In reply to a question by the Coroner, witness stated that, in company with Mr. Mace, he had visited the strong room. He had found the door of the bullion safe open, and from the cursory examination, which was all he had yet had time to make, he had no doubt that gold and notes to the amount of between three and four thousand pounds, together with the twelve hundred pounds' worth of change, had been abstracted from the coffers of the Bank. "Am I to understand, Mr. Brancker," asked the Coroner, "that you know nothing whatever as to the origin of the bloodstains on the floor of your office, nor of the marks of a similar kind scattered about the contents of your drawer?" "I know nothing of them whatever, sir, and I was never more surprised in my life than when I saw them there this morning." "I presume that you locked your drawer before leaving it last evening?" "To the best of my recollection I did." "And you found it locked on your arrival this morning?" "I certainly did. To me the whole affair is utterly inexplicable." At this juncture, who should shoulder his way into the room but William Strong, the man Mr. Brancker had been so anxious to see the previous evening. Mr. Mace recognized him, and whispered to the Coroner, and next moment, greatly to his surprise, Strong was summoned by name out of the crowd, and sworn by the Coroner's clerk. "Have you any objection to tell the Court where you were last evening between the hours of half-past ten and half-past eleven?" queried the Coroner. "I was at home, sir. I've been ill, and have not put foot outside the door for four days till this afternoon." "Will you swear to that?" "Of course I will, and my wife will tell you the same thing if you ask her." "Then if you were at home the whole of last evening, as you state, you could scarcely have failed to hear if anyone knocked at your door?" "Of course I couldn't, sir; my house ain't like a gentleman's mansion. There's only four rooms in it altogether." "Mr. Brancker has just told us that he knocked at your door some time between ten and eleven last night--that he knocked repeatedly, but that nobody answered his summons." "There must be a mistake somewhere," said Strong, with a puzzled shake of his head. "All I know is that I was never out of the house, and that nobody could have knocked without my hearing them." "What time did you go to bed last night?" "At twelve, to the minute--my general time. If I go to bed sooner than that I can't sleep." "Perhaps Mr. Brancker was mistaken in the house," suggested one of the jury, "and knocked at the wrong door." "Well, sir, I hardly see how that could happen," said Strong, with a slow, incredulous smile, "seeing that my little shanty ain't one of a row, but stands all by itself." John Brancker could contain himself no longer. He started to his feet. "Do you mean to say, Strong," he cried, "that you were never out of the house last evening, and yet that you did not hear me knock?"