Van Gogh Painting

Van Gogh Painting
And then what immediately followed recalled to Mrs. Bunting, for the first time, that informal little country inquest of long ago.
First came the "Oyez! Oyez!" the old Norman-French summons to all whose business it is to attend a solemn inquiry into the death - sudden, unexplained, terrible - of a fellow-being.
The jury - there were fourteen of them - all stood up again. They raised their hands and solemnly chanted together the curious words of their oath.
Then came a quick, informal exchange of sentences 'twixt the coroner and his officer.
Yes, everything was in order. The jury had viewed the bodies - he quickly corrected himself - the body, for, technically speaking, the inquest just about to be held only concerned one body.
And then, amid a silence so absolute that the slightest rustle could be heard through the court, the coroner - a clever-looking gentleman, though not so old as Mrs. Bunting thought he ought to have been to occupy so important a position on so important a day - gave a little history, as it were, of the terrible and mysterious Avenger crimes.