Kaida
The cottage was on the far edge of town, past the tanner’s yard and the communal well, down a lane so narrow that Maggie and I had to walk single file to reach it. The woman who showed it to us — a stringy, sharp-faced widow named Marta — pushed the door open with her shoulder. She stood back and folded her hands in her apron with a slight grimace.
The door swung open.
A rat shot across the floor and disappeared into a hole in the skirting board.
Maggie made a sound and clutched the carpet bag to her chest.
I stood in the doorway and looked at the dim interior.
It was small. One room, a sleeping loft above, a single window, a hearth on the far wall large enough to be genuinely useful. The floor was beaten earth, dry at least. The walls were sound enough, the plaster crumbling i
