"We certainly know best that punishment will not fail. They shot our poor Marczi, and he only gave a man a blow. If you ever had a little quarrel with any one in the tavern, they imprisoned you for weeks and months. I, too, have atoned for the crime I committed; nothing remains unpunished, and the nobleman will get his deserts, as we have always received ours."
The sun was setting, and the notes of the vesper-bell echoed from the distance. The old man picked up his hoe, which he had left in the furrow and, lost in thought, walked home with his daughter in silence. Panna prepared the bed she had used when a girl in her father's hut, and went to rest early. It is not probable that she slept during the night. At least she was already completely dressed when, very early the next morning, the parish-beadle knocked at the door of the hut, and it was she who opened it.
He asked for the key of her house, because the corpse must be carried to the town-hall.
"Why?"
"Because, early in the forenoon, the committee and the district physician will come from the city to hold the coroner's inquest."
"Will he be present?"
"Who?"
"The—Herr von Abonyi."
The beadle shrugged his shoulders and said,
"I don't know."