re settled, then the
magistrate, deeply agitated, took leave of his unfortunate friend. The
former had not considered it necessary to arrest him, as Abonyi had
pledged his word of honor to hold himself always ready to obey the
summons of the court.

Panna of course heard these tales, as well as other people, and she
also noticed how they were received in the village. There were
numerous comments, some foolish, some sensible; as usual, opposite
parties were formed; one condemned Abonyi's being left at liberty, the
other thought it perfectly natural, since it could not be supposed that
so great and rich a man as Carl von Abonyi would make his escape under
cover of the darkness, like a strolling vagabond who has nothing but a
staff and a knapsack. Panna of course belonged to the malcontents. It
did not enter her head that any one could be permitted to go about
unmolested, after killing a man. The ingenious distinctions between
imprisonment while awaiting trial, and imprisonment as a punishment
were too subtle for her, and she did not wish to understand them; she
only knew that whenever her father was brought before the examining
magistrate, he was detained, and used to wait in jail two months and
longer, until at last condemned to a fortnight's imprisonment, which
was considered expiated by the imprisonment while awaiting trial.

Justice seemed to her far too slow. What kind of justice was this
which delayed so long, so torturingly long? Punishment ought to follow
crime as the thunder follows the lightning-flash. The murdered man's
death-glazed eyes ought to be still open, when the murderer is dangling
on the gallows. This was the demand of Panna's passionate heart, but
also of her peasant-logic, which could comprehend the causal relation
between sin and expiation clearly and palpably, only when both were
united in a single melodramatic effect. Why was nothing heard of a
final trial, of a condemnation? For what were the legal gentlemen
waiting? Surely the case was as clear as sunlight, with no
complication whatever, the criminal had acknowledged everything. Even
if he had not, there were three witnesses who had all been present, the
committee had seen the corpse, the hole in the forehead, the bullet
from the revolver, the blood-stains in the coach-house, was not all
this a hundred times enough to condemn a man on the spot? Yet week
after week elapsed, and nothing new was heard of the matter.

Meanwhile it