“What did you do there?”
“We had a big kettle and a great fire. Everybody dropped what she loved best in the kettle. We played and clapped hands and jumped as high as the tree-tops. When we clapped our hands, it thundered, and when we ran around the kettle the wind blew our clothes away.”
“You were brewing the storm that broke next day?”
“Oh, aye!”
“The leech and Joan Heron were with you?”
Elspeth twisted her body and peered around. “Is that Joan Heron and is that the leech? They ran round thrice to our once, and they kissed the closest, and at last they wandered away.”
Will the smith’s son was called. “You stopped at Heron’s cottage that Sunday evening?”
Will stammered, looking wild, hollow-eyed, and awed. “Aye, I did, please Your Honour!—But I never would have stopped but that it was storming so.—My mother was with me, please you, sir.”
“No one means you any ill.—It was dark under the clouds without, but there was a light inside the cottage—a red light?”
“Yes, sir; bright like firelight.”