An interval of perhaps ten minutes elapsed; the men returned, singly and in groups, with one poor fellow dashing out of the chamber entirely, to be sick as I supposed in Mr. Barlow’s stable yard. The coroner took no notice of this, save to await the man’s return before proceeding. When all were reassembled, Mr. Munro glanced up from his foolscap and pen, eyes roving about the room until they fell upon Mr. Prowting.
“I should like to call Mr. William Prowting of Chawton, who holds the commission of the peace for this county, to be sworn before God and this panel.”
Mr. Prowting rose to his feet, and made his ponderous way towards the enclosure reserved for witnesses at Munro’s right hand. He made his oath, and composed himself with an air of gravity; told the coroner and the townsfolk of Alton how he had assisted his neighbours with the disposal of some heavy articles in the cellar at approximately four o’clock the previous afternoon, and therewith, in all innocence, discovered Shafto French’s remains.
“There was no possible entry to the cellar except through the rooms of the cottage itself?”
Mr. Prowting affirmed that this was so—“despite the hatchway set into the cellar ceiling, a remnant of the place’s former usage as a public house.”
“The hatch was closed at the time of the body’s discovery?”
“Closed and barred from within. I opened the hatch myself, as I just described to you, and may attest that the dust had not been disturbed.”
I wondered at that statement; in the dim light of my tallow candle, little could have been observed of either wooden bar or the dust that coated it. But it was not for me to say what Mr. Prowting had seen; it was not my hand that had lifted the hatch’s bar.
“And the new tenants of Chawton Cottage opened the house only yesterday?”
“Mrs. Austen and her daughter arrived before the gate at half past two o’clock, as I observed from my parlour window directly opposite.”
“You paid a call upon the household soon thereafter?”
It was a point of conjecture whether Mr. Prowting would now condescend to mention the appearance of so extraordinary a visitor as Mr. Chizzlewit, with liveried lackeys behind; but the former was a magistrate of long standing, and had been trained to observe the brevities of a public proceeding. Mr. Chizzlewit did not pertain to Shafto French; furthermore, Mr. Chizzlewit had treated him, William Prowting, with the grossest condescension. Mr. Chizzlewit might hang in obscurity for the nonce.
“I wished to afford the ladies an interval to investigate the cottage in privacy,” the magistrate told the room, “and thus paid my call of welcome perhaps half an hour after they arrived.”
“Very well. Did you observe any sort of disturbance, Mr. Prowting, to the cellar floor where Deceased lay?”
“I did not. The place was as quiet as a tomb,” the magistrate observed; and considered too late of his choice of words. “From the closed air of the room, I should have thought the place shut up a decade or more. I was astonished to discover the remains.”
“You did not notice a shifting of the dust,” Munro persisted, “on the surface of the floor, as might have been occasioned by the passage of feet?”
Mr. Prowting replied in the negative.
“Nor yet any stain, as of water spilled and later dried?”
At this last question, I straightened in my chair with interest. To what end did the coroner’s questions lead?
Mr. Prowting had seen no stain of dried water. “The floor being unpaved, and the dirt of a sandy composition, any moisture might probably have drained away. The body, after all, had been lying where it was some days.”
Mr. Munro might have protested this statement, or wondered how Prowting could be so sure of the date of death; but it was common knowledge by now that French’s face had been entirely et away — and nobody would dispute the conclusions to be drawn from the activity of the rats.
The magistrate stood down.
I awaited with interest the summoning of the next witness; and it was, indeed, myself — who after being sworn, attested simply that I had never set foot in my present abode before yesterday afternoon; that I had not been in Chawton, indeed, except for a fleeting visit to the Great House two years before; that I had received the keys to the cottage from Mr. Barlow, the George’s publican, who at my brother the Squire’s instruction had held them in safekeeping ever since the departure of the previous tenant, Widow Seward, four months earlier; and finally, that I had ventured to the cellar only after Mr. Prowting appeared to assist me in the conveyance of some heavy articles requiring storage.
It was probable, I thought as I made my way back to my chair, that the entire town of Alton had now concluded that a hoard of jewels — a king’s ransom, Henry had called it — was locked in my cellar. I had been wise to shift Lord Harold’s papers to my bedchamber.
“The coroner summons Jemima French.”
The woman I had observed at the front of the room rose before Mr. Munro, and was apparently stricken instantly with paralysis.
“You may take this chair, Mrs. French,” he said with blunt kindness, “and make your oath, if you please.”
She moved waveringly towards the proffered seat, and I saw with pity that she was increasing. A hopeful family, Mr. Prowting had said. How many children did Shafto French leave behind?
And how ill-provided for?
“You are Jemima French, wife of Deceased?”
“I am, sir,” she answered faintly.
“I will not trouble you long. When did you last see your hus band in life, Mrs. French?”
She made as if to speak, and then her features crumpled with misery and she buried her face in her hands.
“Saturday,” she managed, “as he was leaving for the Crown.”
“The Crown is a publick house?”
“Yessir. Shafto liked it better’n the others.”
“I’m that sorry, then, that he has to lie in the George,” cried Mr. Barlow, considerably put out.
Mr. Munro ignored the publican. “Your husband did not come home that night?”
Mrs. French shook her head.
“Nor yet the next day?”
“No, sir. I did not lay eyes on him again until yesterday, when Mr. Curtis’s boy brought word.”
The unfortunate woman wiped her eyes with her apron.
“Was your husband in the habit of disappearing for several days together?”
“Shafto, he sometimes went a good distance in search of work.”
“Had he been employed of late?”
“Yes, sir, it being summer and the season good for building. Mr. Dyer often found a use for Shafto, shifting stone and suchlike.”
“I see. In your husband’s sudden absence, did you think to enquire of Mr. Dyer whether he had hired Mr. French?”
Jemima shook her head once more.
“Glad to be shut of ’im,” a rude voice called out from the back of the room, “and no wonder! Shut of ’im for good you are, now, Jemima!”
The grieving widow half-rose from her witness seat, face flushed. “Who said that? What heart of stone would speak ill of my Shafto? Three little ’uns he’s left, and the good Lord alone knows how I’ll feed ’em. Vipers, all of ye, to spit upon a man’s name, and him lying yonder with his eyes closed on this world.”
There was a silence, and the turning away of heads; for my own part, I could have applauded the woman’s speech. Fighting words had afforded Jemima French the strength at least to leave off weeping.
“Mrs. French, you have our deepest sympathy,” Mr. Munro assured her. “You may stand down. If any man has the desire to be heard in this proceeding, he may come forward and be sworn. Otherwise, I must beg you to preserve a respectful silence. Recollect that we are all of us in the presence of the Departed.”
A chair scraped the floor some distance behind me, as though in protest, but no further gibes were uttered.
“At this juncture,” the coroner declared, “it is perhaps best that I state for the understanding of one and all my conclusions as a physician regarding Shafto French’s death.