Silas Dene came to the inquest in spite of Calthorpe’s intervention, Mr.
Medhurst’s collaboration, and the coroner’s acquiescence.
He had agreed not to come; he had been surly and ungracious, but finally
had given his consent and had even added a word of conventional
gratitude. He had given a written affidavit, which was read at the
inquest before his arrival. All evidence had been taken, that of Dene’s
mates, of the driver of the truck-train,—the fog had been very thick at
the level-crossing, and he couldn’t see five yards ahead of him,—that of
the shunters who had found the body lying across the rails. All had gone
smoothly in unbroken formality; the inquest was held in the village
concert-room, with the body lying next door; Calthorpe was there, Mr.
Medhurst, a representative of the board of directors, and many of the
factoryhands who out of curiosity had interpolated themselves as
possible witnesses; the proceedings were nearly over, and the verdict
about to be pronounced, when after a fumbling at the door Silas Dene
appeared suddenly in the room.
He was alone, and in the unfamiliar room he stood stock still, solitary,
detached and startling; isolated as a man who has vast spaces around
him, regardless of the cheap pitch-pine walls that actually confined
him. He was bare-headed, in his working-clothes, as rugged as the bole
of a storm-wrecked tree on the borders of a great plain. All gazed at
him, and the coroner ceased speaking.