The inquisitive juryman was not quite satisfied. He asked to have the maid-servant recalled; and, when she appeared, put the same question to her. "Why had she not told of it?"
Why didn't she tell! was the independent retort. Did the gentlemen think she was going to bleat out to the world what the young ladies had seen, when they did not choose to tell of it themselves, and so bring 'em here to be browbeat and questioned, as they had all been this day? Not she. She was only sorry other folks had ferreted it out, and told.
Very little evidence was forthcoming, none of consequence to the general reader. Supervisor Kyne volunteered a statement about smuggling, which nobody understood, and Justice Thornycroft at once threw ridicule upon. The coroner cut it short, and proceeded to charge the jury. Primarily remarking that, if the evidence was to be believed, Cyril Thornycroft must be held exempt from the suspicion whispered against him, he went on: If they thought a wicked, deliberate act of murder had been committed, they were to bring in a verdict to that effect; and if they thought it had not, they were not to bring it in so. Grateful for this luminous advice, the jury proceeded to deliberate--that is, they put their heads together, and spoke for some minutes in an undertone; and then intimated that they had agreed upon their verdict.
"Wilful murder against some person or persons unknown."
[CHAPTER XII.]
Robert Hunter's Funeral.
Filing out of the room in groups, came the crowd who had filled it. The day had changed. The brightness of the morning was replaced by a wintry afternoon of grey sky; the air blew keen; snow began to fall. The eager spectators put up their umbrellas, if they happened to possess any, and stood to talk in excited whispers.
Crossing to the waste land, the roundabout road she chose to take on her way home, was Anna Chester. Sarah had gone striding up the nearest way; Captain Copp had been laid hold of by Supervisor Kyne, whose grievance on the score of the smugglers was sore; and Anna was alone. Her veil drawn over her white face, her eyes wearing a depth of trouble never yet seen in their sweetness, went she, looking neither to the right nor left, until she was overtaken by Miss Thornycroft.
"Anna!"
"Mary Anne!"