LOCKFORD Street presented an unwonted appearance; at every cottage door the inhabitants were standing in twos and threes discussing this dreadful deed that had been done in their midst. Round the Hargreave Arms quite a crowd assembled, while inside the accommodation of the long room known locally as the club-room was taxed to the uttermost by all those whose position entitled them to be present.
The inquest was to be opened that day, and public interest in the proceedings was at fever heat. The progress of the jury across to the mortuary to view the body had been watched with interest by a crowd of onlookers, and their different appearance as they emerged was freely commented upon. Now, however, a fresh rumour was going round—one that for exciting public attention had eclipsed all previous reports.
Sam Grooms, the youth with whom the rumour apparently originated, was for the time being the centre of attention, and even the advent of the closed carriages from the Manor containing Lady Laura and her daughter passed almost unnoticed.
“I don’t believe it, Sam Grooms. He’d never go for to do a thing of that sort.”
“Believe it or not, as you like,” was the response of Mr. Samuel Grooms, a clumsy hobbledehoy just passing out of his teens. “I don’t say as it’s true. I had it from Jim Levett, him as is own cousin to Constable Jones.”
“What was it as he said?” this from a new-comer to the group.
“Why, he would have it as there was a note found in her pocket from Mr. Garth Davenant asking her to slip out and meet him outside the Manor that night.”
There was a subdued sound of horror.
“If he did ask her to meet him it don’t prove as he had anything to do with what followed,” remarked one voice, bolder than the rest.
Meanwhile in the club-room matters were progressing. Evidence of identity was given both by Dr. Grieve and by the dentist whom poor Mary Marston had employed, and was further corroborated by the marks on her clothes and by her dressmaker. Questioned as to the cause of death, Dr. Grieve, who had conducted the autopsy in conjunction with two well-known surgeons, gave it as his opinion that death had undoubtedly resulted from suffocation, though proof of this was difficult to obtain.
Sir Arthur was seated beside the Coroner, while Garth Davenant, who was accompanied by the family solicitor, had placed himself near the reporters’ table. He was looking unwontedly pale as he listened to the evidence.
In the landlady’s private sitting-room Mavis, awaiting her turn to be called as a witness, was pacing up and down in a state of intense nervous excitement, while Lady Laura lay back on the couch and tearfully inhaled smelling salts.
“I can’t realize it, Mavis,” she repeatedly exclaimed.
The girl’s hands were tightly locked together, her brown eyes looked strained, the pupils were intensely dilated.
One report which had been communicated to her that morning by an officious housemaid Mavis had so far contrived to keep from her mother. It was that a letter from Garth Davenant, supposed to be of an incriminating character, had been found upon the dead woman, but her own nerves had been terribly upset by the rumour. Unutterably as she had dreaded having to give her evidence, she yet felt now as though, if the moment were delayed long, the tension would be too much for her, and it was with a sigh of relief that she greeted her brother when he came to fetch them.
Arthur was secretly relieved.
“That is plucky, Mavis,” he said approvingly as he gave his arm to his mother. “Keep up your courage, dear, it will soon be over.”
Way was made for them through the crowded room, and chairs were provided for both, but there was still a period of waiting.
Superintendent Stokes was giving his evidence with regard to the articles found on the body; the formal list had just been completed when Sir Arthur had left the room.
As the superintendent was about to leave the witness-box one of the jurymen leaned forward.
“You say that in the pocket, one pencil, one gold-plated thimble, one handkerchief marked ‘M. MARSTON,’ and one letter were found. Is it possible to decipher the letter?”
“Certainly. The paper is discoloured and stained, but the writing is perfectly legible.”
The juror looked at the Coroner.
“Would it not be well to have the letter put in now? It might help us in the matter—we should know what questions to put.”
The Coroner hesitated.
“I had thought of reserving it to a later stage of the proceedings; but if the jury wish—”
There was a pause; the jury conferred, and then the foreman spoke.
“We are agreed that it should be put in now, sir.”
The Coroner gave a resigned shrug of his shoulders as he ordered the production of the letter, and his clerk, taking the sadly-discoloured note in his hand, began to read it in his loud, unsympathetic tones:
“Wednesday night.
Dear Mary,
Will you come out and speak to me? I shall not keep you more than a few moments.
Yours,
G.D.”
A subdued murmur ran through the room, followed by a prolonged hush during which every one turned to look at Garth Davenant, whose expression had not altered, and whose countenance remained as impassive as ever beneath their scrutiny.
When the note had been handed to the jury for their inspection, and, after turning it about, the foreman had inquired whether anyone had been asked to identify the writing, before the Superintendent could reply, Garth Davenant rose in his place.
“I think it may save time,” he said in his clear impassive tones, “if I state at once that I wrote that note to the deceased, Mary Marston.”
The jury appeared profoundly impressed, and the Coroner, a man who had known the Davenants all his life, glanced keenly at the young man over the top of his spectacles.
“Do I understand, Mr. Davenant, that you admit having asked this young woman to come out and speak to you on the night of Wednesday the 6th of June last?”
“Certainly not!” Garth’s voice was as firm and clear as ever. “I stated that I wrote the note produced.”
“This note is dated Wednesday night,” the Coroner went on more severely, “and we know that she disappeared on the night of Wednesday, the 6th of June.”
“That note was written to her the week before when she was at her mother’s cottage.” Garth leaned forward and glanced at it. “It is most unfortunate that the day of the week should happen to be the same as that on which she disappeared, and that I should neither have dated nor directed it more definitely.”
“Most unfortunate!” the Coroner echoed. “That is all for the present, Mr. Davenant. You will have an opportunity later of giving, on oath, an account of the affair. Call Miss Mavis Hargreave.”
As Mavis rose for one instant Garth looked towards her, and their glances met; and then Garth sat down, quivering in every nerve in spite of his unmoved exterior. How could she bear this terrible ordeal to which her love and faith in him were about to be exposed, he marvelled, and he shaded his eyes with his hand as he heard her low, clear tones answering the Coroner’s questions.
After that first swift glance she looked away from her lover, away from the crowded room, straight at the Coroner, a fatherly old man whom she had often met out at dinner. The first formal question gave her time to recover herself and to collect her thoughts, and she gave her account of that evening of the 6th of June and of Nurse Marston’s anxiety to speak to her mother, clearly and lucidly.
When she had finished the Coroner studied his notes a moment.
“I think I must ask you, Miss Hargreave, when you last saw Mr. Garth Davenant that night?”
Mavis’s colour rose, but she retained her self-possession.
“He said good night to me in the morning-room before I went upstairs.”
“Ah!” The Coroner looked at his plan of Hargreave Manor attentively. “That would be the room here,” laying his finger upon it. “The door is close to that of the small library.”
“Yes, but not to the one that we went in by,” Mavis said quickly. “There are two doors, one leading into the smaller drawing-room; we went in by that; the other was not opened.”
“I see.” But the Coroner’s grave face indicated clearly to those who knew him that in his opinion Mavis was strengthening the case against her lover. “One more question, Miss Hargreave. I believe you saw the tobacco-pouch that we have been told was found in the small library. Did you recognize it as the one which you had worked for Mr. Garth Davenant?”
“I am quite sure it was not."
There was a pause, and the Coroner looked at his notes again.
“May I ask why you are so positive, Miss Hargreave? We have been told that you stated it was very like the one you gave Mr. Davenant.”
“Exactly. I believe it was very like,” Mavis replied with spirit. “But it was much dirtier than Mr. Davenant would have made a present from me. Besides”—holding up her head proudly and speaking very distinctly—“I am quite sure that it was not the same, because Mr. Garth Davenant told me so, and I know that I can rely upon his word.”
Then for a moment Garth looked up, his eyes full of a passionate gratitude, and as Mavis smiled at him across the crowded room his heart swelled with a glad thankfulness. Mavis would not fail him whatever happened.
“Very natural, and—ahem!—a very creditable feeling, my dear young lady, I am sure,” said the Coroner, “but you will understand that it is not evidence.”
“Can you tell us anything of the disappearance of this pouch, Miss Hargreave?” asked the foreman.
“Nothing at all,” Mavis replied decisively. “I knew nothing of it until I heard my brother mention it.”
It was evident that no more was to be learned from Mavis. The Coroner intimated that he had finished and the girl stepped down.
It was Lady Laura’s turn next, but her evidence was purely formal, being confined merely to describing how Nurse Marston had requested an interview, and, after having had the small library appointed for such interview, failed to put in an appearance.
Then there was a stir of expectation through the room when Garth Davenant was called.
“It is my duty to tell you, Mr. Davenant,” said the Coroner, “that you are not compelled to give evidence, and also to warn you that whatever you say will be taken down and may be used in evidence against you.”
The significance of his words was unmistakable. A sort of electric thrill ran through his hearers. Garth alone appeared unmoved; not one muscle of his face altered as he acknowledged the warning with a grave bow, and his tone was firm as he said: “I should prefer to give my evidence, sir.”
“You remember the events of the Wednesday, the 6th of June?” the Coroner began when the witness had been duly sworn.
“I do.”
“Will you relate them to us in so far as they bear upon this case.”
Garth paused a moment.
“In the morning, hearing from Dr. Grieve that a nurse was required at the Manor and that there might be a difficulty in procuring one at the local hospital, I suggested Mary Marston, who, I happened to know, was at her home in the village and was unemployed.”
The Coroner glanced at him quickly.
“How did you know it?”
“Because I was in the habit of calling on old Mrs. Marston, and I had seen her daughter on several occasions and heard that she was unemployed. I offered to walk down to the village and interview Mary Marston,” Garth proceeded. “I did so, and though she was a little unwilling to leave her mother, who was not well, she consented to go until they could get some one else. I met her accidentally in the avenue as she was going up to the Manor in the afternoon, and that was the last time I saw her. I heard nothing more until Miss Hargreave informed me the next morning that she had disappeared.”
“May I put a few questions to the witness, sir?”
The foreman of the jury was standing up, holding a piece of paper in his hand.
“Certainly!” the Coroner assented.
The foreman was a sleek and prosperous grocer, a man who had been a thorn in Sir John Davenant’s side for years, partly from the fact that his shop was his own and, standing like an oasis amid the Davenant property, was a veritable Naboth’s vineyard to Sir John. He was by no means inclined to let Garth off lightly.
“Do you now declare on your oath that the note produced in Court and found in the deceased’s pocket was not written by you to her on the night of Wednesday, the 6th of June last?” he asked severely.
“It was not. It was written during the preceding week, on Wednesday the thirtieth of May.”
Garth’s tone was clear and distinctly audible throughout the room.
“Then how do you account for the fact that it was still in her pocket the following week, and also for the terms in which you addressed the deceased?” fixing a searching glance upon the young man.
Garth’s countenance did not alter beneath his scrutiny.
“I can only conclude that it was slipped into her pocket and forgotten. As for the terms I employed, they were those in which I usually addressed Mary Marston.”
“‘Yours, G.D.’ Would that be your usual signature?”
“To her it would,” Garth answered without hesitation. “Mrs. Marston nursed me. I had known and liked her daughter all my life, and Mary was a favourite with us all.”
As the foreman paused the Coroner interposed:
“I understand, Mr. Davenant, that you state on your oath that this note was written on the preceding Wednesday—that on Wednesday, the 6th of June, you swear you did not see Mary Marston after you met her in the avenue on her way to the house?”
“That is so, sir.” Garth’s tone rang out as decidedly as ever.
“Why should you ask her to come out to meet you?”
The old man’s tones were sharp; he glanced keenly at Garth.
For a moment, and for the first time, there was a noticeable hesitation in Garth’s manner.
“I wished to speak to her without her mother hearing what I had to say,” he answered.
“Why?” The Coroner fired the word at him rather as though it had been a pistol-shot, and again Garth’s pause was noticeable.
“My conversation was of a private nature. I am not at liberty to disclose it—at present.” He added the last words in a lower tone.
The Coroner consulted his clerk for a moment; then he turned to the young man again, his tone markedly colder.
“I understand that you were walking with this young woman in Exeter a few days before her coming to the Manor?”
“On the Saturday before,” Garth assented.
“Had you met by appointment?”
This time not only did Garth hesitate, but his colour manifestly changed.
“We had,” he replied.
“For what reason?” The Coroner eyed him closely.
“It was on the business to discuss which I asked her to meet me outside her mother’s cottage.”
The reply was an enigmatic one, and the Coroner pondered it for a moment.
“Then you decline to enlighten us with regard to this private understanding which undoubtedly existed between Nurse Marston and yourself?”
“I have no choice but to do so at the present stage of the proceedings; I assure you”—and Garth’s expressive voice was very earnest now—“that it could have had no bearing whatever on the mystery which surrounds her death.”
“Um! We are hardly in a position to judge of that,” said the Coroner. “You can stand down, Mr. Davenant, and I cannot help commenting upon the extremely unsatisfactory way in which you have elected to give your evidence.”
Garth’s mouth was set in grim lines, his eyes looked pained and tired as he moved back to his place. It seemed to him that all the eyes in the room were fixed upon him with unfriendly criticism.
Sir Arthur made his way to him.
“Mavis wants to speak to you,” he said quietly. “She is in Mrs. Owens’s private sitting-room.”
It seemed to Garth that the young man’s tone was distinctly less friendly, that his eyes rather avoided him, and he braced himself up for an ordeal. Mavis’s friends must have convinced her that her faith was misplaced; he told himself bitterly that in any case it could not have lived through his evidence, and his step was heavy and his spirit flagged as he turned down the passage.
The door was open and Mavis was standing alone in the middle of the room waiting for him. As he came in sight she smiled instantly at him and held out her hands.
“Garth, my poor boy!”
The reaction was so great that as Garth held her in his arms, as she rested against his shoulder, for a moment he could not speak; his clasp became a convulsive one as he pressed his lips to her hair. Presently Mavis put up her hand and touched his cheek softly.
“I am so sorry, Garth!”
“Sorry for what, sweetheart?”
“Sorry that people are so stupid,” she said, nestling up to him with a little laugh. “That they don’t see you did not ask Nurse Marston to come out that night—that they don’t seem to trust you!”
Garth felt her trembling as she clung to him. Very tenderly he raised her face and gazed into her eyes.
“How can I tell you how much I thank you for your brave words in the room, Mavis? Tell me—tell me that nothing has changed you, since?”
There was a moment’s silence; then Mavis drew herself erect and raised her eyes bravely to his.
“I shall never change, Garth. I trust you now and for always. Tell me you will never doubt me again. It—it hurts me somehow,” with a wistful, pathetic little smile.
Garth bent down and kissed her slender fingers again and again.
“It is only that I cannot realize your goodness to me,” he murmured brokenly; “Oh, Mavis, Mavis, am I—is any man worthy of such love as yours?”
A sound in the passage made them start asunder; Lady Laura’s skirts rustled as she came down attended by the obsequious landlady.
“We shall be ready in five minutes, Mrs. Owen,” she said as she came in. “I will tell Miss Mavis—Oh, is that you, Garth?” coldly. “I wondered—”
Mavis’s cheeks flamed.
“Mother, won’t you tell him that you are sorry, that you believe in him?” she exclaimed unwisely.
Lady Laura looked at her with obvious displeasure.
“Certainly I believe Garth in so far as I do not suppose he had anything whatever to do with Nurse Marston’s death; but—as the young man turned to her in mute gratitude—“I do think it is exceedingly tiresome of you, Garth—Yes, Mavis, I shall speak out. I think it is very annoying of you to refuse to tell exactly why you wished to see her, and thus incur all this odium and suspicion. I had not the faintest idea that you were in the habit of requesting private interviews and making clandestine appointments with young women when I gave my consent to your engagement with my daughter, or—”
Garth was about to speak, but Mavis checked him with a look as she prepared to follow Lady Laura out of the room.
“She is tired and a little cross, poor mother!” she observed softly. “All this has been a terrible shock to her.”
Garth relieved her of her wraps and escorted her down to the waiting carriage. As they drove away and he turned back the echo of a loud voice speaking in the adjacent taproom caught his ear:
“Adjourned for a week to give the police time to complete their inquiries indeed! I think I could ha’ helped ’em to come to a verdict sooner. It runs in the family, that is what it does; and if Mr. Garth Davenant had been a poor man—”