“Miss Bates, as far as we know, you were the first person to enter the church on the afternoon in question. Can you—”
She interrupted him. “I don’t know if that’s truly the case, sir. The church was open, you see. I walked right in, so I imagine anyone else might have done so, as well.” She paused, as if struck by a thought. “Especially the murderer, of course, since he was there before I was.”
“Unlessyouwere the murderer, Miss Bates, that is obviously the case,” Dr. Hughes replied, clearly annoyed.
When Miss Bates visibly flinched, Emma’s heart sank. She could sense the poor woman inching closer to the edge of a cliff.
“Ma’am,” said Dr. Hughes, “can you tell me what time you entered the church?”
She made an effort to compose herself. “It was just before two o’clock, as I recall.”
“And why were you going to the church?”
She fussed with her reticule, extracting a handkerchief.
“Miss Bates, would you please answer the question?”
“Of course. I do apologize. I . . . I was to . . . to meet Mrs. Elton,” she stammered, ending on close to a whisper.
“I am not sure the jury heard you. You were to meet Mrs. Elton there, is that correct?”
“Yes.”
“And what was the purpose of this meeting?”
That elicited a lengthy, garbled reply about altar linens, vestry cabinets, and mice. By the end of her recital, even Dr. Hughes looked daunted.
“Er, thank you,” he said. “Now, please relate to the jury what you witnessed upon entering the church.”
What little color that remained leached from the spinster’s face. “I . . . I saw the body of Mrs. Elton lying on the steps of the chancel. The most dreadful thing I have ever seen in my life.”
Mr. Elton let out an anguished moan and covered his face with his hands, as if overcome.
A startled Dr. Hughes took a moment to recover, apparently, his train of thought. “Indeed a distressing sight, Miss Bates. So, when you entered the church, did you immediately realize that Mrs. Elton was dead?”
“Oh, no. Or, at least, I don’t think I did. I was so shocked to see her lying in . . . in so awkward a position. Mrs. Elton was always so graceful, you know. Quite the most elegant woman in Highbury—but for Mrs. Knightley, of course, and my niece, Jane, Jane Churchill, that is. Jane is so terribly elegant. Mrs. Elton herself said so on many an occasion.”
Dr. Hughes manfully waded back in. “After spotting the body, what did you do next?”
“I rushed to Mrs. Elton. I thought perhaps she had fainted and was in need of smelling salts. It was a warm day, and I thought perhaps she was overcome by the heat.”
“And when did you conclude that she was not overcome but deceased?”
“When I . . . I knelt down to untie her bonnet, hoping to give her air. That’s when I saw all the . . . the blood.”
“How utterly ghastly,” Anne Cox loudly whispered. “Only think, Susan—”
Emma turned around and glared her into submission.
Dr. Hughes continued to question Miss Bates, extracting her testimony in fits and starts. It more or less matched what she’d told Emma, with occasional meanderings into inartful commentary, which clearly frustrated the coroner. She couldn’t truly blame him. With Miss Bates, one often became lost in her welter of words, with the risk of never finding one’s way back to sensible discourse.
Emma tensed, though, after Dr. Hughes obliged the spinster to explain why she’d run away.
“It was foolish of me,” she tearfully said. “But I was so frightened. When I heard voices from outside the church, I became even more frightened, and so . . . and so I ran and hid. I . . . I couldn’t even begin to think. All I could see was poor Mrs. Elton and all the blood. And that was . . .” Her frail composure broke, and she dabbed her handkerchief under her spectacles, wiping away tears.
Emma’s father flapped a hand to catch her eye. “Emma, Dr. Hughes is badgering Miss Bates. Mr. Knightley must make him stop.”
“I think Father is right,” she murmured to George. “She’ll become hysterical if this continues.”
