When Blake stood up and tendered his testimony, a murmur of ugly import ran through the room. In all there were not more than fifty people present, but the fifty were typical of the general public, and already feeling ran high against Blake.

He looked around contemptuously, defiantly. At one moment it seemed as though he was about to laugh outright. The public can endure anything better than derision. The murmur grew to a groan. Silence was called in a tyrannical tone. The coroner pushed his spectacles up on his forehead, and regarded Blake steadfastly for a few seconds.

A square-built man, of medium height, stood before the judge. His hair was short, crisp, grizzled. He wore his hat jauntily in front of his waistcoat, and had an eye-glass fixed in his left eye. In the hand which held his hat he carried a stout oak stick. His hat was a soft felt one; his clothes light, coarse tweed, of pepper-and-salt colour. His brow was firm, low, and handsome; his complexion florid, the colour of his eyes bright blue. He wore no hair on his face but heavy, grizzled moustachios. His boots were patent leather. He was ungloved.

The coroner, an old and venerable-looking man, viewed Blake with anything but favour.

"Do I understand you to say, sir, that you are the person who saw deceased last before his death?"

This was said in a grave, monitory-tone.

"So I believe," said Blake, lightly; "and as I am most anxious to tell all I know, I should like to be examined before the adjournment."

"I had determined to take no more evidence to-day than would warrant me in adjourning until a post-mortem examination could be made."

"Well, if you examine me, it may save the police trouble."

The coroner looked at the inspector who was watching the case, and then at Pringle and Bertram Spencer, who were watching the case for the widow and brother of the deceased. The inspector looked down and smiled; Pringle looked up at the ceiling in unpleasant doubt; but Spencer, who represented Mr. Edward Davenport, was urgent that Blake should be heard. The public were also anxious Blake should be examined. The public were athirst for blood or scandal. In this case the public was unwashed and evil-visaged. Even the jury, who were not there by choice, had a forbidding, ghoul-like, and clayey look. The coroner was scrupulously clean. He was blanched and ghostly. Alfred Paulton looked like one suffering from a hideous nightmare. The inspector was grim, sardonic, rigid; the coroner's clerk sullen and sleepy, and seemed to think the last thing which in fairness ought to trouble a coroner's clerk was a coroner's inquest.

In that dull, saddened room, lit by the wan February light, the only bright-looking figure or face was that of Thomas Blake, upon whom rested a strong suspicion of murder.

After some talk and thought, the coroner resolved to take Thomas Blake's evidence, and having cautioned the witness, which made the witness smile in a way that provoked the public, he took down Blake's version of the story. Again it will be most convenient to throw the evidence into the form of uninterrupted narrative:

"I am now thirty-six years of age. I have known the late Mr. Davenport for many years. I knew him abroad before I met him in Ireland. It was in Florence that I met him first. I was introduced to him by an American gentleman, a sculptor by profession. I saw a good deal of Mr. Davenport when I was in Florence. I am now speaking of eleven or twelve years ago. While I was on friendly terms with him in that city his mind was affected. He suffered from a delusion that there was a conspiracy to kill and rob him. He usually at that time carried valuable jewels and considerable sums of money on his person. I often advised him to give up that habit, but my words for some time produced no effect on him. Then, all at once, they seemed to operate, and he turned on me and said, with great fury, that if there were danger to his property or person he had no one to fear but me.

"At that time I was a needy man, and I had borrowed money of him, which I have never repaid. That is so. During the time Mr. Davenport was ill--was suffering from this delusion or suspicion--I was constantly with him. I do not think he disclosed to any one but me the delusions or suspicions he was under. When he recovered he made me swear most solemnly I would never tell a soul. Then he lent me, or, if you prefer it, gave me, more money, and left Florence, and I lost sight of him until I met him in Ireland.

"I do not consider my conduct in that matter dishonourable. I had done him a service by minding him and keeping his malady private, and he gave me money for my services. Yes, and for my silence, if you like.

"I do not know whether my conduct would be considered gentlemanly. I am not here to give an opinion, but to state facts. If an opinion of gentlemanly conduct is required, why not have an attorney's clerk from the purlieus of Lincoln's Inn Fields as an expert? I beg your pardon, sir, I should not have used such words, but I heard that question suggested by Mr. Davenport.

"I did not again see the late Mr. Davenport on the Continent. The next time we met was in Ireland. Yes; at that time I was paying attentions to Mrs. Davenport, who was then Miss Butler. When the deceased came on the scene, Miss Butler and I were secretly engaged to one another--engaged to one another without the knowledge of Miss Butler's father. I was then practically without means or the reasonable expectation of getting any; but, then, few young men in such a position are very particular as to whether the expectation is reasonable or not. If they expect, that is enough for them."

Then the witness gave evidence in the same line as that of the widow. While this part of the inquiry was progressing, a light rain began to fall. The evidence of Blake went on:

"It was I who broke off the engagement between Miss Butler and myself. By the time that occurred, Mr. Butler had discovered the existence of the private engagement. He was very indignant, and forbade me his house. This was at Scrouthea, Mr. Butler's place in the county of Cork.

"I took no notice of Mr. Butler's prohibition. I communicated with Miss Butler as often as I thought fit and could find an opportunity. But at this time I began to feel there would be no chance of our ever marrying. The opposition of Mr. Butler continued undiminished. Mr. Davenport did not cease to importune, and at that time I lost the last money I had in the world on a horse.

"It was not purely matters of prudence that made me desist in my suit. I saw now quite plainly there was no use in my continuing to hope. Persistence would only waste the lives of both of us. All this time Mr. Davenport and I were on speaking terms. I was in no fear of his supplanting me in the affections of Miss Butler, and he was in abject fear of me.

"His fear of me arose from the power I had of telling of the seizure to which I had seen him subjected in Florence. Like all men who are a little odd, his great aversion was from being thought odd, and the notion of any one suspecting him of insanity filled him with absolute horror.

"To be brief, I told him I had lost the last shilling I had in the world, and that consequently I had made up my mind Miss Butler and I could never more be anything else but friends, and that I would leave the country if I had the means. He asked me to say nothing about what I had seen in Florence, shook me by the hand, and lent or gave me a thousand pounds. With that thousand pounds I went out of the country. Before leaving, I wrote to Miss Butler saying all must be at an end between us because of my poverty, arising from my loss on the Turf.

"How much did I lose on the horse? Let me see. All I had. How much was that? Let me see again. About seven hundred and fifty pounds."

"But when Mr. Davenport had given you the thousand pounds, you were better off than before the race. Why, then, did you renounce Miss Butler?"

"Yes, no doubt, I was even better off; but do you think I could honourably employ this man's money in taking away from him the woman he loved?"

"And do you think it was honourable for you to give her up, and take hush money from your rival?"

"I am here, as I said before, to state facts, not to give opinions. When gentlemen want opinions, they hire lawyers to give them."

"You gave up the lady to whom you were engaged, and black-mailed your friend for a thousand pounds?"

"I give up the facts to you. It is the duty of the attorney to embellish them. I am not, Mr. Coroner, bound to answer questions which are simply rhetorical."

The coroner merely shook his head, and the evidence went on:

"From the day I bade Mr. Davenport good-bye in Ireland, ten years ago, until the day of his death, I often saw Mr. Davenport, and spoke to him."

"And you heard from him? You received communications from him?"

"Yes."

"And money?"

"Yes, from time to time I received money from him by letter."

"Was that money black-mail?"

"I wrote him saying I was in want of money, and he sent me money accompanied by friendly letters. You are at liberty to call it what you like. If you search his papers, no doubt you will find my letters to him. I did not keep copies of them, nor did I keep his replies.

"Yes; I had an object in calling on him the night he died. I had heard he was in London, or coming to London, and I got the address in Dulwich. I had business with him. It was to get more money from him. You may say 'extract more money from him' if you like.

"I knocked at the door. He opened it himself. He complained of his asthma, said there was no servant in the house, and that Mrs. Davenport had gone to bed. He asked me to go into the dining-room, which I found as has been described, and we sat and chatted for some time in a most agreeable manner. We talked of indifferent things. Of course we spoke of Mrs. Davenport. He said, in talking of her, that although theirs had not been a love-match, they had got on wonderfully well together, and that he was quite happy, and he believed she was contented. He asked how long I purposed staying in London, and I said only a few days. Then he invited me to call on Mrs. Davenport and himself when they were in better trim----"

"What--what is that you say?" shouted Mr. Edward Davenport, starting to his feet and gesticulating wildly. "It's perjury--wilful and corrupt perjury!"

It was with the greatest difficulty Bertram Spencer could prevail upon his client to resume his seat and keep silent. After a while Blake was allowed to continue his evidence:

"I promised to come the next evening but one, and he said that would suit them admirably. Then he smiled and said he was sure this was not merely a visit of ceremony, and that he supposed I would allow him to be of any use I chose. I told him he was quite right, that I had no money, and that two hundred pounds would be of the greatest service to me at that moment. He said he had not so much by him, but that he would give me a hundred now and another hundred when I called the next day but one. 'That will be,' said he, 'the 19th of February.' He added that he'd make a memorandum of it, and he did so in the pocket-book which has been produced here by the police. After that nothing passed but 'Good-nights' on both sides, and then I went away, closing the front door after me."

Here reference was made to the pocket-book, but no such entry as that described could be found. There was no such entry in the book.

Then, having cautioned the witness again, the coroner said two leaves of the book had been torn out, one of which had been found. On the leaf found appeared words of the gravest import. They were:

"Pretended death. Blake gone. He emptied chloroform over me--held me down. Can't stir. Dying."

Could witness give any explanation of this?

"No; I can give no explanation of that writing. It is perfectly untrue. When I left the presence of the man now dead he seemed to be in as good health as his asthma would allow. My only way of accounting for what followed is that, after my leaving, he administered some chloroform to himself. This disturbed his reason, and he suffered from a return of the old delusion he had suffered in Florence----"

"And of which you are the only living person who knows, or ever did know, anything?"

"Yes."

"And further?"

"And further, that while suffering under this delusion, and being greatly excited and rendered tremulous by it, he accidentally spilled the remainder of the chloroform over himself."

"He did not show any suicidal tendency, or say anything of suicide while you were present?"

"No; on the contrary, he seemed in very good spirits, and spoke quite cheerfully of the future. By-the-way, I forgot to mention one saying of his. When asking me to come and see Mrs. Davenport and himself on the 19th, he said, 'You know I am not afraid of a rival now. We are none of us as young as we were ten years ago, and if you have kept single with the notion of marrying a rich widow--she will be rich, Blake--you will have a weary time to wait; for asthma gives a long lease to life."

Here the inquiry was adjourned for four days in order to give time for the post-mortem examination.

As the people began to leave their places, Richard Pringle whispered to Jerry O'Brien:

"That man Blake has put his head into the halter and kicked away the barrel from under his feet."

When Pringle and O'Brien got out of that room in the "Wolfdog," they looked everywhere for Alfred Paulton. He was not to be found. He had disappeared, leaving no word or trace behind him.

As Blake left the inn, two men, dressed like stable-helpers, came up to him and said they arrested him on suspicion of being concerned in the murder of the late Mr. Louis Davenport.

The rain was now falling in torrents.