Shattered

One day in winter, the inspector comes to investigate the track-walker's records. He sees the daughter scrubbing the stairs. That night the mother wakes from her sleep. She is unable to gain admittance to the inspector's room and breaks down the door with an ax. There she finds her daughter, half-clothed, with the inspector. Horrified, she wanders into the storm and falls, exhausted, at a wayside shrine. She freezes to death. In the morning the track walker returns. Missing his wife he searches and finds the body and prepares it for burial. As the inspector is packing, the daughter pleads with him. He refuses and the girl goes to her father as he sits by his wife's empty couch. She screams her betrayal to him. He slowly rises, goes from the room and chokes the inspector to death. The next day he signals a train and gives himself up as a murderer. The comfortable passengers wonder at the stop. The daughter gazes after the departing train.