by Megan Chance
“Hannah, I am not a witch.”
“Please. For the sake of your own soul, confess the truth. Would you be hanged as a liar? Would you die unregenerate?”
I was stunned by her words. “I am not going to die. This is a mistake. I will be redeemed at my trial.”
“You will not be redeemed unless you tell the truth. You must confess to your covenant with Satan. I’m begging you, Susannah, for the sake of your soul.…”
“How can you believe this? How can you put this babe in my arms and believe I am yet a disciple of evil?”
Hannah’s eyes became bright with tears. “I am hoping the child will move you to do what you must. Lucas gave me leave to bring her. Do not leave this world unredeemed, Susannah. Cleanse your heart.”
“Lucas…gave you leave? Does he know…why you’ve come here?”
Hannah sighed. “My dear Susannah, there is not a one of us who would have you end your life as a reprobate.”
I could not believe Hannah could know me, and yet still believe…But this place, this town, how dark it was. How afraid they all were.
“Lucas is in a sad way,” Hannah went on. “To testify against his own sister.…How much easier ’twould be for him if you admitted the truth.”
I wished she would leave, but because I wanted Faith a bit longer, I suffered Hannah’s presence until the babe fell asleep in my arms and I handed her back and watched the two of them go.
I felt Faith’s warmth in my arms for a long while after. I opened the bag Hannah had brought: a blanket and another skirt of rich green, some clean linen. And there, at the bottom of the bag, lying in wait like some wretched viper, was the red paragon bodice.
The next day, Sarah Cloyce was brought to jail, along with Elizabeth Proctor and her husband, John, who had called the girls liars at his wife’s examination and had been accused himself. They all spoke of how the moving of the examinations to town to accommodate Thomas Danforth and another man, Samuel Sewall, a judge from Boston, had turned what was already chaos into unimaginable horror. Danforth had taken over the questioning, Sarah told us, and the exams had become as talked about and well attended as a hanging—which, she said bitterly, there soon might be. My isolated days in prison were over. Now we were visited often. People had begun to come and stare at us through the door as if we were the poor wretches of Bedlam, or the mangy animals in the Tower of London’s menageries.
I began to suffer from nightmares. Deep in the night, I would jerk awake to find Dorcas Good curled into my arms, her body tight against mine. I would hear the weary pleas of the latest residents, begging for sleep as Jem prodded them awake to question them, to watch for familiars that never came. In my head was the single word: Confess. Confess. I woke exhausted and undone. Confess. The word was a constant echo in my head.
’Twas soon after, that Rebecca and the Proctors and Sarah Cloyce were moved to the Boston Jail to make room for four others: Martha Corey’s husband, Giles, among them, and someone else who surprised me, someone I had not expected ever to see held a prisoner in the dungeon. Charity’s friend, mousy little Mary Warren, the Proctors’ maidservant.
When the girl was brought in and saw me, she turned back to the door as if she might try to scratch her way free. But Jem closed the door in her face, and she sank to the floor and buried her face in her arms, sobbing piteously.
’Twas a mystery why she was here; she had been seeing specters only last week—Elizabeth Proctor among them, from what the talk in prison had been. There was a part of me that hoped…for what, I didn’t know. That perhaps clearer heads had indeed prevailed. But with that thought came a fear. I had been afraid for Charity; now my worry grew stronger.
I approached Mary as if she were a wild animal I did not want to frighten away. Giles Corey said gruffly, “Leave the little bitch be. Let her suffer; ’tis what she deserves,” and Abigail Hobbs, who’d been brought only the day before, loose-haired and wild-looking, chuckled and said incomprehensibly, “Aye. She knows, she does. She knows.”
I ignored them both. I knelt beside Mary Warren. She jerked away from me in a jangling of chains. The shoulder of her bodice slipped and I saw the healing marks of a good thrashing.
“What happened?” I asked. “Why are you here?”
She steadfastly ignored me.
“Let her rot,” Giles said again. “She’s as much a liar as the rest of ’em. Proctor said he beat the Devil out of her and well he should.”
Mary glanced at him with burning hatred in her eyes—a look so intent it transformed her mousiness into something almost strangely pretty.
“They claim she signed the Devil’s book,” Giles told me. “No doubt she’s confessed to it too.”
“Is it true, Mary?” I asked her. “Did you confess to being a witch?” When she said nothing, I whispered, “What of Charity?”
She looked back at me, expressionless. “What of her?” she asked. The contempt in her words took me aback. She turned away again, and though I longed to ask more questions, ’twas clear she wouldn’t answer. Finally I did as Giles suggested; I left her alone.
It was not long before the magistrates came to the cell to take her out. They did not take her from the dungeon—I heard the opening of another cell door; here, everything echoed against the stone. I knew they’d put her into one of the other cells—I had seen them all, and I knew how small it was. ’Twas hardly room for Mary Warren and those men to stand one up against the other.
Their voices rang out, loud enough that we could hear as well as if they stood in this cell with us.
’Twas Hathorne’s voice first, relentless from the start. “Abigail Williams has said that Goody Proctor made you sign the Devil’s book. When did you do this?”
Her voice was soft, a whisper. I could not catch it.
Hathorne said, “You confessed to it.”
“No, no, I did not. I was confused. I did not understand.”
“When did you sign the book?”
“I did not sign. There was no Devil’s book.”
“You have said before there was: Which is true? Is there a book? Did you not say your mistress signed it?”
“I did. But…’twas not true.”
“Not true? She did not sign the book?”
There was silence. I heard Mary sobbing, such a quiet sound, so loud against these walls.
“’Tis a lie,” she said finally. “’Tis all a lie.”
At this, the others in the cell with me perked up.
“A lie?” ’Twas Jonathan Corwin. Well did I remember his cruelty. “What is a lie?”
“All of it. All of it.” Mary was sobbing so hard now ’twas difficult to understand her. “They have dissembled.…I have dissembled. You might as well examine a madwoman and take notice of what she said, as take the word of any of the afflicted.”
“Dear God,” Martha whispered. “Did I hear…?”
“Ssshhh,” hissed her husband.
“A lie? Did she say a lie?” Abigail Hobbs went to the door, peering out as if she hoped to see something. “Why, ’tis not a lie, none of it. I have seen them witches dancing in the dark with the Devil. In the woods, off Parris’s field. You can hear the spade-foot frogs there now, loud as you please, singing the Devil’s song, them evil things.…”
“Quiet yourself, you crazy witch,” Giles said, but I was as shocked by the woman’s words as I had been by Mary’s. When I turned to stare at her, she looked right at me with her dark eyes. She smiled as if she knew me.
“Aye, you too,” she said. “I seen you there too, didn’t I?”
I was shaken. Hannah’s words—Confess—and then Mary’s They dissemble, all of them, and now this madwoman staring at me with eyes that seemed to see beyond these dungeon walls.…
Hathorne said, “You testified against your master. Was this a lie?”
“I never accused him,” Mary cried out. “I would not accuse him!”
“Tell us the truth, Mary,” Corwin said. “What has afflicted you
now so you cannot tell us the truth? Who has blinded you? Goody Proctor? Her husband?”
“No one. I tell you, no one! I am telling the truth. All are lies.”
“Your fits were only deception? How can that be? Were you not in fact fighting the Devil? Did he not attack you when you resisted?”
She burst into tears, piteous sobbing that did not let her speak, and though they kept questioning her, Mary Warren did not answer again, but only cried as if her heart would break. Finally the magistrates called Jem down and I heard their footsteps along the hall as they left her; their shadows passed fleetingly by the door.
Martha Corey sighed and went back to her bed, and the madwoman began to pace the length of the cell. I went to my own pallet, turning away from them all. But Mary’s words kept me staring into the dark for a long while, and I wondered: What had happened between those girls? What secrets did they hide? Why had they banded together this way? What had caused it, what were they hoping for?
And worse…why had no one yet asked them?
I did not expect to see Lucas again; so when, a few days later, he came again to the cell to see me, I stared at him in surprise. How long had it been since his last visit? Two weeks? More? He looked more haggard than before, his eyes red-rimmed. There was a translucent fragility to his skin, deep shadows, hollows.
“Lucas,” I whispered. “Dear God, what has happened to you?”
“I cannot live with this,” he said in a strangled voice. “I cannot do it.”
Warily I said, “You cannot do what?”
He glanced to the others, who were paying us no attention, and I took his arm and led him to my bed. When we sat, he said in a voice heavy with tears, “When Charity accused Rebecca, I could scarce believe it. Then…last night, Charity told me she saw Judith come to her in a winding sheet. She says Judith’s spirit accuses you of murder—a small child whom you drowned in England; a crew member of the Sunfish you stabbed with a meat knife and pushed overboard; and another man, a stranger you met in Salem Town, whom you strangled with your bare hands.”
I stared at him. The charges were so absurd I had to resist an urge to laugh.
Lucas closed his eyes briefly. “I do not believe her. I know it cannot be true. ’Tis…madness.” Tentatively he took my hand, and when I did not protest, he held it tight—something he had never done before. “This is all…madness. And yet…it has moved beyond me, Susannah. It has moved beyond us all. The ministers cannot stop it, no matter how they pray and fast. Last week, our old pastor, Deodat Lawson, came to pray for the girls, to try to stop this. Instead, there are seven more afflicted—not just girls, but four women now—and here Rebecca is accused, and her sister. And now I ask myself—if the things Charity says now are not true, if she is truly…deluded…then…can there be truth in anything else she’s said?”
I did not know what to say.
“What happened between her and Sam?” he asked me.
I was surprised by the question, but I answered as well as I could. “I suspect Sam…seduced Charity, that she…did not resist him, perhaps she even fell in love with him. I believe Judith felt ’twas an unsuitable match, and she paid him five pounds to leave, and that he did so without a backward glance.”
Lucas’s face was grim. “Judith had said something to me, but I…I didn’t heed it. I saw Charity as a child, and yet…she is no child. She is sixteen now. Sixteen.” His voice turned bitter. “The days have leaped by, and I did not mark their passing. I look at her and I wonder: Where have I been? ’Twas my task to keep the Devil from her, and yet here he is. How could I have failed her so completely?”
In the corner, Dorcas began to cry that the chains at her wrists were hurting. Martha went to soothe her. Lucas’s glance went to her. He watched as the child went into Martha’s lap and the woman pressed her hand against the child’s hair and murmured some little comfort. When he looked back to me, it seemed that something had changed in his manner. I could not tell what, only that there was a change; there was sudden purpose in the way he squeezed my hand and released me, in the way he stood.
“I will not leave you here,” he whispered, and then, before I could protest, he went to the door and demanded, “Jailkeep, open the door.”
“Lucas,” I called out, hurrying to him, but he was already outside the cell, and Jem closed the door in my face.
Lucas paused. I had curled my fingers around the bars of the window, and he touched my knuckle and smiled—such an astonishing thing. I had not seen anything like it on his face before—not bittersweet, not sad, but soft and sweet.
I watched until I could no longer see him, as he followed Jem up the stairs, out of the dungeon. The things Lucas had told me, his concerns about Charity, his struggles…There was nothing easy in them, nothing to hope for. But as I turned back to the others, I felt for the first time a strange and wonderful fullness in my heart.
Chapter 34
THE NEXT MORNING, LITTLE DORCAS GOOD WAS LED AWAY. SHE clung to me and cried as the other jailkeep, Richard, tried to pull her from the cell, until he commanded her to quiet, and said, “You’re goin’ to see your ma.” She, too, was on her way to the Boston Jail, and I was lonely again when they took her, even in this cell full of people.
An hour later, Richard pushed his way through the gawkers at the door and shouted at them to leave. When they had gone, shouting and cursing and laughing every step of the way, he gestured to me with a leer and a wink. “Come on, you—the pretty one. Get on over here. You’ve been summoned.”
I’d had my fill of being summoned. “Tell them I will not go.”
“Aye, you will. Danforth hisself asked for ye.”
“Why?”
“How should I know?” Richard unlocked the door and came inside; a pair of manacles dangled from his hand. “Come on now.”
I did not make it easy for him. Richard jerked my arms from behind my back and forced the manacles on my wrists so roughly that the healing welts and sores burst open again to sting and burn. When I cried out, Richard ignored me. He pulled me to my feet, and led me out of the cell and up the stairs.
The thin light coming into the cells upstairs burned my eyes; so used was I to darkness. When Richard led me outside, the sun was unbearably bright. I had to close my eyes to keep them from hurting.
The air was brisk, but not freezing, not as it had been the last time I’d seen the sky. While I’d been in jail, the winter had gone; I felt spring already. I had grown used to the stale, rotting scent of my cell, and now the scents of the sea, of drying cod, salt mud, and the tannery, were so new to me that I was overwhelmed. I blinked and stared at the world through watering eyes. The sky was pale blue, with dozens of ship masts thrusting into it, so tall I could see them even past the houses. ’Twas as if the world had been newly tinted; trees were budding, green shoots pushing through where the sun shone warm. The snow and ice that had covered the ground when I’d last been outside were gone; there was only mud now, the unpaved roads nothing but a morass of deep carriage-wheel ruts and puddles.
It seemed impossible that there should be a change, that I should have been imprisoned for so long. ’Twas unfair that I had not been present to see the winter fade. The days passed as they always did—with me, or without me.
’Twas a thought that sat heavily upon me as I followed Richard. It turned out there was not far to go—a block or so, just past the Salem Town meetinghouse that sat across the street from the jail.
“What is this place?” I asked Richard.
“The courthouse,” he said tersely.
I stopped in surprise and dismay. “’Tis my trial? I had not expected—”
He jerked my chains so I had to walk or fall. “Come now. I ain’t got all day for this.”
No one crowded the street; when we went inside, I saw the magistrates’ desk and the bar of justice and the benches—all empty. The Proctors had said there were crowds watching the pretrial examinations; surely there would be as many for the trials themselves
. Yet the room was empty.
Richard paused only a moment; then he turned, and I saw another door, which he knocked upon. “The prisoner’s here,” he announced to the wood.
I heard a step; then the door was opened by a man I had not seen before. He had thinning hair and an unsettling air of command about him. He glanced at me, then stepped back to allow us entry. In a deep voice, he said, “Bring her in.”
’Twas a small room, with a desk and chairs that reminded me greatly of Jonathan Corwin’s study. As if to make that memory brighter, I saw Judge Corwin standing at the desk along with John Hathorne, who had questioned me so brutally at the examination. I stopped short. Then I heard a voice, a quiet “There is nothing to fear, Susannah.”
I turned to see Lucas standing there. Lucas, and behind him Thomas Putnam and Samuel Parris.
I grabbed the back of a nearby chair. My chains rattled and clanked against it. “What is this?” I whispered. “Why am I here?”
“I must confess, ’tis what I wonder as well,” the man with the deep voice said. “What is it you wish to tell us, Goodman Fowler? What news have you?”
“Let her sit,” Lucas said firmly, and when none of them protested, I did so gratefully. Then he looked to the man who’d opened the door. “Governor Danforth, you are a busy man, I know. I would not take up much of your time. You were not present when this woman was imprisoned, yet what I would say now requires your attendance.”
Danforth nodded somberly. “Proceed.”
“Susannah Morrow is my wife’s sister. My wife died in late October, and since then, Susannah has lived in my house. Six weeks ago she was…accused of the terrible crime of witchcraft. I testified against her.” Lucas did not look at me as he said these words. He gestured toward Hathorne and Corwin. “These men have my deposition on record, along with my signature.”
“I have it here,” said Corwin, motioning to a heavy record book on the desk.
Lucas said, “’Tis all laid out for you. What is not laid out for you is the truth. What I have not said is that I lusted for Susannah Morrow from the moment I first saw her. What I have not said is that I was bewitched by her. I could not resist the temptation of her—”