“There’s vicar. Looks pale, don’t he? I wonder if he had a hand in it. ‘Twas done at Vicarage, after all.” “How can you, Mary Adams? And him visiting Henry Abbott at the time.” “Oh! but they do say him and the colonel had words. There’s Mary Hill. Giving herself airs, she is, on account of being in service there. Hush, here’s coroner.”
The coroner was Dr. Roberts of our adjoining town of Much Benham. He cleared his throat, adjusted his eyeglasses, and looked important.
To recapitulate all the evidence would be merely tiresome. Lawrence Redding gave evidence of finding the body, and identified the pistol as belonging to him. To the best of his belief he had seen it on the Tuesday, two days previously. It was kept on a shelf in his cottage, and the door of the cottage was habitually unlocked.
Mrs. Protheroe gave evidence that she had last seen her husband at about a quarter to six when they separated in the village street. She agreed to call for him at the Vicarage later. She had gone to the Vicarage about a quarter past six, by way of the back lane and the garden gate. She had heard no voices in the study and had imagined that the room was empty, but her husband might have been sitting at the writing-table, in which case she would not have seen him. As far as she knew, he had been in his usual health and spirits. She knew of no enemy who might have had a grudge against him.
I gave evidence next, told of my appointment with Protheroe and my summons to the Abbotts. I described how I had found the body and my summoning of Dr. Haydock.
“How many people, Mr. Clement, were aware that Colonel Protheroe was coming to see you that evening?”
“A good many, I should imagine. My wife knew, and my nephew, and Colonel Protheroe himself alluded to the fact that morning when I met him in the village. I should think several people might have overheard him, as, being slightly deaf, he spoke in a loud voice.”
“It was, then, a matter of common knowledge? Any one might know?”
I agreed.
Haydock followed. He was an important witness. He described carefully and technically the appearance of the body and the exact injuries. It was his opinion that deceased had been shot whilst actually in the act of writing. He placed the time of death at approximately 6.20 to 6.30 – certainly not later than 6.35. That was the outside limit. He was positive and emphatic on that point. There was no question of suicide, the wound could not have been self-inflicted.
Inspector Slack’s evidence was discreet and abridged. He described his summons and the circumstances under which he had found the body. The unfinished letter was produced and the time on it – 6.20 – noted. Also the clock. It was tacitly assumed that the time of death was 6.22. The police were giving nothing away. Anne Protheroe told me afterwards that she had been told to suggest a slightly earlier period of time than 6.20 for her visit.
Our maid, Mary, was the next witness, and proved a somewhat truculent one. She hadn’t heard anything, and didn’t want to hear anything. It wasn’t as though gentlemen who came to see the vicar usually got shot. They didn’t. She’d got her own jobs to look after. Colonel Protheroe had arrived at a quarter past six exactly. No, she didn’t look at the clock. She heard the church chime after she had shown him into the study. She didn’t hear any shot. If there had been a shot she’d have heard it. Well, of course, she knew there must have been a shot, since the gentleman was found shot – but there it was. She hadn’t heard it.
The coroner did not press the point. I realised that he and Colonel Melchett were working in agreement.
Mrs. Lestrange had been subpœnaed to give evidence, but a medical certificate, signed by Dr. Haydock, was produced saying she was too ill to attend.
There was only one other witness, a somewhat doddering old woman. The one who, in Slack’s phrase, “did for” Lawrence Redding.