“Did you recognize the other voice?”
“No, sir. It was a boy’s voice.”
“Was it one you had ever heard before?”
“I couldn’t tell, sir; I wasn’t near enough to hear or to catch the words. King Sanker spoke last, just as I got over the spot.”
“You heard of the accident the next morning, you say. Did you hear of it early?”
“It was afore breakfast, sir. Some of our boys that waited for the last van telled me; and Ferrar, he telled me. They said they had helped to look for him.”
“And then it came into your mind, that it was King Sanker you had heard speak?”
“Yes, sir, it did. It come right into my mind, all sudden like, that he might have been throwed over.”
“Well now, Mr. Harry Dance, how was it that you did not at once hasten to report this? How is it that you have kept it in till now?”
Harry Dance looked too confused and frightened to answer. He picked at the band of his grey cap and stood, first on one foot, then on the other. The coroner pressed the question sharply, and he replied in confusion.