Reicht said to her, "Eh, woman, she has been to your hermit, and heard no good news."
"Come in," said Joan, eager for a gossip.
Margaret would not go in. But she sat down disconsolate on the lowest step but one of the little external staircase that led into Joan's house; and let the other two gossip their fill at the top of it.
"Oh," said Joan, "what yon hermit says is sure to be sooth. He is that holy, I am told, that the very birds consort with him."
"What does that prove?" said Margaret, deprecatingly. "I have seen my Gerard tame the birds in winter till they would eat from his hand."
A look of pity at this parallel passed between the other two. But they were both too fond of her to say what they thought. Joan proceeded to relate all the marvellous tales she had heard of this hermit's sanctity. How he never came out but at night, and prayed among the wolves, and they never molested him: and how he bade the people not bring him so much food to pamper his body, but to bring him candles.
"The candles are to burn before his saint," whispered Reicht, solemnly.
"Ay, lass; and to read his holy books wi'. A neighbour o' mine saw his hand come out, and the birds sat thereon and pecked crumbs. She went for to kiss it; but the holy man whippit it away in a trice. They can't abide a woman to touch 'em, or even look at 'em, saints can't."
"What like was his hand, wife? Did you ask her?"
"What is my tongue for, else? Why, dear heart, all one as ourn; by the same token a had a thumb and four fingers."