Mercy Porter’s fall had been a surprise to everybody. She was a girl of shy and reserved manners, graver and sadder than youth should be. She had been kept very close by her mother, allowed to make no friendships among the girls in the village, to have no companions of her own age. She had early shown a considerable talent for music, and her piano had been her chief pleasure and occupation. Lady Cheriton had taken a good deal of notice of her when she grew up, and she might have done well, the gossips said, when they recalled the story of her disgrace; but she chose to fall in love with a married man of infamous character, a notorious profligate, and he had but to beckon with his finger for her to go off with him. The circumstances of her going off were discussed confidentially at feminine tea-drinkings, and it was wondered that Mrs. Porter could hold her head so high, and show herself at church three times on a Sunday, and entertain the curate and his wife to afternoon tea, considering what had happened. The curate and his wife were new arrivals comparatively, and only knew that dismal common story from hearsay. They were both impressed by Mrs. Porter’s regular attendance at the church services, and by the excellence of that cup of tea with which she was always ready to entertain them whenever they cared to drop in at her cottage between four and five o’clock. * * * * * The inquest was opened early on the afternoon of Monday at the humble little inn near the forge, with its rustic sign, “Live and let live.” Juanita gave her evidence with a stony calmness which impressed those who heard her more than the stormiest outburst of grief would have done. Her mother and her husband’s mother had both implored her not to break down, to bear herself heroically through this terrible ordeal, and they were both in the room to support her by their presence. Both were surprised at the firmness of her manner, the clear tones of her voice as she made her statement, telling how she had heard the shot in her dream, and how she had gone down to the drawing-room to find Sir Godfrey lying face downward on the carpet, in front of the chair where he had been sitting, his hand still upon the open book, which had fallen as he fell. “Did you think of going outside to see if any one was lurking about?” “No, I thought of nothing but trying to save him. I did not believe that he was dead.” There was a look of agony in her large wide open eyes as she said this—a piteous remembrance of the moment while she still hoped—which thrilled the spectators. “What course did you take?” “I rang for the servants. They came after a time that seemed long—but I believe they came quickly.” “And after they had come——?” “I remembered nothing more. They wanted me to believe that he was dead—and I would not—I could not believe—and—I remember no more till next day.” “That will do, Lady Carmichael. I will not trouble you further.”