Susannah Morrow

by Megan Chance

  Before us was a building that looked too small to be a jail. ’Twas a single story only, with clapboards worn as gray and colorless as the sky. Just behind it was a narrow band of flat land and weedy hillocks and bog, the stinking wet mud and shallow water of a tidal river. “This cannot be the jail,” I said.

  “Aye, it is,” the constable assured me. He jerked me to the door as if I were struggling against him, instead of merely stumbling over the icy mud of the street.

  He went not to the main door, which was padlocked, but to a smaller one off a lean-to at the back. He did not bother to knock, but ushered me into a dark room barely lit by a single candle. I was assailed instantly with the stink of urine and filth. ’Twould have been bad enough on its own, but mixed in were odors of boiled cabbage and salt herring, and the stench of salt-washed mud and rot from the river.

  “What’s this?”

  ’Twas a man’s voice, and as he spoke, I saw his shadow rise from a table, and without him blocking the hearth, the room became light enough to see. ’Twas a tiny place—a hearth, a large worktable, and kegs of what I took to be beer or cider lining the walls.

  “Susannah Morrow,” the constable said from beside me.

  “Ah, yeah. We been expecting you, lady fair.” The jailkeep smiled mockingly. He was tall and dark, dressed in filthy homespun, and his hair was spiky, as if he had not combed it in a goodly while. He wiped his arm across his face, and I saw the grease on his fingers, and looked beyond him to see the remains of a meal on the table. At his belt hung a ring of keys. “Come on, then,” he said, motioning for us to follow.

  I saw the door then, a door with a massive lock, and suddenly my knees would not bend; George Locker had to push me to make me move.

  “Your friends were sent to Boston Jail yesterday,” the jailkeep said.

  “My friends?” I asked.

  “Them other witches,” he told me. “Lucky you, you’ll have the cell to yourself for a piece. Not for long, though. I hear them girls are still calling names.”

  He unlocked the door and pulled it open, stopping for a moment to light a lantern before he stepped into darkness. The constable pushed me again, and I stumbled through, nearly falling, while the jailkeep laughed.

  Here, the wet-rot smell of the river was stronger. ’Twas a room about twenty foot square, with three cells bearing a heavy door and a tiny barred window. Each was very small, and held two bunked beds with straw pallets, and a slop pail. There were windows along the hall, but they were small as well. It had not been warm in the outer room, though there had been a fire going, but ’twas a paradise compared to the cold here.

  ’Twas a horrible place, the most horrible I’d ever seen. But though I expected the jailkeep to open one of these barred doors, he continued on to another padlocked door half hidden in shadows. He gave me a lewd smile before he unlocked it as well, and pulled it open.

  “Here’s where you’ll be. The witch dungeon.” He laughed; ’twas an eerie sound that echoed in the darkness. The air turned dank, the kind of damp cold that creeps into bones. Before me were open slat stairs. The jailkeep took them as one familiar enough with a place that darkness was no barrier, and his lantern lit the way for the constable and me.

  Again I balked—I could not walk past my dread. Locker pulled on the end of the chain binding my wrists, and I went. Down, down, and then into a room so cold and damp and foul I could not believe I was to stay here. It, too, was divided into cells, some too small even for a child. The stone floors were damp through my shoes, the low-ceilinged walls—made of brick and stone—dripped moisture that smelled of the mudflats. I heard a scurrying in the shadows, a squeak.

  I began to tremble. There were no windows, only heavy iron sconces in the walls meant for lanterns or rushlights.

  The jailkeep must have seen my horror. “Don’t worry, lady fair. It ain’t so bad. Sometimes them rats even sleep with you. They like to be warm too.” He went to one of the larger cells. The key scraped and rattled in the lock; the door creaked as he pulled it open. He said to Locker, “You want to chain her to the wall?”

  Locker shook his head. “There’s no need.”

  The jailkeep shrugged. “As you wish.” He turned to me. “But if you be trouble, I’ll put ’em back on you right quick.”

  I looked at the constable. “You cannot leave me alone.”

  “You won’t be alone,” he said. “You’ve got Jem here to watch you.”

  Jem nodded. “I’ll keep a good eye on you, lady fair. You bet I will.”

  That frightened me more than the rats and the dark, but I said nothing as George Locker closed the cell door and the lock clanged shut.

  They left me then. Jem took the lantern. I watched that small bit of light grow fainter as they went up the stairs, and opened the door; then the light was gone, and I was in a darkness so deep I could not even see the denser shadow of myself within it.

  I heard the steady drip of water down a wall, and the squeaking came again, a shuffle in the straw. Carefully I backed away, remembering where the bed was and moving in that direction, until I felt the rough wood of the bunk against my backside. I felt along it—just a straw pallet, without a blanket or a sheet. When I sat, I smelled dust and mildew—not even clean straw. Who knew how many other bodies had slept on it? Still, ’twas not on the ground, and I was grateful for that, though I knew how rats could climb.

  In the lack of any other sound, my own breathing was loud and uneven. I pulled my cloak close about me, but the damp chill seeped steadily past it. I wished I had thought to bring a scarf, a blanket. I would have given much to have my fellow prisoners here, even such women as that, both for company and warmth.

  I don’t know how long I sat there, trying to keep warm, but finally I heard the scrape of a key in a lock, the creaking open of the door above the stairs. I saw the faint glow of light coming through the barred window, but then I saw ’twas only Jem, and the lantern only made plain what had disappeared in the darkness. In the end, I preferred not to see the hell I was in.

  The jailkeep smiled again as he came to the cell. I saw he was carrying a bottle, a blackjack noggin, and a bucket that emitted some foul smell. “Thought you might be hungry,” he said. “You hungry, lady fair?”

  He didn’t wait for me to answer. He shoved the pail inside, and then the noggin. “Your friends’re gonna be sorry they missed this one.”

  Cautiously I came from the bed. “What is it?”

  “Prison stew. Nothin’ but the best scraps for witches, eh?”

  I had been hungry, but when I took the pail and opened the lid, my appetite died. The smell was horrible, the same boiled cabbage I’d smelled upstairs, along with chunks of something else, pared away and dotted with maggot holes that I could see even in the dim light of the lantern. “I cannot eat this.”

  Jem shrugged. “You’ll be hungry for it soon enough, I’ll warrant.”

  I reached for the noggin. ’Twas beer at least; I knew it by the smell. In relief, I gulped it, and then choked at the salt and pickle taste of it. “’Tis tainted,” I gasped.

  “Tis what the prisoners get,” he said. “Drink up.”

  I pointed to the bottle. “What is that?”

  “’Tis mine,” he said. He held it close to his chest. “This be fine Barbados rum—it won’t be comin’ close to your greedy hands. Drink your beer.”

  I was thirsty—even the beer was better than nothing, and so I drank. Yet it left a dry salt taste in my mouth; when I finished, I was nearly as thirsty as when I began.

  I had barely emptied it when Jem pulled a stool I had not seen from the shadows. He settled it in the corner of my cell and sat down, leaning back against the wall, setting the lamp on the floor beside him. He uncorked the bottle and took a long great sip that made my own throat constrict in longing.

  I wiped my mouth with the back of my hand. “What are you doing?”

  “I been paid to watch you, and that’s just what I’m going to do.”

&nbs
p; I gestured to the door. “I can hardly escape.”

  “You been accused of a witch. I hear you can send your spirit anywhere. And I got to watch for your familiar, case he makes a visit.”

  “I’m not a witch.”

  “They all say that,” he told me. “But I’m guessin’ the best liars be servants of the Devil.”

  I stepped back, leaving the foul stew and the empty noggin abandoned, and went to the bed, where I sat again in the shadows. I sat there for a few moments, listening to him gulp his rum while my thirst raged in my throat and my bladder grew heavy. I bore it until I could not any longer, and then I got up to use the slop pail in the corner.

  “I need to relieve myself,” I told Jem. “Turn away.”

  He only smiled and gestured with the bottle. “Go on,” he said, and stared at me unabashedly, until I was forced to pull up my skirts and squat over that pail while he watched. I retreated again to the bed, humiliated and horrified. There was nothing to do but curl up on the pallet and try to sleep.

  I did not allow myself to think of Lucas or Charity—such thoughts were too painful, too uncertain. Instead, I thought of Jude and Faith, soothing myself by thinking of the baby’s soft, downy head, her solid weight. Only a few weeks ago, Hannah had come by and put Faith in my arms, and then sat at the table with Jude while I taught them both a game I’d played as a little girl, one with sticks thrown into a pile and grabbed up one by one. Now I thought of that time, of Jude laughing and Faith falling asleep nuzzled against my breast, and the memory warmed me as no fire had ever done; I forgot my thirst. Finally I fell asleep.

  I was in the midst of a dream where I was waiting on a great hill for Lucas to come, and through the fog I saw his shadow upon a horse. I heard him call my name. Then ’twas as if I were yanked back, falling, and I startled awake to find a man bending over me, his rummy breath in my face, his fingers gripped tight around my arm.

  “Now, now,” he whispered. “Wake up, dearie.”

  I was groggy, still sleep-fed. For a moment I was not sure where I was. I felt his weight against me, his hand at my hip. The straw of the pallet was hard and scratchy against my cheek. The man laughed in my ear, and I remembered suddenly: I was in jail, and this was Jem, the jailkeep, and his hands were all over me. I gagged and rolled, trying to get him off me, but he stuck like a tick, all hands. My rolling had only managed to put me on my back, and him on top of me. He laughed again and relaxed, holding my wrists, his body full on mine.

  “Don’t touch me,” I said.

  “Not so fast, not so fast,” he said. “Just makin’ sure you’re awake is all. Nothin’ more.” But he wriggled his hips against me, and I felt the hard ridge of his cock between my legs.

  He was stronger than I, even as thin and scrawny as he was. I closed my eyes and burrowed deep within myself, waiting for Jem to pull up my skirts and be done with it. But he only pressed himself against me, humping me through our clothes, and whispered, “Aye, you’d like that, wouldn’t you? Well, I ain’t bewitched by you like them others.”

  Still, he lay upon me until I felt him jerk and go still; then he rose, pulling at his breeches, and I heard him move to the stool again and settle upon it. Then I heard him laugh, and I felt the end of a long, sharp, pointed stick. “No sleep for you tonight, lady fair,” he said, and his laughter echoed like a demon in my head. “Tell me, when does your familiar come?”

  When Jem finally left, early in the morning, I fell into a shallow, restless sleep that could not have lasted more than an hour, perhaps two. When I heard the cell door opening, I dragged myself awake, expecting to see my tormentor. Instead, I saw a man I didn’t recognize, who wore Jem’s key ring at his waist. He was followed by two women and a greasy-haired man of middle years.

  The man with the key ring was older than Jem, with graying, sandy brown hair and no front teeth. “This here’s the one,” he said to the other. “Make short work of it, will you? I’ve got things to do.”

  The other man and the women came inside. The women were matrons, dressed in homespun, with the caps upon their heads nearly hiding the color of their hair. The man was dressed in patched breeches and a vest so stained ’twas hard to see what the color had been—and in the dimness, impossible to tell in any case.

  He stopped just inside the door and looked at me, and then a grin moved over his pock-marked face. “Now then, are you sure? I was led to believe ’twas an old woman.”

  Jem’s replacement shook his head. “This is the witch.”

  “What is this?” I asked, bewildered by their talk. “Are there more accusations? Are you victims as well?”

  The man laughed. The women looked faintly horrified. At the cell door, the man with the key ring snorted. “Didn’t Jem tell you they’d be comin’?”

  “No. Where is Jem?”

  “Sleepin like a babe,” he said. He winked at me. “You wore ’im out last night, for sure.”

  I ignored that. I looked to the strangers in my cell. The man was carrying a leather bag, which he set aside, and I began to feel a sick foreboding. “Who are you then?”

  “I’m a surgeon,” he said. “These two women are my assistants. Please stand.”

  I drew back into the shadows of the bed. “Why?”

  “We’ve been asked to search you.”

  “Search me? For what? I’ve nothing but my clothes.”

  “Stand,” he said again. When I made no move, he glanced at the new jailkeep, who sighed and came reluctantly over.

  “Come on, gel,” he said, pushing past the still-silent women. He jerked me from the bed so hard I gasped and cried out. “Stand up for the man, or I’ll hold you still for im.”

  I stood with as much dignity as I could muster—a dignity that lasted only as long as it took for the women to set upon me.

  I could not understand what they were doing—testing my arms, I thought, running their hands over my hips, looking for something. Then I realized they were undressing me, unlacing my bodice, unfastening my skirt, and I began to struggle against their hands.

  “Be still,” one of the women said crossly, slapping me hard. The jailkeep held me so tightly I could not move. When the women slid off the sleeves of my bodice and chemise, I felt the heat of shame work its way over my face. They stripped me bare, so ’twas nothing but my skin against the cold dampness of the prison; I stood there before four strangers completely naked.

  The surgeon came forward. “Lift your arms,” he said, and made me raise them over my head, though I was weak and could not hold them that way without trembling. The women stepped forward then to hold them there, to hold me still while that man ran his hands over my body. He pinched my nipples, pulling them, twisting them. I heard his breathing go fast and coarse, and smelled the onion and smoke smell of him, the grease of his hair. I wanted to struggle against him, but the women and the jailkeep held me still, and I was too exhausted to do more than flinch when his hand lifted my breast and he bent so close I felt the heat of his breath on my nipple.

  I had a mole there, a little fleshy thing. Now he pulled it, gently at first, then harder. He held out his hand, and one of the women dropped her hold on me to fish in her pocket. She pulled out a small packet of pins, which flashed in the lamplight, and held one out for him. He took it, and I gasped as he pierced the mole with it. He glanced up at me. “Does that hurt?”

  I turned away from him. He wiggled the pin again, until the flesh went numb and I felt nothing, not even when he pulled it loose. “Looks to me like a teat,” he said. “She don’t feel a thing.”

  The women bent close. “Aye,” one said breathlessly. “Look at how it seems it has been suckled upon.”

  “’Tis dry now,” said the other. She glanced up at me. “When did your familiar last eat?”

  I understood now, what they were looking for. Preternatural teats, used to nourish a witch’s demon familiar. “I have no familiar,” I said. “’Tis just a mole.”

  They ignored me. The surgeon rose and looked
again at my breasts. “You see how fresh and full they are now? We shall check them again in the evening to see if they have changed.”

  “There is no need,” I said. “They look as they ever do.”

  “Bend over,” the surgeon said.

  “I will not,” I told him.

  The jailkeep grabbed my breast, squeezing it so hard tears came to my eyes, and said, “Bend over for the doc, lest you want more o’ the same.”

  I could not fight them, and as I bent and grasped hold of the edge of the bed, I lost the will to do so. I felt that surgeon at me, probing into my deepest parts until I was beyond humiliation or feeling. I barely knew when it was over, only that they were gone, and I was left alone in the darkness.

  Chapter 32

  ’TWAS LATER THAT DAY, OR THE NEXT MORNING—I HAD NO NOTION of time in this dank and forgotten place—that they put the chains on me again. “The girls complain still of your specter pinching them,” Jem told me. “They say ’tis because you’re unchained that your spirit is free.” He yanked the end of the chain to a place near the bed where there was one of many metal rings embedded in the stone, and chained me to it.

  The chain was short; I had barely room to get to the bed, and when I was there, I could lie in only two positions comfortably. I was too exhausted to care. I was grateful to be alone, to finally rest. Sleep was all I could think of, all I wanted.

  As the days passed, my hours were broken only by the jailkeeps bringing me food or poking me awake to watch for my familiar. I was not taken for another examination, though I had expected and dreaded it. I began to feel as if I were sinking into darkness—I was confused and disoriented. I thought often of the night I’d left Lancashire for good, the last time I’d seen my sister before our ill-fated meeting here. How I’d lain waiting until my parents fell asleep, until I heard the quiet, even rise and fall of Judith’s breath, how quietly I rose from the straw pallet so that I would not wake her. Earlier I’d gathered my few belongings into a sack—a second bodice, an apron, two pairs of stockings—and hidden it away behind a barrel of salt meat. I’d made no noise as I retrieved it, but I heard Judith stir, and I froze until she whispered, “I will tell them you left early to see the parson. ’Twill be hours before they think to look for you.”