One evening as he was about to put a morsel of corned beef and cabbage into his mouth his hand stopped.  His eyes fixed themselves on a paragraph in the evening paper which he had propped against the water-carafe.  He replaced the morsel of food on his plate and read the paragraph attentively.  Then he drank a glass of water, pushed his plate to one side, doubled the paper down before him between his elbows and read the paragraph over and over again.  The cabbage began to deposit a cold white grease on his plate.  The girl came over to him to ask was his dinner not properly cooked.  He said it was very good and ate a few mouthfuls of it with difficulty.  Then he paid his bill and went out.

He walked along quickly through the November twilight, his stout hazel stick striking the ground regularly, the fringe of the buff Mail peeping out of a side-pocket of his tight reefer overcoat.  On the lonely road which leads from the Parkgate to Chapelizod he slackened his pace.  His stick struck the ground less emphatically and his breath, issuing irregularly, almost with a sighing sound, condensed in the wintry air.  When he reached his house he went up at once to his bedroom and, taking the paper from his pocket, read the paragraph again by the failing light of the window.  He read it not aloud, but moving his lips as a priest does when he reads the prayers Secreto.  This was the paragraph: 

Death of A lady at Sydney parade
A painful case

Today at the City of Dublin Hospital the Deputy Coroner (in the absence of Mr. Leverett) held an inquest on the body of Mrs. Emily Sinico, aged forty-three years, who was killed at Sydney Parade Station yesterday evening.  The evidence showed that the deceased lady, while attempting to cross the line, was knocked down by the engine of the ten o’clock slow train from Kingstown, thereby sustaining injuries of the head and right side which led to her death.

James Lennon, driver of the engine, stated that he had been in the employment of the railway company for fifteen years.  On hearing the guard’s whistle he set the train in motion and a second or two afterwards brought it to rest in response to loud cries.  The train was going slowly.

P. Dunne, railway porter, stated that as the train was about to start he observed a woman attempting to cross the lines.  He ran towards her and shouted, but, before he could reach her, she was caught by the buffer of the engine and fell to the ground.

A juror.  “You saw the lady fall?”

Witness.  “Yes.”

Police Sergeant Croly deposed that when he arrived he found the deceased lying on the platform apparently dead.  He had the body taken to the waiting-room pending the arrival of the ambulance.

Constable 57 corroborated.

Dr. Halpin, assistant house surgeon of the City of Dublin Hospital, stated that the deceased had two lower ribs fractured and had sustained severe contusions of the right shoulder.  The right side of the head had been injured in the fall.  The injuries were not sufficient to have caused death in a normal person.  Death, in his opinion, had been probably due to shock and sudden failure of the heart’s action.