There it was—a hanging plastic bag, fed by a catheter that snaked up under the covers. Working quickly, she unfastened the bag from its tubing, lip curled in faint distaste. If it were anyone else, she thought, balancing it in her hands as she clambered to her feet, looking down at his face. Nothing. Good.
She turned to the windowsill, tipping the container on an incline until its meager contents trickled in slow waves down the inside of the bottle. She emptied it about halfway, filling the bottle two-thirds full, its blue glass shimmering green around the liquid from Sam’s body. In an instant she was done, and Connie got back to her knees, fastening it back in place under the bed.
As she crouched on the floor on her hands and knees, there was a shifting in the bed over her head and she heard a hoarse voice say, “That you, Cornell?”
Quickly she sat up on her heels, looking into Sam’s face. His lids had eased open halfway, soft green eyes underneath growing more awake. “What are you doing on the floor?” he whispered, half-smiling.
“Nothing,” she said soothingly, easing herself into the chair. “I dropped an earring. No big deal.”
His grin widened, one eyebrow traveling up his forehead. “Nice try. You don’t wear earrings,” he remarked.
She smiled back. “Says you. I’m sorry I woke you up.”
“Nah,” he said, shifting his weight in the bed. “You didn’t. Doctors say I need to sleep whenever I can, but it comes and goes.”
“Do you want some water?” she asked, mind skipping ahead to consider ways to distract him from noticing the bottle on the windowsill. He licked his lips, seeming to find them dry, and settled his head into the pillow.
“Sure,” he said, straining a little against the straps. “You might take these off, too. Frickin’ irritating.”
Connie rose, turning to the small sink that was under the paper towel dispenser and scrubbing her hands briskly under hot water. “Have you had any of them today?” she asked quietly, reaching for a glass and filling it with water from the tap.
“What time is it?” he asked, voice thick.
Connie glanced up at the institutional clock overhead. “Four thirty-three,” she said.
“Then it’s been about two hours since the last one,” he said. He sounded weary. She brought the water to him, placing it on the nightstand and bending to loosen the straps at his wrists. When they were free, he stretched his arms overhead, rolling his hands at the wrists and exhaling with a great, shuddering sigh. She watched him, enjoying the revealed tautness of his body, at the same time appalled at herself for thinking of him that way in such a context. He eyed her, drinking down the water.
“What?” he asked, bringing the glass down from his lips.
“Nothing,” she replied, feeling a flush creep down from her hairline, wrapping around her ears.
“What?” he teased, setting the glass down again on the table and folding his arms.
“Nothing,” she said, a smile twisting her mouth. He reached forward, sliding his hand behind the nape of her neck and pulling her to his mouth. When their kiss ended, some moments later, he rested his forehead against hers, their noses touching.
“I didn’t expect this to happen,” he said, hand still resting on the back of her neck. Connie felt the warmth of his fingers pressing there and reached up to drape one hand over his bent arm.
“Which part?” she asked. Through the tight skin of his forehead she could sense his anxiety, knowing that as the minutes passed they drew closer to his next seizure, and that there was nothing either of them could do about it.
“Any of it,” he admitted, “but I was really referring to the part where I met you.”
She smiled, but her smile was strained and sad. She reached up to pull on his earlobe, saying nothing.
“Listen,” he started to say. “I want you to know something,”
“Don’t worry about it,” she said.
“You don’t know what I was going to say,” he objected.
“Yes, I do,” she whispered, pressing her forehead more firmly against his. They sat like that for a while in silence, both eyes closed, communicating without speaking.
Presently Sam sighed, saying, “You should probably put on the bands again,” and she heard fear coiled under his matter-of-fact tone. She nodded, stooping to kiss the back of his hand before easing it into the padded Velcro strap hanging from the railing of the bed. “Make it tight,” he told her.
“Sam,” Connie said, working on the strap for his other hand, “I don’t want you to worry, but you might not see me for a couple of days.”
“Why?” he asked. “Something up?”
“You could say that,” she said, finishing with his left hand. “I have something pretty important that I have to do.”
“Is this for that conference that you mentioned? The one Chilton wants to take you to?” He tried to brighten as he said this. He always asked about her work, always made an effort to carry on as if they were just talking over coffee. Connie’s heart contracted with guilt when he did so, though he swore that he preferred the normalcy of discussing work and ideas to non-stop reflection on his worsening condition. She tried to believe him.
“Yes and no,” Connie said, stroking his hair. “Maybe. But I want you to know that I’ll be thinking about you the whole time.” She leaned in to whisper in his ear. “I have the book.”
Sam’s eyes sparked with excitement, and he sat up against the pillows. “No way!” he gasped. “And you didn’t bring it? You’ve got to bring it! I can’t believe you came to see me and you didn’t bring it.” He looked genuinely thrilled. A burst of softness and warmth stretched out under Connie’s rib cage, causing her to deepen her breath. She grinned at him.
“You’ll see it. Soon. I just have to do this one thing first.” She placed one palm on his forehead, easing him back into the pillows. She tried to telegraph a feeling of lightness, comfort, and sleepiness from her hand into his skin, filtering it deep into his brain, attempting to prepare his body for the tremors that were—she looked up at the clock, and wished as she did so that she had done it more subtly—probably only moments away. “Don’t worry,” she murmured. “This is all going to sort itself out. Very soon.”
As she spoke, his eyelids grew heavier, draping over his eyes like a thick velvet curtain. A tiny smile played about his lips, and his body loosened, hands falling slack in the restraints. Maybe he’ll sleep through this one, she hoped as she felt his consciousness drift away under her pressing hand. When his eyes were completely closed, she slowly removed her hand, watching his chest rise and fall.
Satisfied, she turned back to the bottle standing unnoticed on the windowsill, pushed the stopper back into its neck, and slid it into her shoulder bag. Then she folded up the paper towel, easing it silently into the garbage can by the sink.
She returned to the bed, pulling the small note card with no title out of its hiding place in her pocket. It had been secreted away in the same packet as the Latin charm for growing tomatoes, interleaved with unremarkable midcentury recipes for aspic and casserole. Rereading its contents, Connie shook her head, smiling and incredulous.
The card held a seemingly nonsensical sequence of letters, arranged in a triangle, and though Connie could still not entirely believe it, she knew that even a little child would recognize it for what it was. The charm looked like this:
Underneath the strange triangle was written only one instruction. “To draw out the sickness, apply as a charm to the body,” Connie read aloud in a whisper. She folded the card into a tiny square and leaned forward, brushing Sam’s forehead with her lips as she slid the charm into the pillowcase under his head. He snored gently in his sleep, and Connie gazed down at him, her face softening. “This has got to work,” she said to herself, but perhaps to the universe as well.
Then she crossed the room on silent feet and slipped out the door.
Interlude
Boston, Massachusetts
July 18
16
92
A flurry of voices traveled down the grim hallway, a young woman’s in rapid and emphatic discourse with a sullen male. The prisoners in the narrow, grimy cells lining the passageway raised their heads, listening. The volume rose, then dropped, and the sound of clattering keys signaled the opening of the door at the far end of the hallway. Dirty faces pressed against the small openings at the top of the heavy cell doors: here George Burroughs, a deposed minister in the Village, his hair grown weedy and long; there Wilmott Redd, a plump fishwife from up Marblehead, her usually merry face now thin and drawn.
Mercy Dane looked on the faces with sorrow, slipping a thick, hard biscuit through each cell slot. She had not known how much to bring; Sarah Bartlett told her it was best to bring too much. Hands extended from the cell door openings, grasping at the meager sustenance, most of them too exhausted even to utter thanks. Mercy made her way slowly down the passage, distributing her bread, finally stopping at the last cell at the end. She peered through the slot in the cell door and could just make out two figures huddled in the darkness: what looked like a little girl balled up in the far corner, clad in only a stained undershirt, and a woman sitting up, her head leaning against the stone wall, her back to the door. The floor was scattered with a thin layer of straw, and the stench of mold was almost overpowering. The cell was barely lit by a small, barred rectangular window high overhead, all available sunlight blocked by the boot heels of a loiterer standing in the street.
“Mama?” Mercy whispered through the cell door. The leaning figure inside the cell did not move. Glancing around her to ensure that she went unobserved, Mercy raised her hand to the lock on the cell door and whispered a long string of Latin words. A blue glow swelled from the inner depths of her palm, warm and crackling, and it pressed outward from the surface of her skin to envelop the rusted metal of the lock. When the glow subsided, Mercy pressed her fingertips against the heavy wood of the door and felt it yield to her pressure. She edged through the open crack, shutting it silently behind her.
“Mama?” she whispered again, creeping nearer the huddled figure on the floor. When she reached the fragile woman in the cell, she dropped to her knees and placed a gentle hand on her mother’s shoulder. Slowly Deliverance turned her head to face Mercy, the light of recognition flickering in her eyes.
“Mercy?” she asked, blinking. “But how did you…” She trailed off, clutching her trembling daughter to her chest. Mercy buried her face in Deliverance’s neck, winding her arms around her waist and breathing in the soothing feeling of her mother’s skin.
“I told them I ha’ come to settle the bill they sent,” she said, her voice muffled in the folds of Deliverance’s collar. “Then with some technique, I made them let me pass.”
Deliverance stroked the long hair that tumbled down Mercy’s back, rocking her a little. She smiled. “And where did you find the coin for such a feat?” she asked. In her voice, Mercy heard that Deliverance was proud of her.
“Goody Bartlett helped me,” Mercy said. “Lent me the money and her bay mare, too. I brought biscuits.” She produced a few hard lumps of bread from the sack that she was carrying. “Shall I give one to Dorcas?” Mercy looked worriedly over at the tiny girl lying immobile in the darkness on the opposite side of the cell, eyes closed, thumb between her lips. “And where is Goody Osborne?”
“I’ll feed her when you’ve gone,” Deliverance said. “None too settled when others approach, is that little one.” Her voice was sad, resigned. “And Goody Osborne, she has no more worries in this world. God took her to Him some three weeks ago.”
“When I’ve gone?” Mercy echoed, meeting her mother’s tired eyes. “But, Mama. ’Tis all arranged. You’re to come with me.”
Deliverance looked on her earnest daughter’s face and laughed weakly. She reached a hand forward to cup Mercy’s flushed cheek, and at her touch, Mercy could feel the depths of Deliverance’s resignation.
“Oh, my daughter,” Deliverance said, the corners of her mouth just turning up. “You know I cannot go.”
“But you can!” Mercy cried, grasping her mother’s wrists. “The warden sleeps from the physick I gave him, and I ha’ learned the charm for managing the locks! We’ve only to go, Mama!”
“And leave the others? Them being innocent of a crime which, you must see, I ha’ committed?” Deliverance asked, searching her daughter’s face for understanding.
“Committed?” Mercy asked, sitting back on her heels. But sure she is distracted, Mercy thought. In these many months in prison her mind must ha’ gone as well.
Deliverance shifted, adjusting the position of her back against the stone wall of the cell with a soft grunt.
“Then you did kill Martha Petford?” Mercy asked, face growing stricken and confused.
“Ah! No,” Deliverance said, shaking her head. “Not I, though ’tis no surprise I am not believed. For she were bewitched, you see. Of a sort. And the physick that I chose spoke to the wrong ailment.”
“But why?” Mercy asked, baffled. “Who would seek to kill a child?”
“None but the most wretched and hideous of devils. But think on it, Mercy. How come you to call something by bewitchment?” She watched her daughter, eyebrows drawn down over her pale eyes. “The suffering needs be caused by some certain malefactor, and not by mere happenstance or divine Providence. And yet the malefactor mightn’t know wherefore he does what he does, nor even the means by which it is enacted. The error lies in looking for the ill intent, and not contenting oneself with treating the effects.” Deliverance closed her eyes, resting for a moment and swallowing. “A man need not be a sorcerer to bring bewitchment upon a suffering soul.”
“Mother,” Mercy said, “I don’t attend. Who was the malefactor, then, for little Martha?”
Deliverance opened her eyes again, and Mercy thought that they looked marginally duller, as if their glitter were being gradually tarnished by fatigue and undernourishment. “Why, Peter Petford, of course,” she said, voice thick.
Mercy gasped. “Goodman Petford!” She sat balanced on the balls of her feet, her lips parted in shock.
“Through no knowledge of his own,” Deliverance added. “Poor, long-suffering man.”
“But how?” Mercy demanded.
“When I first arrived at his daughter’s sickbed, I thought her to be suffering from common fits. Or maybe she were malingering, a sad little thing entreated to maintain the household at too tender an age. And her with no mother neither.” Deliverance brought a fragile hand to her forehead, seeming to massage away the unpleasant memory. “I fed her a mild tincture for the nerves and prayed o’er her, thinking some warm tonic and soft words should bring her round.” She heaved a sigh, her thin chest rising and falling with the effort. “Rarely ha’ I been so wrong. It were saturnism withal. Brought about by too much lead, like to ha’ leached from poor pots into her victuals. Her fits worsened whilst I were with her, and though I spoke some better charms to combat metals and poisonings, it were altogether too late. And the poor child died.”
“Saturnism,” Marcy breathed, eyes widening with comprehension.
“Aye, for Saturn be the planet of lead, as Mercury be the planet of quicksilver. I see you’ve kept up your studies, clever girl.” Deliverance smiled at her daughter.
“You saw which pots then?” Mercy asked.
“A few—some crockery with chipped leaden glaze, though naught to be sure. It accounts for his great distraction, as well. What kills a child in great fits and torments drives a grown man’s senses well away. And perhaps it undid Sarah Petford, too, she being dead some months afore the girl fell ill.” A great swath of sadness wiped across Deliverance’s face. “So Martha were bewitched, of a sort, but there were naught to do withal. Shall I ruin the aggrieved father with the truth? Move him from distraction to utter destruction, and with none like to pay me heed?”
“But then you are innocent, Mama. You tried to minister to Martha, not to harm her,” Mercy insisted. “We must tell Gov
ernor Stoughton! He is a learned man. He must hear reason when it is spoken to him.”
“None on the Court be well disposed to the hearing of reason, I’m afraid,” Deliverance said. “They are gripped with fear for their own reputations. So long as those wild girls cry witchcraft, ’tis impolitic for the court to do otherwise. And while the girls taste power through their fancy and their petty manias, the trials will continue.”
Deliverance shut her eyes again, resting a hand on Mercy’s knee. “May Christ in His infinite mercy forgive them.”
“But you must come with me, Mama,” Mercy cried, her voice growing shrill. “It were a grave injustice otherwise.”
Deliverance laughed, her face grim. “Injustice?” she repeated. “By that wall the very picture of injustice lies.” She gestured to the ruined, broken little girl lying chained to the opposite wall. “There be no diabolism to witchery—to say that alone approaches sacrilege—but a witch I be nonetheless. How can I vanish and leave innocents to die in my place?” She stroked Mercy’s cheek, bringing her daughter’s chin up so that their eyes met. “What would such an action indicate about my immortal soul?”
Deliverance’s eyes bored into Mercy’s, and for the first time, Mercy realized that she could not carry out her plan. How could she have thought otherwise? To ask her mother to cast aside eternal life and the hope of divine salvation, that they might have a few paltry years together in this one? The realization caused Mercy to confront her own selfishness, and her temples flushed with shame. I am a wretched girl, Mercy thought, detesting herself, for though she knew what needs must happen, she nevertheless yearned for her mother to come with her still.
As these unpleasant thoughts battled together in Mercy’s mind, crumpling her face, she felt her mother toying gently with her hair. “Now, listen to me, my daughter,” Deliverance said, her face grave. “I’ll have you leave from Salem Town. I’ll brook no argument.” She held up a hand, staving off Mercy’s sputtering objections. “You’ll see from poor Dorcas that the Court enjoins to look for malefaction within families. You’re to go.”
The Physick Book of Deliverance Dane Page 33