after burning
the sponge and the towel in the kitchen range he opened the windows,
straightened the rooms out, called the elevator man, asked him to send
for Dr. Curry, and telephoned to Patrick that Rice was dead.
Jones had no sooner telephoned Patrick that Rice was dead than the
lawyer hastened to Dr. Curry's, and within forty minutes appeared with
him in Rice's apartments, assuming complete charge.
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