A coroner’s warrant was immediately issued, and the valet was arrested, and confined in jail to await the action of the grand jury.

An experienced detective officer was sent upon the track of the mysterious, vailed woman, with the heavy black bag, who on the night of the murder had taken the midnight train from Lone to London.

Then at length the coroner’s jury adjourned, and Castle Lone was cleared of the law officers and all others who had remained there in attendance upon the inquest.

And the preparations for the funeral of the deceased banker were allowed to go on.

In addition to the long train of servants there remained now in the castle but seven persons: 

The young lady of the house, who lay prostrate and unconscious upon the bed of extreme illness or death; Lady Belgrade, who in all this trouble had nearly lost her wits; the Marquis of Arondelle, who had been requested to take the direction of affairs; the old Duke of Hereward, who had been brought to the castle in a helpless condition; the family physician, who had turned over all his other patients to his assistant, and was now devoting himself to the care of the unhappy daughter of the house; and lastly the family solicitor, and his clerk, who were down for the obsequies.

Beside these, the undertaker and his men came and went while completing their preparations for the funeral.

There had been some talk of embalming the body, and delaying the burial, until the daughter of the deceased banker should view her father’s face once more; but the impossibility of restoring the crushed skull to shape rendered it advisable that she should not be shocked by a sight of it.  So the day of the funeral was set.

But before that day came, another important event occurred at Lone Castle.  It was not entirely unexpected.  The old Duke of Hereward, since his arrival at the castle, had sunk very fast.  He had been carefully guarded from the knowledge of the tragedy which had been enacted within its walls.  He knew nothing of the murder of Sir Lemuel Levison, or even of the banker’s presence in the castle.  His failing mind had gone back to the past, and he fondly imagined himself, as of yore, the Lord of Lone and of all its vast revenues.  The presence and attendance of all his old train of servants, who, as I said before, had been kindly retained in the service of the banker’s family, helped the happy illusion in which the last days of the old duke were passed, until one afternoon, just as the sun was sinking out of sight behind Ben Lone, the old man went quietly to sleep in his arm-chair, and never woke again in this world.

A few days after this, in the midst of a large concourse of friends, neighbors and mourners, the mortal remains of Archibald-Alexander-John Scott, Duke of Hereward and Marquis of Arondelle, in the peerage of England, and Lord of Lone and Baron Scott, in the peerage of Scotland, were laid side by side with those of Sir Lemuel Levison, Kt., in the family vault of Lone.