Pringle had resolved to have her evidence taken to-day at any risk. Several reasons urged him to this determination. It would look better, or, rather, less bad, in the eyes of the public to state that in a week's time her strength would be diminished by waiting and anxiety; and to get her examined thus, after the point at which the coroner had intended practically to close the evidence for that day would, he felt certain, tend to mitigate the rigours of the examination.
Mrs. Davenport was called.
CHAPTER XII
ANOTHER WITNESS
There was a slight commotion in the dingy-room when this woman with the lovely figure and beautiful head and face entered. The coroner straightened himself and looked at her under his spectacles. The jury leaned forward and stared, and the few members of the general public who had succeeded in gaining admission to the room strained their necks and shuffled their feet.
She advanced quietly to the table at which the coroner sat, with the jury on his right, and having thrown back her thick widow's veil and ungloved her right hand, took the Book and kissed it when the proper moment for doing so arrived. The coroner pointed to a chair, and told her she might be seated. She simply bowed and remained standing.
She was pale, rigid, collected. The coroner busied himself with the pens, ink, and paper before him for a little while, and then asked her to tell them all she knew of the night and event under consideration.
When she spoke her voice was clear and firm-as free from emotion as though she was repeating an old task by rote. The earlier portions of what she said may be partly omitted, for they have been already related to Alfred Paulton and Richard Pringle. For the sake of conciseness, the remainder of the evidence taken that day will, in the case of each witness, follow the order of events in narrative form, and not the order of events as given by the witnesses.
"She and her husband arrived at Crescent House the night he died. He was not so well as usual, but she had known the asthma more troublesome. They had supper together. He ate more sparingly than usual. They were alone in the house. He decided upon resting on the couch all night. No room but her sleeping room was in anything like order. She was tired after the journey. They had come from Chester that day. Her husband suggested she should go to bed. At about ten o'clock she went to her room, but resolved not to lie down yet, as she was anxious about her husband, and resolved to see him once more, and put more coal on the fire before retiring finally. She sat down in a chair, and, being overcome with fatigue and drowsiness, fell asleep. She had no means of telling exactly when she fell asleep, but she thought she must have been about twenty minutes in her room before she grew unconscious.
"Close to midnight she awoke with a start. It must have been the opening of the dining-room door that aroused her. She had left her bed-room door ajar, and the carpets not being down, sounds were exaggerated and travelled far.
"She listened and heard voices-the voices of two people, two men. She knew the two voices. One was that of her husband-the other that of Mr. Thomas Blake. Both voices seemed friendly, but she did not catch the words. Shortly after she heard Mr. Blake distinctly say 'Good-night,' and her husband answer 'Good-night, Blake.' She was quite positive these were the words spoken, and that the tones were friendly-yes, she was prepared to swear, cordial. Then she heard a man's footstep on the uncarpeted boards of the hall, and in a moment the front door was closed.
"Some time elapsed before she went down-half-an-hour, or perhaps a little more. She had a reason for not going down immediately. From the time the front door was shut until she went down she had not heard a sound, not the faintest sound, in the house. A slight noise arising in the dining-room, where she had left Mr. Davenport, would be inaudible to her; but she felt almost certain no one could in that interval of time enter or leave the house without her hearing him.
"At twenty minutes past twelve she descended and crept cautiously into the dining-room, wishing not to disturb her husband if he should be sleeping. Her husband was reclining on the couch in very nearly the same attitude she had left him; it was such as he always took when his cough prevented his lying down.
"She believed he was sleeping, and stood gazing at him for a few seconds. Then, becoming uneasy, she did not know why, she called him several times, and failing to arouse him with her voice, she placed her hand on his shoulder. She now became grievously alarmed, for he had always been a remarkably light sleeper. She listened for his breathing, but could hear nothing.
"After a few moments she became terrified, desperate, and, going to the front door, opened it and attracted the attention of Mr. Paulton, who in a short time brought Dr. Santley, who said he was dead.
"Yes; she identified that bottle. It was the one in which her husband used to keep chloroform. He had the bottle always by him. When she left him to go to her room that night two hours earlier the bottle was more than three-quarters full of chloroform, and the cork was in it. Thirty or forty drops was the quantity her husband generally used at a time. He always spilled the chloroform into a napkin formed into a rude resemblance of a cornucopia, and then inhaled it. To her knowledge, he never used the drug internally, nor in any way but that described.
"I have known Mr. Thomas Blake for many years. We were once secretly engaged to be married, but my father broke the matter off, and I married Mr. Davenport, who was much older than I-twenty-five or twenty-six years older. When Mr. Blake was a very young man he met Mr. Davenport abroad, so my late husband told me. It was Mr. Blake introduced my late husband to me. At that time Mr. Blake and I were secretly engaged. After this engagement was known to my father and broken off by him, as far as his forbidding me to see Mr. Blake, I still communicated with Mr. Blake and received letters from him. These were surreptitious communications.
"Mr. Davenport then proposed to me and I refused him. Shortly after this I received a letter from Mr. Blake, saying there was no use in our continuing to hope we should one day be married, as neither of us had any money or the chance of getting any, and consequently we ought to make up our minds to resign ourselves to fate. Shortly after this Mr. Davenport proposed to me again and I accepted him. We were married a few months later, and have most of the time since then resided at Mr. Davenport's place near Kilcash, in the county of Waterford.
"The terms upon which Mr. Blake gave me up will be told you by himself. I had nothing to do with that bargain. After an absence of a little time from Ireland, Mr. Blake came back and stayed occasionally in Kilcash, close to which my husband's house was. I saw little of Mr. Blake. My husband met him now and then. In those days I believe Mr. Blake gave me up solely for the reason mentioned in the letter of which I have spoken. Subsequently I found out other considerations had been working in Mr. Blake's mind.
"My marriage with Mr. Davenport was not a love-match. A variety of reasons urged me into marrying him. Among these reasons I cannot count love. I have diligently, conscientiously done my duty by him for ten years. I never pretended or professed to love him. I respected his moral code, but his social and intellectual faculties did not impress, did not interest me, and certainly did not gain my esteem. We lived in peace and comfort. He never once quarrelled with me-I never with him.
"I said I had a reason for not going down immediately after Mr. Blake left the house the other night. My reason was that generally after a visit from Mr. Blake, Mr. Davenport was unpleasantly excited with, as I even then thought, a lingering feeling of jealousy. At such times he never said anything harsh or unpleasant of Mr. Blake or of myself, but he was certain to become feverishly angry with some one or other; and believing that after such a journey, and with so bad a cough, it would be injurious to him to excite himself unduly, I kept back awhile.
"I had the strongest possible objection to having this unhappy occurrence made the object of official inquiry or public comment. I would not have spoken as I have since I came in here for any other consideration in the world than my inability to tell anything that is not true.
"I would not swear anything that was not true to save my life; no, nor to save the life of any one living or any one who has lived. You ask me did I not perjure myself when I swore at the altar to love my late husband. I say I did not. When I took that oath I meant to keep it. I meant to try and love him with all my-I will not say heart-with all my reason, if such an expression may be allowed. I was fully honest when I took the oath. When you do all you can to carry out your promise, and yet fail in the end, there is no flaw. One cannot control the inevitable.
"Now that all is known, all my recent life laid bare, who is the richer? Does any one wonder I had no liking to expose what has been told of since I came into this place? You, Mr. Edward Davenport, have, in the moment of her sorest trial, done all you could to injure the character of your brother's wife. You had not the courage to attack her openly when she was a widow, but must shamble and crouch behind a hireling advocate-a creature who would pocket as clean the gold of any one even more leprous than himself."
And before the coroner could collect himself, or stay her by gesture, she had swept out of the room.
From beginning to end her voice had never altered in pitch. The concluding words were spoken in the same manner as those of the opening. Hence when the import of her final words began to reach the minds of the hearers, she had finished, and was in the act of leaving the room. Her words "shamble" and "crouch" were peculiarly applicable to Edward Davenport at the time, for no sooner did she begin her reference to him than she pointed him out, and he instinctively shrank behind his solicitor, to whom he had been prompting questions most offensive.
When the murmur which followed the disappearance of Mrs. Davenport had subsided, and the coroner had somewhat recovered from his astonishment, Thomas Blake stood up, stepped forward to the table, and, laying his hand on it, said:
"I am the last person who saw Mr. Louis Davenport alive. I desire to be examined."
CHAPTER XIII
BLAKE'S EVIDENCE
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.