She fell silent and I scurried alongside her, choosing my next words as carefully as my footsteps along the refuse-strewn thoroughfare. ‘It can sometimes be dangerous for a woman who tries to help people like that,’ I hinted. Getting no response, I am ashamed to say that I blurted out, ‘What did your mother die from?’

Myfanwy stopped still and shot me a sharp glance. ‘Oh she was not accused of witchcraft, if that is what you are thinking. The travelling priests are sympathetic to the country ways and they often used my mother’s cures themselves. No – in a way she killed herself. There are many, many different plants and most are kindly, some are helpful, but some are dangerous. One day she made a new potion from a selection of roots and fungi and became very sick. In two days she was dead.’

I made the sign of the cross. ‘God rest her soul. Did you discover what it was that caused her death?’

‘No, my mother always kept a recipe secret until she had perfected it and tried it herself; then, if she was satisfied, she got me to write it down. She had not yet given me the recipe for the potion that killed her. But I have her book. My father wanted to burn it but I hid it and took it with me when my father arranged a marriage to a widowed farmer, to get rid of me because he was grieving and full of anger.’

‘Blessed Marie! How old were you then?’

‘Seventeen. I was old enough and my husband much older but he was kind and did not work me too hard on his farm. He did not even mind that I did not conceive. He already had several sons – but unfortunately the eldest took a fancy to me. When my husband learned this they had a fight and the son hit his father on the head with a spade.’ She heard my gasp of horror and a bitter smile crossed her face. ‘I do not think he meant to kill him but he was drunk and did not know his own strength. It is wild country there, Jane. Then the son dragged me into his bed. He would marry me he said, but I knew it was against the law and besides I hated him. So I slipped a sleeping draught into his ale and ran away.’

The Market Place was too busy for this kind of conversation but near the church we found a quiet corner and I asked her to continue her sad story. ‘Where did you go? How did you live?’

‘I ran to Denbigh, to an apothecary there who had bought some of my mother’s cures. He and his wife took me in, but I had to let them use some of the recipes. My mother would have been furious. Sometimes I think she haunts me because of it.’

‘Why would she do that?’