Susannah Morrow (33 page)

“Sarah Good, why do you not tell us the truth? Why do you thus torment these poor children?”

“I do not torment them!”

“Who do you employ, then?”

“I employ nobody. I scorn it.” The same words as before, but they had lost their power, and she her anger. She looked frightened
now, and desperate.

“How came they thus tormented?”

“What do I know? Whoever you brought into the meetinghouse with you.”

“We brought you into the meetinghouse.”

“But you brought in two more.”

“Who was it, then, that tormented the children?”

She looked puzzled. Then her expression cleared. “’Twas Osborne.”

I closed my eyes briefly in horror. The murmurs of the crowd—appalled, disturbed, terrified—filled my ears. Hathorne was as
one on to blood scent. He leaned close. “I have reports that you go muttering from people’s houses when they displease you.
What is it you say?”

She looked confused and afraid. “It is the Commandments. I may say my Commandments, I hope.”

“What Commandment is it?”

She hesitated, her confusion more apparent than ever.

Hathorne said, “Who do you serve?”

“I serve God.”

“What God do you serve?”

“He that made Heaven and the Earth,” she said sharply.

“Here, sir,” came a voice from the pews. I turned to see Sarah Good’s husband rising. It had been so long since I had seen
him, I had nearly forgotten his existence. He was thin and bowed, many of his teeth rotting or gone.

“Who are you?” Hathorne asked.

“William Good. That woman’s husband, God save me.”

“What have you to say? Is this woman a witch?”

“If she is not, she will be one very quickly,” he said.

“Why would you say such a thing? Has she afflicted you? Have you seen anything to make you believe this of her?”

“No, not in this nature,” Good said, gesturing to the children. “But she is a disobedient wife. She does not respect me or
heed me. Indeed…I may say with tears that she is an enemy to all good.”

Her own husband had turned upon her.…That, along with the spectral evidence of the girls, was impossible to deny, no matter
how long or often Goody Good denounced the charges.

One could not witness these things and not believe the Devil was among us. When Goody Good was dismissed and Sarah Osborne
brought in, weak and frail, supported on Locker’s arm, I felt the air as a weight upon my shoulders. I could not take my eyes
from the girls’ fits when they were told to look upon her, and I saw Osborne’s fear in the midst of it. I heard her shaken
tales of how a shadow man had come to her—“A thing like an Indian, all black, which did pinch my neck…I am more bewitched
than a witch!”—and felt a terrible certainty.

But all this was as nothing when they brought in the slave woman.

The moment Tituba entered, the girls fell into fits. Nothing could quiet them, not even Hathorne’s direction that Tituba look
away. He had to shout his questions over their screaming, over the chaos of those trying to comfort them. Tituba gripped the
bar. Her dark eyes were large and frightened; one was blackened from a recent beating.

Hathorne yelled questions over and over again, and her voice grew fainter and fainter as she answered them, denials all. I
did not doubt she was a witch, and I saw the same belief in my neighbors. How could I deny it given the evidence before us,
writhing on the floor, crying out in pain? The questioning seemed to go on for hours, though it could not have been that.
The din was impossible; my ears hurt straining to hear; my soul felt bombarded by the girls’ sufferings.

Hathorne shouted, “Tell the truth. Who is it that hurts them?”

Tituba shook her head and swallowed nervously. “The Devil, for aught I know.”

“How does he appear when he hurts them? With what shape?”

Abigail Williams cried out, “Why do you pinch me so, Tituba? Goody Good, why do you torment me?”

“With what appearance does he come?” Hathorne asked again. “When did he appear?”

Tituba seemed to sag. In a voice nearly too quiet to hear, she said, “Like a man. I think yesterday.”

Hathorne went still. Someone asked, “What did she say?” and the whisper went around; the crowd went quiet. Miraculously, the
fits stopped. The girls sagged, exhausted, listening.

My hands tightened on my gun—though why or how I should use it, I could not fathom.

Then ’twas as if the truth raced from Tituba, words so horrible ’twas hard to listen to them without terror. Sarah Good told
her to hurt the children, and she was forced to do it. Good and the others were so strong that they had forced Tituba to go
to the Putnams’ with them; they had ridden on a long pole through the air. They had forced her to attack young Annie with
a knife—to which the child wrung her loose white hair and called out, “’Tis true, ’tis true! She tried to cut off my head!”
Good prevented Tituba from listening to her master’s prayers. The witch had a yellow bird that sucked between her fingers,
and a hairy creature like a dog or a wolf that did her bidding.

“Who else was there?” Hathorne asked. “Did you see Goody Osborne?”

“Aye,” Tituba said. “There be a man too. And…others. There be others.”

There was an audible gasp. Hathorne looked stunned.

“Others?” he asked. “There are others? How many?”

“I…I don’t know.”

“Many? A few?”

“I…”

“More than three?”

Tituba swallowed. “Aye. More than three.”

There was a terrified hush.
Others. There were others.

The slave could not answer beyond that, though Hathorne was relentless. After another hour, we knew nothing more—not who those
other witches were, nor how many. Finally the magistrate seemed to run out of questions.

Tituba stood nervously, her hands gripping her skirt, wrists bound by heavy iron manacles made for a man, so large they slipped
to the base of her hands. Her head was bowed, and she seemed exhausted. I was as anguished as the others in the room as Hathorne
called a halt to the proceedings.

“We shall take up again tomorrow,” he said to Tituba. “For now, you will go with the constable.”

George Locker and his men came up beside her, and I saw how they were reluctant to touch her, how they prodded her to move
with their flintlocks rather than their hands. The crowd was still as they left, but the moment they went out the door, the
meetinghouse burst into sound: arguments, fearful words, loud whispers. I glanced at Sam, who looked pale and stunned, and
I knew I must look the same.

“Dear God,” he murmured. “What has become of us?”

I could not answer him. The evil that had come into this house of God was unbearable, and terror stayed with me as I followed
Sam from the meetinghouse into the dusk of early evening. I stood there a moment, watching my neighbors leave in close-knit
groups, listening to the whispers. I saw the suspicion in their eyes as they regarded each other, and I thought back to what
Francis had said days ago, about how no good could come of this.
Others. There were others.
How could we fight this? How had Satan gained such a foothold without our knowing?

But I knew the answer to that question already. It did not take much to give the Devil an open door. ’Twas as simple as a
hungry heart, a soul that yearned.…

“Come,” Sam said to me. “Let’s to home. I’m weary of this place.”

I nodded, and as he moved to the path, I started after him, stopping only when I dropped a glove. I turned to pick it up and
saw from the corner of my eye a movement—a shadow hovering around the corner of the meetinghouse—and it caught me. There was
a familiarity to the furtiveness. I straightened and turned fully to look, and ’twas then I realized who was hiding from me.

Charity.

“G
O ON
,” I
CALLED TO
S
AM
. “I’
VE LEFT SOMETHING IN THE MEETING
house.”

“I’ll wait,” he said.

“No. I won’t keep you from your family. This might take some time.”

He nodded, though reluctantly, and I waited until he’d turned and started to walk again before I hurried back to the meetinghouse.
My daughter had disappeared, but I made my way to the darkened side of the building where I’d seen her. ’Twas cold, and the
wind blew the shadows before me; the cold, icy stink of the swamp mud beyond was heavy here. Charity was not to be seen. I
sped my step, nearly running around back, and I saw her huddled against the wall, as if she could hide by melting into the
weathered clapboards.

She looked up and saw me, and then shrank into her cape and the shadow of her broad-brimmed hat, but she didn’t try to move
or run away. As I neared, I saw that ’twas not because she was meekly and submissively waiting for her punishment, but because
she was paralyzed with fear. Her eyes were large and unseeing, her lips trembling, and I saw the constant movement of her
hands beneath her cape.

“Ti-Tituba,” she whispered as I came to her. “I heard h-her.”

“You should not have come,” I said gently. “I told you to stay home with Susannah.”

Her gaze leaped to mine. She swallowed; it seemed to be difficult and painful. Her mouth worked as if she wanted to speak,
but no words came.

I sighed and touched her arm. “Come with me, child. We’d best get home before it turns dark.”

“Aye,” she said unsteadily. “Aye.”

I held out my arm, and she took it, stumbling along after me as I made my way around the corner of the meetinghouse, back
toward the road. I was anxious to be gone; I felt still the evil of that room, and I pulled my daughter closer into my side.

She was shaking, her teeth chattering. The chilblains on her face had become scabbed from her constant rubbing. Saturday seemed
too long to wait to send her to town. After what had happened today, I could not imagine letting her linger here, with Tituba’s
confessions tormenting her and her friends lapsing into fits. I resolved to take her to town tomorrow. No doubt Poole would
understand, once I told him the affairs of the village—if he had not heard already.

“What possessed you to come?” I asked her finally.

Her glance was quick, horrified. “I…I had to know…what she would say.”

Uncomfortably, I remembered the way Tituba’s gaze had shifted to my daughter’s face when we’d visited the parsonage together.
I wanted to ask why that was, but I was afraid, and as if Charity read my mind, her shaking grew worse. I pulled her close,
trying to still it with my strength.

“Wh-what will happen now?” she asked. “Wh-what will they do with her?”

I shrugged. “She will be urged to confess everything. Then there will be a trial.”

“W-will she hang? Will those other wi-witches hang?”

“If they are guilty.”

“And what of the De-devil, then?”

I tried to reassure her. “Satan will leave this village when he sees we will not tolerate him here.”

She nodded against my shoulder, but I knew she did not quite believe me. ’Twas no surprise—I was not sure I believed myself.

“Father, you will not tolerate him, either, will you? You will help to fight him?”

“Aye,” I reassured her. “I will help to fight him.”

We were home quickly. The house smelled of stew and bread. Jude’s innocent babble filled the air, along with Susannah’s low
replies.

I nearly had to push Charity inside. Jude quieted. Susannah turned from the fire.

Her glance went past me to Charity, and she straightened in surprised confusion. “Charity, I thought—”

“I snuck out,” Charity said, bowing her head. She looked contrite, though I knew she was not. Neither was her “Forgive me”
sincere, but this time I said nothing.

Susannah paused. “’Twas no harm done, I suppose. I trust you ran into no trouble.”

“Nothing but trouble,” I said. “It seems the Devil has made a place for himself in Salem Village.”

“The examination—”

“There was a confession,” I said. “The slave woman confessed to being a witch.”

Susannah went still. “She said that? She said she was a witch?”

“Aye. And that there were others. Good and Osborne among them.”

“Others? More than just the three?”

I nodded grimly. Jude stared up at me with eyes as big as an owl’s, and I said, “We’ll pray tonight. Tomorrow I think we should
fast. ’Twill be our own day of humiliation.”

“We shall pray Satan away,” Jude said.

“If it were only so easy,” Charity murmured.

Susannah made a sound, and I glanced at her and saw her eyes were dark with worry. She searched my face, and I turned away
and hoped she would take my silence as a sign that we would talk later.

She seemed to. Her voice was deceptively light as she said, “Well, if we are to fast tomorrow, we’d best eat well tonight.”

As she laid the food before us and took her own seat, we fell into silence. Even my prayer of thanksgiving did not have staying
power. Charity barely touched her supper, and my own stomach was churning, so I could not eat. Jude was the only one of us
with any appetite, and it was too soon before we were done and the table cleared. I was sitting with my daughters at the fire,
reading Psalm 78:49 for their lesson.