With no vestige of colour in cheek or lip, with eyes that had grown larger in the new horror of her life, yet unutterably calm, with not one passing tremor in the low voice, and with not one instant of hesitation, she answered the coroner's questions. "At what time had she fallen asleep after her return from Fulham Park?" "It must have been past four o'clock." "Was your maid in attendance upon you when you went to bed?" "No, I have never allowed my maid to sit up for me after a late party." "Are you a heavy sleeper?" "Not usually; but I was very tired that night." Eustace Lyon noticed that she spoke of "that night," the night before last, as if it had been ages ago. The fact appealed to his imagination as a poet. He remarked afterwards that it is only poets who perceive such subtle indications. "Did you hear nothing between six and half-past eight o'clock?" "Nothing." A plan of the upper floor was lying in front of the coroner, and he was studying the position of the rooms. "The room in which the shot was fired has a door communicating with your bedroom?" "Yes." "Was that door shut?" "It is always shut." "Shut, but not locked?" "No, it was not locked." The poet and Mr. Symeon looked at each other as she made this answer, with unalterable composure. The coroner was an elderly man, a doctor--grave always, but especially so on this occasion, for this was an exceptional case, and appealed to him in an exceptional manner. The murder was even more mysterious than terrible; and he was at once touched and mystified by the unshaken composure of this young woman, who had been awakened from her morning sleep to be told that her husband had been murdered within a few yards of the room where she had been sleeping, full of happy dreams, perhaps, after the pleasant excitement of a dance. Except for a strained look in the large grey eyes, there was nothing in her aspect to indicate the ordeal through which she had passed within the last two days. "Isn't she simply wonderful?" murmured Susan Amphlett in the ear of Mr. Symeon, who was standing by her chair. "She has been like that ever since." There was no need to say since what. "I was with her all yesterday; but it was not a bit of use. She has turned to stone. Not a tear, not a cry; only that dreadful look in her eyes, as if she were seeing him murdered. It would have been a relief to hear her scream, or burst into a flood of tears." "That kind of woman does neither," said Symeon. "She is a grand soul, not a bundle of nerves. She has force and courage; and she knows that death does not matter." The coroner treated this witness with the utmost respect, but he did not spare her. A crime so extraordinary demanded a severe investigation, and searching questions had to be asked. Had Mr. Provana a quarrel with anybody, either in his social or business relations? Did the witness know of any incident in her husband's life--in England or in Italy--which might suggest a motive for the crime?