In a village in early twentieth-century Armenia, Davo, a former village headman, tells the teacher about the disappearance of his neighbor Peto’s hay and the investigation that followed. Suspicion falls on Matos and, in the hands of the village authorities, becomes a pretext for coercion and violence. In Davo’s self-assured account, humor and self-justification sit alongside a painful reality, revealing how an ordinary dispute, fear, and arbitrary power can lead to an irreversible outcome.