“The deceased and Mr. Sidmouth were on such terms as might encourage social intercourse?” he enquired.

“So my brother and I assumed,” Miss Crawford replied, “from understanding that the Captain had preserved the mademoiselle from an adventure of some danger to her person, and was thus due, one would think, the deepest gratitude from all who held her welfare among their dearest concerns; but imagine our amazement, when Mr. Sidmouth betrayed himself as anything but pleased to see the Captain, and went so far as to question my brother's motives in having invited them both!”

“Miss Crawford,” the coroner probed with the faintest suggest of irritation, “what is it you would wish this panel to understand?”

The lady stared at him open-mouthed, as though dumbfounded the fellow should be so obtuse. “Why, my good sir!” she rejoined. “Is not it apparent? Mr. Sidmouth bore the Captain a grudge! The mademoiselle treated her cousin with excessive coldness — the result, I imagine, of his having caused the very misadventure which required the gallant Captain's assistance, or so I understood, from something the Captain once dropped; and that she preferred Captain Fielding to Mr. Sidmouth, caused in him an enormity of rage, the result of which we saw first in our drawing-room, and not two days later, upon the Charmouth road!”

“And how would you explain the fact of the dead man's purse having been stolen? Surely you would not suggest that a crime of passion was also one of calculation?”

“I suppose Mr. Sidmouth to have been covering his tracks, by suggesting some common footpad had killed the Captain.”

“But, my dear lady,” Mr. Carpenter said smoothly, “it would appear that covering his tracks, is exacdy what Mr. Sidmouth did not do.” He paused to appreciate the full effect of his little joke, then took up his pen with an air of dismissal. “I fear this is all conjecture, Miss Crawford. It cannot put our enquiries any for warder.”

“You ridiculous man!” that lady cried. “Do not you see that Fielding was killed in a duel over the mademoiselle's honour?”

“You may stand down, madam,” the coroner replied distantly. “Mr. Geoffrey Sidmouth!”

Miss Crawford spluttered, and looked all her outrage; but she was conducted from her place nonetheless, and suffered a momentary quailing of her courage, in being forced to pass quite close to the very Mr. Sidmouth she had just maligned, as he approached the coroner's table. He gave her neither a look nor a word, being intent, it appeared, on the maintenance of his gravity, amidst the tide of chatter his passage engendered. I could not detect in the noise, however, any evidence of ill-will towards the gentleman, despite his damning appearance of guilt; and it struck me forcibly that Geoffrey Sidmouth retained his reputation among the folk of Lyme, and a measure of gratitude, however heinous his offences. A curious community, indeed, that could treat a Maggie Tibbit with such contempt, and a Geoffrey Sidmouth with unrelenting tolerance.

Mr. Carpenter gave the gentleman at his right hand a cursory glance, neither severe nor benign. “You are Mr. Geoffrey Sidmouth, of High Down Grange, are you not?”

“I am.”

“And what answer can you give, Mr. Sidmouth, to the conjectures so lately put forward by Miss Augusta Crawford?”

“I would suggest that the lady pay greater heed to her own affairs, and less to those of her neighbours, or she shall utterly lack for dinner partners,” he rejoined mildly, to some laughter; but from knowing Sidmouth a little, I judged him to be checking his temper only with the greatest difficulty. A muscle at his temple had commenced to pulse, in a distractingly involuntary fashion.

“And did you, sir, bear a grudge towards Captain Fielding?”

“I certainly bore him little affection.”

“That is frankness indeed, from a man so imperilled by circumstance as yourself,” Mr. Carpenter said, in some surprise.

“I make it a practise, sir, to offer honesty when such is possible.”

“When it is possible — but not, you would have us understand, on every occasion?”

“Can any man assert such consistency?”

“It is a common enough profession.”

“But to profess honesty, and to practise it without fail, are entirely different talents. Rare is the gentleman who allies them both.”

My father leaned towards me and winked. “One for my philosopher,” he observed softly.

“So we may take it as settled that you harboured towards the Captain a healthy dislike. On what was it predicated?”

“Upon matters of a personal nature.”

“Having to do with Mademoiselle—”

“—LeFevre.”

“LeFevre. And would you care to elucidate, Mr. Sidmouth?”

“As I have stated, these are personal matters. It should be a violation of every conception of honour, did I canvass such things before the common crowd.”

“I see.” From his expression, Mr. Carpenter clearly did not see. “And will you state your movements during the course of Sunday evening last?”

“I was away from home.”

“This panel is aware of that. And were you riding your black stallion” — at this, the coroner peered narrowly at his papers — “the unfortunately-named Satan?”

“I was.” From Mr. Sidmouth's expression, it pained him to let slip even so small a sentence.

“In the company of the surgeon's assistant, Mr. William Dagliesh?”

“Yes.”

“Mr. Sidmouth,” the coroner ejaculated, in evident exasperation, “if we are to have any hope of placing your guilt in doubt, you must give us some means of proving your innocence! Will you not tell us your movements on the night in question?”

There was an instant's silence, and Sidmouth's eyes met mine with a sudden flaring of intensity, so that I felt my heart lurch; then his gaze moved beyond me, to the back of the room. I knew whose face he sought; and turned, despite myself, to look for it.

Seraphine had risen, as slow as a spectre rising from the grave. “Tell them, Geoffrey,” she said — though her voice was so caught in her throat, the sense of it may not have reached him. “Tell them,” she cried, in a firmer accent, and clutched at a chair for support.

“You know that I cannot,” he rejoined. His voice was infinitely gentle — the very quiet of despair, I thought. “Sit down, my dear, before you fall.”

“Is there something you wish to say to this panel, madam?” the coroner asked, rising to gaze at the mademoiselle. She nodded briefly, unable to look at her cousin.

“Say nothing, Seraphine!” Sidmouth interposed with sudden fierceness. “There can be no cause for such sacrifice. I will not allow it! Say nothing — I beg of you — that you will not recall years hence, with vast regret!”

“Oh, Geoffrey—” she said, in a breaking wail, and swayed as I watched. In an instant, Sidmouth had sprung from his place, and coursed down the aisle to her aid; but Dobbin's men were before him, and barred his path, in evident alarm that he meant to flee. He was seized, and maddened by the seizure, as Seraphine crumpled to the ground in a faint; and the room was in an uproar in an instant. Between Sidmouth's efforts to fight loose of his captors, and the shouts of those around him, even Mr. Carpenter's gavel rang out unheeded in the tumult.

At last the gentleman was subdued, and the lady borne from the room into the street, the better to revive her; and the jury dismissed, for the consideration of the case. In but a few minutes they had returned, with hanging heads, and avowed their belief that Captain Fielding had died at Geoffrey Sidmouth's hands. And so the master of High Down was taken away, half-mad with anxiety for his cousin's state, and thrown once more into the foetidness of Lyme's small gaol.

Miss CRAWFORD ALONE COULD LOOK TRIUMPHANT, AS THE assembled crowd filed away. She was afforded no congratulations; and indeed, most of Lyme's worthies avoided her like a manifestation of the plague; but she had seen enough to confirm her wildest conjectures. From Seraphine's behaviour, could anyone doubt that she was the cause of all the Captain's grief? Or that her cousin bore her such love, as would counsel killing to preserve it?