Liane, pale and nervous, neatly dressed in black, entered quietly, removed her right glove, and took the oath. Having given her name, the Coroner asked,—
“When did you last see the deceased, Miss Brooker?”
“When she set out to go to the railway station,” she answered, in a low faltering voice.
“Have you any idea why she should have gone to Cross Lane? It was entirely out of her way home from Burghfield to Stratfield Mortimer, was it not?”
“I cannot tell,” Liane replied. “We went along that road on our cycles only on one occasion, and found it so rough that we agreed never to attempt it again.”
“I presume, Miss Brooker, that the deceased was your most intimate friend?” observed the Coroner. “She would therefore be likely to tell you if she had a lover. Were you aware of the existence of any such person?”
“No,” she replied, flushing slightly and glancing slowly around the hot, crowded room.
“You had a visitor whose name your father has just given me upon this paper,” observed the Coroner. “Was that visitor known to the deceased?”
The eyes of the father and daughter met for a single instant as she glanced around upon the long lines of expectant countenances.
“Oh, yes,” she replied. “The gentleman who came unexpectedly to see us has been known to us all for fully five or six years.”