“Because they du say as I’ve the ‘evil eye’ an’ can blight a man wi’ a look as easy as I can a pig ... or a cow.”
“To be sure your eyes are very strange and bright,” he answered gently, “and must have been very beautiful once, like yourself—when the world was younger.”
“Beautiful,” she repeated in changed tone; and her eyes grew less keen, the harsh lines of her fierce, old face softening wonderfully. “Beautiful?” said she again. “Aye, so I was, years agone ... though there be few as would believe it o’ me now an’ fewer eyes sharp enough t’ see.... An’ you bean’t fruttened o’ me then, young man?”
“No, I am not frightened,” answered Sir John.
“Why then,” quoth she, “when you’m done wi’ that cabbage o’ mine, there be an onion over yonder, agin the dik!” Sir John deposited the cabbage, and having retrieved the errant onion, added this also to the well-laden basket.
“That is all, I think?” said he, glancing about.
“Aye!” she nodded. “An’ it be plain t’ know you be a stranger hereabouts. There bean’t a man nor bye, aye, an’ mortal few o’ the women, would ha’ stooped to du so much for poor old Penelope Haryott, I reckon.”
“And pray why not?”
“Because they say I be a witch, an’ they be arl main fruttened o’ me, an’ them as say they ain’t, du hate me most. Aye, me! I’ve been thrattened wi’ the fire afore now; an’ only las’ March, an’ main cold it were, they was for a-duckin’ o’ me in the Cuckmere.... Ah, an’ they’d ha’ done it tu if Passon Hartop ’adn’t galloped over tu Alfriston an’ fetched Sir Hector MacLean as knew me years ago, an’ Jarge Potter as I’ve dandled a babe on my knee. Sir Hector were main fierce again the crowd an’ swore t’ cut any man’s throat as dared tetch me, an’ Jarge Potter ’ad on his old frieze coat—so the crowd let me go ... they ain’t tried to harm me since.... But ’tis very sure you be a stranger in these parts, young man.”