began I knew what you were up to."

"Here's a fool!" smiled his wife. "Why, do you suppose, you thick-head,
that I make the storm?"

"H'm!... Grin away! Whether it's your doing or not, I only know that
when your blood's on fire there's sure to be bad weather, and when
there's bad weather there's bound to be some crazy fellow turning up
here. It happens so every time! So it must be you!"

To be more impressive the sexton put his finger to his forehead, closed
his left eye, and said in a singsong voice:

"Oh, the madness! oh, the unclean Judas! If you really are a human being
and not a witch, you ought to think what if he is not the mechanic,
or the clerk, or the huntsman, but the devil in their form! Ah! You'd
better think of that!"

"Why, you are stupid, Savely," said his wife, looking at him
compassionately. "When father was alive and living here, all sorts of
people used to come to him to be cured of the ague: from the village,
and the hamlets, and the Armenian settlement. They came almost every
day, and no one called them devils. But if anyone once a year comes in
bad weather to warm himself, you wonder at it, you silly, and take all
sorts of notions into your head at once."

His wife's logic touched Savely. He stood with his bare feet wide apart,
bent his head, and pondered. He was not firmly convinced yet of the
truth of his suspicions, and his wife's genuine and unconcerned tone
quite disconcerted him. Yet after a moment's thought he wagged his head