Chapters (76)
- Cover
- About the Author
- Also by Karen Brooks
- Title Page
- Dedication
- EXPLANATORY NOTE
- PART ONE
- One
- Two
- Three
- Four
- Five
- Six
- Seven
- Eight
- Nine
- Ten
- Eleven
- Twelve
- Thirteen
- Fourteen
- Fifteen
- Sixteen
- Seventeen
- Eighteen
- Nineteen
- Twenty
- Twenty-One
- Twenty-Two
- Twenty-Three
- Twenty-Four
- Twenty-Five
- Twenty-Six
- Twenty-Seven
- Twenty-Eight
- PART TWO
- Twenty-Nine
- Thirty
- Thirty-One
- Thirty-Two
- Thirty-Three
- Thirty-Four
- Thirty-Five
- PART THREE
- Thirty-Six
- Thirty-Seven
- Thirty-Eight
- Thirty-Nine
- Forty
- Forty-One
- Forty-Two
- Forty-Three
- Forty-Four
- Forty-Five
- Forty-Six
- Forty-Seven
- Forty-Eight
- Forty-Nine
- Fifty
- Fifty-One
- Fifty-Two
- PART FOUR
- Fifty-Three
- Fifty-Four
- Fifty-Five
- Fifty-Six
- Fifty-Seven
- Fifty-Eight
- Fifty-Nine
- Sixty
- Sixty-One
- Epilogue: Autumn 1706
- AUTHOR’S NOTE
- GLOSSARY
- LIST OF CHARACTERS
- ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
‘Nae, he wouldn’t,’ said Nettie, catching the direction of her gaze. ‘Not now those city gents know what he’s accused of doing. They’ll want to question her further. Us too, no doubt.’ Aware they’d been dawdling and the others were some way ahead, Sorcha and Nettie increased their pace. ‘You wait,’ added Nettie, satisfaction making her voice stronger. ‘Janet will be free soon. Then no one can touch her.’
Forty
FORTY
Nor have we ever read or heard of any [witch] grown rich by Witchcraft.
— A True and Full Relation of the Witches at Pittenweem, 1704
The residents of Pittenweem were forced into an uneasy truce. The women accused of witchcraft for a second time were deemed not guilty by the city authorities and the Queen’s law and therefore set at liberty.
All except Janet Cornfoot, who remained in solitary confinement in the damp darkness beneath the kirk.
As December drew to a close, Sorcha, Nettie and Nicolas returned to their trade once more, baiting lines, mending nets, sorting the fish, wielding their knives to scale and gut the catch before throwing it into their creels and padding the snow-covered lanes and wynds to sell them. They may not have been welcomed back to the harbour, but they weren’t entirely rejected, either. Sorcha wondered if it was out of sympathy, for not long after Nettie was released, Thom White died.
Instead of crumbling under the weight of her grief, Nettie used her rage towards those who’d unjustly imprisoned her and taken her away from her husband when he needed her most to fuel her resolve not to kowtow to their desire to drive her away. She refused to have her husband buried in Pittenweem because she didn’t want Reverend Cowper to preside over the service, so Sorcha, Beatrix, Isobel and Nicolas, along with a few of the other fishwives and their men, took the coastal path to Anster one sleet-driven day to pray as Thomas White, mariner and former bailie of Pittenweem, a man once held in high esteem who’d loved his wife so much he’d allowed her freedoms most women only dreamed of, was laid to rest.
After that, Nettie leased her house in Anster and Thom’s in Pittenweem and came to live with Sorcha. It was as if by staying together they could ward off the ongoing hostility of the townsfolk and watch each other’s backs as they made their way to the harbour before dawn each morning and tramped home through the snowdrifts and mizzle each freezing night. They took to roaming the countryside to sell fish together as well. Nicolas often joined them. When they did encounter trouble, usually groups of cupshotten men, they put on a bold face and laughed. It was the best way to silence the jeers and the threats, to make a mockery of those issuing them by reminding them of their mothers, sisters, daughters and their own flaws and foibles.