"Very well. Have the jury any questions to put to this man?"

A movement at once took place in that profound body.

"I should like to ask a few," exclaimed a weazen-faced, excitable
little man whom I had before noticed shifting in his seat in a restless
manner strongly suggestive of an intense but hitherto repressed desire
to interrupt the proceedings.

"Very well, sir," returned Thomas.

But the juryman stopping to draw a deep breath, a large and
decidedly pompous man who sat at his right hand seized the opportunity
to inquire in a round, listen-to-me sort of voice:

"You say you have been in the family for two years. Was it what you
might call a united family?"

"United?"

"Affectionate, you know,--on good terms with each other." And the
juryman lifted the very long and heavy watch-chain that hung across his
vest as if that as well as himself had a right to a suitable and
well-considered reply.

The butler, impressed perhaps by his manner, glanced uneasily
around. "Yes, sir, so far as I know."

"The young ladies were attached to their uncle?"