"Let me put this to you," he said. "Consider calmly, if you please, what we have heard already, from previous witnesses, and what you yourself have admitted. Mrs. Saumarez has sworn that you and the late Mayor were rivals for her hand and that there was jealousy between you. You admit that Mrs. Marriner is correct in identifying the burnt and blood-stained fragment of handkerchief found in the Mayor's Parlour after the murder as your property; you also acknowledge the existence of a door communicating between your house and the Moot Hall. You further admit that you were away from your surgery for nineteen minutes at the very time the murder was committed--according to the medical evidence--and that you were in your drawing-room from an inner room of which the door I have just referred to opens. Now I suggest to you, Dr. Wellesley, that you should give us the name of the person who was with you in your drawing-room?" Wellesley, who, during this exordium, had steadily watched his questioner, shook his head more decidedly than before. "No!" he answered promptly. "I shall not say who my caller was." Meeking spread out his hands in a gesture of helplessness. He turned to the Coroner who, for the last few minutes, had shown signs of being ill at ease, and had frequently shaken his head at Wellesley's point-blank refusals. "I don't know if it is any use appealing to you, sir," said Meeking. "The witness----" The Coroner leaned towards Wellesley, his whole attitude conciliatory and inviting. "I really think that it would be better, doctor, if you could find it in your way to answer Mr. Meeking's question----" "I have answered it, sir," interrupted Wellesley. "My answer is--no!" "Yes, yes, but I don't want the jury to get any false impressions--to draw any wrong conclusions," said the Coroner a little testily. "I feel sure that in your own interest----" "I am not thinking of my own interest," declared Wellesley. "Once again--I shall not give the name of my caller." There was a further pause, during which Meeking and the Coroner exchanged glances. Then Meeking suddenly turned again to the witness-box. "Was your caller a man or a woman?" he asked. "That I shan't say!" answered Wellesley steadily. "Who admitted him--or her?" "I did." "How--by what door of your house?" "By the side-door in Piper's Passage." "Did any of your servants see the caller?" "No." "How came that about? You have several servants." "My caller came to that door by arrangement with myself at a certain time--7.30--was admitted by me, and taken straight up to my drawing-room by a side staircase. My caller left, when the interview was over, by the same way." "The interview, then, was a secret one?" "Precisely! Secret; private; confidential." "And you flatly refuse to give us the caller's name?" "Flatly!"