The King in Yellow and the Messenger: (Robert W Chambers Masterpiece Collection Starling and Black Classic Double)

"The bullet entered here," said Max Fortin, and he placed his middle finger over a smooth hole exactly in the center of the forehead. I sat down upon a mound of dry seaweed and unslung my fowling piece. The little chemist cautiously felt the edges of the shot-hole, first with his middle finger, and then with his thumb. "Let me see the skull again," said I. Max Fortin picked it up from the sod. "It's like all the others," he repeated, wiping his glasses on his handkerchief. "I thought you might care to see one of the skulls, so I brought this over from the gravel pit. The men from Bannalec are digging yet. They ought to stop." "How many skulls are there altogether?" I inquired. "They found thirty-eight skulls; there are thirty-nine noted in the list. They lie piled up in the gravel pit on the edge of Le Bihan's wheat field. The men are at work yet. Le Bihan is going to stop them." "Let's go over," said I; and I picked up my gun and started across the cliffs, Portin on one side, Môme on the other.