The Maid, the Witch and the Cruel Queen (6 page)

But they hit a pool where the town drain runs out. They came out spluttering, smelling strongly. They did not smell of sweet heather, either.

It was then that Lord Scuggate ran to meet the queen – dripping and smelling of the town toilets.

The friendly men in the local tavern laughed when I told them the story of the trick we'd played on the foul Lord Scuggate.

Next day, they climbed the hill and build a new cottage for Nan, fine enough to keep out the wicked winds that whipped Butterburn each winter.

No one helped Lord Scuggate to rebuild the manor. And he had lost all he owned in the fire. He moved in with his friend, Sir James at Roughsike. They deserve each other.

He won't be back to bother Old Nan again. And, even if he did, he'd find she has two fierce dogs to guard her. Lord Scuggate's dogs!

How did she tame the beasts? With kindness? Or with witchcraft?

Only Old Nan knows!

Afterword Old Nan's Story

The Maid, the Witch and the Cruel
Queen
is a story based on real people and events in Tudor times.

Mary Tudor became queen when her brother, Edward VI, died in 1553. She was a Catholic and wanted everyone in England to worship at Catholic churches. She made a new law that said people who refused could be burned. From 1555 till she died in 1558, three hundred men and women were burned.

The people of England learned to hate her and to call her ‘Bloody Mary'. They had bonfires and parties when she died. Mary's sister, Elizabeth I, took the throne and stopped the burning of people who refused to worship in Catholic churches.

But killing ‘witches' still went on.

In Tudor Britain, it was against the law to practise witchcraft. In England, the punishment was to be hanged, while in Scotland, witches were burned.

Most of the people accused of being witches were harmless old women who had no one to protect them. From 1450 to 1598 over thirty thousand people in Europe were executed as witches.

But there are some stories of women accused of witchcraft who got away with it. One of these stories was about a woman in northern England known as ‘Old Nan'.

It was said that the local men tried to hunt her down, but when they chased her to the top of a hill she appeared at the bottom. No matter where they chased her she seemed to appear somewhere else calling, “Leave me alone!”

Did Old Nan use witchcraft? Or did she use a trick like the one in this story? Was there ever such a person as Old Nan? Or is she just a legend?

Only Old Nan knows!