CHAPTER VIII.
THE PARISH REGISTERS I had noticed the Reverend Mr.Ridley sitting in the room with some other gentlemen of the neighbourhood, and had wondered what had brought him, a clergyman, there.

I knew him well enough by sight.

He was a vicar of a lonely parish away up in the hills--a tall, thin, student-looking man that you might occasionally see in the Berwick streets, walking very fast with his eyes on the ground, as if, as the youngsters say, he was seeking sixpences; and I should not have thought him likely to be attracted to an affair of that sort by mere curiosity.

And, whatever he might be in his pulpit, he looked very nervous and shy as he stood up between the coroner and the jury to give his evidence.
"Whatever are we going to hear now ?" whispered Mr.Lindsey in my ear.
"Didn't I tell you there'd be revelations about Gilverthwaite, Hugh, my lad?
Well, there's something coming out! But what can this parson know ?" As it soon appeared, Mr.Ridley knew a good deal.

After a bit of preliminary questioning, making things right in the proper legal fashion as to who he was, and so on, the coroner put a plain inquiry to him.