by H C Turk
“You will be told by Lord Bulkeley, not by me. I am here only to take you, and will do so now.”
This tallest constable would have grasped Mother’s shoulder, but preferring not to touch this ugly female, he merely gestured for her to move. Before Mother could respond, one of the remaining males spoke.
“We’ve a bit more here, constable,” he stated to his colleague, then earnestly confronted Mother. “We would enter the premises, woman, and seek evil within.”
Mother at once gave a sweeping gesture of welcome toward our door, announcing, “Please enter, constables. Simultaneously, you might recall the manners taught you by your parents and use my proper name, which is not ‘woman,’ but Mrs. Landham. Once within, sirs, thankful I would be for your removing all the evil you find, since we good women of God have no use for the stuff. If you uncover no evil, kindly leave none of your own.”
Although displeased at my mother’s comments, the men were also amazed at a witch’s speaking so fluently, a style Mother used to impress sinners, one so impressing me in those early years that I emulated her lingual abilities. The constables, however, remained mute upon entering our abode, gaining even more displeasure to find nothing heinous: only benches and straw. Placed carefully on our general table were church dresses and shoes. The arbor vine that had entered years before, a welcome friend whose growth we enjoyed, likely seemed improper for even a decrepit home, for is not a house’s function the exclusion of nature? Surely, our non-evil beds were disappointing; for despite pressing their sinning hands throughout the straw—a violation I could feel, the act more vulgar than Marybelle’s fingers within me—the men discovered no intimations of evil.
The sinning men’s intrusion had so distressed me that their next vexing could scarcely increase my dismay, yet what words could have been more frightening than the tall constable’s final orders?
“The girl,” he submitted, “must be delivered as well.”
Calm Mother offered no argument. Since this latest turn was unexpected, we witches had not planned a response, but the ways of sinners are no more predictable than their laws are constant. Our preparation was Mother’s experience. Throughout my life, she had readied me for the sinners’ suspecting my manner of living, and the time was nigh to discover how well I had learned.
Calm Mother was moved. Perhaps she noticed some sinners’ reaction I was too young to sense. As we stepped from our home, Mother turned to one of the constables and declared with a voice calm as a witch’s passion:
“God forgive you for your thoughts, with your staring at my daughter too young for your wicked mind.”
We then departed for the sinners’ world where I would receive my strongest lesson in evil, where witches would be shown minor in dispensing Satan’s malice, the sinners as dedicated in their inhuman destruction as the devil himself.
• • •
I was made to wait alone in a large room that was all edges and angles not existing in the forest. A guard stood outside while I waited in silence, hearing neither rustling leaves nor moving insects, only my own shallow breathing, my heart beating painfully with a rhythm ready to break. I heard no words, but would later learn of the “interview” then being held with my mother as subject.
Alderman Bulkeley and Reverend Corliss were accompanied by constable and clerk, as though the king’s guard were required to contain my small mother. Fearful men, these decisive officials did not hesitate. At once they informed Mother she had been accused by Martin Vidgeon of witchcraft.
She swooned. Praying to God for salvation from lies to torment a poor woman, Mother wailed convincingly of her innocence and righteous fear. After further interrogation, the alderman in charge determined that Lord Martin’s stature justified the township’s bringing Mother to trial. Truly, the authorities had sought a confession from her, thereby proceeding to her punition without a lengthy public display. Failing this, Mother was set aside with me in a jail cell, and Jonsway made plans to kill her.
Though having prosecuted alleged witches before, Jonsway began a persecution with my mother. Normal fare for an English town was publicly beating any woman adjudged to have been temporarily entered by Satan without her choosing, though she was held responsible for being a wicked vessel. Such crimes were considered minor because the corruption was not thorough, but Mother was formally accused of being a witch and therefore unholy, in league with Satan by choice, as though the devil existed on Earth as do peddlers and clergymen, individuals available for discussion who provide their services for a fee. Appropriate for such a heinous crime was the punishment of death. Here the sinners knew themselves extreme, for having never extracted this ultimate penalty for a crime so difficult to prove, they sought expertise from exterior sources. The priest requested the bishop of his diocese to attend the trial, and the alderman hired an expert in witchcraft from London to provide her knowledge. To our sisters’ great misfortune, the fervent bishop knew his holy duty, and the expert knew her witches.
The sinning public soon displayed one of its more pitiable traits, for upon learning of the witch trial, they panicked and changed it to a witch hunt. A contagion began wherein gossip burgeoned until countless episodes of witchcraft were discovered in average lives. In brief days, Mother and I were joined by women incarcerated in adjacent cells: five strange sinners, and two sisters we knew: Chloe and Marybelle.
I was not formally arrested, but the alderman found such difficulty in separating me from Mother that together we remained, his problem doubled because no Jonsway home would now accept the previously fine child; and since the authorities would have me near and not in the woods, why not with the mother? Furthermore, since I was lovely though yet interred, Jonsway deemed it reasonable to arrest average-appearing women: a widow with a tiny farm who supposedly sold crops that rotted within the consumer’s stomach, the truth being that one bad ear of corn terrified a foolish sinner into inventing an instantly believed explanation as inspired by the original and only true tale of the bald and ebullient Lady Vidgeon. Another sinner was accused due to her numerous cats, too many black, the woman thus clearly responsible for all the wild felines roaming Jonsway, most of which had suddenly begun to steal the breath of babies.
Additional stories of the kind developed, no truth being necessary for a panic to have set loose human fear. What explanation could exist for children who die young, for harsh weather, bad crops, disease, and poverty? What more believable a cause for all these calamities than ugly women esteemed by none?
Our cell seemed pleasant with its roaches and rats, the smell of body waste more honest than any varnish. For days we waited, Mother so constant in her humor and strength that my youthful fear was contained—but no more than contained; for though I never screamed and raved and attempted to dig through the stone walls, this was my desire.
The alderman and minister also spoke with me. To Bulkeley and Corliss I praised God and Jesus, displaying great and honest fear as they described Sarah Vidgeon’s condition. My response to their foolish questions of lizards’ innards and spells was true incredulity. Mainly I spoke the truth, for the average witch displays no blatant evil; and magic is a subtle force, difficult and rare, unlike the sinners’ easy killing. Those lies required, I conveyed with ease; for although witches have an honest nature, we possess too much respect for living not to lie for our own salvation. Our lives were given only by God, Who alone reserves the privilege of rescinding them. But since Satan supplies evil for all, sinner and witch alike must suffer.
Though largely unnoticeable due to Mother’s variegated skin, the crock’s contents had left pink blotches on her hands, a mark fully obvious on the white daughter. Separately Mother and I were asked of the injury. Equal were our descriptions, that a stew in its vessel had overturned upon us. The constables then noted that there had been no ashes in the fireplace nor at any site around our cabin. And there will be none, sirs, for we are chary of fire since it has recently damaged our persons.
The truth of witch
es’ effects was never spoken; for although the men around us had more and more difficulty with their sexual lives, the subject was so embarrassing that no mention was made of impotence, not with so many wives revealing how they had always hated the act, and were it not to gain children….
Though unsatisfactory to the authorities, our accounts of eating wild herbs and sleeping on straw were no proof of witchcraft. Questions about lost livestock and moneys disappearing from the treasury caused neither Mother nor me grief, and we knew our nearby friends—long experienced in sinners’ official lies—would fare equally. The greatest difficulty, Mother warned me, would certainly come with the trial. I then asked her of our friends not enjailed, whether we might be saved by their hot activities. Our friends number too few for the effort, Mother explained, for more are captive than free.
Neither of us was aware of any expert in witchcraft summoned from London; but Marybelle—unseen but smelled compartments away—was familiar with such doyennes, and had connived information from the alderman on this expert. Marybelle recognized the name given in reference to scandals on the Continent wherein women and witches had been burned like kindling. Marybelle knew that this expert was genuine, knew that each true witch would be discovered and killed. Unable to communicate with her sisters, however, Marybelle devised a plan to save us, a strategy no youthful witch could conceive.
The next morning, Marybelle began moaning in her cell, producing such a commotion that the guards were prepared to beat her to silence. Upon drawing near, however, they heard Marybelle swear in her most pious voice that an angel of the Lord had visited her, and she was prepared to confess her true identity. Marybelle was thus removed to Alderman Bulkeley and one Bishop Dalimore, who had arrived that morning, replacing the local priest to the latter’s holy relief. In private chambers, Marybelle swore with all the conviction she could simulate that Lord Jesus had entered her, promising a quick death and a quiet eternity if she confessed herself before God’s man. Therefore, Marybelle on her knees before the bishop confessed to being a witch and Satan’s helper, conceding that she and her kind were responsible for all the isle’s problems. She then promised to reveal those other true witches imprisoned—if only one request be granted.
“Oh, Holy Bishop,” she pleaded, swooning to kiss the Reverend’s feet, “the greatest Lord Jesus has shown me the only peace for a witch—death, death and removal from the world where her evil does not belong! Reverend Bishop, hear the truth of my unholy sisters so that we all can be redeemed by death. But you must vow before the only true God as His Son has promised me that our deaths will be without suffering. As we give you the gift of our dying, fine bishop and fine man, you must give us the certain death of drowning, not the horror of flames, of burning, burning….” Then she could no longer speak, collapsing as the Reverend in his generosity bent to touch the evil one’s shoulder, providing her with God’s word.
“Be at peace, unfortunate witch, for God in His utter wisdom has shown you the only manner of rest, and so shall it be delivered to ye and your heinous friends. Name your fellows, and before Jesus I vow to fulfill His salvation for you by providing the death you have foreseen.”
Breathing deeply, feigning such weakness that she could only roll onto her back, Marybelle looked up to the bishop, with a quiet voice speaking of God’s visit that had come solely from her imagination.
“There came a vision,” she whispered, “a vision where Jesus from the cross reached down to touch me, vowing that no witch who confesses in agony will be touched by her greatest fears, by metal or flames. Lord Jesus with His own right hand reached down to tie rope about my legs and to a stone my size from the cliffs of Man’s Isle. Then His angels descended with peace to lower me into the Irish Sea, to bury and slay me as the Lamb of God watched over me until I died and the evil within me was released, washed clean by God’s sea and Jesus’ blood.”
Marybelle then blinked, and with a more worldly visage, looked upward to the bishop, touching his holy ankle as she concluded.
“This must be you, God’s man. This must be you who binds my legs and who watches above me while I die and thereby gain the Lord’s salvation….”
The pledge was made and sealed with holy gestures, holy phrases. No hesitation had the bishop, for what more constant truths were known of witches than their fear of fire and that they could not swim? After the oath was given, Marybelle again grew agitated, asserting that her salvation could wait no longer, for she had suffered a century with her burden of evil. Now that God and His man had promised, the cleansing power of a kindly death could not come soon enough. Marybelle then spoke a desire to regain her strength quickly so that she might arise and point out each true witch. With his fine public voice, the bishop prayed aloud for God to grant this evil one a rapid recovery. And, lo, as though her body were reborn by God the Maker, Marybelle rose renewed before Dalimore with an energy gained from histrionics.
Rejoicing, Marybelle led the sinners to their victims. Accurately she dismissed the poor sinners as mere women, then pointed her finger to the true sister, Chloe. And though no witch was aware of Marybelle’s plan, she described her designs with only her presence as she stood before her sisters and condemned them.
“These are each a witch and Satan’s own. Know now, unholy creatures, that your time of suffering is ended, for Lord Jesus sends His Father’s man with salvation. Confess ye the evil of your lives and be cleansed with the healing death of an ocean drowning, never again to suffer the wickedness ye are made of. Confess now before Jesus!” she shouted.
Mother said nothing. Carefully she smelled Marybelle before exploding. After a moment of deliberation, Mother leapt into the air and tore at her clothing, thrusting her limbs as she collapsed to the floor, her entire body jerking as she slobbered and screamed.
“God tears the truth from me past Satan! I am the witch and ever the witch—God’s will be done if His men can do it!” And she thrashed twice before calming, breathing roughly.
Panic in Mother was a lie. Kindly love for me and our friends was her life, not mortal passion. I could smell no such response from her. She reeked of effort and energy, but also of truth. Therefore, my response was not difficult. I was no ancient witch who had suffered from sinners for decades. I was a child, and came aware that I no longer had to feign a strength I had yet to achieve, and suffer the stress of dishonesty. Looking from my mother and past Marybelle, I met the bishop’s eyes, relaxing my efforts of salvation, which were never more than hope.
“I am the witch God and Mother made me,” I declared, then pointed to Marybelle with a languid imitation of her gesture. “I am the same witch as she.” Then, with sheer honesty, I fainted.
• • •
The plan was deadly. On a sinners’ ship in a water world we sisters imagined our salvation, imagined slow breathing, the water’s air seeping into our lungs: even the witch child knew how to breathe within water. We imagined grating the rope against our rock’s sharpest edge or untying bonds hopefully mediocre in being secured—as per Marybelle’s plan—by a bishop instead of a sailor.
Even my fear was dying. The fish smell and salt breeze offered me no energy. The costumed sinners set to prove their immoral power over people they did not understand struck me as neither unjust nor offensive. I felt but a numbness that signified my impending demise, for smothering while bound in the sea was not salvation but cold destruction. Because I so clearly faced doom, I was unable to have the strength of a good witch or the passion of an average sinner. Dying for me was as lethargic as an animal rotting.
From my first smell of the constables in the forest, I had been taken by countless visions of Mother’s dying. Not my own death nor the world’s destruction could have so affected me in prediction. So often had I felt my innards wrenched from visions of Mother’s death that the pain became normal, cramping me with a daughter’s ultimate terror. But never did I cry out as the torment demanded, for this would have been cruel to my mother, unkind to the person I suffered
from because I loved her most, Mother who retained the subtlest courage by never lying but never refusing to accept the truth. If we are to die, she told me, think beforehand of the love we share, and praise God that our concern will be forever moved to His superior hands. Mother then smiled and held me. Then I loved her as ever, and again felt her die, then loved her more.
Our salvation became grimness. Leaving shore, I saw child sinners frolicking in the sea waves, and I knew that Satan had sent them to mock us. In their pleasure, however, they remained oblivious to our execution. Not a word was spoken of salvation by the four sisters, not a word beyond God’s will being done and peace from death and other brief confessions. Yet grimness was appropriate, for a lengthy submersion in saltwater was no assured salvation. Having passed beneath rivers, I knew the breathing to be as uncomfortable as smothering with a wet cloth, knew that long immersion induces terror. The sea is worse because the salt stings the eyes and nose: after one attempt at the shoreline years before, I retreated with distress. Now our only hope was desperation, for not only would we have to remain submerged longer than any witch would choose, we would have to cut our bonds on stones not completely jagged. And if we survived the long walk to shore, what if we were seen by sinners, evil people cavorting in a sea meant to kill us?
Upon comprehending Marybelle’s plan as she identified us in jail, I had felt admiration for her courageous brilliance, felt genuine love for a sister I previously found intimidating. But Marybelle was now on the ship’s gunnel being tied to a rock that could crush her, while a sinner playing God’s representative prayed above an evil creature who to her shit was his moral superior. Who had this man ever saved from death, and when had he jeopardized his eternal existence to help his friends? The holy man proved his evil by waving a false Jesus stick, intending to cut God’s creatures as dead as though he wielded the devil’s sword. Certainly, the words he murmured in some pretentious language were meaningful to either God the King or His Prince of Darkness, but which of the opposing forces?