LITMIR.BIZ

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      "I can't think what has come to Grahame," muttered a sporting squire to his next neighbour. "He used to be such a pleasant fellow, but to-day he looks like a murderer."

      "You don't think he threw the girl out of the train, do you?" asked the other.

      "God forbid! But by that London lawyer's questions one would think he suspected Grahame of having had a hand in the business."

      The jury gave their verdict presently, "Death from misadventure."

      "Tell Dora not to expect me at dinner," said Bothwell to Julian Wyllard, before they left the inn; "I shall dine in Bodmin."

      "Have you any engagement?"

      "No, but I can easily make one. I am not going to break bread with your lawyer friend. So long as he is at Penmorval I shall be missing."

      "My dear Bothwell, you have no right to be angry at a simple question which you might have so easily answered," remonstrated Wyllard gravely.

      "It was a question which I did not choose to answer, and which he had no right to ask. It was an outrage to ask such a question – to press it as he did. Fifty years ago he might have been shot for a lesser insult. By Jove, I never felt more sorry that the good old duelling days are over – the days when one man could not insult another with impunity."

      "How savage you are, Bothwell, and against a man who was only in the exercise of his profession!"

      "He had no right to question me as if I were a murderer," retorted Bothwell savagely. "Did he think that I spent my time in Plymouth plotting that girl's death? If I had made up my mind to push a woman over an embankment, I should not have wanted to spend a day in Plymouth in order to plan the business. A murder of that kind must be touch and go – no sooner thought of than done."

      "All trouble would have been saved, my dear fellow, if you had given a straight answer to a simple question."

      "To answer would have been to acknowledge his right to question me. No judge would have allowed counsel to have asked such a motiveless question. Nowhere except at a petty rustic inquiry would such a thing be permitted."

      "I can only say that you are needlessly angry, Bothwell," said Wyllard. "Here comes Distin. You had better drive home with us."

      "No, thank you; I shall be home before the house shuts up; but you'll see no more of me to-night."

      "Good-night, then."

      The Penmorval barouche was waiting before the porch of the Vital Spark – a great day for that rural hostelry when such a carriage could be seen waiting there – a great day at the bar, where all the strength of the establishment could not serve brandies-and-sodas and pale ales fast enough. Joseph Distin came tripping out, and took his place in the carriage beside Julian Wyllard. He had lingered at the inn for a few minutes' talk with the Coroner.

      "Is not Mr. Grahame going back with us?" he asked, as they drove towards the town.

      "No. You wounded his dignity by those questions of yours. He is a curious young man, and is easily offended."

      "He is a very curious young man," answered the lawyer, with a thoughtful air.

      He was looking at the landscape intently as they drove along the shady road, between deep banks and luxuriant hedges; but he would have found it rather difficult to say afterwards what kind of timber prevailed in the hedgerows, or what crops grew in the fields.

      He was thoughtful all that evening, though he did his utmost to make himself agreeable to Mrs. Wyllard at dinner, talking to her of art, music, the drama, society, all the arts and graces and pleasures of life – doing everything in his power to distract her thoughts from that one grim theme which was the motive of his presence in that place.

      When she was gone, and Distin and his host were alone together over their claret, the lawyer dropped his society manner as if it had been a mask, and began to talk seriously.

      "For the first time for a good many years I find myself completely at fault," he said, leaning across the table, and cracking filberts in sheer distraction of mind. "I thought that I should be able to get up a case while I was in London, but not a shred of evidence have I discovered. If this girl had dropped from the moon, it could not be more difficult to trace her."

      "Well, my dear Distin, you have done your best, and we must be satisfied," replied Wyllard quietly. "I felt it to be my duty as a magistrate to do all in my power to fathom the mystery of that poor girl's death. The best thing I could do was to put the case in your hands. If you cannot help us, no one can. We must be satisfied."

      "But I am not satisfied, Julian; I never shall be satisfied until I have solved this problem," said Distin resolutely. "I am not the sort of man who can stand being baffled in a matter of this kind. Is all my professional training to go for nothing, do you think? And yet in your interest it might be best that I should let this business drop out of my mind – forget the whole story if possible."

      "How do you mean, in my interest?" exclaimed Wyllard, surprised. "What bearing can the case have upon me or my interest, beyond my desire to do my duty as a magistrate?"

      "I fear that this mystery touches you nearer than you suppose. Surely, Wyllard, you must have been struck by the manner of your wife's kinsman under my examination."

      "Great Heaven!" cried Wyllard, "you don't mean to tell me that you suspect Bothwell Grahame of any hand in this business?"

      "In perfect frankness, between man and man, I believe that young man to be in some way – either as principal or accessory – concerned in the murder of that girl."

      "My dear Distin, you must be mad."

      "Come now, my dear Wyllard, you cannot pretend that you did not notice the strangeness of Mr. Grahame's manner this afternoon: his refusal to answer my question about his business in Plymouth."

      "He was angry at your catechising him in that manner; and I must confess that your question appeared to the last degree irrelevant, even to me."

      "Granted. My question was irrelevant. But it was a test question. I should never have cross-examined Mr. Grahame, if I had not seen reason for suspecting him before the inquiry began. I was painfully impressed by his manner the night I dined here with him; and I believe, from certain indications dropped unconsciously by your Coroner, that he too saw reason for suspecting Mr. Grahame. His manner to-day confirms my suspicion. I am deeply grieved that it should be so, on your wife's account."

      "You had need be sorry for her. Why, Bothwell is like a brother to her. It would break her heart," said Wyllard, strongly agitated.

      He had risen from the table, and was walking slowly up and down the room, between the windows opening wide upon the gray evening sky, and the warm lamplight within. Joseph Distin could not see his face, but he could see that he was strongly moved.

      "My dear fellow, let us hope that Mrs. Wyllard will never know anything about this suspicion of mine," said Distin soothingly. "I have – so far – not one scrap of evidence against Mr. Grahame; except the evidence of looks and manner, and the one fact of his refusal to say what he was doing in Plymouth the day of the girl's death. There is nothing in all that to bring a man to the gallows. I may have my own ideas about this mystery, and Mr. Heathcote may have pretty much the same notion, but there is nothing to touch your wife's cousin so far. I shall go back to town, and try to forget the whole matter. All you have to do is to keep your own counsel, and take care that Mrs. Wyllard knows nothing of what has passed in strictest confidence between you and me."

      "I would not have her know it for worlds. It would break her heart; it might kill her. Women cannot bear such shocks. And to think that a man can be suspected of a crime on such grounds – suspected by you, a student of crime and criminals – because of a moody manner, a refusal to answer a question! The whole thing seems too absurd for belief."

      "Say that the thing is absurd, and that for once in his life Joe Distin has made a fool of himself. Take your wife to Aix-les-Bains – or to Biarritz – "

      Julian Wyllard started at that last word as if he had been stung.

      "What the deuce is the matter with you, or with Biarritz?"

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