While the shepherd and the boy walked toward the inn, the old
doctor and Liska had hurried onward to the rectory. They were met
at the door by the aged housekeeper, who staggered down the path
wringing her hands, unable to give voice to anything but
inarticulate expressions of grief and terror. The rest of the
household and the farm hands were gathered in a frightened group
in the great courtyard of the stately rectory which had once been
a convent building. The physician hurried up the stairs into the
pastor's apartments. These were high sunny and airy rooms with
arched ceilings, deep window seats, great heavy doors and
handsomely ornamented stoves. The simple modern furniture appeared
still more plain and common-place by contrast with the huge spaces
of the building.

In one of the rooms a gendarme was standing beside the window. The
man saluted the physician, then shrugged his shoulders with an
expression of hopelessness. The doctor returned a silent greeting
and passed through into the next apartment. The old man was paler
than usual and his face bore an expression of pain and surprise,
the same expression that showed in the faces of those gathered
downstairs. The room he now entered was large like the others, the
walls handsomely decorated, and every corner of it was flooded with
sunshine. There were two men in this room, the village magistrate
and the notary. Their expression, as they held out their hands
to the doctor, showed that his coming brought great relief. And
there was something else in the room, something that drew the eyes
of all three of the men immediately after their silent greeting.

This was a great pool of blood which lay as a hideous stain on the
otherwise clean yellow-painted floor. The blood must have flowed