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So came the evening and the banquet, and the end of that day; but the witch-wife led Arthur by the hand to the board, and afterwards to the chamber ere we slept. On the fourth day and the fifth it was no otherwise than erst; and when I fared to bed I felt confused in my head and sick of heart.
That spring-tide, amidst of April, she followed the witch-wife down to the Sending Boat for the third time; and there went everything as erst, and she deemed now that the lesson was well learned, and that she was well-nigh as wise as the witch herself therein.
But before she did on her garments, she looked on them, and saw that they lay not as she had left them, whereby she knew well that the witch-wife had handled them.
The witch-wife, fairy-wife, child or whatever she was seemed to wither as a flower in a hot wind. Bessie Prawle towered above her in her strength, and gained invective with every fierce breath she took. Her blue eyes burned, her bosom heaved like the sea; her arm bared to the shoulder could have struck a man down. Yet in the midst of her frenzied speech, in full flow, she faltered.
Herein also was she wise, to wit, how to give wrath the go-by, so that she oft found the wood a better home than the house: for now she knew that the witch-wife would enter it never; wherefore she loved it much, and haunted it daily if she might.
An' at that moment the Lord's ain hand out o' the heevens struck the Horror whaur it stood; the auld, deid, desecrated corp o' the witch-wife, sae lang keepit frae the grave and hirselled round by deils, lowed up like a brunstane spunk and fell in ashes to the grund; the thunder followed, peal on dirling peal, the rairing rain upon the back o' that; and Mr.
Fewer still would wish to emulate the sturdy plain-speaking of the "gudeman" in the Scottish ballad, who, when his witch-wife boasted how she bloomed into beauty after drinking the "wild-flower wine," replied, undauntedly, "Ye lee, ye lee, ye ill womyn, Sae loud I hear ye lee; The ill-faured'st wife i' the kingdom of Fife Is comely compared wi' thee."
Rotha stood perplexed, and looked after her as she disappeared down the lonnin. Liza burst into a prolonged fit of uproarious laughter. "Hush, Liza; I'm afraid she means mischief." "The old witch-wife!" cried Liza. "If tempers were up at the Lion for sale, what a fortune yon woman's would fetch!" Rotha's apprehension of mischief, either as a result of Mrs.
So fared the witch-wife straight to the creek-side, and Birdalone must needs stick close to her, or she had known nought, so black was the night amongst the alder-boughs.
There was Moncrieff of Tippermalloch, that was Popish, and the laird of Carslogie, a kend Queen's man, were in the fair, with wha kend how mony swords and bucklers at their back; and they would be sure to make a break-out if the officers meddled with the auld Popish witch-wife, who was sae weel friended; mair especially as the laird's best men, such as were not in the castle, were in Edinburgh with him, and he doubted his honour the Doctor would find ower few to make a good backing, if blades were bare."
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