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I turned my head to hide a ss on the bench, foreclaws anchored in the tabletop, his big green eyes watching the movements of the ladle with fascination

"Oh, you want some, too?" I reached for a saucer from the shelf and filled it with a dark puddle of broth, savory with bits of goose lobules

"This is froorously

"Not a bit of it, Mrs Fraser," she said "The bonnie wee laddie’s caught six mice in here in the past two days" She bea broth as fast as his tiny pink tongue couldhe likes from o at the ones in ue ofthe baseboards like shadows after nightfall, and even in broad daylight, shot suddenly across floors and leaped out of opened cupboards, causing minor heart failure and broken dishes

"Well, ye can scarcely blalance at o where the food is, after all"

The pool of broth had nearly drained through theof flotsam behind I scraped this off and dropped it on Adso’s saucer, then scooped up a fresh ladle of broth

"Yes, they do," I said, evenly "And I’m sorry about it, but the mold is important It’s medicine, and I--"

"Oh, aye! Of course it is," she assured e of sarcasm in her voice, which rather surprised h the slit in her skirt, into the capacious pocket that she wore beneath

"There was a man, as lived in Auchterlonie--where we had our hoose, Arch and e there He was a carline, was Johnnie Howlat, and folk ary near hiraiths, and soht, for to buy charlance at me, and I nodded, a little uncertainly

I knew the sort of person she hland charraiths" she’dlovephilters, fertility potionsill wishes So in its wake a faint feeling of unease, like the sli in memory the small bunch of thorny plants, so carefully bound with red thread and with black Placed beneath haire--purchased from a witch na was getting at? "Carline" was not a word I was certain of, though I thought ithtfully, her normal animation quite subdued

"He was a filthy wee mannie, Johnnie Hoas He’d no wos So did he" She shivered suddenly, in spite of the fire at her back

"Ye’d see hiround He’d find creatures that had died,back their skins and their feet, bones and teeth for to make his charms He wore a wretched auld smock, like a farmer, and so pooched up under his sh the cloth"

"Sounds most unpleasant," I said, eyes fixed on the bottle as I scraped the cloth again and ladled more broth "But people went to him anyway?"

"There was no one else," she said sily oninside her pocket

"I didna ken at first," she said "For Johnnie kept raveyard and bone dust and hen’s blood and all htfully at low--"ye’re a cleanly sort"

"Thank you," I said, both a

"Bar theslightly "And that heathen wee pooch ye keep in your cabinet But it’s true, no? Ye’re a char what to say The memory of Cranesmuir was vivid inI wanted was for Mrs Bug to be spreading the rumor that I was a carline--some already called al prosecution as a witch--not here, not now But to have a reputation for healing was one thing; to have people cos that charuardedly "It’s only that I know a bit about plants And surgery But I really don’t know anything at all about charh I had confir them

Before I could respond, there was a sound fro a hot pan, followed by a loud screech Je of his toy, had cast it aside and crawled over to investigate Adso’s saucer The cat, disinclined to share, had hissed at the baby and frightened hihtened Adso under the settle; only the tip of a sitated whiskers showed from the shadows

I picked Je took over the broth-straining She looked over the goose debris on the platter and picked out a leg bone, the white cartilage at the end sly under Jerabbed the bone, and put it in hisbone, with shreds ofto it, and put that down on the saucer