Witch Woman

by Jeanette Baker

  Maggie nodded and turned away, strangely comforted and yet unable to watch her mother pass through the door and out of her life.

  * * *

  The afternoon passed slowly while she waited for a call from Mike Costello. The sky darkened. Lightning flashed over the ocean, the rumble of thunder following immediately behind. She fed the cat, pulled a container of yogurt from the refrigerator, and picked up the phone, dialing the number on the detective's business card. No answer. She thought of Holly and how terrified she must be. Maggie paced the length of the room, fifteen steps forward, fifteen back. Forward and back, forward and back. Once again she looked at the ticking clock. Unless she took action, another night would pass. Pulling her jacket from the closet, she zipped it up, grabbed her keys and let herself out the door.

  The Summers' residence was at the end of street, no more than five minutes away. Lights lit the first floor of the house and the backyard studio where Deborah worked on her sculptures. Maggie blamed herself for not following up on her instincts. From the beginning of their acquaintance, something had bothered her about Deborah. She'd seen the light in the studio many times on evening walks. It never occurred to her to wonder why a blind woman needed light.

  Climbing over the hedge, Maggie ran across the yard and positioned herself against a giant elm tree to wait, for what she couldn't describe. But she would know when it happened.

  * * *

  Abigail fingered the smooth edges of the jade talisman before slipping it into her pocket beside the candle and book of matches. Then she picked up the stalk of arnica, touched the pentacle hanging on a chain around her neck, wrapped a dark shawl around her shoulders and looked into the bathroom mirror. She looked old. When had that happened? Just yesterday she was a young girl, flirting with Nathanial Burke, just starting out with all of life ahead. How had she come to this, an old woman whose life was virtually over with nothing at all to show for it? She always meant to go home, but she never intended to go alone. Abigail's plans always included Margaret. She imagined their homecoming, the look of joy and wonder on John's face. His younger daughter had always been his favorite. To see Margaret grown and lovely was to be Abigail's gift to him, a consolation prize for their years apart. That he waited for them, she never doubted. John March was a good man, forever predictable, forever doing the right thing.

  But Maggie wasn't little Margaret. She had a mind of her own. Perhaps the seventeenth century, or was it the eighteenth now, was no place for an outspoken woman. Sighing, Abigail looked around the room for the last time. She loved this house, the windows filling the rooms with light, the gleaming wood floors and high ceilings. She would miss it. She would miss a great many things. If only the portal wasn't so close. She would have liked to help Maggie. Maybe—she looked at the clock. No. She dare not wait even a minute longer. Maggie was a grown woman. She'd made her choice, perhaps the only one she could have made.

  Hurrying down the street, past the harbor and cemetery, Abigail crossed an empty lot and disappeared into a grove of pine and liquid amber maples. Gravel rolled under her feet on the unpaved road. Above her head, the shrunken moon, a mere sliver of light, climbed to its summit in the night sky.

  Ahead, Abigail could see the fire circle of the ancient coven. As far as she knew, no one used it anymore. It was strategically located with the moon above and the town downhill. She lifted the pentacle to her lips and kissed it. It was warm from the heat of her skin. She looked around, eyeballed the angle and carefully placed the jade stone on a dead tree trunk. Closing her eyes, Abigail began to compose the words of the journey spell in her mind when she heard the sound. It was undeniably human. No animal fearful of its life would move so carelessly through the underbrush. She folded her arms and moved out of the clearing into the shadow of the trees. Who could be out walking this late?

  She almost didn't recognize the man who stepped into the clearing. The moon was too small for any real light. It was the brightness of the stars that revealed what Abigail had already suspected. It was Scott Hillyard and he was obviously distressed. He'd lost weight and his normally pleasant expression was haggard and despairing. Poor man. Who could blame him? Susannah looked up at the sky and the twinkling star that was her focus. Perhaps there was still time to do Maggie one small favor. She stepped into the clearing. "Hello, Scott," she said, immediately identifying herself so as not to startle him. "It's Susannah Davies."

  He jumped back. "Son of a bitch," he swore out loud. "Susannah? You scared me to death."

  "By the look of you, death might be a welcome condition."

  He stared at her. "What are you doing out here all alone?"

  "I might ask the same about you?"

  "I'm looking for Holly," he said simply. "I'm always looking for Holly. Every time I kick a stone or a tree branch, every time I see a lump on the ground, my heart stops beating. I'm afraid I'll find her or, God forbid, a piece of her."

  "Maggie says she's alive."

  His disparaging grunt enraged her. "I wouldn't assume that superior tone if I were you," she said fiercely. "Maggie is a level-headed woman who takes responsibility very seriously. She wouldn't tell you something with certainty unless she was sure."

  "Maggie claims to be a psychic. I don't believe in that."

  "I'm sorry that life has dealt you a double blow, Scott, but not everything has a logical explanation. There are scientific laws that have none at all. We just accept them. Maybe you shouldn't limit yourself to one viewpoint. If the police have enough confidence in Maggie's abilities to ask for her help, who are you to belittle her field of expertise?"

  He frowned, noticing for the first time that she was truly angry. "I'm not belittling her, Susannah. I just don't believe in the supernatural. There's no verifiable evidence that second sight or life on the other side actually exists."

  "Have you read Elizabeth Kublar-Ross?"

  "Of course. But her findings can be explained."

  She let the shawl slip over her shoulders and turned to face him directly. "Explain this." Reaching into her pocket she pulled out the candle and matchbook, struck a flame and lit the wick. She held the light close to her face. "Look at me, Scott. Look at my eyes."

  "What is this, Susannah?" he began angrily. "What's the matter with—" His sentence ended abruptly as he took in what she was trying to show him. They stood there, in silence, for several minutes. "Who are you?" he said at last, "and why do you have Maggie's genetic mutuation?"

  Abigail threw caution to the winds. She straightened to her full height. The wind lifted her shawl and blew it into a sail behind her. She had nothing to lose and Maggie had everything to gain. When she spoke, her voice belonged to another world, to Abigail March in that terrible time of Salem's shame. "My name is Abigail March," she began, "and I was born in 1667 on the island of Barbados. In 1682, as an indentured servant bound to the March family, I sailed to Salem Village on the Sealark and one year later married John March. I gave birth to two daughters. We were cried out against in that terrible year of the witch trials. I sent my youngest forward in time, to this place," she waved her arm to encompass the city, "until I could find my way to her." She stood, proudly defiant, a dark silhouette against the shrinking moon. "It has taken me many years and much heartbreak to find Maggie. You would do well to listen with more than your mind, Scott Hillyard. Maggie is your friend."

  "Are you insane? Do you really expect me to believe this?"

  She looked at the moon and then back at him, scorn printed on her carven features and in the scathing words she flung at him. "Think what you will." Pulling her shawl against her body, she blew out her candle and looked up at the sky. A single beam of moonlight filtered through the darkness making its way toward her.

  "Wait," he said, his hand gripping her shoulder. "Tell me what I should do."

  She ignored him, her eyes on the light that was now the size of a stream.

  "Please," he begged her. "For the love of God, if you have any compassion at all, help me. Give m
e something."

  She brushed his hand away and turned, momentarily, from her focus to face him. "Deborah Summers is not blind," she said, and looked back toward the beam of light.

  Scott looked as well, and what he saw froze his speech, rooting him to the ground. The beam began to dip at regular intervals, forming depressions in what looked like a footpath or, even more fantastic, a moving staircase. As easily as if she were crossing the street, Susannah stepped on to the moonlight path and began to climb, her gaze fixed on something he couldn't see, something above the darkness. He watched until clouds swallowed her figure and the river of light separated, disappearing into the night sky. For a long time he stood motionless, until waves of dizziness claimed him. He sank to his knees and, for the first time since he was a child, prayed.

  Chapter 30

  Maggie, consumed with visions of Holly miserable and afraid, decided to take action. Mike Costello wasn't answering his phone and she'd waited long enough in the darkness, watching a figure that could only be Deborah move around in the backyard studio. Wayne must be somewhere in the house. She would approach him first.

  He held open the door, eyebrows lifted in surprise. "Maggie? How are you? Please come in."

  Maggie followed him into the kitchen. Student work covered the table. A half empty bottle of wine and a glass sat on the counter.

  "I apologize for the mess. I'm correcting papers. Would you care for some coffee or something stronger?"

  "No, thanks."

  He leaned against the counter. "What can I do for you?"

  Maggie hesitated. She was new to this. Normally, her role ended with a description and a location handed over to the authorities. How did someone go about telling a man that his wife was a child abductor? She was already beginning to regret her impulse to act on her own. Wayne Summers looked benign enough, but he could be as deeply involved as Deborah. Just because someone taught school didn't mean he was above suspicion. "I came to see Deborah," Maggie lied. "Is she here?"

  "She's in her studio, but I wouldn't interrupt her. Between you and me, Maggie, Deborah isn't what I'd call a tolerant person." He sounded bitter. "I know I should be more patient with her because of her handicap, but I don't mind telling you that it gets a little rough."

  Maggie was intrigued. Obviously the wine had gone a long way toward loosening Wayne's tongue. She pulled out a chair and sat down. "Maybe I will have little of that wine."

  He poured her a glass. She left it on the table in front of her, untouched. "Have you been married long?" she asked casually.

  "Twenty years. She wasn't always like this," he continued. "When we met she was fun and interesting, not at all negative."

  "How did you meet?"

  "I'd just starting teaching here. I was recruited from upstate New York. Deborah and I met in the library. She worked there. I guess you could call it a whirlwind courtship. Before I knew it we were married. She wanted a quiet ceremony, just us and two witnesses. Deborah has no family left."

  It all fit together, a contrived meeting, no family, feigned blindness to keep her isolated. "I assume she wasn't always blind," said Maggie, knowing the answer but wanting Wayne to continue his story.

  "It happened after our daughter was stillborn. No one knows why Deborah can't see. The doctors call it traumatic or hysterical blindness, depending on which one you talk to. Basically, it means there's no physical cause. She simply decided not to see and now she can't."

  "I'm sorry about your daughter. How long ago was that?"

  "Nine years."

  "Nine years." Maggie looked thoughtful, allowing the words to roll off her tongue as if they'd just occurred to her. "Nine years. Holly is nine years old."

  "Yes." Wayne looked stricken. "It's terrible. Holly Hillyard is one of my best students. Who would do such a thing?"

  Maggie, encouraged by his disclosures, leaned forward and took a chance. "I need to ask you this, Wayne. Feel free to not answer if you like. Has Deborah been acting unusual lately, taking walks or appearing especially nervous or irritable, even unbalanced?"

  "Except for the walks, you're describing the typical Deborah." His smile faded as he realized where Maggie was going. "You can't think Deborah would—no, no, Maggie. Deborah would never do anything illegal. She's fond of Holly. She would never hurt her or do anything crazy like actually take her. Where would it get her? She'd have to leave Salem. How does a blind woman take a little girl out of a city without anyone seeing her? Holly would let out a howl and that would be the end of it." He shook his head. "It just isn't possible."

  "Deborah isn't blind," Maggie said. "She wants you to think she is, but she can see as well as any of us."

  Suddenly, without warning, a blow from behind knocked her to the floor. Pain exploded in her head. Reeling and dizzy, fighting nausea, she looked up to see Deborah, in full command of her vision, wielding a wooden post.

  "Bitch!" the woman screamed. "How dare you come here to seduce my husband and take my child from me. You thought I didn't know you, Maggie. You thought I'd forgotten Abigail's spawn." She laughed insanely. "You escaped us once, but not again. This time you shall pay for what you are."

  In a flash of insight, Maggie recognized her enemy. Four hundred years had passed, but the evil that existed between Abigail March and Hannah Woodcock had come full circle. Whether Deborah was Hannah or her direct descendent was immaterial. She lived in the mind of this woman who brandished a two-by-four with the intent to kill.

  Wayne Summers, shocked into immobility during the original attack, now shouted at his wife. "Deborah, for God's sake, stop! Are you insane?"

  Maggie used the woman's momentary hesitation to roll under the table. Frantically, she reached into her pocket, fumbling for her cell phone. Her hand came away empty. She must have dropped it. Cursing and crying, she scooted to a corner, stood and gripped the edge of the kitchen table. Fear gave her strength. When the two-by-four came down again, she flipped the table, knocking the weapon from Deborah's hands, forcing the woman to jump back.

  The door was on the other side of the room. Maggie would have to pass Deborah to reach it. Wayne stared at his wife as if seeing her for the first time. "Deborah, you can see. Please," he begged. "Don't do this."

  She turned on him. "If you won't help me, stay out of the way." Her hand found the knife rack and closed over the butcher knife. She pulled it out and pointed it at Maggie. "You won't take her from me. I won't allow it. You'll die right here."

  "Deborah!" her husband shouted. "What are you saying? Tell her you don't mean it." He spoke to Maggie. "She's having a breakdown. She's not herself. I know she would never hurt you."

  "Shut up," his wife screamed. "You know nothing. She's going to take our child. We must stop her."

  Maggie recognized her danger, but her brain refused to react. Out of the corner of her eye, through a nearby window, she caught a glimpse of a beam of light, a dying moon and a moving shadow. She felt as if she'd experienced everything before, the woman's rage, the threatening words, even the strange heat that coursed through her blood, warming her flesh. Maybe this was it, the reason she'd been sent forward into a time when science blurred instinct, when the value of seeing beyond was relegated to strange women destined to walk alone, labeled witches and Satanists when they were nothing more than throwbacks to an earlier age when it was acceptable to see more than most. Maybe her last act in this life would be to reveal the whereabouts of Holly Hillyard because all at once she saw that the beam of light, and what was left of the moon, were swallowed by dark clouds and it was at that very moment that everything became startlingly clear.

  She spoke slowly and calmly, hoping to pierce through the shock threatening to consume Wayne Summers. "She's in the crypt, Wayne, in the Old Burying Point Cemetery. Holly's locked in the Woodcock family crypt. She's terrified. She needs you. Find her and take her home."

  Deborah screamed. Summoning a terrible strength, she lunged at Maggie with the knife.

  Maggie dropped to the floor
, covering her head with her arms when the door burst open.

  Uniformed police, their guns pointed, filled the room. "Police," a voice shouted. "Drop your weapons and put your hands over your heads."

  Maggie took one look at Mike Costello's homely, familiar face, drew one deep, ragged breath and then everything went black.

  * * *

  Two days later, Maggie's strength returned, enough to once again open the doors of her shop. Mike Costello told her that Holly had been found alive and well, although traumatized enough for Scott to seek out the services of a therapist. She'd gone to Deborah's house that day because she wanted to play dress-up with the woman's clothes and her father, heeding Maggie's warning, had forbidden it.

  Personally, Mike told Maggie, he thought Holly Hillyard had spunk. She was more angry than afraid and that would see her to recovery sooner than professional help. Deborah had been arrested and Wayne had been put on paid leave with orders not to leave town.

  Maggie hadn't seen Holly, or Scott either, even though Mike informed her that it was Scott who had convinced the police to stop in at the Summers' house that night. He said that Scott told him he'd run into Maggie's mother and it was she who'd convinced him that Deborah was the abductor. The detective had looked at her curiously, saying he didn't know that Maggie had family in the area.

  Maggie nodded without answering. Let him think what he wanted. After she'd fainted that night, she'd been taken to the hospital where she was treated for shock and released the following morning. She did nothing for the rest of that day and the day after that except drink tea, eat snacks and lie on the couch flipping through magazines attempting to come to some understanding of time.

  Time was a continuum, infinitely stretching forward and backward. She'd learned that in school, most likely math class. But it was more than that. What she had not learned in school, but knew now, was that it extended side by side as well, overlapping, the past, present and future, decades and centuries, even generations existing somewhere in their own circles but side-by-side with others who came before and would come after. It was too much to take in. She wanted to cry, to bury her head in Abigail's skirt and confess that she didn't understand.