Something scaring off the locals.

[ He turns bottles around. Most are unlabelled, and those that are are labelled with people’s names instead of the contents of the bottle. He’s not going to sniff at the contents to try to guess. ]

Guessing this is a witch’s house. Means we’ll be undisturbed, but means we really, really shouldn’t be seen going in or out. Just because the law and the church won’t do shit about it these days doesn’t mean an angry mob won’t.