"By trees?"
"Yes, wait a little. Every year since I could run alone my mother made me cut a cross in a young tree when the birds were building their nests. Now here in Münsterthal there was one tree," she reckoned on her fingers, "on the road to Marienberg there was one; two at Nauders, and five in Finstermünz, and in the Ober-Innthal three, that makes twelve, then there are three in Lechthal, and one on the way down, in Vintschgau; that makes sixteen little trees. So that since I came into the world there must have been seventeen springs, for when I cut the first cross I was so tiny that my mother had to guide my hand with the knife; so she told me, for I cannot remember it."
"Then you are already seventeen summers old? I thought you were still quite a child," said Donatus thoughtfully.
"And what colour are your eyes?" he went on presently. "Brown or blue?"
"Brown I fancy, but I cannot be certain, for I have no mirror but the water, but mother used to say they shone at night like owl's eyes."
"And your hair?"
"Reddish-brown. The children used to call me Hairy-owl when they saw me combing it, because I could cover myself all over with it like a cloak; here, feel my plaits, they are as long as I am tall. I have to fasten them up." And she laughingly drew the thick, half unplaced locks through his hand while he wondered at their length and weight.
"And your eyebrows grow together, the true sign of a witch?"
"Alas, yes."
"And a little rosy baby mouth?"