“I imagine,” said Mr. Fransemmery at last, “that what we heard just now from Mrs. Tretheroe originally arose out of some early love-affair? I suppose Harborough and Guy Markenmore were rivals, eh?”
“Everybody knows that, my dear sir!” answered Chilford. “When Mrs. Tretheroe was Veronica Leighton—her father was Vicar of Markenmore, you know—she was a decided and incorrigible flirt, and she’d no end of young men running after her. But these two were first in the running, and I’ve always felt that it was through her, and because of her, that both of them left home as they did. She either married old Colonel Tretheroe out of pique, or for his money—money, I should say. There’s some mystery about what happened at that time—some strange mystery that’s never been made clear.”
“And now there’s another!” said Mr. Fransemmery. “And—she seems to be in it.”
“Aye!” observed the solicitor with a dry laugh. “She let things out just now. But Markenmore was with her last night. Now, where?—and how long?”
Mr. Fransemmery made no reply. He had caught sight of something, and he lifted a hand, pointing to it. The men carrying Guy Markenmore’s dead body were just emerging from the fringe of wood.
Two days later, Mr. Fransemmery summoned to discharge the functions of a juror at that ancient institution, a Coroner’s inquest, found himself acting as foreman of twelve good men and true in the old dining-hall of Markenmore Court. That venerable apartment had been specially prepared and fitted up for the occasion; it was the first time, observed Braxfield mournfully, that it had ever been used since the grand state dinner which Sir Anthony had given to his friends and neighbours when Guy came of age. It was a room of vast size: baronial in appearance, and in its time there had been many gay and striking scenes in it. But never, since its first building by a dead and gone Markenmore, had it been so filled with folk of various degree as on this bright spring morning. There were jurymen and police and witnesses; there was Chilford, representing the family, and another solicitor representing Harborough; there was a London barrister in charge of the case as it presented itself to the authorities; there were officials of many sorts; there were reporters from the local Press, and two or three representatives sent specially from London newspapers. But all these were as nothing to the crowd of spectators—village folk; county family folk; folk from near and far. Already, decided Mr. Fransemmery, as he adjusted his gold-rimmed spectacles and looked around him, the Markenmore problem bade fair to be a _cause célèbre_.