Rose now felt how dangerous a thing it is to have any concealment from a parent. She had gone on in perfect innocence with Chandos Winslow; she was accidentally a participator in his secret; she would have thought it base to betray it, even if she had not loved him; yet how much pain and embarrassment did the concealment in which she had shared, in which she must still share, cause her at that moment. She answered then with agitation and hesitation: "He spoke a few words to me at the basin as I was feeding my gold-fish, and left me as if to go from the garden. I was at the side of the pond after he quitted it. I am sure he left the garden directly." Mr. Tracy marked his daughter's manner, and thought it strange; but he was not a very observant man; and his thoughts soon wandered away from that which he concluded was some merely accidental circumstance. "I must get some breakfast, and go down directly," he said: "so ring the bell, my love, and pour me out some tea. Where is the inquest sitting?" he continued, when the servant appeared. "Down at the Cross-Keys, in the village," replied the man. "Well, let me know when they come to view the body," rejoined Mr. Tracy; but the footman informed him, that the part of the proceedings which he mentioned had taken place a full hour before. Mr. Tracy then ordered his horse in half an hour; but the first post came in earlier that day than usual. Several letters engaged his attention first, and then a paragraph in the newspaper; so that the horse was kept walking up and down for fully twenty minutes. At the end of that time he mounted and rode away; but, before he had been gone a quarter of an hour, the butler, who had taken a cross-cut over the fields, entered the breakfast-room, as if looking for his master. "Papa's gone down to attend the inquest, Taylor," said Rose, who had remained in deep thought at the table. "Tell me what has taken place?" "Why, Ma'am, the inquest is all over," answered the butler; "and master will find them all gone." "But what is the verdict, then?" inquired the young lady eagerly; "what have the jury discovered?" "Why, I am sorry to say, Miss Rose," replied the man, who seemed to be made very unwillingly the bearer of bad tidings, "they have given a verdict of 'wilful murder' against Mr. Acton, our head-gardener." "Impossible!" cried Rose, gasping for breath. "He could not be the murderer; for he quitted the garden while I myself stood by the basin." "He came into it again, Miss Rose," said the butler in a sorrowful tone; "his feet were traced straight from the haw-haw, back to the very spot where the dead body was found. Some of his clothes were bloody, too, and those the very clothes he had on last night. The hoe too, with which the poor old man was killed was his; and nobody can deny it is all very suspicious: and so they have sent him off to the county gaol."