Winds of Salem (4 page)

The gentlefolk in the meetinghouse laughed again.

The magistrate sneered. “Anything else?”

“Once, with the other servant of the Putnam household—where I now work—Freya, we visited Goody Brown, and she lied to us. She tried to cheat us when we bartered for flour, adding stones for weight, she did. She can be greedy. I saw much of this firsthand when I worked—”

“Next witness!” yelled the magistrate, cutting Mercy off as he looked back down at his papers.

Mercy was ushered away, Freya brought forth. Unlike Mercy, Freya did not want to make any accusations. There were enough
cantankerous relations in the village as it were, and she certainly did not want to get herself into trouble or cause bad blood between herself and other villagers. Yes, it was her opinion that Goody Brown was lying about the plums. But Freya also knew for certain that Goody Brown was no witch, a very grave and dangerous accusation—the penalty being the noose. If anyone here were a witch, it was Freya herself, and this made her cheeks burn as she was sworn in, remembering what had happened with the butter churn and then the broom.

“What hath this deponent to provide as evidence?” asked the magistrate.

Freya shrugged, her cheeks now a similar tint to her strawberry curls that fell from beneath her cap. The sun shone through the windows now and Freya felt overheated. The meetinghouse, crammed as it was, had grown pungent, rank with odor. She felt as if she couldn’t breathe.

“Anything that could point to Goody Brown employing witchcraft? Have you seen her
collude
with the devil, perhaps?” asked the magistrate.

“I have seen no such thing,” she said.

Thomas lowered his head in the front row, feeling embarrassed by his servants. Bringing them here had been a waste of everyone’s time. Clearly his girls were not much help in moving this case along.

The magistrate, a pragmatic and forward-thinking man, was not entirely disengaged from the proceedings and did derive a certain amount of pleasure from debunking the phantasmagorical imaginings of country folk. “I would like to call forth my own witness,” he declared as Freya was accompanied to her seat. “Mr. Nathaniel Brooks, please rise and step forward.”

A din rose in the meetinghouse as a tall youth came forward. He strode with ease and confidence to the front, hat in hand,
standing in a relaxed and guileless manner before the magistrate. His ebony hair fell just above his shoulders, and his emerald eyes caught the light.

“Please tell the court where you live,” said the spice merchant.

“Presently, I live in Salem Village with my uncle, a widower, who needs a hand on his farm,” said the youth. “I haven’t been in the village very long.” He smiled, taking his time, glancing around the meetinghouse. For a fleeting moment, the youth caught Freya’s eyes. She felt a jolt from his stare. But just as quickly, the lad looked to the magistrate.

“Now, Mr. Brooks, where were you on the afternoon of Wednesday the twenty-sixth of June, 1691. Do you remember?”

“Why, yes, I do. I was at the market, purchasing a plum pie.”

The spectators took in a collective gasp.

“I very much like plum pie and wanted one for dinner,” continued the youth.

The people in the meetinghouse laughed.

“And does the witness see the maid from whom he purchased said plum pie in the meetinghouse? Is she present?”

“She is,” said the youth. He pointed to Goody Brown. “There she is. It was her plum pie I bought.”

The spectators leaned forward, whispering, anxiously awaiting what might come next. The magistrate waited, relishing creating suspense. Finally, he spoke. “And did you, Mr. Brooks, eat said plum pie?”

“Yes,” said the youth with a smile. “Yes, sir, I had the pie for dessert that very evening.”

The spectators leaned farther forward.

“And how would you, Nathaniel Brooks, describe this plum pie?”

Nathaniel looked out at the people in the pews and galleries, taking his time. His gaze met Freya’s and their eyes locked again. He smiled. She smiled and her cheeks flushed.

The magistrate cleared his throat. “Nathaniel Brooks? Will you please answer the question carefully?
How did you find this plum pie?
”

Holding Freya’s gaze, as if the remark were directed at her, Mr. Brooks replied, “
Quite sublime
, Sir Magistrate! In fact, Goody Brown mentioned that the pies were made with the best plums of Salem Village.”

Again came a loud collective gasp, and afterward everyone began to chatter.

“Order!” called the magistrate. The room silenced.

Goodwife Faith Perkins was smiling, feeling somewhat vindicated. Goody Brown was indeed a liar but perhaps that didn’t exactly make her a witch, either. After all, she herself had exaggerated a bit about her baby and the sow.

The magistrate gave his verdict, chastising both women. The only crimes here, he summarized, were lack of neighborliness, greed, and wasting his time. The case was dismissed, and he was done for the day. The meetinghouse adjourned.

As Freya followed the crowd outside to the fresh, briny air of the harbor, her heart beat hard in her chest as she recalled young Mr. Brooks daringly making eye contact with her. She had been instantly struck—smitten, as if every sense in her body came alive at his glance. She spotted Mr. Putnam by the carriage, speaking to Mr. Brooks and another young man. Something flashed in her memory and for a moment she saw Mr. Brooks in his bright linen shirt, opened at the neck, revealing a tanned swath of skin—and his hands were wrapped about her waist, pulling her toward him—then it was gone.

“There you are!” said Mercy.

“Yes,” Freya said in a daze.

They stood in the shade of a building. Mercy followed Freya’s gaze to Thomas and the two youths across the way.

“Goodness! There he is!” said Mercy.

“Who?” asked Freya.

“My handsome youth. The one I told you of, with dark hair and green eyes.”

Freya looked at her friend in a panic. “The witness?” she asked. “Nathaniel Brooks?”

Mercy laughed. “No, no, the other one, his friend. James Brewster. Isn’t he lovely?”

Freya smiled, relieved.

James Brewster looked up, caught her eye, and winked.

What cheek!

Even from this distance Freya could see that James Brewster did have green eyes but a yellow green, like an inquisitive cat’s. James’s hair was dark as well, as Mercy had described it, but a sandy brown with light streaks, whereas Nathaniel’s was a raven black.

“Did you see that?” Freya asked.

“See what?”

“Nothing.” Freya shook her head, suppressing a smile. Life had certainly become much more interesting now that they had glimpsed the two young men.

Mercy offered Freya her arm. “Shall we?”

Freya nodded and the two girls crossed the street.

chapter three

Secrets

“Do not despair, my brothers and sisters, for there are also true saints in the church,” Reverend Parris proclaimed from his pulpit. Here he gave Thomas Putnam a subtle nod. It was lecture day, noon on a Thursday, and the reverend was giving one of his interminable, unrelenting, and punishing sermons. The psalms had already been sung in a most monotonous and tuneless manner, parishioners echoing back the deacon, prayers recited. And now Parris was going on about the devil trying to infiltrate the church and how one had to align oneself with God Almighty. Parris always found reason to chastise his parishioners. “The church consists of good and bad, as a garden that has weeds as well as flowers…”

Parris’s long dark hair flailed around his shoulders when he railed on about the devil. He had large brown almond-shaped eyes and a long, slim aquiline nose. A good-looking man whose bitterness made him ugly, as he was full of envy, especially for the merchants who had succeeded in business where he himself had failed in Barbados before coming to New England. Thomas Putnam had found an ally in the reverend—they both harbored an intense dislike for the people of Salem Town. Parris’s words reached a fever pitch as his tithing man strode up and down the aisles with a stick, prodding those who nodded off or using the feather end to tickle fidgeting women beneath the chin.

“Here are good men to be found, yea”—again a glance at Thomas, Captain Walcott, then Mr. Ingersoll, who ran the inn, all in the front row—“the very best; and here are bad men to be found, yea, the very worst.” He looked up to the ceiling here, not selecting any particular culprit for the bad ones, knowing they themselves would know who they were.

Freya and Mercy stood in one of the galleries along the wall, with the Putnam children lined up beside them, first Ann Junior, then the rest, tallest to shortest. Ann surreptitiously reached for Freya’s hand. Freya squeezed it tightly to reassure the girl.

Nathaniel Brooks and his friend James Brewster stood across the way in the opposite gallery, hats in hands, heads bowed, as was Freya’s. Now and then, Freya’s eyes lifted, meeting Nate’s. Was he really staring back at her? She felt Mercy elbow her once as if to note he was indeed. Freya’s body grew tingly. Nate’s black bangs fell over his left eye. He was ravishingly handsome. When Thomas had driven the four young people back to the village from their court day in Salem Town, Nate had helped Freya out of the back of the carriage, chivalrously reaching out a hand. His grip was firm, strong yet gentle. A surge of energy passed between them as their hands and eyes met. Freya thrilled at the memory as she looked back to the reverend, a smile playing on her lips.

Freya noticed that the good reverend was preaching against covetousness when just yesterday she and Mercy had brought him the gold candles he had requested for his altar. She glanced at Nate, who rolled his eyes. Was he having similar thoughts? She glanced at Parris for fear they might get caught sending each other these silent missives. Confident that the reverend had not cottoned on to her glances, she looked back at the boys’
pew. This time, it wasn’t Nate who was staring back at her but James.

Later that afternoon, Freya donned a cape, slipped the hood over her head, grabbed her basket, and wandered off into the woods. Once a week, the servants in the Putnam household were afforded an hour for solitary prayer. She wended through the pines, oaks, and beeches down a path, kneeling to pluck an herb or flower now and then. Few dared to venture out so far, knowing the native settlements were near, and the kidnapping of villagers was not uncommon. Freya was not afraid of the natives, however violent the stories she heard. Some called them savages, heathens, or devils. But she had also heard that their white captives often refused to return to their old lives after they were rescued. They preferred the native culture of all things—the freedom from all the rules and codes one had to follow in Puritan society. She had a feeling she would like that freedom as well.

The villagers’ fear granted her privacy and Freya let her mind roam however she wanted. In these woods
she
was free. She could breathe.

She heard branches crackling and quickly pivoted around. A deer leaped between the trees. She smiled at the doe and continued along the light-dappled path until she came upon a clearing. On the border of the meadow, she found a huge outcropping of stone, where she sat for a bit. She noticed a nearby dog rose bush. She got up and strode over to it. The roses were still just little buds. They would blossom in June, delicate petals the white pink of a maiden’s cheek. Once the petals fell they would turn into rosehips later in the summer—which would make for a good marmalade and a potent cough syrup. Freya reached out, whispering a word she didn’t quite understand, and the little bud
came off its stem as if plucked by an invisible hand, dropping into her outstretched palm. She felt a thrill, then caught herself. There was someone behind her. She stood stock-still. Had whoever it was seen what she had just done? Had she been caught?

“
Rosa canina
,” came a low, soft voice. “That’s what they are called.”

She turned, pricking a finger on a thorn, dropping the small bud. James Brewster stood in the clearing, smiling.

“You pricked yourself!” he said, and took her hand to wipe the blood trickling down her wrist.

“Oh!” she said, taking her hand back and biting on the puncture, squeezing out a last drop of blood from it. “What are you doing here?” she asked, looking up at him.

James spoke hurriedly. “I’m sorry, Miss Beauchamp, I didn’t mean to startle you. Forgive me, I saw you wander off into the woods while Brooks and I were helping Mr. Putnam with the new barn. I had to go to the river to gather stones. When I got there, I saw Miss Lewis with the eldest Putnam girl. The little one fell into the river and hurt herself. She called for you. ‘Only Freya can fix it,’ she said. So I ran until I found you. They fear they will be in trouble from Mr. Putnam as the girl is supposed to be home, tending to the children.”