The Physick Book of Deliverance Dane (31 page)

“Susannah Martin,” he intoned as the crowd simmered, “Sarah Wildes, Rebecca Nurse, Sarah Good, Elizabeth Howe, and Deliverance Dane. Pursuant to the evidence presented here against you, that your specters have come to these girls in the dead of night, besieging them and demanding that they serve the Devil, that diverse ones of you are found by trustworthy examination to have unnatural teats whereby to give suck to hideous imps, that several of you have been seen to quarrel with your neighbors and then cause damage to their persons or their property through invisible means, and that you have been observed here in congress with devils and yet deny the truth of that statement, we hereby find you guilty of the crime of witchcraft and so sentence you to be hanged by the neck until dead.”

Mercy screamed out in horror. Governor Stoughton banged the gavel down on the library table as the meetinghouse exploded in cries of relief and dismay, several onlookers wailing, “God be praised! We shall be delivered!” as the afflicted girls trembled and shook.

“See how she comes!” cried Ann Putnam. “Goody Dane sends her spirit out to strike me! It is not I, Goody Dane, who condemns you! It is not
I!” She huddled down, hands held over her head as if to fend off a blow. Mercy threw her gaze at the cowering girl, and without thought hurled a ball of pure intention in the direction of the sniveling wretch, whose head rocked back as if she had been slapped. A bright scarlet welt rose across her face, and Ann Putnam started to cry.

Mercy looked up from the hysterical girl and met her mother’s cool eyes. To her surprise Deliverance did not look angry or afraid. As the warden led the chained and weeping women to the waiting cart outside, Mercy reflected that if anything, her mother seemed only sad.

Salem, Massachusetts
Early September
1991

C
ONNIE EASED THE HANDLE OF THE HOSPITAL ROOM DOOR DOWNWARD,
feeling the click of the bolt withdrawing through the metal, and slipped silently into the room. The bed nearest the door was empty, its mattress folded back on itself, naked pillows stacked at the foot. She crept toward the farther bed, careful not to disturb the sleeping occupant within. He had so little opportunity to sleep.

In the bed lay a muscular young man, one leg still encased in plaster from the knee down. He lay on his back, mouth just open, breath moving over his lips with a gentle whisper. His hair was swept back from his brow, and even in sleep his eyes were bracketed by lines etched by years of smiling. Connie rolled up the doctor’s examining chair so that it was positioned by the bed. She rested her chin in her hands, watching him. His eyelids twitched in a dream, and his mouth fell open with a quiet snore. The doctors had taken out his nose ring, and without it he looked younger, less dangerous.

She allowed her eyes to travel down his body, tracing the pattern of a stark black Celtic tattoo that ringed his upper arm—a college indiscretion, he had called it—and roving to his chest, down his muscled arms, until they took in the soft straps that bound his wrists to the metal frame of the bed.

Oh, Sam
, she thought.

“Connie, I want you to know that we would understand,” his mother had said over coffee the previous week.

“Understand?” Connie had asked, confused. “Understand what?”

Linda Hartley turned her coffee mug between her hands, not meeting Connie’s eyes. “Sam’s father and I—we would understand if this was all a little…much for you,” she said.

She’s giving me permission to break up with him
, Connie realized. Not that she had any intention of doing so.

“It’s not,” Connie responded, meeting Linda’s gaze.

Now she listened to the silence in the hospital room, broken only by the occasional muffled announcement of the loudspeaker system in the hallway. Sam’s chest rose with a sigh, shifting the thin sheet, and Connie reached forward with two fingers to ease it back into place. He did not stir.

Though she longed to talk to him, it was probably fortuitous that he was asleep, at least for now. Connie opened her shoulder bag, sliding out the small glass bottle that she had carried up with her from the Milk Street house, together with one of the note cards from Granna’s recipe collection. The one with no title.

If anyone catches me at this, they will think I’ve lost my mind
, Connie reflected, her mouth flattening into a grim line.
And that goes for Sam, too.

She looked back to his sleeping face. He was scowling now. A bad dream. Flurries of tension moved across his eyelids, and Connie told herself that she should act quickly.

She pushed the long sleeves of her T-shirt up over her elbows and rolled a length of paper towel out of the dispenser on the wall. Spreading the paper out on the windowsill behind her, Connie set the dusty bottle on the paper and removed its stopper. She padded back to the door of the hospital room, easing
it open and looking up and down the corridor, checking for nurses, doctors, Sam’s parents—anyone who might happen upon her. A knot of teenage candy stripers giggled together at the far end of the hallway, but otherwise it was deserted, fluorescent lights reflecting on the scrubbed linoleum floor. Connie clicked the door closed.

She sneaked back to the bed where Sam slept, his arms straining momentarily against the restraints. In the back of her mind Connie wondered when Sam’s rest would break apart; at any moment his body could seize up, rocking into muscle spasms and dragging him up out of his sleep. Her heartbeat tripped a little faster, sending adrenaline tingling down her arms and legs as she got to her knees under the metal bed.

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.