“By the beech-tree!” exclaimed Brandes doubtfully.  “No, across there, toward Mast Gorge.”

“I tell you, by the beech-tree; long Heinrich’s gun-sling even caught on the crooked branch; why, I saw it!”

The forester turned into the path designated.  Frederick had not changed his position the whole time; half reclining, with his arm wound about a dry branch, he gazed immovably after the departing man, as he glided through the thickly wooded path with the long cautious steps characteristic of his profession, as noiseless as a lynx climbing into the hen-roost.  Here and there a branch sank behind him; the outlines of his body became fainter and fainter.  Then there was one final flash through the foliage; it was a steel button on his hunting jacket; and now he was gone.  During this gradual disappearance Frederick’s face had lost its expression of coldness, and his features had finally become anxious and restless.  Was he sorry, perhaps, that he had not asked the forester to keep his information secret?  He took a few steps forward, then stopped.  “It is too late,” he mused, and reached for his hat.  There was a soft pecking in the thicket, not twenty paces from him.  It was the forester sharpening his flint-stone.  Frederick listened.  “No!” he said in a decisive tone, gathered up his belongings, and hastily drove the cattle down into the hollow.

About noon, Margaret was sitting by the hearth, boiling tea.  Frederick had come home sick; he had complained of a violent headache and had told her, upon her anxious questioning, how he had become deeply provoked with the forester—­in short, all about the incident just described, with the exception of several details which he considered wiser to keep to himself.  Margaret gazed into the boiling water, silent and sad.  She was not unaccustomed to hear her son complain at times, but today he seemed more shaken than ever.  Was this perhaps the symptom of some illness?  She, sighed deeply and dropped a log of wood she had just lifted.

“Mother!” called Frederick from the bedroom.  “What is it?  Was that a shot?”

“Oh, no!  I don’t know what you mean.”

“I suppose it’s the throbbing in my head,” he replied.  A neighbor stepped in and related in a low whisper some bit of unimportant gossip which Margaret listened to without interest.  Then she went.  “Mother!” called Frederick.  Margaret went in to him.  “What did Huelsmeyer’s wife say?”

“Oh, nothing at all—­lies, nonsense!” Frederick sat up.  “About Gretchen Siemers; you know the old story well enough!—­there isn’t a word of truth in it either.”

Frederick lay down again.  “I’ll see if I can sleep,” he said.

Margaret was sitting by the hearth.  She was spinning and thinking of rather unpleasant things.  The village clock struck half-past eleven; the door opened and the court-clerk, Kapp, came in.  “Good day, Mrs. Mergel,” he said.  “Can you give me a drink of milk?  I’m on my way from M.”  When Mrs. Mergel brought what he wished, he asked “Where is Frederick?” She was just then busy getting a plate out and did not hear the question.  He drank hesitatingly and in short draughts.  Then he asked, “Do you know that last night the ‘Blue Smocks’ again cleared away a whole tract in the Mast forest as bare as my hand?”