They returned to the threshold, and as they were bending over to grip
the dead man the same sound filled the air, but this time louder, more
intense, a cry of great agony. The sweat dripped from McCurdie's
forehead. They lifted the dead man and brought him into the room, and
after laying him on a dirty strip of carpet they did their best to
straighten the stiff limbs. Biggleswade put on the table a bundle which
he had picked up outside. It contained some poor provisions--a loaf, a
piece of fat bacon, and a paper of tea. As far as they could guess (and
as they learned later they guessed rightly) the man was the master of
the house, who, coming home blind drunk from some distant inn, had
fallen at his own threshold and got frozen to death. As they could not
unclasp his fingers from the broken bottleneck they had to let him
clutch it as a dead warrior clutches the hilt of his broken sword.
Then suddenly the whole place was rent with another and yet another
long, soul-piercing moan of anguish.
"There's a second room," said Doyne, pointing to a door. "The sound
comes from there." He opened the door, peeped in, and then, returning
for the lamp, disappeared, leaving McCurdie and Biggleswade in the pitch
darkness, with the dead man on the floor.
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