is naturally
anxious to know all about it, I went, little suspecting that the man was
insane."

"Did you see him after that?"

"Certainly not, until to-day, when I recognised in the body that has
been exhibited to me the same individual."

"Gentlemen," said the coroner to the jury, "it appears to me that this
is a most mysterious affair; the deceased person has a wound in his
throat, which, I have no doubt, you will hear from a medical witness has
been the cause of death; and the most singular part of the affair is,
how, if he inflicted it upon himself, he has managed to dispose of the
weapon with which he did the deed."

"The last person seen in his company," said one of the jury, "was the
baron, and I think he is bound to give some better explanation of the
affair."

"I am yet to discover," said the baron, "that the last person who
acknowledges to having been in the company of a man afterwards murdered,
must, of necessity, be the murderer?"

"Yes; but how do you account, sir, for there being no weapon found by
which the man could have done the deed himself?"

"I don't account for it at all--how do you?"

"This is irregular," said the coroner; "call the next witness."

This was a medical man, who briefly stated that he had seen the
deceased, and that the wound in his throat was amply sufficient to
account for his death; that it was inflicted with a sharp instrument
having an edge on each side.

This, then, seemed to conclude the case, and the coroner remarked,--

"Gentlemen of the jury,--I think this is one of those peculiar cases in
which an open verdict is necessary, or else an adjournment without date,
so that the matter can be resumed at any time, if fresh evidence can be
procured concerning it. There is no one accused of the offence, although
it appears to me impossible that the unhappy man could have committed
the act himself. We have no reason to throw the least shade of suspicion
or doubt upon the evidence of the Baron Stolmuyer of Saltzburgh; for as
far as we know anything of the matter, the murdered man may have been in
the company of a dozen people after the baron left him."

A desultory conversation ensued, which ended in an adjournment of the
inquest, without any future day being mentioned for its re-assembling,
and so the Baron Stolmuyer entirely escaped from what might have been a
very serious affair to him.

It did not, however, appear to shake him in his resolution of taking
Anderbury-