"He's sitting there; you ask him; he knows."
As a matter of fact Mr Hugh Morice--who had throughout shown a lively interest in the proceedings--was occupying the chair on the coroner's right hand side. The two men exchanged glances; there was an odd look on Mr Morice's face, and in his eyes. Then the coroner returned to the witness.
"If necessary, Mr Morice will be examined later on. At present I want information from you. Why should you have intended to shoot Mr Morice?"
"Obeying orders, that's what I was doing."
"Obeying orders? Whose orders?"
"My old governor's. He says to me--and well Mr Hugh Morice knows it, seeing he was there and heard--'Jim,' he says, 'if ever you see Hugh Morice on our ground you put a charge of lead into him.' So I done it--leastways, I meant to."
The coroner glanced at Mr Morice with an uplifting of his eyebrows which that gentleman chose to regard as an interrogation, and answered,--
"What Baker says is correct; the late Mr Arnott did so instruct him, some seven or eight years ago."
"Was Mr Arnott in earnest?"
Hugh Morice shrugged his shoulders.