“How comes this?” said the chief again, excitedly. His associates also demanded to know how this business came to be possible, and what was its meaning. The room was filled with the shrill cries of the men denouncing Garde more stridently than before, and with the exclamations of astonishment and shouts to know what had become of the witch they had come there to try.
During all this confusion, Garde was clinging to her grandfather and begging him to take her home.
“Have the girl stand forth,” commanded the chief magistrate. “We must know how this business has happened.”
Three of the men laid hold of Garde and took her from her wondering grandfather’s side. She regained her composure by making a mighty effort.
“Goody Dune was no witch!” she cried. “You all know what a good, kind woman she has been among you for years—till this madness came upon us! She is a good woman—and I love her, for all she has done. She is not a witch—you know she is not a witch!”
The witnesses, who knew all the ways in which witches were to be detected, raised their voices at once, in protest.
“Order in the Court!” commanded the magistrate. “Young woman, have you connived to let this Goody Dune escape?”
“She was no witch!” repeated Garde, courageously now. “I knew you would try to send her to the gallows. I knew she was fore-condemned! I could do no less—and you men could have done no less, had you been less mad!”
“Blasphemy!” cried Higgler. “She is convicted out of her own mouth!”
“When a witch is young,” cried Pinchbecker, “she can work ten times more awful evils and arts!”