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 raised the bundle gingerly, and carried it thus to the village. On their return they picked up the half-dead steward whom the hostler had to almost carry all the way back. They went directly to the parsonage.

The priest was not yet asleep and cheerfully opened the door. They there examined what they had found. All of them stood transfixed as if they had been dropped from the clouds. Two white sheets and a brown woollen skirt with a red border. They recognized the skirt.

“That belongs to bewitched Bára!” they all cried. “Damnable!” some of them cursed. “A perfect dragon!” swore others.

But the most furious were the sexton and the steward, both going almost mad with rage. The hostler was the only one who laughed.

“I’d sooner have guessed it was real Death stalking around as a ghost than Bára. She is a devilish woman!”

Miss Pepinka just then burst into the company. The noise and confusion had attracted her from her room where she had already betaken herself to bed. She was wrapped in a shawl, on her head a yellow quilted nightcap. She always had to have something yellow on. She came with a lamp in one hand and an immense bundle of keys in the other. “For Heaven’s sake, people, what has happened?” she cried, wholly terrified.

From several pairs of lips she heard the remarkable occurrence.