And then what was he doing with
that strange baste on his shoulder, my Lady?"
"Why, it was only a tame squirrel," said Lady Eleanor.
"Squirrel, my lady," said Mrs. Fry mysteriously. "Aye, 'twas a
squirrel; but who knows but what it mayn't be a dragin when it gets
'oom?"
"A squirrel turn into a dragon?" said Lady Eleanor. "I never heard
such childish stuff in my life; and I wouldn't have believed that a
sensible woman like you could have thought of such a thing."
"Well, I won't say as it _was_ a dragin, my Lady," said Mrs. Fry, a
little abashed, "but they do say that the witch has to do with dragins.
She comes from out over the moor some place, she doth; and though she's
a seen on times about Cossacombe, no man can tell where she liveth nor
dare go sarch for mun. Jimmy Beer went out to look for mun two year
agone in the dimmet after Cossacombe revel, but the fog came down so
thick as a bag; and while he was a-wandering, a dragin (for so he saith
it was, though I never seed a dragin myself) passed so close to mun as
I be to you, my Lady, and when he looked to the ground he saw the mark
of his cloven hoof so plain as could be. And he was pixy-led all that
night, my Lady, was the old Jimmy, and when he come home all his money
was gone; so I reckon that the pixies is in league with the witches."
"I suspect that Jimmy had drunk too much cider," said Lady Eleanor
severely; "he should have kept sober or stuck to the road, and then he
would not have brought back foolish stories about pixies and witches.
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