Sir John, addressing himself to him, said: "Attend to me, Gumley, if you please. Although the evidence I am about to take down this morning is merely preliminary to the fuller inquiry which will have to be held later on, when the same evidence will have to be sworn to a second time, I have deemed it right that you should be present in order that you may have a clear understanding from the first of what you are charged with, and may thereby have every opportunity afforded you of disproving the same when the time for doing so shall have arrived."
"All right, guv'nor," answered Gumley, in the sullen way which seemed natural to him. "I can onny say, as I said afore, that I'm as innercent of the charge as the babby onborn."
Drelincourt crossed from the window and sat down on a chair a little withdrawn from the table and apart from the others.
"This fellow's face is an indictment of itself," he said under his breath, "and with nine people out of every dozen would go far to convict him."
"Inform Mrs. Drelincourt's maid that she is wanted," said Sir John to the constable at the door.
"A faithful, good hearted creature. My poor sister was much attached to her," remarked Mr. Ormsby, sotto voce, to the baronet.
Enter Lucille, a rather attractive looking young woman, not in the least shy or embarrassed by the unfamiliar surroundings among which she finds herself. She favored the two gentlemen at the head of the table with a graceful courtesy as soon as the door was shut behind her, and then went slowly forward.
Here a momentary hitch occurred, which was got over by Roden Marsh's production of a Greek Testament from one of the bookshelves. The witness was then sworn in the usual way by the constable in waiting, who had been so often called upon to take the oath in his own person that he had the formula at his tongue's end.
When the witness had stated that her name was Lucille Fretin, and that she had filled the position of maid to the late Mrs. Drelincourt from the time of that lady's marriage, Sir John said to her: "You have already, I believe, had some conversation with Mr. Ormsby about this most shocking affair; be good enough to tell us here, on your oath, all that you know about it."
"Monsieur and gentlemen," began Lucille, standing with a hand thrust into each pocket of her coquettish looking apron, and speaking with a pronounced French accent, "yesterday madame, my mistress, gave me permission to go to London to see my sister, who is ill. She had the bonté to say that I might stay all night, but that I must return by the first train this morning. That is what I do. I come back by the early train, and I reach the house just as the clocks are about to strike seven. Five minutes later I enter madame's room. I call her softly. I say, 'Madame, je suis arrivée.' She does not reply. I say to myself, 'She sleeps. I will not disturb her.' Then I go a little nearer, and then--mon Dieu!--I see something which frightens me. It is one big drop liKe blood on the pillow! Then I bend over her, and I see that her eyes are not shut, but open and staring; and then something tells me that they are the eyes of a dead woman."