Jean bent her head. She felt not only frightened, but utterly lonely and forlorn.
“You are, I believe, aware that you are to be among the witnesses called by the prosecution, that is, by the Crown, at the forthcoming trial of Henry Garlett for the murder of his wife. I want you to understand quite clearly that you will be examined on what you tell me to-day—examined, that is, by the prosecution and cross-examined by the defence.”
Jean Bower was in the condition in which many a poor wretch must have been during those periods of the world’s history when such an examination as she was about to undergo was always carried out with the aid of physical torture. While determined to say nothing that could implicate the man she loved, she felt too oppressed and bewildered to make full use of her wits.
He looked at the paper he held in his hand. “You became secretary to the Etna China Company last April? I take it that you were already acquainted with Mr. and Mrs. Garlett before you obtained that appointment?”
“I did not know Mrs. Garlett,” she answered in a toneless voice. “But I had seen Mr. Garlett two or three times. My aunt had taken me to call on him at the Etna China factory, and I had seen him walking about the village.”
“Come, Miss Bower”—his voice was at once stern and contemptuous—“you are, I understand, Dr. and Mrs. Maclean’s adopted daughter? Do you mean to tell me that you were not acquainted with the lady who was your uncle’s principal patient?”
“I lived with my father in the north of England till last February, and though I always accompanied Dr. and Mrs. Maclean on their holidays, I had not been in Terriford since I was a child.”
She looked at him quite straight.
“While I was doing war work I took no holidays. My father worked himself literally to death, as did so many men who were too old to join up. After the war he became an invalid, and I nursed him till his death, just a year ago.”
“I see. By a strange chapter of accidents you had not been to Terriford for many years till you came here to live last winter?”