Old Elspeth smiled grimly, and showed the one lonely tooth that was in the front of her shrunken gums.
"Heed not the child's silly fears," said she to Kenric, "and tell me, for what cause has she been weeping?"
"It was a stoat that harried an ouzel's nest and slew the birds," replied Kenric.
"Bairns weep at trifles," said Elspeth; "what matters the death of a little bird? The stoat must live by the food that the great God gives it, and the birds must die when their time comes. 'Tis alike with all God's creatures upon earth. Even the castle of Rothesay is no more free at this moment from its secret enemy than is the smallest wildfowl's nest."
"The castle of Rothesay?" repeated Kenric. "Set me none of your riddles, Elspeth, for they are harder to read even than the abbot's missals. What is your meaning? My father has not an enemy in all the isles. Who, then, would do him an injury?"
"Speed you home to Rothesay and see with your own eyes," said Elspeth, taking up her bundle of faggots again; "Earl Hamish of Bute is in great danger, I say. Go to him now, I charge you, and give him my warning against the enemy who is within his gates."
And at that she hobbled away down the hillside towards the little wooden hut that was her home. As she went the red sun sank behind the dark hills of Kintyre. Kenric stood in doubt.
"I marvel that you will dare to hold speech with that evil hag," said Ailsa. "'Tis our own good fortune if she have not already cast her eldritch spells upon us both."
"Nay, Ailsa; fear her not. She is but a poor harmless body," said Kenric. "Only the witless carls and cottar folk are so simple as to believe that she has aught of evil in her words."
"Ah, but I well know that Elspeth is a witch," declared Ailsa. "Never do I see her but I must shrink away and cross myself in dread of her. Why do all the brave men of Bute fear her more than they would fear a band of armed Norsemen? She casts her spells upon our kine so that they give no milk, and upon the fountains so that the clear drinking water is turned rank and brown. Allan told me but yesternight that she rides over to Inch Marnock in a boat that has neither sails nor oars, and that the ribs of the boat are of dead men's bones."