“Yes”
“That is a very important matter, gentlemen,” the coroner said, turning to the jury. “It has some bearing on the possibility of suicide.”
I glanced at Pepster, whose face was wrinkled in a quiet grin. Really, such orders had no bearing at all on the question of suicide—they were just such as a man might give who had determined to take his own life but desired to conceal the truth. A person bent on suicide—though “temporary insanity” is usually the verdict of kindly juries—can manifest very considerable skill, and frequently does, in covering up the real mode of his exit from this life. Scores of cases of “accident”—according to the verdict—in my experience have been suicide disguised. Men and women who have been killed on the railway, or run over by motor-cars, or drowned while bathing, or shot while cleaning a gun, or swallowed poison from bottles labelled something else, have carefully arranged those happenings, chiefly for the benefit of insurance companies. Suicide is much more frequent than is generally supposed, and it is far more often the result of careful calculation and arrangement than of insanity, temporary or otherwise.
“Did Sir Philip give you any order when he rang for you?” the coroner went on, continuing his examination of Tulmin.
“Yes, he told me to bring him a whisky and soda.”
“You did that?”
“I brought him a bottle of whisky, a siphon of soda-water and a glass, and I placed them on a small table which I drew up to the side of the couch on which Sir Philip was reclining.”
“How much whisky was there in the bottle?”
“It was about half full.”
“Where was this bottle kept?”