She gave a small nod. ‘Perhaps, and if that had been the only example then you could be right. There were others and then, not weeks before William’s death, she foretold that too.’

‘She predicted his death?’

Ailsa smiled thinly. ‘Not so lucky.’

I tried to swallow my reaction, tried to cling hard to what logic dictated, but the sands of reason shifted beneath my feet. I could not find an easy explanation for such a prediction. ‘Is that why the islanders considered her a witch?’

She looked at me with a glint of approval. Then she shrugged her square shoulders, covered the dough and put it on the range. Dragging out a chair, she sat and from a drawer pulled out a small pipe into which she put a twist of tobacco. Lighting a wick, she puffed furiously until it was lit. The smell was sharp and as unlike the sweet tobacco my father used as I could imagine. She blew out the smoke with satisfaction, daring me to pass comment.

‘I think you know the answer to that question. You told me you had learned what she was like. What she did.’

I nodded.

‘She was clever with herbs, too. Women who talked badly behind her back, put their fear aside when their babies grew sick and sought her help. Some said she had hands that could heal.’

‘These other abilities, if she really possessed them, could only have been assets, surely.’

She smiled. ‘Hands that can heal may also be hands that can harm.’

I thought of the boy under her charge and what he became.

‘But Miss Swansome, this is not what I feel I must tell you.’ She spoke quietly now, as if she was afraid of being overheard, ‘Do you know what role I take on the island?’

I shook my head.

‘I assist the dead.’ As she said this she looked to me for a reaction, but I kept my face impassive. ‘Do you know what that means? I cleanse the bodies, wrap the dead flesh. If necessary, I bathe the wounds and correct the breakage of limbs. I place a coin on the tongue and sew closed the eyes and mouth.’

‘It’s a necessary job.’

‘It’s an act of love. When you die, Miss Swansome, would you not like to think that tender hands took care of you at the very end? That even in your coffin you were laid to rest as if you were preparing just for sleep?’

Her voice was like oil.

‘What were you told about William’s death?’

‘He fell from Stack Mor, an accident.’

‘But was it now?’

Her look was cunning.

‘You do not scare me,’ I said.

At that, she laughed again. ‘I am pleased for that. I don’t mean to scare you. I mean to warn you.’

‘Of what?’ In spite of myself, I shivered.