She raised her eyes dully. She was too weak even to move. "I knew you would come," she said in a whisper; and with that her eyes shifted and settled on the body in the path.
"Take him away! I—I did not kill him."
Her husband set down the child. "Run indoors, little one: you shall kiss mamma presently."
He bent over her, and, unstringing a small wine-skin from his belt, held the mouth of it to her lips. The priest stooped over the dead man, on whose collar the figures "28" twinkled in the sunlight. The child, for a moment rebellious, toddled towards the doorway of the hut.
Mercedes' eyelids had closed: but some of the wine found its way down her throat, and as it revived her, they flickered again.
"Sebastian," she whispered.
"Be at rest, dear wife. It is I, Sebastian."
"I did not kill him."
"I hear. You did not kill him."
"The child?"