he
inquest was to begin at once. Meanwhile, the folk were busy with
conjecture. They made way, however, for my uncle, who, being on such
occasions a person of no little importance, easily gained us entry
into the Red Room where the inquiry was about to be held. As we
stepped along the passage, the landlord's parrot, looking more than
ever like Aunt Elizabeth, almost frightened me out of my wits by
crying, "All hands lost! All hands lost! Lord ha' mercy on us!" Its
hoarse note still sounded in my ears, when the door opened, and we
stood in presence of the "crowner's quest."

I suppose the Red Room of the "Lugger" was full; and, indeed, as the
smallest inquest involves at least twelve men and a coroner, to say
nothing of witnesses, it must have been very full. But for me, as
soon as my foot crossed the threshold, there was only one face, only
one pair of eyes, only one terrible presence, to be conscious of and
fear. I saw him at once, and he saw me; but, unless it were that his
cruel eye glinted and his lips grew for the moment white and fixed,
he betrayed no consciousness of my presence there.

The coroner was speaking as we entered, but his voice sounded as
though far away and faint. Uncle Loveday gave evidence, and I have a
dim recollection of two rows of gleaming buttons, but nothing more.
Then Jonathan, the coast-guardsman, was called. He had seen, or
fancied he saw, a ship in distress near Gue Graze; had noticed no
light nor heard any signal of distress; had given information at
Lizard Town. The rocket apparatus had been got out, and searchers
had scoured the cliffs as far as Porth Pyg, but nothing was to be
seen. The search-party were returning, when they found a shipwrecked
sailor in company with a small boy, one Jasper Trenoweth, in
Ready-Money Cove.

At the sound of my own name I started, and for the second time since
our entry felt the eyes of the stranger question me. At the same
time I felt my mother's clasp of my hand tighten, and knew that she
saw that look.

The air grew closer and the walls seemed to draw nearer as Jonathan's
voice continued its drowsy tale. The afternoon sun poured in at the
window until it made the little wainscoted parlour like an oven, but
still for me it only lit up one pair of eyes. The voices sounded
more and more like those of a dream; the scratching of pens and
shuffling of feet were, to my ears, as distant murmurs of the sea,
until the coroner's voice called--"