by Megan Chance
I was sweating and trembling from sheer anxiety as I put the last of the pumpkin into a kettle of water, and my mind was racing. My father would be in soon for dinner; perhaps I could appeal to him, perhaps there was some chore he could give me that would take me into town—
“The butter won’t come,” Jude complained. “I’ve been churning for hours.”
“’Tis cold,” my aunt said. “It may take a while today.”
“Not this long. My arms are tired.”
Susannah looked over her shoulder. “Try this, Jude. ’Twill make the time go faster. Sine: ‘Come, butter, come. Come, butter, come. Peter stands at the gate, waiting for a buttered cake. Come, butter, come.’ ’Tis a bit of magic, you’ll see.”
Jude sighed. “‘Come, butter, come—’”
“Jude!” I jerked away from the kettle. “You can’t say such a thing. Why, ’tis a spell!”
I knew at once that I’d given myself away. Susannah turned to me, and that turn was quiet and slow, as if she knew I would wait all day for her to look at me. Her expression was kind, but I saw past the surface to the lie.
“There’s no harm in it, Charity,” she said. “Let her be.”
“I won’t!” I said. “You’ve given her a spell!”
“’Tis a rhyme, nothing more—”
“It’s come!” Jude shouted. “Look, Auntie, it worked! The butter’s come!”
I spun from the fire in horror. “You see!” I cried. “It is a spell!”
“Charity,” Susannah said. “Charity, don’t be such a fool.”
I saw that she was going to tell me another lie—one to reassure me, to silence me, and I knew then that I could not stay. I left the pumpkin boiling, and I ran upstairs to our bedroom, ignoring her calls to come back. I slammed the door shut behind me and waited to hear her footsteps on the stairs, trembling in terror lest I hear the sound.
Susannah did not come after me. I hardly knew what to make of that, but I didn’t hesitate. I went to her trunk and threw open the lid, listening for any noise on the stair. Her clothes were neatly folded inside, and for a moment, I stared, srunned by the colors I saw, the sheer brilliance and richness of the fabrics. But then, I didn’t tarry. I rifled through the trunk until I found the red paragon bodice, and I pulled it out and laid the other clothes on the top and hoped she would not be able to tell. Then I shoved the bodice beneath the bed and closed her trunk, and I sat there, waiting, and heard…nothing.
Finally, when my heart had calmed, I went to the crack in the floorboards and knelt beside it, leaning down to see through. I saw Jude and Susannah at the tableboard, and Susannah was kneading the butter in a bowl of clear water, speaking slowly and patiently to Jude. I wondered how I could leave them together, how long it took the Devil before he could claim a child’s soul, and knew I had no choice but to leave things like this today.
It seemed I waited a long time, but finally Susannah patted the butter into a firkin and wiped her hands on her apron. Then she said something to Jude, and I saw her move toward the cellar door. I heard the creak of it opening, and then its close.
It was my chance. I reached under the bed and grabbed the bodice, shoving it beneath my skirt, and then I went as fast as I could. The stairs creaked as I came down them, and Jude looked up from the table and said, “What ails you, Char—”
“Sssshh!” I hissed. “Quiet!”
“But—”
I came close to her, a mere inch from her face. Jude started to back away, but I grabbed her and held her firm. “I’m leaving,” I said, catching her glance and holding it. “If you say a word about this to anyone, I’ll beat you within an inch of your life when I get back.”
“But, Charity—”
“I mean it,” I said. “Especially, don’t tell her.”
I wanted to wait until I saw assent in jude’s eyes, but I didn’t dare. I had no choice but to trust that she would keep quiet. I gave her my most threatening stare, and then I hurried to the front door and crept out, staying in the shadows for a moment until I was sure Father was not coming from the barn. Then, as quickly as I could, I ran down the pathway to the road beyond, clutching the bodice beneath my skirt, breathing easy at last.
Chapter 9
THEY WERE ALREADY GATHERED AT THE PARSONAGE WHEN I AR-rived, but Tituba was nowhere to be seen. ’Twas Abigail who opened the door when I knocked, who looked me over with cold gray eyes before she motioned me inside. “We’ve not much time, and you must be very quiet,” she told me. “My uncle’s gone only to visit Sergeant Putnam’s, and my aunt is sick upstairs.”
I glanced toward the darkness of the stairs. “’Tis just as well. No one knows I’m here.”
“Did you sneak out, then, Charity?” Mercy Lewis spoke from where she stood at the entryway of the hall, a clever look on her thin and bony face.
“Aye.” I let her think what she would about it. At this moment, I cared for little but the task at hand. “Where’s Mary?”
Mercy stepped back, and I went past her into the hall and saw them all huddled around the table again, but this time there was no bowl of water on it, and Mary and Betty and Mary Warren were whispering and laughing quietly among themselves. Young Betsey Parris sat at the end of the long bench, looking pinch-faced with worry her blue eyes huge. The little Parris boy played with a wooden spoon near the fire. He banged it in an indifferent rhythm, on the settle, and then the floor, and then on an upturned trencher, and the different sounds rang hollowly in the room: bang bing bong, over and over again.
I glanced back at Abigail. “Where’s your servant?”
She shrugged. Her pale eyes looked eerie in the dimness of the room. “You mean Tituba? She’s somewhere.”
“Oh, there you are, Charity!” Mary called out from the table, and there was a false heartiness in her greeting, and then a faint needling when she said, “I wondered if you would be here today.”
“I said I would, didn’t I?” I went farther into the room, the bodice heavy against my legs, seeming to burn my skin where it was crumpled beneath my skirt. “Did you really think I would not?”
“I wasn’t sure.” She came over to me. Her gaze went to my skirt. “Why, Charity, what are you hiding at your belly? At least, I hope you’re hiding something, and there’s not some other reason for there to be a lump there.”
Mercy laughed. I flushed and reached under my skirt to pull out the bodice. “Here,” I said, holding it out to her. To my dismay, my hands were trembling. “Take it.”
Mary smiled. She took my aunt’s bodice into her hands with a gentleness I’d never seen in her before; she caressed the double camlet with special care, turning it so the silk and wool weave shimmered softly in the candlelight. “Ah, ’tis as beautiful as I remember,” she said quietly. “Where do you suppose she ever got such a thing?”
“In London,” I said. “She has more clothes than I’ve ever seen.” I stepped close to her and lowered my voice so none of the others could hear. “Mary, now I’d ask a favor—”
“Ah, how beautiful that is.” Mary Warren had come from the table to look over Mary’s shoulder.
Mary held the bodice to her breasts and twirled around, “what do you think?”
“It makes your eyes look brown,” Mercy said.
Betty nodded. “The red is perfect for your skin.”
“Do you think he’ll notice me in this?” Mary asked.
“If he does not, he’s blind,” Betty assured her.
“Mary,” I said, “if I could have a word—”
“Who is blind?” Abigail pushed past me. “Who are you talking about?”
“Mary’s enamored with Robert Proctor,” Mercy teased. “Such an old man as that!”
Mary blushed. “He’s hardly old. Why, he’s just thirty.”
“And set in his ways. I don’t think he’s even looking for a wife.”
“He may not be looking, but I expect to show him what can be found.” Mary made a little prancing step, and laughed with a l
ow, delightful chuckle that reminded me how pretty she was, how I’d once been jealous of the way Sammy looked at her, and that made me think of everything that had led me here, and I was desperate to get her attention. But she was paying me no mind. She was laughing with the others while Mary Warren said thoughtfully, “’Tis true, Master Robert’s handsome enough. And he’s not so old. He doesn’t get along well with his father, though. I think ’twould be hard to have John Proctor as a father-in-law.”
“No, you’d rather have him for a husband,” Mercy joked, and Mary Warren flushed.
“Well, Robert’s the eldest son,” Mary said, smoothing the bodice again—’twas as if she could not stop touching it. “And…Goodman Proctor is nearly sixty.”
Betty laughed. “Aye. You’d have him in the grave tomorrow. I can see you’ve already set your sights on all that property in Ipswich.”
“’Twould get me out of this tiny village,” Mary snorted. “Don’t tell me the rest of you don’t want the same.”
“I wouldn’t marry an old man for it,” Abigail said. “Can you imagine him touching you with those dry hands—”
“I imagine you’d learn to tolerate anything for the right to be called ‘Mistress.’”
“Anything but that.” Abigail shuddered.
“You’re young yet yet,” Mary told her. She glanced at me, and her smile was knowing and clever. “There will be a time when it won’t seem so bad. It might even be fun. Isn’t that right, Charity?”
I could not give her an answering smile. “’Tis what I’ve heard,” I managed. I wished she would stop talking, that the others would go back to their fortune-telling and leave me the chance to have a word with her. I wished she would put the bodice away. It only reminded me of the urgency of my task and the risk I’d taken in getting it for her. It didn’t help that whenever I looked at it, the bodice seemed to shiver and gleam as if it had a life of its own. I could not help thinking of my aunt Susannah standing at the table in Ingersoll’s Ordinary, her face glowing with her special light. I imagined ’twas the same light I saw now on that bodice, and I shivered at the thought that there was something of her here, watching me, haunting me.
Mary looked at Mary Warren. “You’re sure Robert’s at the tavern today? He did come down last night from Ipswich?”
Mary Warren nodded. “He’s there. You should have heard the row he had with his father last night. I thought he would return today for certain. But I heard him say he would stay until tomorrow.”
“Then it must be tonight,” Mary said.
“What must be tonight?” I asked.
Mary tilted her head at me. “Why, a visit to the Proctors’ tavern.”
“You wouldn’t dare.”
“Aye, I would.” She laughed, and I heard the excitement in her voice and knew she would do it. She would walk the miles to Ipswich Road in that red bodice just to catch Robert Proctor’s eye, even knowing that her master would cane her for sure if she was caught, even knowing that Proctors’ Ordinary was a haven for outsiders. He was licensed to sell only to travelers on the Ipswich Road, and not the village, and no one we knew ever went there.
She was so fearless. I admired her for it; I longed for some of her courage and cleverness now.
“What will the sergeant say when he finds you’re gone?” I asked.
“He won’t know,” Mary said. “I’ve told him I’ve gone to Papa’s house today.”
“What if he sends for you?”
“He won’t. Mistress Putnam’s had a falling-out with my stepmother. They’re not speaking just now. She told me good riddance when I asked for permission to visit.” Mary folded the bodice over her arm and motioned us over to the table. “Now let us see my fortune before I go.”
We all went over; I was the slowest to go. My stomach knotted—I thought I would see that bowl of water after all, and I did not want to look into it. I was nervous enough already—I did not want to give my vague foreboding a chance to blossom. I was relieved when I got close enough to see there was no bowl. Just a pair of shears and a sieve strung on a piece of string.
Carefully Mary laid the bodice on the bench and picked up the shears. “Now, who shall hold the other end?” she asked. Her hazel gaze moved over us, and I wished this would all be done. All I needed was a minute with Mary alone, just long enough to ask for her help.
“Oh, I shall hold it,” Abigail said. She came forward and reached for the shears, and Mary jerked them back from her grasp and shook her head slowly, a small smile on her face.
“I don’t think so.” She looked at me. “Charity, I think. Charity shall hold the other side. For this, I want someone with experience.”
Again I heard the implication in her voice. I’d never before done anything like this divination, and so it wasn’t that experience she meant. I looked at the others, and I saw that most of them understood that too.
I could not keep the heat from flooding my cheeks. I reached for the shears, taking one handle. After Mary told Abigail to tie the sieve so it was hanging suspended between the points of the shears, I leaned close and whispered against her ear, “I must talk to you.”
She threw me a quick glance, a little frown, and then she Megan Chance mouthed, Why? I shook my head slightly to show I meant it to be a secret.
“Quiet!” Abigail said to the boy still drumming before the fire. His noise stopped. He cowered as if he expected her blow, but she had forgotten him already. “’Tis ready,” she said to Mary. She stepped back from the sieve.
“Charity, you hold your side as you can, and I’ll do the same. If the sieve moves toward you, the answer will be no. If it moves to me, then yes! Now the question.” Mary took a deep breath and closed her eyes. When she spoke again, it was with a strong steady voice. “Will my love notice me tonight?”
She opened her eyes. The room went still; no one shifted; there was not a single hushed sound. I felt us all leaning toward the sieve, the force of our states crowded the air. At first it was like that, just smoke, harmless tension, and then the air changed. I felt it moving closer, growing heavier, until it seemed so heavy I could not fill my lungs with it. I knew this feel—I was suddenly afraid. But this time no spirit appeared to me. Instead, though there was not a breeze or a movement in the room, not even a breath, the sieve began slowly to swing. First toward me, then toward Mary again; then it hovered in the middle. I kept my side of the shears still, I swear I did—I have no idea what propelled it—but I watched in disbelief as that sieve moved slowly toward me.
Little Betsey Parris gasped; she had been so quiet that I had forgotten she was there. When I looked at her, she was staring at the sieve, and her little bowed lips were trembling as if she’d just seen the Devil himself. I knew she felt the air too; I knew she understood, as I did, what a dangerous game this was—
Mary jerked the shears from my hand and threw them on the floor. They skidded to a stop near the settle, dragging the sieve behind until it caught on an uneven board and stayed there, the string stretching taut between the open scissors and the sieve. It looked a Y there on the floor, until I saw the shadow it made. A shadow like a cross. We all stared at it for a moment, silent. Then Mary said, “I hate this game. ’Tis nonsense.”
“The sieve never works,” Betty assured her. “We should have used the bowl of water.”
Little Betsey shook her head. “I don’t like the water. It makes me more afraid.”
“No one cares what you think,” Abigail said.
“Perhaps we should try something else,” Mercy put in. “We could ask questions with the Bible—”
“About true love?” Mary scoffed. “I think not. This is silly, anyway. How could it be true? How could he not notice me in that bodice?”
Betty nodded. “Perhaps it was only saying that he would not notice you without it. We phrased the question all wrong. Ask again.”
Mary’s voice was thoughtful and a little hesitant when she said,“No, I think not tonight.” She stared at the sieve for
a moment, and I wondered what she was thinking, what schemes were turning in her head. She grabbed up the bodice from the bench. “There’s only one real way to find out.”
Quickly she undid the laces of the plain brown bodice she wore and pulled it off, letting it fall in a heap to the floor. She stood in her skirt and her shift, fingering the rich red fabric of Susannah’s bodice; then, with almost reverent fingers, she drew it on.
It was too large for her—Susannah had a more womanly shape—but not so much that it was noticeable once the laces were tightened and the virago sleeves were tied into the armholes, the wings in place over her shoulders. Betty and Mercy helped her put it on. I stood back; I’d had enough of touching it. When they were finished, I had to admit that Mary had been right about it. It did make her eyes seem browner and darker, and the red brought color into her skin. She fairly sparkled in it—now I understood why the village women never wore anything but muted colors, why they left such rich and vibrant fabrics to those who had not made their covenant with God. “The pride of apparel was evidence of a proud heart”—I had heard the admonition many times. Now I understood why. Mary looked worldly and seductive, made for sin. She was what the women in the village had warned us against since we were old enough to talk.
“Why, it looks beautiful on you,” Betty said.
Mary smiled. She smoothed it with flat palms, as if she could not get enough of touching the fabric, and her smile was dreamy and fascinating. “Two slashes,” she said, turning her arm to see the way her chemise showed through the cuts. “’Tis perfect.”
“Are you sure you want to do this, Mary?” I asked her. “Remember, it won’t be just Robert Proctor seeing you there. What will everyone think?”
Mary frowned. “I don’t plan to spend my life wasting away here—what do I care for what they will say?”