Mr. Gryce knew misery when he saw it.  This man had not overstated the case when he had said “I suffer.”  But the cause!  To what could this excess of sensibility be attributed?  To remorse or to an exaggerated personal repulsion?  It looked like remorse, but that there might be no doubt as to this, Mr. Gryce hastened to assure the Englishman that on the departure of the jury the body had been removed to one of the inner rooms.  The relief which this gave to Mr. Travis was evident.  He showed no further reluctance to proceed and was indeed the first of the three to enter where the great drapery hung, flanked by the two immense vases.  Would he pause before it or hurry by into the broad corridor in front?  If he hurried by, what would become of their now secretly accepted theory?

But he did not hurry by; that is, he did not pass beyond the upper end, but stopped when he got there and looked back with an air of extreme deprecation at the two officials.

“Have we arrived?” asked Mr. Gryce, his suspicions all returning, for the man had stepped aside from the drapery and was standing in a spot conspicuously open to view even from the lower court.

The Englishman nodded; whereupon Mr. Gryce, approaching to his side, exclaimed in evident doubt: 

“You were standing here?  When?  Not at the moment the young girl fell, or you would have been seen by some one, if not by everyone, in the building.  I want you to take the exact place you occupied when you first learned that something had gone wrong in the opposite gallery.”

The stranger’s distress grew.  With a show of indecision scarcely calculated to inspire confidence in either of the two men watching him, he moved now here and now there till he finally came to a standstill close by the pedestal—­so close, indeed, to its inner corner that he was almost in a line with its rear.

“It was here,” he declared with a gulp of real feeling.  “I am sure I am right now.  I had just stepped out——­”

“From behind the tapestry?”

“No.”  His blank astonishment at the quickness with which he had been caught up left him staring for a moment at the speaker, before he added: 

“From behind the pedestal.  The—­the vase, as you see, is a very curious one.  I wanted to look at it from all sides.”

Without a word the Coroner slipped past him and entering the narrow space behind the pedestal took a look up at the vase from his present cramped position.

As he did this, two things happened:  first Sweetwater, who had stolen upon the scene, possibly at some intimation from Mr. Gryce, took a step toward them which brought him in alignment with the Englishman, of whose height in comparison with his own he seemed to take careful note; and secondly, the sensitive skin of the foreigner flushed red again as he noticed the Coroner’s sarcastic smile, and heard his dry remark: 

“One gets a better view here of the opposite gallery than of the vase perched so high overhead.  Had you wished to look at those ladies, without being seen by them, you could hardly have found a better loophole than the one made by the curving in of this great vase toward its base.”  Then quickly:  “You surely took one look their way; that would be only natural.”