“I thought he might have been taken ill or have fallen down dead. He once told me that he would probably die quite suddenly. I believe that he suffered from some affection of the heart, but he did not like speaking about his health.”
“Are you sure that there was nothing more than this in your mind?”
“There was nothing more. I thought that his heart might have failed and that he might have wandered, in a half-conscious state, away from the main path and fallen dead in one of the thickets.”
The coroner pondered this reply for some time. I could not see why, for it was plain and straightforward enough. At length he said, very gravely and with what seemed to me unnecessary emphasis:
“I want you to be quite frank and open with us, Miss D’Arblay. Can you swear that there was no other possibility in your mind than that of sudden illness?”
She looked at him in surprise, apparently not understanding the drift of the question. As to me, I assumed that he was endeavoring delicately to ascertain whether deceased was addicted to drink.
“I have told you exactly what was in my mind,” she replied.
“Have you ever had any reason to suppose, or to entertain the possibility, that your father might take his own life?”
“Never,” she answered emphatically. “He was a happy, even-tempered man, always interested in his work, and always in good spirits. I am sure he would never have taken his own life.”
The coroner nodded with a rather curious air of satisfaction, as if he were concurring with the witness’s statement. Then he asked in the same grave, emphatic manner: