So, for the first and last time, I saw him.  So the Visitation of God ruled it that he and I should meet.

XI

The inquest was hurried for certain local reasons which weighed with the coroner and the town authorities.  It was held on the afternoon of the next day.  I was necessarily one among the witnesses summoned to assist the objects of the investigation.

My first proceeding in the morning was to go to the post-office, and inquire for the letter which I expected from Marian.  No change of circumstances, however extraordinary, could affect the one great anxiety which weighed on my mind while I was away from London.  The morning’s letter, which was the only assurance I could receive that no misfortune had happened in my absence, was still the absorbing interest with which my day began.

To my relief, the letter from Marian was at the office waiting for me.

Nothing had happened—­they were both as safe and as well as when I had left them.  Laura sent her love, and begged that I would let her know of my return a day beforehand.  Her sister added, in explanation of this message, that she had saved “nearly a sovereign” out of her own private purse, and that she had claimed the privilege of ordering the dinner and giving the dinner which was to celebrate the day of my return.  I read these little domestic confidences in the bright morning with the terrible recollection of what had happened the evening before vivid in my memory.  The necessity of sparing Laura any sudden knowledge of the truth was the first consideration which the letter suggested to me.  I wrote at once to Marian to tell her what I have told in these pages—­presenting the tidings as gradually and gently as I could, and warning her not to let any such thing as a newspaper fall in Laura’s way while I was absent.  In the case of any other woman, less courageous and less reliable, I might have hesitated before I ventured on unreservedly disclosing the whole truth.  But I owed it to Marian to be faithful to my past experience of her, and to trust her as I trusted herself.

My letter was necessarily a long one.  It occupied me until the time came for proceeding to the inquest.

The objects of the legal inquiry were necessarily beset by peculiar complications and difficulties.  Besides the investigation into the manner in which the deceased had met his death, there were serious questions to be settled relating to the cause of the fire, to the abstraction of the keys, and to the presence of a stranger in the vestry at the time when the flames broke out.  Even the identification of the dead man had not yet been accomplished.  The helpless condition of the servant had made the police distrustful of his asserted recognition of his master.  They had sent to Knowlesbury over-night to secure the attendance of witnesses who were well acquainted with the personal