t woman, a God-fearing woman
besides, to whom every one must take off his hat?

The chairman put far away from him the tell-tales and busybodies; but
when, shortly after, one Sunday night the hayrick burned which he had
just stacked up Saturday evening, he too began to scent mischief. From
the direction of Will Stoker's cottage he too began to smell smoke.
Was it after all possible that Will Stoker could not give up the
business of poking fires? He had been in the village since the previous
winter. In the gray of winter nothing had happened; but now, when the
sun was shining again, when it was aglow in the heavens, when day in
and day out it spread its red heat over cottages and fir-trees, over
grain field and hill top, when the underbrush flared and the pebbles in
the dry river bed scintillated, and the powdery dust on the sun-baked
roads was blinding, now--!

Strange thoughts surged through the chairman's head; he took counsel
with this neighbor and that, secret counsel. Behind the barn they
whispered, like pairs of lovers, or far out on the open field, where
only the quivering heat could overhear them. Appealing to courts of law
is always bad business; one never knows whether one is going to get
justice or injustice. But before one should let the village be laid in
ashes, now, just now, when the well was beginning to run dry, when even
the brook in the cooler valley trickled only in a thin stream over
shining stones, now, when one must be mindful of the harvest--it was
abundant this year, but who could have the courage to gather it into
the barns?--now the watchword was, better accuse than regret!

* * * * * *

On a warm evening after a serene summer day the constable from the
nearest city hall and the chairman of the parish council plodded along
together toward the cottage of the Widow Driesch.

Katherine Driesch was cooking her evening porridge. Her William
had just driven in the herd; the last blast of his trumpet still
reverberated in the air and every cow was rushing, tail up, into her
stall. The herdsman could now rest from his labors. He was sitting on
his stool by the hearth, with the bowl in his lap, the spoon in his
hand, and his mother was serving him his evening meal. But he paid no
attention to the scraps of bacon which swam like appetizing little
fishes in the porridge. With unaverted eyes he gazed at the fireplace,
where the sparks were dancing.

His mother said, "E