"Of that I can have no notion, Sir," was the young gentleman's reply. "I did not even know that he had been seeking me, till you informed me of the fact just now." He saw that some suspicion was beginning to attach itself to him; but Chandos Winslow was not a man to suffer himself to feel personal alarm easily, and he remained so calm and self-possessed, that Mr. Tracy felt that some vague doubts which he had entertained had done him injustice.
"This affair," he said, at lengthy "is as strange as terrible, and must be immediately inquired into further. Taylor, you remain here with one of the men till the constable can be brought up from the village. Then give the body and the hoe into his charge, and render him every assistance he may require; but nothing must be taken away or altered till the coroner, to whom I shall write immediately, arrives. Let everybody, too, avoid the spot where the crime was committed, in order that any traces which may perhaps be apparent to-morrow, though we have not been able to find them to-night, may not be effaced."
"It may perhaps be better, Sir," said Chandos, "to keep the door by my cottage locked. Then the men will not pass that way to their work. Here is my key; I can go round by the house. Sandes has also a key, which can be fetched from him, if you like."
"Do you know when Sandes left the garden?" asked Mr. Tracy quickly, as if a new thought had struck him.
"A little before myself," answered Chandos. "I met him and his boy in the walk going homeward."
"And are you certain this crime had not been committed before he went home?" was the next inquiry.
"Perfectly, Sir," said Chandos; "for I must have seen the body if it lay by the fish-pond, as you said just now. Sandes must have been out of the grounds, if he went straight forward, before I reached the basin."
"It is all very strange!" said Mr. Tracy; and, taking the key, he left the spot, followed close by Chandos, and some of the servants. No further conversation took place, however; and the young gentleman, with a feeling of deep gloom, returned to his cottage, leaving fate to direct the course of events which had commenced so terribly.
It was half-past eleven when Mr. Tracy returned; and Emily and Rose had retired to rest. He had been called out of the room on business, and neither of the two girls had an idea that anything painful had occurred which might render their waiting his return either a duty or a consolation to their father. Emily's days were days of hard labour; of constant combat with feelings wearing and oppressive; and she first proposed to her sister to go to bed.