He ran back into the clearing, with Nathaniel close at his side, and pointed to the smoking ruins of the cabin among the lilacs.
"They were killed last night!" he cried shrilly. "Somebody murdered them—and burned them with the house! They are dead—dead!"
"Who?" shouted Nathaniel.
Obadiah had stopped and was rubbing and twisting his hands in his old, mad way.
"The old folks. Ho, ho, the old folks, of course! They are dead—dead—dead—"
He fairly shrieked the words. Then, for a moment, he stood tightly clutching his thin hands over his chest in a powerful effort to control himself.
"They are dead!" he repeated.
He spoke more calmly, and yet there was something so terrible in his eyes, something so harshly vibrant of elation in the quivering passion of his voice that Nathaniel felt himself filled with a strange horror. He caught him by the arm, shaking him as he would have shaken a child.
"Where is Marion?" he asked. "Tell me, Obadiah—where is Marion?"
The councilor seemed not to have heard him. A singular change came into his face and his eyes traveled beyond Nathaniel. Following his glance the young man saw that three men had appeared from the scorched shrubbery about the burned house and were hurrying toward them. Without shifting his eyes Obadiah spoke to him quickly.