Annabel Horton, Lost Witch of Salem

by Vera Jane Cook

  “Bitch!” She slapped me.

  The demon laughed and turned me around. I fell off the girl and he lay above me. He brought my lips close to his. His large tongue invaded my mouth, and I almost gagged. He pressed me close to his chest, and I could feel his large phallus against me. His fingers bore into my flesh. I felt my skin burn under his touch. Then the demented girl pushed him off me and buried her head between his thighs. I held my hands straight out before me and stared into his eyes.

  “Return to your darkness, devil!” I commanded.

  He was thrown from the girl and landed sharply against the trunk of a tree. My heart raced frantically, but I ran to escape. In my panic, I tripped and fell on the ground. I turned to find my way. When I turned back, I saw the demon recover and pull the naked girl up his body. His laughter reverberated into the night sky like the echo of thunder. The girl’s legs were around his waist and her horrid face hung upside down. The phallus was buried inside her. Her hair fell to the dirt. Her cross-eye found me.

  “Witch!” she screamed. “Watch the devil fill me with his seed.”

  I found the strength to stand.

  “Take your whore back to hell,” I screamed.

  He put out his hand and pointed his fingers at my heart. My skin was seared, and my flesh opened. I felt the burn so deeply I could barely stand it. But I kept my hands straight out before me. My gaze never left his. This time, he flew back against a tree with such force that the girl, too, was thrown. The moon’s light had faded, and the night was now dark. I looked to find Urbain, but all I saw was the naked girl, who also searched for him. Then, in an instant, he reached out of the darkness and fiercely grabbed me by the neck.

  “Au revoir, God’s little avenger,” he whispered.

  In one split second, he had disappeared in a violent strike of light. I picked myself up and turned on my heels. I forced myself to run back down the dark dirt path. I screamed until my throat closed and I could scream no more. I ran back to my father’s house without looking behind me. They all heard my screams and had come out to the field to comfort me, all but my father, who stood silently on the porch steps of our home and did not move.

  “Help!” I yelled with my sore and raspy throat. “Dear God! Help!”

  I fell into Philippe’s arms. He held me and moved the hair from my eyes.

  “Grandmamma has seen the devil.” I heard my Meredith Mae whisper.

  “Yes,” said Philippe. “She must have seen Urbain.”

  “Welcome back to the seventeenth century, Mother,” my son said.

  * * * *

  My father ordered me off his land. Philippe offered to take me to the Putnam farm by carriage. I was distraught and frightened.

  “What does the demon want of me?” I whispered.

  “I believe he has left Salem. At least, for a while.” Philippe reassured me.

  The horses trotted quickly forward in the rain. I breathed in the dampness and wondered how my soul could feel so tortured when the rain fell on my lips and the cold night air penetrated my lungs. “How will I ever live in the Putnam house, Philippe? How will I bear it?”

  He kept his gaze in front of him. His face was stern and sad. “It will not be forever,” he told me.

  * * * *

  But it was forever. For years, I lived with Thomas Putnam and his family. I learned of the family’s treachery and cruelty during the trials. I discovered that Tituba had been promised salvation for her part in the incitement. I was let in on family secrets that included the rape of Mercy Lewis and the planned and manipulated accusations against John Proctor and the others. I discovered the feebleness of Reverend Parris and the molestation of several of the children by the examiners. I learned that the only sin of the accused was either arrogance or innocence. For years, I turned over and over in my bed at night consumed by hatred and rage. I yearned to bring the dead from their sphere of time and banish the demons from a forgiving heaven, to a purgatory ruled by a vengeful God. “Let there be no forgiveness in hell for the unmerciful,” I prayed.

  Thomas Putnam forbade me to read—except for the Bible. If it were not memorized to his specifications, I would be made to kneel for hours and recite the Psalms I had forgotten. I could not hold opinions that were different from his. Once, when I told him that the theocratic foundations of our society might one day be questioned, he beat me with a leather strap.

  It was difficult for me to escape to my father’s farm in the mornings because I had to account for every moment of my time. There were days when I could only spy on my family from the shadows of Cherry Hill. I would sit crying in the open air and watch Meredith Mae and Elizabeth carry milk from the north field. I could see Philippe washing down the horses or mending the roof. Far off in the distance, I knew that my son was on the old plow with my father. What a terrible farmer he was and how he hated it. I smiled to myself knowing how hard he would try to please, but how desperately sick he was of the dirt under his nails and the physical exhaustion he felt at the end of the day. He could not bear owning just one simple pair of pants, and he found the winters on the Massachusetts hillside pernicious and interminable.

  I ached to join my family, but we could only steal moments when Father was away in Andover, or when he was distracted by his daily chores. Sometimes, he would visit long enough with my brothers and I could spend whole hours sitting in the sparse pine kitchen conversing with my family. I would tell Thomas Putnam that I was praying and memorizing the Bible, but it was not very often that I could steal these moments. I would risk a beating if I stayed away too long.

  * * * *

  Though we dared not admit it, we longed for the grand luxury of our home on Montague Street. We could not get used to the austerity of the small, quiet rooms, reflecting a precious simplicity so contradictory to our understanding of comfort.

  Matthew’s tales about the city we called Brooklyn, in another dimension of time, fascinated Elizabeth. She listened intently when we spoke of women walking under pastel parasols and brightening their faces with rouge. She listened to our stories of spontaneous dimensions with pensive and complaisant acceptance, but I knew she doubted us. She had recuperated well from her transformation out of darkness to land fortuitously in the body of Annabel Horton. Her spiritual image ingrained in my lost features like symmetry captured in clay. Of course, her only recollection of the trials were contained in the shadows of genetic omniscience. It was assumed that the tragedies were too frightening to carry in memory.

  My son was clearly happy, so I hid my misery as best I could. But, one morning, my brother James caught me on the farm and went for his pistol. Matthew jumped him and James ran from the house in a rage. He was furious that we would allow Ann Putman into our home. I could not control my sorrow that day. My own brother, whom I loved—the brother that had taught me to climb trees and had always shielded me from harm—did not know me. I wept bitterly after he left and told them all how unbearable it was to live without them…to pretend that I was a Putnam when the very thought of the Putnam’s caused me such disgust.

  * * * *

  On my next visit, Matthew suggested I return to Brooklyn and live in peace.

  “To return to what—an empty house—Malcolm Northrup and his horrid family? No, Matthew. I will never leave you.”

  I brought his hand to my lips and kissed it.

  “So be it, Mother,” he whispered. “But I wish you would reconsider.”

  “I will never leave you,” I repeated firmly. “Not ever.”

  Chapter Thirteen

  My father’s land was adjacent to the Cloyce farm. Peter Cloyce lived in a tiny house at the foot of the Mile Brook. His wife had died after the birth of her last child, and he was left alone with his seven children. He was a friendly man that spoke often to everyone, and yet, was a friend to none. The Cloyce’s had always attended Reverend Parris’s church, and not the Chapel on Lindal Hill, where my family always gathered on Sunday mornings. Yet, my father was there when they laid his wife
Ruth to rest, and as a child I played in the fields with his youngest sons, Daniel and Isaac. After dark, Peter Cloyce could always be found at the Ingersoll Tavern, a popular meeting place for the people of Salem Village. Since the death of his wife, he only seemed interested in farming and drinking. He left the care of his youngest children with his two oldest daughters, Sarah and Susanna. Almost every evening he would stop at the door of our house and yell for Father, “Joshua Horton, come join me for beer and leave a hard day’s work behind you.”

  Father would laugh and rise to the window. “I shall keep my wits about me, Brother, but the Lord bless you.”

  Peter Cloyce would then continue on down the road to join his eldest sons at the Ingersoll Tavern, and there they would drink beer and liquor and share family tales with their neighbors, straining the ear for gossip as the crowds gathered.

  Father had few close friends and preferred the company of his sons and their families. He considered Peter Cloyce to be an ass with the face of a man, but it was after the witch trials that my father’s tolerance for him evolved from a casual politeness into a fierce resentment. Father would never forget that during the trials Peter had been quick to judge the accused and yet complacent and indifferent toward the accusers. Father said he revealed a weakness of character in a time of great need and community suffering.

  Upon my return to the dimension of the late 1600s, I was acutely aware that the town had remained torn apart by the trials and senseless hangings. The people still argued over the guilt or innocence of those who rotted in the town jail or swung by their necks on Gallows Hill. But life went on. The afflicted girls matured into women, and some of them even joined hands with the sons of those they had injured. Three of Peter Cloyce’s children married into families whose sisters and wives had been accused of witchcraft. His fourth son, Samuel Cloyce, married Mary Harding, who had accused half the town of Andover of the devil’s sorcery. And though the village tried to heal itself by random acts of benevolence, the suffering of those who had been victimized haunted the happiness of those responsible. But everyone made the best of their lives and sought to live in God’s righteousness. The ministers preached forgiveness and the people of Salem searched their hearts for the courage to honor God. They prayed for the souls of those murdered but they avoided apology. That would not come for several years.

  * * * *

  Peter Cloyce had a brother by the name of Ezra. Ezra returned to Salem Village in the year 1698, with a wife and three small daughters. Unlike his brother, who was more simplistic than malevolent, Ezra Cloyce wore evil in his smile. His eyes were a curious cinereous color with lids that were lined in blood. His teeth were large, and his body bent like a long, lean twig so that his head walked out in front of him. His back stooped as if it might swallow his neck. He was a huge hulk of a man with hands so large he only needed one to lift his youngest daughter into the wagon.

  He and his brother built a house on the Cloyce land for Ezra and his family. Ezra’s house also bordered the Mile Brook, but it was shielded by two large apple trees and faced away from the road. When it was finished, it seemed to dwarf Peter’s small and unassuming farmhouse, so the brothers decided they would move Peter’s farmhouse to face the mountains. When the work was completed, Peter’s house had been set back from the road, as well, and several rooms had been added. My father’s rear yard now faced the front door of Peter Cloyce’s new home.

  Father told the brothers that he owned fifteen feet of the land taken up by Peter Cloyce’s new house. Peter and Ezra disagreed with the deed map my father produced and refused to pay my father for the use of the land. Now, my father was a gentle man and would have easily turned his head and ignored an issue not worth more than fifteen feet of land, but my father’s beloved view of the brook had been completely obstructed by a house that he considered a reckless and grotesque investment. To add further salt to the wound, Ezra Cloyce refused my father access to the brook that ran past the fifteen feet of land under Peter Cloyce’s house. Peter’s diplomacy was lost on Ezra’s meanness, and eventually, both men opposed my father and agreed that he not access the brook on land he actually owned.

  The feud between the three men went on for several months. My brothers finally insisted that Father turn to the courts to settle the matter and either order the Cloyce brothers to pay my family a rent for the land they were using, or have the house torn down and rebuilt.

  The courts eventually sided with my father, and the Cloyce brothers were forced to buy the fifteen feet of land they were trespassing on. My father was also granted an easement, which provided him access to the brook. Ezra Cloyce exposed his vengeance for my father by shooting at his dogs and tearing down the small bridge he had built with my brothers over near the old Planters Farms. My brothers, James and Jeremiah, often returned bruised and bloody from confrontations in the field with Ezra.

  But out of all the men in our family, it was my son Matthew whom Ezra Cloyce truly hated. I was distressed to learn that he appeared on our land one afternoon when Father was in Andover. He walked on the land and began throwing pebbles at my son.

  When my son yelled at him to stop, Ezra paused for a moment, and then turned away, as if he might leave. But then, he gave a little laugh and began to throw the pebbles again. Philippe went to intervene, and Ezra Cloyce drew a pistol.

  “I only throw pebbles. Can the boy not take it?” he asked. Then he made odd sounds in the back of his throat and began to taunt Matthew with cruel and hideous remarks.

  “Daffy man. Come darn my socks. Here daffy, daffy. Me wants a wife like you.”

  “Get off our land, mister. I’ll shoot you if I have to.”

  I was told Matthew walked right up to him and stood firm. Ezra Cloyce held his side and made loud wheezing sounds from the back of his throat.

  “Is that right, daffy? What are you going to shoot me with? That pretty daffy finger of yours?”

  He then made obnoxious chuckling sounds, like a hungry pig, and started shooting his pistol on the ground around my son’s feet. Matthew stood very still, but Philippe later told me he could hear Matthew’s heart pounding in his chest. Elizabeth must have heard the shots because she ran from the house screaming and throwing large objects at Ezra Cloyce. She had brought two pots from the kitchen, and after one hit his knee, and the other hit his arm, she began to grab dirt and rocks from the ground that she angrily threw at his face. He had been startled by Elizabeth’s unexpected charge, so Philippe was able to jump on him and wrestle him to the ground. Ezra Cloyce gave Philippe two heavy punches to the chin and almost knocked him out with those huge, brawny hands of his, before he turned and ran back toward the Cloyce farm. All the way back they could hear his laughter as he leaped over the brook and called behind him. “Daffyyyyyyy. Daffyyyyyy. Daffyyyyyyy.”

  * * * *

  My son said he was not afraid of Ezra Cloyce. But I was afraid. I began to feel as I had on the day of my sentencing. My chest was explosive and my body shook. “Please, Matthew, let us return to Brooklyn.”

  My son laughed. “Mother, Annabel…”

  I corrected him quickly. “Elizabeth, Matthew. I am Annabel. The girl is Elizabeth…a spirit not yet born.”

  “Forgive me, Mother. I will try and remember. Elizabeth is not touched by God as we are. She cannot move the walls of time. And I will not walk through without her.”

  “Let us teach her our power then,” I told him. “She is of our blood,” I insisted.

  He looked at me for a long time and then reached out to hold me.

  “All right, Mother. See that you are careful not to frighten her, though.”

  He kissed me on my forehead and I promised that I would do nothing to harm her. I begged him to protect himself against Ezra Cloyce, and he assured me that Ezra Cloyce was a harmless brute who would eventually tire of tormenting our family, but if it would give me some relief, he would arm himself against anymore surprise visits by keeping his pistol on him when he was in the south field near the h
ouse or near the brook that bordered the two farms.

  * * * *

  While Matthew worked the fields with my father, I spent hours with Elizabeth. I did not talk of potions and of spells, as Tituba had once spoken of with the children. No, I spoke of the mind and the power within to shatter the vision of flesh and blood and see with the soul. The girl listened pensively. Philippe made a large labyrinth way out in Birch Plain and she walked it for hours. We waited for the presence of infinity. We hoped to see a second in which Elizabeth would vanish, when the line of gravity would be delicately revealed in the ripple of the wind. But, poor Elizabeth could only weep and fall to the ground. “Annie, I haven’t power. I try, but I only feel quiet and relaxed. Nothing more.”

  * * * *

  She called me Annie, as everyone else did in Salem, though I told her once that I was Matthew’s mother.

  “Shish, Annie. What will I do with you? The witches have all returned to Satan. If you go around telling people that, they shall press you to death, or surely hang you from the tree. You’re but a girl’s age, Annie.”

  I wondered how much Elizabeth really believed and what magic she actually possessed. Certainly, I could see that she did not have the power of Meredith Mae or Matthew, but she could feel cold spots on the earth. She was sensitive to the pull of time and the gentle shift of the environment that occurs when one passes a dimension of violence or passion. But alas, she was so very limited.

  * * * *

  When the labyrinth failed to guide Elizabeth to the inner sanctum, when it failed to expose her to that confrontation with perception that sends the soul beyond the flesh, we lay her in the fields and hummed. We held hands and closed our eyes. The sound that Philippe and I made came from the memory of our ancestors. From the echo of those who had given us a power we could not account for. We followed the voice of those kindred souls and were led into a low and sonorous breath that we pushed out from deep within. After several minutes, Philippe and I could move beyond our bodies and feel the vertiginous surface of gravity release us. We could turn and see the physical world. We could see ourselves lying in a bed of daffodils and hear the call of our breath in the wind. But Elizabeth sat solid and impenetrable, her mind a mirage of images and preconceived realities, which we could not threaten with this greater knowledge of pure and infinite life. We would return to the harbor of flesh and stare sadly at Elizabeth’s artless attempts to master transmigration.