He advanced with an ill assured step.

Perhaps he thought his internal consciousness that Bonthron must have been the assassin might be sufficient to implicate him in the murder, though he was not directly accessory to it.

He paused before the bier; and his voice faltered, as he swore by all that was created in seven days and seven nights, by heaven, by hell, by his part of paradise, and by the God and author of all, that he was free and sackless of the bloody deed done upon the corpse before which he stood, and on whose breast he made the sign of the cross, in evidence of the appeal.

No consequences ensued.

The body remained stiff as before, the curdled wounds gave no sign of blood.
The citizens looked on each other with faces of blank disappointment.
They had persuaded themselves of Eviot's guilt, and their suspicions had been confirmed by his irresolute manner.