‘Yes,’ her hands pressing themselves painfully together.
‘Miss Leavenworth, the key to the library door is missing.’
She made no answer.
‘It has been testified to, that previous to the actual discovery of the murder, you visited the door of the library alone. Will you tell us if the key was then in the lock?’
‘It was not.’
‘Are you certain?’
‘I am.’
‘Now, was there anything peculiar about this key, either in size or shape?’
She strove to repress the sudden terror which this question produced, glanced carelessly around at the group of servants stationed at her back, and trembled. ‘It was a little different from the others,’ she finally acknowledged.
‘In what respect?’
‘The handle was broken.’
‘Ah, gentlemen, the handle was broken!’ emphasised the coroner, looking towards the jury.
Mr Gryce seemed to take this information to himself, for he gave another of his quick nods.
‘You would, then, recognise this key, Miss Leavenworth, if you should see it?’
She cast a startled look at him, as if she expected to behold it in his hand; but, seeming to gather courage at not finding it produced, replied quite easily:
‘I think I should, sir.’
The coroner seemed satisfied, and was about to dismiss the witness when Mr Gryce quietly advanced and touched him on the arm. ‘One moment,’ said that gentleman, and stooping, he whispered a few words in the coroner’s ear; then, recovering himself, stood with his right hand in his breast pocket and his eye upon the chandelier.
I scarcely dared to breathe. Had he repeated to the coroner the words he had inadvertently overheard in the hall above? But a glance at the latter’s face satisfied me that nothing of such importance had transpired. He looked not only tired, but a trifle annoyed.
‘Miss Leavenworth,’ said he, turning again in her direction; ‘you have declared that you did not visit your uncle’s room last evening. Do you repeat the assertion?’
‘I do.’
He glanced at Mr Gryce, who immediately drew from his breast a handkerchief curiously soiled. ‘It is strange, then, that your handkerchief should have been found this morning in that room.’
The girl uttered a cry. Then, while Mary’s face hardened into a sort of strong despair, Eleanore tightened her lips and coldly replied, ‘I do not see as it is so very strange. I was in that room early this morning.’
‘And you dropped it then?’
A distressed blush crossed her face; she did not reply.
‘Soiled in this way?’ he went on.
‘I know nothing about the soil. What is it? Let me see.’
‘In a moment. What we now wish, is to know how it came to be in your uncle’s apartment.’
‘There are many ways. I might have left it there days ago. I have told you I was in the habit of visiting his room. But first, let me see if it is my handkerchief.’ And she held out her hand.
‘I presume so, as I am told it has your initials embroidered in the corner,’ he remarked, as Mr Gryce passed it to her.
But she with horrified voice interrupted him. ‘These dirty spots! What are they? They look like—’
‘—what they are,’ said the coroner. ‘If you have ever cleaned a pistol, you must know what they are, Miss Leavenworth.’
She let the handkerchief fall convulsively from her hand, and stood staring at it, lying before her on the floor. ‘I know nothing about it, gentlemen,’ she said. ‘It is my handkerchief, but—’ For some cause she did not finish her sentence, but again repeated, ‘Indeed, gentlemen, I know nothing about it!’
This closed her testimony.
Kate, the cook, was now recalled, and asked to tell when she last washed the handkerchief.
‘This, sir; this handkerchief? Oh, some time this week, sir,’ throwing a deprecatory glance at her mistress.
‘What day?’
‘Well, I wish I could forget, Miss Eleanore, but I can’t. It is the only one like it in the house. I washed it day before yesterday.’
‘When did you iron it?’
‘Yesterday morning,’ half choking over the words.
‘And when did you take it to her room?’
The cook threw her apron over her head. ‘Yesterday afternoon, with the rest of the clothes, just before dinner. Indade, I could not help it, Miss Eleanore!’ she whispered; ‘it was the truth.’
Eleanore Leavenworth frowned. This somewhat contradictory evidence had very sensibly affected her; and when, a moment later, the coroner, having dismissed the witness, turned towards her, and inquired if she had anything further to say in the way of explanation or otherwise, she threw her hands up almost spasmodically, slowly shook her head and, without word or warning, fainted quietly away in her chair.
A commotion, of course, followed, during which I noticed that Mary did not hasten to her cousin, but left it for Molly and Kate to do what they could toward her resuscitation. In a few moments this was in so far accomplished that they were enabled to lead her from the room. As they did so, I observed a tall man rise and follow her out.
A momentary silence ensued, soon broken, however, by an impatient stir as our little juryman rose and proposed that the jury should now adjourn for the day. This seeming to fall in with the coroner’s views, he announced that the inquest would stand adjourned till three o’clock the next day, when he trusted all the jurors would be present.
A general rush followed, that in a few minutes emptied the room of all but Miss Leavenworth, Mr Gryce, and myself.
‘His rolling Eies did never rest in place,
But walkte each where for feare of hid mischance,
Holding a lattis still before his Face,
Through which he still did peep as forward he did pace.’
—SPENSER’S THE FAERIE QUEENE
MISS LEAVENWORTH, who appeared to have lingered from a vague terror of everything and everybody in the house not under her immediate observation, shrank from my side the moment she found herself left comparatively alone, and, retiring to a distant corner, gave herself up to grief. Turning my attention, therefore, in the direction of Mr Gryce, I found that person busily engaged in counting his own fingers with a troubled expression upon his countenance, which may or may not have been the result of that arduous employment. But, at my approach, satisfied perhaps that he possessed no more than the requisite number, he dropped his hands and greeted me with a faint smile which was, considering all things, too suggestive to be pleasant.
‘Well,’ said I, taking my stand before him, ‘I cannot blame you. You had a right to do as you thought best; but how had you the heart? Was she not sufficiently compromised without your bringing out that wretched handkerchief, which she may or may not have dropped in that room, but whose presence there, soiled though it was with