Magic Lessons

by Alice Hoffman

  When Maria returned to the cabin, she took out the book, for what is written will open the world itself. As she paged through the Grimoire, she thought of the woman who took her in on a snowy day and gave her the Owens name, who had shared all she knew about the Nameless Art. Own your own life, Hannah had told her. Never depend on others. Protect those closest to you.

  When she went to the courthouse, Maria was mindful that a woman in her situation must not call attention to herself. Not yet. Not now. She wore a white cap she had sewn, using the white cotton lining of the bodice of her blue dress. She had affixed white cuffs to a gray shift so that she would appear more presentable. Her hair was pinned up so that no one could spy that it was not long enough to knot into a braid but sheared at chin length, as if she were a boy. A legal document was worth little, for laws are made to serve the men who create them, and are rarely meant to honor women, but land is difficult to take away from the rightful owner. She kept her eyes lowered when she went before the magistrate, and she spoke softly. Be careful what you say when you come before such men, for they will find guilt in innocence, and evil in what is most natural. The magistrate approved of her manner of speech, and he allowed her to buy the acreage she camped on, for it was considered worthless. She used Hathorne’s silver, for unlike the gems, these coins were real enough, and it gave her pleasure to know the man who wished her to vanish had made it possible for her to own land. That same day her ownership was recorded in the book of deeds and stamped with the clerk’s initials. Married women could not own property, but a woman without a husband was free to do as she pleased.

  Maria Owens did exactly that.

  1685

  II.

  By the age of five, Faith was a charming, well-behaved girl with talents all her own. She had already learned that judgment was everywhere in their world, and one should keep one’s private thoughts and deeds and attributes to oneself. Her mother warned that being different could cause grief, for men often destroyed what they didn’t understand. When the child asked who her father was, for surely she must have one, Maria simply said that some things were best not to know, and that, whoever he was, he had a darling child.

  Faith understood that theirs was a world of secrets. She told no one that she could start a fire simply by imagining a red flame or that she could leap from the roof and land softly on the balls of her feet. She could call birds and fish to her, and because of this she soon discovered that certain rumors in town were, indeed, correct; there was a serpent in Leech Lake, a large gray-scaled eel-like creature she soon trained to eat crusts of bread from her hand. She told no one about his existence, for already she had witnessed how men handled any creatures they deemed to be monsters. This winter, she had spied two hunters dragging a she-wolf from her den; they murdered her in the snow, along with her pup. Wolves were outlawed in the colony, and men went about killing them one by one, as they did with the native people. One of the first laws the Puritans had passed in 1630 was to place a bounty on wolves, and that included Indian dogs, which looked to be a mixture of a wolf and a fox. A black wolf’s fur was worth the most, and the poor mother wolf had a coat of that color. Faith had been hidden behind the bramble bushes, her hand over her mouth so they wouldn’t hear her sobs. It was a terrible thing to have witnessed, and it changed who she was. She felt her difference tenfold, and the part of her that was human was ashamed of humankind.

  Another pup, overlooked by the hunters because he was so small and weak, soon emerged from the den. His half-opened eyes were silver-gray, the same shade as Faith’s own, and his coat was pure black, all the better to slip through the night unnoticed. He went to Faith as if he’d known she was waiting for him, and that she could be trusted, and that they belonged to one another. Faith raced home carrying the tiny surviving pup. Maria gave Faith a leather glove filled with goat’s milk for the wolf pup to drink, sucking on a hole cut in the fingertip. Faith kept the wolf in her bed that night, to make sure he stayed warm. She named him Keeper, for she didn’t intend to let him go. Sometime after midnight the pup ceased whimpering, and soon they were dreaming the same dream, girl and wolf alike, a dream of blood in the snow, and of warm milk, and of a bed in which to sleep without worry or fear.

  In the early morning, Faith carried Keeper through the dark to the little shed where they kept two goats, and filled the glove with milk. Maria found her there once the sun had risen, asleep in the straw with the wolf by her side. She recognized a familiar when she saw one. Such a creature must always come to you on its own. You cannot choose it, it must choose you. Once it does, it will be loyal for the rest of its life, as Cadin had been.

  “Wolves are killed here,” Maria told her daughter that day. “But if you call the creature a dog, then a dog is what it will be.”

  Faith nodded solemnly. She knew that people in town stared at her red hair, thought by some to be a mark of the devil’s own, and gawked at her mother’s red boots. Everything they were must be a secret, and the same was true for the wolf. From the very first day, when Keeper was a tiny half-blind pup, he did his best to follow Faith wherever she went, refusing to be parted from her, fiercely loyal. She laughed and called him her little goat, for he soon enough ran to the goats in the barn, wishing to be fed, and he played with the tolerant creatures, biting at their hooves and running beneath them, until, having had enough, they butted him and chased him from the barn. Maria wondered if her daughter remembered the man they’d called Goat, for she still slept with the poppet doll he’d made for her. Maria had never told anyone how close Samuel Dias had come to death, a mere breath away. Even then he had continued to talk, as if there would never be enough time to say all that was inside of him. His stories had often seemed like imaginary tales of sea monsters and storms, but his advice to Maria had been true. He’d warned her to be careful in Massachusetts, for men would be men, especially in such a self-righteous place as Salem, and judges would continue to judge those who came before them.

  * * *

  Once Faith had learned to read and write, Maria brought out the Grimoire, their greatest secret, kept in the kitchen under lock and key, in a bureau drawer with a false bottom, so that even if someone jimmied open the drawer, they’d come upon nothing more than two large wooden spoons.

  “This will belong to you someday,” Maria told Faith.

  Faith was delighted with this news. “Which day is that?”

  “A day when you’re very grown-up and I’m a very old woman.”

  Maria had hired a carpenter who went from town to town. He chinked the holes in the walls of the cabin, then rebuilt the shed for the goats so that it would no longer shake in the wind and he helped Maria to lay down a path of blue stones that reminded her of Hannah’s cottage. When Maria claimed there was an underground stream nearby, the carpenter had grudgingly dug their well, surprised when he hit a pool of fresh, clear water.

  “It’s a talent to be able to find water,” he told her. It was said only witches could do so, for they could not drown and had an affinity with water that people used against them. There were those who said they could smell water, and that water had the scent of sweet iris to such women. Maria planned to pay the carpenter with the last silver coin, but instead he asked for her help in exchange for the work he’d done on the house. He had unending headaches and his hands had begun to shake. In time he would not be able to earn his living. He had figured out that Maria Owens practiced the Nameless Art, and if she could help him, there would be no debt to pay. Maria gathered barley and vervain from her garden to boil, then wrapped the mixture in white cloth to place on the man’s forehead. She said words in a language he didn’t recognize, both forward and backwards it seemed. He could not keep his eyes open, and he slept all night in the barn with the goats, without nightmare or dreams. In the morning, his head was clear. He came back to thank Maria. “You have a rare talent,” he said solemnly.

  That was when she knew what her future would be. Maria would forsake love entirely, and turn her ta
lents to the healing arts. She lit a lantern on the porch that the carpenter had built, and then she waited. She was far from town, but the lantern could be seen by anyone wishing to venture this far. They would spy the yellow light, and then the fence, and then the garden that was carefully tended, and they would know they were welcome.

  A Simple Witch’s Garden

  Sage, for headache.

  Summer savory, for colic.

  Green wormwood for wounds, mix with vinegar or rum, then apply.

  Hyssop, for the lungs.

  Colt’s foot and flaxseed, for coughing.

  Motherwort, to quiet the nerves.

  Sweet balm tea, for fever.

  Horseradish, mixed with warm vinegar for aches in the feet.

  Mallows, steeped in milk for dysentery.

  Savory, to give good fortune.

  Parsley, to see the future and make wise choices.

  The shopkeeper’s wife, Anne Hatch, who had always been so kind to Maria, was the first to arrive. Anne was not more than twenty and her husband, Nathaniel, was near fifty. It was not an unusual match in the colony; men often had three, perhaps even four wives, for so many were lost in childbirth. But it was not a good marriage. Anne feared her husband, for he treated her badly; all the same she left her bed to walk alone through the fields, turning into the dark wood to reach the cabin that many said was enchanted. People in town hadn’t forgotten Maria Owens. They saw her when she came in once a month to do her shopping, the little girl tagging along with her black dog at her side. Maria always wore a blue dress and those red boots, which some people said were the color of blood and others insisted were the color of roses. “Hold your breath when she passes by,” mothers told their children.

  On Maria’s market days, Ruth Gardner Hathorne always went to her gate to watch her, as did most of the women on Washington Street. They never spoke a word or greeted Maria; all the same, they felt drawn to this stranger. What might she do for them if they asked? What was there to be found outside their own garden gates? The magistrates had allowed Maria to own land in Essex County; still, it was strongly recommended that no one speak to her, and if anyone should befriend her that person would also be suspect and run the risk of an inquiry. People swore that one day there would be proof enough for her to be brought to trial for witchery. “What makes her think she can defy laws and protocol?” the women whispered among themselves.

  Anne Hatch went up the porch steps, even though her frantic heart was hitting against her ribs. She had been orphaned; first her mother was taken by a fever, then her father was lost in King Philip’s War. She should have been grateful to have a man pick her out of the workhouse where she’d been sent by the Overseers of the Poor, but after the first night with her new husband there was nothing to be grateful for.

  “Bless me,” Anne Hatch whispered to He who watched over her. Her hands were shaking. “Do not judge me for what I must do,” she asked of the Lord.

  Maria had made soap earlier that night and the kettle was in the yard, the embers beneath burning a pale red. The brass bell sounded in the wind and she knew someone had arrived. When she answered the door, her hair was wringing wet, for she’d just washed away the cinders with a pitcher of lake water. She wound her wet hair into a twist, which was kept in place with her silver combs. The hour was late and her girl was in bed, but the leggy black dog growled at the visitor, who shrank back.

  “He’s only a pup,” Maria assured Anne. When she told the dog to hush, he did as he was told, curling up beside the little girl’s bed. Maria had been expecting a visitor, for the broom had fallen only an hour earlier, which always meant company was coming. She had already brewed a pot of Courage Tea.

  They know what they want, Hannah had told her. Ask the right questions and you’ll get the right answers. Even those who have been afraid to speak aloud will tell the truth when they must.

  “I shouldn’t be here,” Anne said apologetically. She looked back at the door, and for a moment it seemed she might flee. “It’s late.”

  “Perhaps it’s not too late, but of course you’re welcome to come or go as you like.”

  Anne steadied herself. Once he knew she’d gone, there would be hell to pay. This was likely her only chance to escape. “I’ll stay.”

  Maria gestured to the table so they might sit together. She was not yet twenty-two, but that was two years older than the unhappy young woman before her, and by now Maria knew a thing or two about love. She understood the situation as soon as Anne removed her jacket and unclasped the hooks on the front of her dress. Anne raised her chin defiantly as she showed herself, but even before she did, Maria knew what would be revealed: bruises in the shape of blooming flowers, the same color as the ones marking Rebecca on the day she came to see Hannah Owens. In Boston Maria had been called upon for cures and love magic. This was something entirely different.

  “He does it to punish me when I’m slow or stupid,” Anne said. “If I charge the wrong price or burn supper or when I speak too loudly.” She had thought of murdering him in his sleep, but she hadn’t the heart for such things, only the imagination.

  Maria gave the shopkeeper’s wife a salve of calamine and balm of Gilead for her bruises, and an amulet made of blue glass beads and blue thread for protection.

  Anne Hatch shook her head, displeased. “This isn’t a strong enough cure for my problem.”

  The women stared at each other. To come this far alone, a woman must be willing to take a risk. What she wants she must want desperately. Maria wished to have nothing to do with the pains of love; still her heart went out to Anne. In point of fact, this wasn’t love, but love gone wrong, a different story entirely.

  “What did you have in mind?” Maria asked.

  “I need poison,” Anne said softly, her chin up, her eyes meeting Maria’s.

  There were many toxic potions that could be made from the local plants: hogweed, lily of the valley, castor bean, tansy, bittersweet nightshade, mountain laurel, yew leaf, white baneberry, henberry, horse nettle, pokeberry, pure cyanide in the pits of wild cherries. But what was done could not be undone, and vengeance always returned to its maker.

  “Neither one of us wants death on our hands,” Maria told her. “It would come back to us and extract a price we wouldn’t want to pay.”

  Anne’s eyes were swollen from crying. “How then am I to be rid of him?”

  “You have to be certain this is what you want.” Maria looked over her shoulder. Faith was still sleeping peacefully. “Once he’s gone, he won’t return.”

  Anne Hatch smiled then, the first smile in a very long time. She was ready to begin.

  * * *

  Maria had Anne cut a lock of her hair to burn in a brass dish. This was the end of an old life and the beginning of a new one, and the transition must be marked. From black cloth and red thread a small poppet was fashioned, stuffed with blackthorn and cherry bark, and then Anne’s husband’s name, Nathaniel, was stitched upon the cloth. Anne pierced her finger in the process and her blood stained the cloth, but she had bled many times before on her husband’s behalf. The incantation for the end of love was written on a slip of paper that she attached to a candle that burned brightly.

  Let our bond be broken by the powers above. You will wish to run, and you won’t look back. When I look for you, nothing will remain. You will not remember me and you will be nothing to me.

  This was magic that needed words, for literary magic held the greatest power. Once home, Anne was to bury the poppet outside her front door, then burn the incantation and walk the perimeter of their property, laying down the ashes. When she went inside the house, she must dust his clothes with salt.

  “This will drive him away,” Maria said. “Once he leaves, his fate is his own and neither you nor I are responsible for what happens then.”

  * * *

  Nathaniel Hatch was gone for a fortnight, then a month. Before long it was summer, and he still had not been seen. Anne ran the store herself, and afte
r six months she went to the court and was declared a widow. A search party had found her husband’s boots and his gun on the far side of Leech Lake. It was thought he had drowned while hunting the sea monster, as others had before him, for there was a pile of salt near his belongings, and salt was known to call to saltwater creatures. No one but Maria had seen the footprints of his bare feet continuing on past the pond, driven by an overwhelming urge to leave Massachusetts.

  As a widow, without any male heirs, Anne Hatch was allowed to own property; the store was now hers. She never again charged Maria for her purchases, whether it be molasses or chicory or flour. When there were items that were difficult to come by, Spanish oranges, for instance, or myrrh oil from Morocco, luxuries that occasionally arrived when ships that had visited faraway lands docked at the harbor, Anne saved them for Maria Owens.

  Soon after Nathaniel Hatch disappeared, women in need of cures began to come to Maria’s door, always late, when most of the good people in town were in bed. Anne Hatch’s mistreatment was not as much of a secret as she had wished it to be, and it quickly became known that she’d had assistance in righting her life. In these times, most people turned to homemade remedies that could often cause more harm than good. They believed babies who died in their cradles had the life sucked out of them by Satan’s emissaries or by cats, which were thought to be untrustworthy, evil creatures. They thought that the skin of an eel could cure rheumatism, and believed that beating a child who had fits, with a thin switch cut from a young tree, would drive the devil from his body. Now, for the sake of themselves and their children, they turned to Maria Owens for other remedies.

  Frustration Tea for granting good cheer, good for those who grieve.