The torturer then wrapped some damp cloths round her breast and body and legs, and raising the bench upright he proceeded to pour great quantities of hot water down her throat so that her stomach became all swollen. Then he let the bench down again.
The alderman asked Katheline if she would now acknowledge her crime. She made a sign in the negative. And the torturer poured more hot water into her; but this Katheline brought all up again.
Then by the advice of the doctor she was released. But she did not speak a word, only beat her breast as much as to say that the hot water had burned her. When the torturer saw that she was recovered from this first ordeal, he said to her:
“Confess that you are a witch, and that you laid a charm on the cow.”
“I will confess no such thing,” replied Katheline. “I am here in your power. Nevertheless, I tell you that an animal can die of an illness, just as a man can, and in spite of all the help of surgeons and of doctors. And I swear by Our Lord Christ who was pleased to die upon the Cross for our sins, that I wished to do no harm to this cow, but simply to cure her by well-known remedies.”
Thereat the alderman was angry and cried out:
“This devil’s drab, she cannot go on lying for ever! Put her to the second torture.”
Then he drank a large glass of brandy.
The torturer meanwhile sat Katheline down on the lid of an oak coffin which was placed on trestles. Now the coffin-lid was pointed like a roof, and the edge of it was as sharp as a sword. A great fire was burning in the fireplace, for it was the month of November. Katheline, seated on the edge of the coffin-lid, had her feet shod in shoes of new leather several sizes too small for her, and then she was placed in front of the fire. When she began to feel the sharp wood of the coffin-lid cutting into her flesh, and when her shoes began to shrink under the heat of the fire, Katheline cried aloud:
“Oh, agony! Will no one give me a draught of black poison?”