One thing stated by Mrs. Crofton much surprised Radmore.  She had asserted, quite definitely, that her husband had suffered from shell-shock.  That Radmore believed to be quite untrue.

With quickened, painful interest he read her account of how odd and how cranky Colonel Crofton had become when wholly absorbed in his hobby of breeding wire-haired terriers.  How, when one of his dogs had failed to win a prize, he would go about muttering to himself, and visiting his annoyance and disappointment on those about him.

She had drawn a sad picture of the last long months of their joint life together and Radmore began to feel very, very sorry for her....  What an awful ordeal the poor little woman had gone through!

The doctor’s evidence made painful reading, but what had really clinched the matter was the evidence of one Piper, the Croftons’ general odd man and trusted servant.  He had been Colonel Crofton’s batman during part of the war, and was evidently much attached to him.  When Piper repeated the words in which his master had once or twice threatened to take his own life, his evidence had obviously made a strong impression on both coroner and jury.

Radmore remembered Piper with a faint feeling of dislike.  It was Piper who had prepared the puppy, Flick, for the cross-country journey to Beechfield, and Radmore had given the man a handsome tip for all the trouble he had taken.

Yes, he had not liked Piper; so much he remembered.  He had thought the man self-assertive, over self-confident, while disagreeably cringing in manner.

He read through the coroner’s charge, which was given fully, very attentively.  It was quite clear that the coroner was strongly biased, if one could put it that way, in Mrs. Crofton’s favour.  He had spoken touchingly of the difficult time the poor young lady had had with her husband.  Then he had recalled that the Colonel’s own favourite terrier, Dandy, on which he had built great hopes, had only been commended, instead of winning, as he had hoped, the first prize at an important show, and that had thoroughly upset him.  Indeed, according to Piper’s evidence, he had used the exaggerated phrase, “My life is no longer worth living.”  Finally the coroner had touched lightly, but severely, on evidence tendered by a spiteful ex-woman-servant of the Croftons who had drawn a very unpleasant picture of the relations existing between the husband and wife.

Yet when the verdict of felo de se had been returned, there had been murmurs in Court, at once sharply checked by the coroner.

Radmore felt surprised.  Surely everyone present should have rejoiced from every point of view.  Had a different verdict been returned, it would have put the unfortunate chemist in a very difficult position, and might easily have ruined his business.

Though Radmore was grateful to Miss Pendarth for allowing him to read the report, it had an effect very different from that she had intended, for it made him pity Mrs. Crofton intensely.  Somehow he had never realised what a terrible ordeal the poor little woman had been through.