“It was mentioned; yes, sir.”
“With recrimination or any display of passion on the part of your wife?”
“You would not believe me if I said no,” was the unexpected rejoinder.
The coroner, taken aback by this direct attack from one who had hitherto borne all his innuendoes with apparent patience, lost countenance for a moment, but, remembering that in his official capacity he was more than a match for the elegant gentleman, who under other circumstances would have found it only too easy to put him to the blush, he observed with dignity:
“Mr. Jeffrey, you are on oath. We certainly have no reason for not believing you.”
Mr. Jeffrey bowed. He was probably sorry for his momentary loss of self-control, and gravely, but with eyes bent downward, answered with the abrupt phrase:
“Well, then, I will say no.”
The coroner shifted his ground.
“Will you make the same reply when I ask if the like forbearance was shown toward your wife’s name in the conversation you had with Miss Tuttle immediately afterward?”
A halt in the eagerly looked-for reply; a hesitation, momentary indeed, but pregnant with nameless suggestions, caused his answer, when it did come, to lose some of the emphasis he manifestly wished to put into it.