"Mr. Sacheverall," he said loudly and very clearly, "I believe Sir Oliver included himself in his castigation of society. Perhaps your own involvement in these events did not allow you to listen to what he said with the attention which I think was its due. I have heard what has been said here today up to this point, and unless there is evidence yet to come which contradicts it, I cannot help but agree that the death of Keelin Melville was a tragedy which need not have happened. And for you to suggest that she was depraved, that she deceived Mr. Lambert willfully, I find unjustified and most distasteful."

Sacheverall's face reddened, but it was as much in anger as shame. There was no shred of retreat in his attitude, and his chin jerked up, not down.

"Unless you have something to say which is germane to the issue, Mr. Sacheverall," the coroner continued, "you will return to your seat and keep from any further interruption to our proceedings." He raised his eyebrows. "Do you have any information we should know as to when Keelin Melville took the poison which killed her, where she obtained it, or when?"

"No—I.. ."

"Did you observe anything which you have not told the police?"

"No—I..."

"Have you anything useful whatever to add?"

"I..."

"Then please resume your seat—and do not interrupt us again!"

Sacheverall retreated in ill-concealed fury. There might have been sympathy for him among his peers, or his friends in society. There was none in the courtroom. Whatever the people there had thought of Keelin Melville in her lifetime, now they had nothing but a sense of pity and an uncomfortable suspicion that they were in some way, no matter how small a way, to blame for her death.

The coroner called Isaac Wolff to the stand. He was obviously in a state of deep grief. His face was almost bloodlessly pale, his eyes had the hollow look of a man who is suffering a prolonged illness, and he spoke quietly and without any lift or timbre in his voice.

The coroner treated him with the greatest courtesy, asking him only those facts which were necessary to corroborate or enlarge upon what was already known.

Wolff answered as briefly as possible, and his bare hands grasped the rail as if he needed it in order to keep his balance. The room was full, for the most part, of ordinary people, and they were too sensible of the presence of loss not to share in it. There was not a sound among them as he spoke. No one fidgeted or turned away. No one whispered to their neighbors.