old, and found his skin cold and dry. The sick man
sighed.

"Your hand is too rough, Anna. The boy's is so soft and warm."

He smiled faintly, then opened his eyes.

"Did you not hear anything? Listen! Was that the horn?"

"I don't think so. I heard nothing."

Gregorics pointed to a clock in the next room.

"Stop it," he said. "I can't hear anything. Quick, quick!"

Anna got on a chair, and stopped the clock. In that moment she heard a
sound in the next room, something like a groan, then the muttered words:
"I hear the horn!" then another groan.

Anna jumped off the chair, and ran into the next room. There all was
still; on the bed were large spots of blood, and Gregorics lay there
dead, his face white, his eyes wide open and staring at the ceiling. One
hand hung down by his side, the other firmly held the umbrella.

Thus died poor Pal Gregorics, and the news of his death soon spread
among his relations and his neighbors. The doctor said he had died of
some illness with a long Latin name, which no one had ever heard, and
said that if he had been called sooner he might have saved him.

Boldizsar was soon on the spot, also his brother Gaspar with all his
family. Mrs. Panyoki, the eldest sister, was in the country at the time,
and on receipt of the news late the same evening, exclaimed
despairingly:

"What a deception! Here have I been praying all my life for him to die
in the winter, and he must needs go and die in the summer. Is there any
use in praying nowadays? What a deception! Those two thieves will take
everything they can lay their hands on."

She ordered the horses to be harnessed, and drove off as fast as she
could, arriving about midnight, by which time the two brothers were in
possession of everything, had even taken up their abode in the house,
and driven Anna out in spite of her protests that the house was hers,
and she was mistress there.

"Only the four walls are yours, and those you shall have. The rest is
ours, and a good-for-nothing creature like you has no right here. So off
you go!"

Gaspar was a lawyer, and understood things; how was poor Anna to take
her stand against him. She could only cry, put on her hat, pack up her
box, and limp over the road to Matyko's mother. But before she went the
two brothers turned her box out, to see she took nothing with her to
which she had no right.

The funeral took place on the third day. It was not a grand one by any
means; no one shed a tear exc