The brigands cracked open the great chests from their wagons, dumped out the sundry goods inside, and began stuffing corpses into them. Even so, they failed to stuff in more than twenty to thirty corpses.

The survivors left standing in the clearing trembled like chickens waiting to be slaughtered. The brigands forced them to tidy up the scene, shoveling the blood-soaked earth into baskets and flinging it into the lake.

Within half a quarter-hour, the ground by the water was once again spotless, save for the mound of corpses piled to one side.

Then, a brigand suddenly pointed toward the lake. “Someone’s escaped!”

All eyes turned. Sure enough, a lone figure was steering a boat away from the shore. He must have bolted in the confusion, hidden in the reeds, and loosed one of the little skiffs.

With the wind at its back,...