and experienced the greatest surprise of the evening.

BOOK NINTH.

THE INQUEST.

CHAPTER I.

Coroner and Jury.

The post-mortem examination had been held; and three doctors had sworn
that deceased came to his death from a great variety of Greek and Latin
troubles, all caused by a learned something which signified, in plain
English, a blow on the head. Coroner Bullfast was so struck with the
clear and explicit nature of the medical evidence, that he had it
reduced to writing for his private regalement.

The post-mortem examination, and the testimony of the three doctors, and
of all the people in the house (except Patty Minford, daughter of the
deceased)--whose joint knowledge upon the subject amounted to nothing
more than hearing somebody with heavy boots come down stairs about
midnight--occupied the whole of the first day. Patty, or Pet, was so
thoroughly unnerved by the events of that horrible night, that the
coroner found it impossible to take her evidence on that day. She had
fainted twice before she could make Coroner Bullfast clearly understand
that Marcus Wilkeson, her benefactor, and her father's best friend, was
THE MURDERER. Having learned thus much, the coroner had put the police
on the track of Marcus Wilkeson, and had postponed the further
examination of the chief witness.

Mrs. Crull, on learning of the tragic affair, had gone in person to the
house of death, and taken Patty to her own home.

The remains of the unfortunate inventor had been removed to the nearest
undertaker's for interment, at the expense of Mrs. Crull. The apartments
had been diligently searched, and the personal effects of the deceased
examined, under the direction of the coroner. A number of documents had
been discovered, which, in the coroner's opinion, threw a flood of light
on the motives that led to the crime. A few dollars and a bull's-eye
silver watch, found on the dead body, precluded the idea that the murder
was done for plunder. With that quickness of perception for which
Coroner Bullfast, like most of his official kind, was celebrated, he had
formed his theory of the murder, and tremendously strong must be the
future testimony that could shake it.

On the morning of the second day, Coroner Bullfast and the jury
reassembled, about ten o'clock, in the room where the murder was
committed.

The coroner was a jovial man, with a bulging forehead, a ruddy nose, a
large diamond breastpin (a real diamond, of that