The head foreman at Redcross Farm going his rounds in the
early hours, had perceived a light burning in the laboratory. The door was
locked, but on forcing his way in, he had come suddenly on a spectacle of
horror. John Betts was sitting--dead--in his chair, with a bullet wound in
the temple; Mrs. Betts was on a stool beside him, leaning against his knee.
She must have found him dead, have taken up the revolver, as it had dropped
from his hand, and after an interval, long or short, have deliberately
unfastened her dress--The bullet had passed through her heart, and death
had been a matter of seconds. On the table was lying a scrap of paper on
which were the words in John Betts's handwriting: "Mad--forgive." And
beside it a little twisted note, addressed to "Miss Marcia Coryston." The
foreman had given it to Briggs. Her maid placed it in Marcia's hands.
She tried to read it, but failed. The girl beside her saw her slip back,
fainting, on her pillows.
CHAPTER XV
It was the old housekeeper at Coryston, one Mrs. Drew, who had been the
presiding spirit of the house in all its domestic aspects for some thirty
years, who came at the summons of Marcia's frightened maid, and helped the
girl to revive her mistress, without alarming Lady Coryston.
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