While the new baronet abandoned himself to the anguish of disappointed avarice and ambition, Honoria sat quietly in her own apartments, brooding very sadly over her husband’s death.

She had loved him honestly and truly. No younger lover had ever won possession of her heart. Her life, before her meeting with Sir Oswald, had been too miserable for the indulgence of the romantic dreams or poetic fancies of girlhood. The youthful feelings of this woman, who called herself Honoria, had been withered by the blasting influence of crime. It was only when gratitude for Sir Oswald’s goodness melted the ice of that proud nature — it was then only that Honoria’s womanly tenderness awoke — it was then only that affection — a deep-felt and pure affection — for the first time occupied her heart.

That affection was all the more intense in its nature because it was the first love of a noble heart. Honoria had reverenced in her husband all that she had ever known of manly virtue.

And he was lost to her! He had died believing her false.

“I could have borne anything but that,” she thought, in her desolation.

The magistrate came to her, and explained the painful necessity under which he found himself placed. But he did not tell her of the destruction of the will, nor yet that the medical men had pronounced decisively as to Sir Oswald’s death. He only told her that there were suspicious circumstances connected with that death; and that it was considered necessary there should he a careful investigation of those circumstances.

“The investigation cannot be too complete,” replied Honoria, eagerly. “I know that there has been foul play, and that the best and noblest of men has fallen a victim to the hand of an assassin. Oh, sir, if you are able to distinguish truth from falsehood, I implore you to listen to the story which my poor husband refused to believe — the story of the basest treachery that was ever plotted against a helpless woman!”

Mr. Ashburne declared himself willing to hear any statement Lady Eversleigh might wish to make; but he warned her that it was just possible that statement might be used against her hereafter.

Honoria told him the circumstances which she had related to Sir Oswald; the false alarm about her husband, the drive to Yarborough Tower, and the night of agony spent within the ruins; but, to her horror, she perceived that this man also disbelieved her. The story seemed wild and improbable, and people had already condemned her. They were prepared to hear a fabrication from her lips; and the truth which she had to tell seemed the most clumsy and shallow of inventions.

Gilbert Ashburne did not tell her that he doubted her; but, polite as his words were, she could read the indications of distrust in his face. She could see that he thought worse of her after having heard the statement which was her sole justification.

“And where is this Mr. Carrington now to be found?” he asked, presently. “I do not know. Having accomplished his base plot, and caused his friend’s restoration to the estates, I suppose he has taken care to go far away from the scene of his infamy.”

The magistrate looked searchingly at her face. Was this acting, or was she ignorant of the destruction of the will? Did she, indeed, believe that the estates were lost to herself?

Before the hour at which the coroner’s inquest was to be held in the great dining-room, Reginald Eversleigh and Victor Carrington met at the appointed spot in the avenue of firs.

One glance at his friend’s face informed Victor that some fatal event had occurred since the previous day. Reginald told him, in brief, passionate words, of the destruction of the will.

“You are a clever schemer, no doubt, Mr. Carrington,” he added, bitterly; “but clever as you are, you have been outwitted as completely as the veriest fool that ever blundered into ruin. Do you understand, Carrington — we are not richer by one halfpenny for all your scheming?”

Carrington was silent for awhile; but when, after a considerable pause, he at length spoke, his voice betrayed a despair as intense in its quiet depth as the louder passion of his companion.

“I cannot believe it,” he exclaimed, in a hoarse whisper. “I tell you, man, you must, have made some senseless mistake. The will cannot have been destroyed.”

“I had the fragments in my hand,” answered Reginald. “I saw my name written on the worthless scrap of burnt paper. All that was left besides that wretched fragment were the ashes in the grate.”

“I saw the will executed — I saw it — within a few hours of Sir Oswald’s death.”

“You saw it done?”

“Yes, I was outside the window of the library.”

“And you —! oh, it is too horrible,” cried Reginald.

“What is too horrible?”

“The deed that was done that night.”

“That deed is no business of ours,” answered Victor; “the person who destroyed the will was your uncle’s assassin, if he died by the hand of an assassin.”

“Do you really believe that, Carrington; or are you only fooling me?”

“What else should I believe?”

The two men parted. Reginald Eversleigh knew that his presence would be required at the coroner’s inquest. The surgeon did not attempt to detain him.

For the time, at least, this arch-plotter found himself suddenly brought to a stand-still.

The inquest commenced almost immediately after Reginald’s return to the castle.

The first witness examined was the valet, who had been the person to discover the death; the next were the two medical men, whose evidence was of a most important nature.

It was a closed court, and no one was admitted who was not required to give evidence. Lady Eversleigh sat at the opposite end of the table to that occupied by the coroner. She had declined to avail herself of the services of any legal adviser. She had declared her determination to trust in her own innocence, and in that alone. Proud, calm, and self~possessed, she confronted the solemn assembly, and did not shrink from the scrutinizing looks that met her eyes in every direction.

Reginald Eversleigh contemplated her with a feeling of murderous hatred, as he took his place at some little distance from her seat.

The evidence of Mr. Missenden was to the effect that Sir Oswald Eversleigh had died from the effects of a subtle and little-known poison. He had discovered traces of this poison in the empty glass which had been found upon the table beside the dead man, and he had discovered further traces of the same poison in the stomach of the deceased.

After the medical witnesses had both been examined, Peterson, the butler, was sworn. He related the facts connected with the execution of the will, and further stated that it was he who had carried the carafe of water, claret-jug, and the empty glass to Sir Oswald.

“Did you fetch the water yourself?” asked the coroner.

“Yes, your worship — Sir Oswald was very particular about the water being iced — I took it from a filter in my own charge.”

“And the glass?”

“I took the glass from my own pantry.”

“Are you sure that there was nothing in the glass when you took the salver to you master?”

“Quite sure, sir. I’m very particular about having all my glass bright and clear — it’s the under butler’s duty to see to that, and it’s my duty to keep him up to his work. I should have seen in a moment if the glass had been dull and smudgy at the bottom.”

The water remaining in the carafe had been examined by the medical witnesses, and had been declared by them to be perfectly pure. The claret had been untouched. The poison could, therefore, have only been introduced to the baronet’s room in the glass; and the butler protested that no one but himself and his assistant had access to the place in which the glass had been kept.

How, then, could the baronet have been poisoned, except by his own hand?

Reginald Eversleigh was one of the last witnesses examined. He told of the interview between himself and his uncle, on the day preceding Sir Oswald’s death. He told of Lydia Graham’s revelations — he told everything calculated to bring disgrace upon the woman who sat, pale and silent, confronting her fate.

She seemed unmoved by these scandalous revelations. She had passed through such bitter agony within the last few days and nights, that it seemed to her as if nothing could have power to move her more.

She had endured the shame of her husband’s distrust. The man she loved so dearly had cast her from him with disdain and aversion. What new agony could await her equal to that through which she had passed.

Reginald Eversleigh’s hatred and rage betrayed him into passing the limits of prudence. He told the story of the destroyed will, and boldly accused Lady Eversleigh of having destroyed it.

“You forget yourself, Sir Reginald,” said the coroner; “you are here as a witness, and not as an accuser.”

“But am I to keep silence, when I know that yonder woman is guilty of a crime by which I am robbed of my heritage?” cried the young man, passionately. “Who but she was interested in the destruction of that will? Who had so strong a motive for wishing my uncle’s death? Why was she hiding in the castle after her pretended departure, except for some guilty purpose? She left her own apartments before dusk, after writing a farewell letter to her husband. Where was she, and what was she doing, after leaving those apartments?”

“Let me answer those questions, Sir Reginald Eversleigh,” said a voice from the doorway.

The young baronet turned and recognized the speaker. It was his uncle’s old friend, Captain Copplestone, who had made his way into the room unheard while Reginald had been giving his evidence. He was still seated in his invalid-chair — still unable to move without its aid.

“Let me answer those questions,” he repeated. “I have only just heard of Lady Eversleigh’s painful position. I beg to be sworn immediately, for my evidence may be of some importance to that lady.”

Reginald sat down, unable to contest the captain’s right to be heard, though he would fain have done so.

Lady Eversleigh for the first time that day gave evidence of some slight emotion. She raised her eyes to Captain Copplestone’s bronzed face with a tearful glance, expressive of gratitude and confidence.

The captain was duly sworn, and then proceeded to give his evidence, in brief, abrupt sentences, without waiting to be questioned.

“You ask where Lady Eversleigh spent the night of her husband’s death, and how she spent it. I can answer both those questions. She spent that night in my room, nursing a sick old man, who was mad with the tortures of rheumatic gout, and weeping over Sir Oswald’s refusal to believe in her innocence.

“You’ll ask, perhaps, how she came to be in my apartments on that night. I’ll answer you in a few words. Before leaving the castle she came to my room, and asked my old servant to admit her. She had been very kind and attentive to me throughout my illness. My servant is a gruff and tough old fellow, but he is grateful for any kindness that’s shown to his master. He admitted Lady Eversleigh to see me, ill as I was. She told me the whole story which she told her husband. ‘He refused to believe me, Captain Copplestone,’ she said; ‘he who once loved me so dearly refused to believe me. So I come to you, his best and oldest friend, in the hope that you may think better of me; and that some day, when I am far away, and time has softened my husband’s heart towards me, you may speak a good word in my behalf.’ And I did believe her. Yes, Mr. Eversleigh — or Sir Reginald Eversleigh — I did, and I do, believe that lady.”

“Captain Copplestone,” said the coroner; “we really do not require all these particulars; the question is — when did Lady Eversleigh enter your rooms, and when did she quit them?”

“She came to me at dusk, and she did not leave my rooms until the next morning, after the discovery of my poor friend’s death. When she had told me her story, and her intention of leaving the castle immediately, I begged her to remain until the next day. She would be safe in my rooms, I told her. No one but myself and my old servant would know that she had not really left the castle; and the next day, when Sir Oswald’s passion had been calmed by reflection, I should be able, perhaps, to intercede successfully for the wife whose innocence I most implicitly believed, in spite of all the circumstances that had conspired to condemn her. Lady Eversleigh knew my influence over her husband; and, after some persuasion, consented to take my advice. My diabolical gout happened to be a good deal worse than usual that night, and my friend’s wife assisted my servant to nurse me, with the patience of an angel, or a sister of charity. From the beginning to the end of that fatal night she never left my apartments. She entered my room before the will could have been executed, and she did not leave it until after her husband’s death.”

“Your evidence is conclusive, Captain Copplestone, and it exonerates her ladyship from all suspicion,” said the coroner.

“My evidence can be confirmed in every particular by my old servant, Solomon Grundy,” said the captain, “if it requires confirmation.”

“It requires none, Captain Copplestone.”

Reginald Eversleigh gnawed his bearded lip savagely. This man’s evidence proved that Lady Eversleigh had not destroyed the will. Sir Oswald himself, therefore, must have burned the precious document. And for what reason?

A horrible conviction now took possession of the young baronet’s mind. He believed that Mary Goodwin’s letter had been for the second time instrumental in the destruction of his prospects. A fatal accident had thrown it in his uncle’s way after the execution of the will, and the sight of that letter had recalled to Sir Oswald the stern resolution at which he had arrived in Arlington Street.

Utter ruin stared Reginald Eversleigh in the face. The possessor of an empty title, and of an income which, to a man of his expensive habits, was the merest pittance, he saw before him a life of unmitigated wretchedness. But he did not execrate his own sins and vices for the misery which they had brought upon him. He cursed the failure of Victor Carrington’s schemes, and thought of himself as the victim of Victor Carrington’s blundering.

The verdict of the coroner’s jury was an open one, to the effect that “Sir Oswald Eversleigh died by poison, but by whom administered there was no evidence to show.”

The general opinion of those who had listened to the evidence was that the baronet had committed suicide. Public opinion around and about Raynham was terribly against his widow. Sir Oswald had been universally esteemed and respected, and his melancholy end was looked on as her work. She had been acquitted of any positive hand is his death; but she was not acquitted of the guilt of having broken his heart by her falsehood.

Her obscure origin, her utter friendlessness, influenced people against her. What must be the past life of this woman, who, in the hour of her widowhood, had not one friend to come forward to support and protect her?

The world always chooses to see the darker side of the picture. Nobody for a moment imagined that Honoria Eversleigh might possibly be the innocent victim of the villany of others.

The funeral of Sir Oswald Eversleigh was conducted with all the pomp and splendour befitting the burial of a man whose race had held the land for centuries, with untarnished fame and honour. The day of the funeral was dark, cold, and gloomy; stormy winds howled and shrieked among the oaks and beeches of Raynham Park. The tall firs in the avenue were tossed to and fro in the blast, like the funereal plumes of that stately hearse which was to issue at noon from the quadrangle of the castle.

It was difficult to believe that less than a fortnight had elapsed since that bright and balmy day on which the picnic had been held at the Wizard’s Cave.

Lady Eversleigh had declared her intention of following her husband to his last resting-place. She had been told that it was unusual for women of the higher classes to take part in a funeral cortège; but she had stedfastly adhered to her resolution.

“You tell me it is not the fashion!” she said to Mr. Ashburne. “I do not care for fashion, I would offer the last mark of respect and affection to the husband who was my dearest and truest friend upon this earth, and without whom the earth is very desolate for me. If the dead pass at once into those heavenly regions were Divine Wisdom reigns supreme over all mortal weakness, the emancipated spirit of him who goes to his tomb this day knows that my love, my faith, never faltered. If I had wronged him as the world believes, Mr. Ashburne, I must, indeed, be the most hardened of wretches to insult the dead by my presence. Accept my determination as a proof of my innocence, if you can.”

“The question of your guilt or innocence is a dark enigma which I cannot take upon myself to solve, Lady Eversleigh,” answered Gilbert Ashburne, gravely. “It would be an unspeakable relief to my mind if I could think you innocent. Unhappily, circumstances combine to condemn you in such a manner that even Christian charity can scarcely admit the possibility of your innocence.”

“Yes,” murmured the widow, sadly, “I am the victim of a plot so skilfully devised, so subtly woven, that I can scarcely wonder if the world refuses to believe me guiltless. And yet you see that honourable soldier, that brave and true-hearted gentleman, Captain Copplestone, does not think me the wretch I seem to be.

“Captain Copplestone is a man who allows himself to be guided by his instincts and impulses, and who takes a pride in differing from his fellow-men. I am a man of the world, and I am unable to form any judgment which is not justified by facts. If facts combine to condemn you, Lady Eversleigh, you must not think me harsh or cruel if I cannot bring myself to acquit you.”

During the preceding conversation Honoria Eversleigh had revealed the most gentle, the most womanly side of her character. There had been a pleading tone in her voice, an appealing softness in her glances. But now the expression of her face changed all at once; the beautiful countenance grew cold and stern, the haughty lip quivered with the agony of offended pride.

“Enough!” she said. “I will never again trouble you, Mr. Ashburne, by entreating your merciful consideration. Let your judgment be the judgment of the world. I am content to await the hour of my justification; I am content to trust in Time, the avenger of all wron............