...
The jury filed in one after the other, twelve stout, hardy specimens of
the country tradesman, with a local doctor and a farmer or two sprinkled
among the lump to leaven it. The coroner followed, having driven up in
the latest thing in motor cars (for he was going to do the thing
properly, as it was at the country's expense). Then the horrible
proceedings began.
After the preliminaries, which followed the usual custom (for the coroner
seemed singularly devoid of originality) the bodies were uncovered, and
a murmur of excited expectancy ran through the crowd. With morbid
curiosity they pressed forward. The reporters started to scribble in
their note-books, a little pale and perturbed, for all their experience
of such affairs. One or two of the crowd gasped, and then shut their
eyes. Brellier exclaimed aloud in French, and for a moment covered his
face with his hands; but 'Toinette made no murmur. For she had not
looked, _would_ not look upon the grim terrors that lay there. There
was no need for _that_.
The coroner spoke, attacking the matter in a business-like fashion, and
leaning down from his slightly elevated position upon the platform,
pointed a finger at the singed and blackened puncture upon the temple of
the thing that was once Dacre Wynne.
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