“Will you state the nature of those remarks?”

“I should prefer to be excused until later in this examination.  For the present, I will merely say that one of Mr. Mainwaring’s guests incidentally met and recognized this caller; that the latter was evidently well and unfavorably known by both Mr. Mainwaring and his guests, and, if I am not mistaken, by the secretary also, and that the mention of the man’s name seemed to affect Mr. Hugh Mainwaring very unpleasantly.”

“In what respect, Mr. Whitney?”

“He grew very pale and appeared confused, if not alarmed, on learning that the man was in this country and had been seen at this house, and he seemed abstracted and very unlike himself for fully an hour after the occurrence.”

“Will you state the name of this man?”

“He was spoken of as Richard Hobson, formerly an attorney, of London.”

CHAPTER VII

A LITTLE ROYAL

“Harry Scorr, private secretary of Hugh Mainwaring,” announced the coroner, when Mr. Whitney had resumed his chair.

As the young secretary walked deliberately through the crowded room, there were few who failed to remark his erect, athletic form, his splendid bearing, and especially the striking beauty of his dark face, with its olive tint, clear-cut features, indicative of firmness and strength, and large, piercing eyes, within whose depths, on the present occasion, there seemed to be, half hidden, half revealed, some smouldering fire.  Instantly a half-dozen pencils were transferring to paper his form and features.

“Say, what are you ‘doing’ him for?” whispered one reporter to his neighbor.  “He isn’t anybody; only the old man’s secretary.”

“Can’t help that,” replied the other; “he’s better looking than the English chap, anyhow; and, in my opinion, the old fellow would have shown better sense to have left him the ‘stuff.’”

Meanwhile, young Scott, having answered a few preliminary interrogatories, turned slowly, facing Mrs. LaGrange, who was watching him with an intensity of manner and expression as though she would compel him to meet her gaze.

As his glance met hers, a look of inquiry flashed from her eyes to his, accompanied by an expression persuasive, almost appealing.  But the only reply was an ominous flash from the dark eyes, as, with a gesture of proud disdain, he folded his arms and again faced his interlocutor, while, with eyes gleaming with revenge from under their heavily drooping lids and lips that curled from time to time in a smile of bitter malignity, she watched him, listening eagerly for his testimony, losing no word that he said.

The young secretary well understood the character of the enemy with whom he had thus declared war, though he was as yet in ignorance of the weapons she would use against him, but the honeyed words of the little note crushed within his pocket had no power to swerve him for an instant from the course upon which he had determined.