Summary

This chapter is presented as a journal belonging to Adriaan Kuypers. He recalls that on the day Aletta Pieters was hung, and he began to recognize “the tenacity of superstition.” (p. 155). He recalls having seen her for the first time when she was in the pillory, with boys taunting her, and her cursing the boys. She invited him near and offered to tell him something, then licked his ear.

The next time Adriaan Kuypers sees Aletta Pieters, and she is crying and deflated, hardly the fiery girl he’d seen earlier. She is looking at the painting of the girl looking out the window and crying. Adriaan finds out that the Aletta has come to live with his Aunt Rika until she is eighteen. His Aunt and Uncle had taken her in to raise her out of charity, although it seems that a large gap of...