Rex Stout by The Hand in the Glove

sphere can I survive him. In confining myself to that, I die, but I owe that to him, for his destruction was never intended by me—”
    George Leo Ranth, without moving, called sharply, “Mrs. Storrs! You are giving an entirely wrong impression!—Sir, all of you, I protest—”
    “Don’t interrupt,” Sherwood snapped. “You can correct impressions later.—Yes, madam?”
    Mrs. Storrs shook her head. “It doesn’t matter. I was offering an apology, but my true apology can never be made now—not even to my daughter—his daughter.” She looked at Janet, seated across the room, and shook her head again. “No. I wish to talk to you—quite differently, on your own level. I can do that. My husband knew I could do that, and admired me for it.” She was silent, and stayed so for long seconds. There was no change in her expression, no faint visible effort at composure; she merely sat unmoving and silent, and no one stirred. Then she went on, “First I must make sure no mistakes have been made, nor will be. I wish to know why your men are invading all parts of my grounds, disturbing the plantings, ruining the gardens.”
    “You understand, Mrs. Storrs …” Sherwood cleared his throat, and called that off. He told her briefly, “They are looking for something.”
    “What are they looking for?”
    “Things. Specifically, a pair of gloves.”
    “Whose gloves? I am not protesting, I am inquiring. I wish to have the practical steps, the facts, explained. Have I a right to ask that?”
    Sherwood nodded. “You have. If not a right, at least a privilege which we are certainly inclined to grant. If you are sure you can—you want to hear these details—”
    “I do. Precisely.”
    “Well. Last night we decided that someone killed your husband by fastening a loop of wire around his neck and then pulling him up, hanging him, by pulling on the other end of the wire which had been passed over a high limb of a tree. It seemed possible that the loop had been fastenedby first assaulting your husband and perhaps knocking him unconscious, but the doctor could find no indication that he had received a blow. We discussed another theory, that your husband had gone to sleep on the bench and the loop had been fastened as he lay there asleep. Questioning the servants and others, we learned that that bench was in fact your husband’s favorite spot for a summer nap. Testing the possibility of fastening such a loop without waking a man up, we found that with a man lying in a certain position it was not even difficult; the end of the wire could be passed through under his neck without touching him, pulled through carefully, brought over and a slip knot made with twists just as it was actually done, leaving a large loop. It would take only an instant to run to the tree and grab the other end of the wire and jerk it, taking up the slack in the wire and pulling the noose tight. Being awakened by a wire tightening around his neck, the natural thing for Storrs to do would be to struggle to his feet, and that would offer the chance to pull the wire some more and hold him there. Then he might try to get on the bench, and perhaps kick it over and away. If he tried rushing at the murderer, the wire would hold him. If he tried to jump to reach the limb, that would finish it—”
    An agonized cry sounded: “My God, why must he—why must we—” Dol Bonner squeezed Sylvia Raffray’s shoulder hard: “Now. Now hold it.” Martin Foltz was there: “Sylvia dear, please dear—”
    Mrs. Storrs’ gaze did not waver from Sherwood’s face. She said, in the tone of a priestess declaiming a dogma, “My husband would have tried to reach the man pulling the wire. He
would
have reached him.”
    Sherwood shook his head. “No, madam. We have tried this thing out.—But you asked about the gloves. It was obvious that to pull that wire as hard as that would bruise a man’s hands badly—it would certainly mark them. That was why last night we examined