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On the northern edge of the woods, just short of the municipal forest of S, a town whose citizens were, for the most part and by tradition, complacent and well-to-do, stood a nearly square little house on underpinnings of heavy oak beams. This house was built of spruce boards originally soaked in ox blood. Its south side, with a door and two tiny windows, faced the woods and was shaded by towering firs. There were two more windows on the north side, and one each in the smaller side walls. The whole thing was topped off by a nearly flat tile roof whose eaves extended not much more than a foot beyond the low walls all around. This little house had been built by a certain Egloff, who had done menial work in the big chemical plant in the town of R for over fifty years.