‘Francis, what’s wrong?’ she persisted.
He gave a quick shake of his head and said, ‘Later. I’ll tell you later. We have pigs to buy.’
They bought three sows and a boar from the same ginger-haired Scottish-Irish pig farmer who had sold them their last five Berkshires and he promised to have them delivered the following day, sealing the deal by spitting into the palm of his hand and shaking on it.
They talked for a while, but Beatrice could barely understand the pig farmer’s accent and she could hardly hear him over the grunting of his pigs.
*
Francis hardly spoke to her on the way back to Sutton. She was beginning to wonder if he had found out about the perfume and the wild flowers and was angry with her. He had said, after all, that he felt ‘ineffectual’.
When they reached home, however, he said, ‘Don’t worry about preparing food for me, Bea. There is somebody I must talk to first.’
Noah came running out of the porch and clung to Beatrice’s gown. Beatrice picked him up and kissed him. ‘Who is it, Francis? Who must you talk to? You’re beginning to disturb me.’
Francis reached inside his coat and took out a folded letter. ‘Very well,’ he said. ‘I received this early this morning from Thomas Norton, the lawyer. One of his sons brought it here.’
She put Noah down and he passed her the letter. When she unfolded it she read:
My Dear Reverend Scarlett,
I believe it incumbent upon mee to inform you that Goodman Ebenezer Rowlandson has requested mee as a matter of Urgency to Deede 36 acres of his propertie to Mr Jonathan Shooks as a Precaution against Further Depredationes of Satan & his Representatives. He has requested Most Earnestlie that I should not inform you of this Matter & I am loath to be seen as an Intermedler but since Master George Gilman has also Deeded almost an Equalle acreage to Mr Shooks for the same Purpose I believe that as our appointed Minister you should be made Conscious of these Transactions.
Yrs Thos Norton.
Beatrice read the letter twice and then handed it back to Francis. ‘Why did you say nothing until now?’ she asked him.
‘Why do you think? Two of my most prosperous and influential communicants have turned for help against the forces of evil to – to what? To whom? Not to me – to some itinerant quack! Some charlatan who has arrived from nowhere telling me that I have no knowledge of the demonic presences in this country and that I am powerless to protect my own congregation!’
Francis was so agitated now that he had crumpled up the letter in his fist and Noah was looking up at him with an apprehensive frown on his face and his bottom lip quivering.
‘George Gilman said nothing to me about deeding his land to Jonathan Shooks, and Ebenezer Rowlandson told me nothing but lies! Why didn’t they both simply say to my face that they have no faith in my ministry, that my prayers have obviously come to nothing, and that I can’t even save my own pigs from the Devil, let alone Nicholas Buckley and George Gilman’s slaves!’
He paused for breath, and then he said, ‘I don’t know why we bothered to travel all the way to Londonderry to buy new pigs. What was the point? The Devil will probably kill those too, just to rub my impotence in my face!’
‘Francis, Francis,’ Beatrice soothed him. ‘If Ebenezer Rowlandson and George Gilman choose to be so foolish, it is not your fault!’
‘Of course it’s my fault! I’m supposed to be their shield and protector! It wouldn’t surprise me if Henry Mendum has given half his land to Jonathan Shooks, too, without telling me!’
‘So what do you propose to do?’
‘I could send Jonathan Shooks an ecclesiastical document warning him off, but I very much doubt if that would deter him. No – I’m going to find him and have it out with him, face to face! This is my congregation, my ministry, and he has wilfully led my communicants astray. It is just as humiliating for me as if they had left my parish and started to attend church in Dover instead.’
‘You should be careful, Francis. Please, my love. Jonathan Shooks is not the kind of man to be crossed.’
Francis grasped her shoulders and looked into her eyes. His own eyes were glittering and dark and she had never seen him look so determined.
‘I am not at all sure what I am confronting here, Bea – Devil or man, demon or deceiver. All I do know is that I am facing the greatest challenge of my entire career as a minister of God – perhaps of the whole of my life. In one form or another, Satan has come to Sutton, and it is my bounden duty to stand up to him.’
‘Where will you find him?’
‘I shall go to the village first to see if anybody knows of his whereabouts. If not, I will go to the inn at Penacook and wait for his return.’
‘Francis, I beg you not to. The law should be dealing with this, not you.’
‘How can the courts deal with Satan, Bea? And what law is greater than God’s law?’
‘Let me show you that stain on my petticoat made by that so-called demon’s hoof print! It’s nothing but a mixture of common substances, Francis! It’s not supernatural at all! Kingdom was poisoned by yew leaves, which anybody could have fed him, and our pigs were probably killed by arsenic or perhaps some toxic plant like belladonna. As far as Ebenezer Rowlandson’s fish are concerned, they could have been affected by oil of rhodium or something similar. The same goes for Henry Mendum’s cattle.’
‘Bea, you don’t understand! How these atrocities were perpetrated, and what with, tells us nothing! What do witches use in their potions? The same common herbs that anybody can grow in their gardens! It’s the way in which they prepare those potions that gives them their power! Just as we say prayers and appeal to the Lord to give us strength, they use rituals and incantations to be given strength by Satan.’
‘Let me show you the stain.’
‘Bea, it makes no difference. One way or another, I have to face up to Jonathan Shooks and take back authority over my own parish. How can I preach my sermon on Sunday, admonishing my congregation to honour the Lord God, when they cannot even honour me?’
‘I honour you, Francis. You know that.’
Francis leaned forward so that their foreheads were touching and they were so close together that Beatrice couldn’t focus on his face. ‘I know you do, my dearest. But this time it isn’t enough.’
*
Francis returned home a little after nine o’clock. She had been waiting at the window for him and she was relieved to see his two carriage-lamps jiggling in the darkness at the end of the driveway. When he came into the house he was dusty and exhausted and he smelled of sweat. He sat down at the kitchen table and she gave him a mug of cider, although he didn’t drink it straight away.
‘You didn’t find him,’ she said.
‘No, I didn’t find him. Everywhere I went he had only recently left, but nobody ever knew where he was bound for next. It was more like hunting a ghost than a man. I went to the Penacook Inn at the very last. He is still residing there, apparently, but I waited an hour and there was no sign of him, so I left.’
‘You’ll find him tomorrow. Somebody must have told him by now that you’re looking for him.’
‘I don’t know if that’s good or bad. If he knows that I’m looking for him he might do everything he can to avoid me.’
‘I don’t think he will,’ said Beatrice. ‘I don’t think he’s that kind of a man.’
The wild flowers, she thought, and the perfume.
*
When they went to bed that night, Francis held her very close, although he made no move to make love to her. She could feel his half-stiffened penis through his nightshirt, but she knew that his mind was full of demons and witches and incinerated slaves and Satan and Jonathan Shooks.
After a while he leaned across her to blow out the candle, but before he did so he said, ‘What’s this?’
‘What’s what?’ she asked him.
He was holding a small purple petal between finger and thumb, like the wing that had fallen off a fairy
. He sniffed it and said, ‘It smells very sweet. What is it?’
‘Bergamot,’ said Beatrice.
‘So where did it come from?’
Beatrice raised her eyebrows but said nothing. The last thing she wanted to do was tell him a lie.
‘Perhaps it’s a sign,’ said Francis. ‘A sign from God of sweet things to come.’
He leaned over again and blew out the candle. Beatrice lay in the darkness and she had never felt so guilty and confused in her life – and fearful, too. There was no moon tonight and she felt as if all around the house the scenery of her world was being furtively rearranged and that in the morning everything would seem different, unfamiliar, and that she would have no idea what to do next.
*
As it turned out, Jonathan Shooks took events in hand. She and Francis were eating a breakfast of flummery and dried plums when they heard a carriage outside and then a knock at their front door. Mary came into the kitchen and said, ‘Mr Shooks is calling on you, reverend.’
Francis gave Beatrice a quick, surprised look and then stood up and went out into the hallway. Beatrice was tempted to say, ‘Be careful, Francis,’ but she was afraid that Jonathan Shooks might hear her and question why she had said it.
Francis took Jonathan Shooks into the parlour. Beatrice took off her apron and left her breakfast to follow them. Jonathan Shooks bowed as she came in through the door, and smiled. He was wearing his pale grey linen coat and britches and shoes with silver buckles that reminded Beatrice of the buckles on Nicholas Buckley’s shoes.
‘The gracious Goody Scarlet, good morning!’ said Jonathan Shooks. ‘I was just asking the reverend why he has been looking for me here, there and everywhere.’
In a strained voice Francis said, ‘I have been given intelligence, sir, that both George Gilman and Ebenezer Rowlandson have deeded you considerable tracts of their land.’
‘Yes, very true,’ said Jonathan Shooks, nodding his head as if Francis had said something very reasonable. ‘And you know, of course, why they should have done so.’
‘Your demons demanded it?’ Francis challenged him.
‘One demon in particular, as a fee for Satan’s protection.’
‘That is nothing short of extortion, Mr Shooks.’
‘I realize that, reverend, but when a man is given a choice between ruination and possible death or surrendering some of his acreage, which do you think he will choose? Let me remind you that if it weren’t for me, Gilman and Rowlandson wouldn’t have even been offered such a choice. The demon would either have destroyed their livelihoods, so that they were forced off their holdings completely, or thought up some grotesque way of killing them.’
‘So who is this demon? Or what?’ asked Beatrice. ‘Is it a man or a woman or a two-legged beast with horns and hooves? Does it have a name?’
Jonathan Shooks smiled and touched the tip of his finger to his lips. ‘I have said before, Goody Scarlet, that I cannot say the name. If I say the name, then all will be undone and Satan will take a truly terrible revenge.’
‘Can I not come with you, next time you meet this demon, and reason with it?’ asked Francis.
‘If you come with me, reverend, then you will discover its identity, and as I say, all will then be undone. Once you know its identity your holy calling will oblige you to try to exorcize it, and that can only bring catastrophe. Whatever choice we make, whether we choose to defy the demon or to come to some arrangement with it, the consequences will be unpleasant, so I am opting for the lesser of those evils.’
All the time he was saying this Jonathan Shooks didn’t once take his eyes off Beatrice, and although his voice was so serious he seemed to be smiling very slightly.
Francis vigorously shook his head. ‘I cannot permit this to continue, Mr Shooks. Sutton is my ministry and while it remains under my authority I will not have bargains made with Satan here, nor with any of Satan’s representatives.’
Jonathan Shooks still didn’t take his eyes away from Beatrice. ‘Would you condemn yet more of your congregation to an agonizing death, like Nicholas Buckley? Is that what you would do? Because that is what would surely happen, I assure you. Your ministry would become a ministry of martyrs simply because you were so inflexible.’
‘Mr Shooks – I insist that you return the land that has been deeded over to you, every work-lot of it, and I also insist that either you desist from your dealings with this demon or else leave my parish altogether. I will take this matter to the highest church authorities if I have to, and to the courts.’
Jonathan Shooks didn’t answer immediately, but turned his head and frowned out of the parlour window as if he had seen somebody quickly walk by. Beatrice looked, too, but she couldn’t see anybody.
After a moment, he turned back to Francis and said, ‘No, Reverend Scarlet, I will not desist. If members of your congregation decide that it is in their own best interests to hand over the acreage that this demon demands, then there is nothing you can do to stop them. They have seen for themselves what this demon can do to them if they refuse.’
‘Is it the Widow Belknap, this demon?’ Francis demanded. ‘Or perhaps some malign spirit that has possessed the Widow Belknap?’
‘I have told you, reverend. I will name no name.’
‘Then you are warned. I will take this matter as far as I have to. I will take it to Governor Wentworth if necessary.’
Jonathan Shooks shrugged. ‘Do what your conscience dictates. All I can tell you is that I have the ability recognize the demons that appear in this land on Satan’s behalf, be they wizards or witches or Wendigos, even if you cannot. Since the only way to save the lives of innocent people is to do business with these demons, then do business with them I shall.’
With that, he bowed again to Beatrice and said, ‘Good day to both of you. I hope when we meet again it will be under more amicable circumstances.’
Francis said, ‘I’m serious, Mr Shooks. I will not allow this extortion continue. Good day to you, too!’
Beatrice escorted Jonathan Shooks to the front door. Outside, in the sunshine, Samuel was waiting with his calash and he waved when he saw her.
‘I am not over-fond of wild flowers, Mr Shooks,’ she told him as he put on his hat.
He looked at her with one eyebrow lifted. ‘Are you not, Goody Scarlet?’
‘Some of them I like. It depends who gives them to me.’
‘I suppose that would apply to almost every gift,’ he replied.
What does he mean? She thought. Is he asking me if I was pleased by the perfume?
‘Yes,’ she said. ‘No matter what it was.’
There was a long silence between them, as if both wanted to say something but both were too wary of committing themselves. Then Jonathan Shooks said, ‘Your husband is a good and upright man, Goody Scarlet. Please try and dissuade him from doing anything rash. There are forces at work here in Sutton of which, for all of his rectitude, he has very little understanding.’
‘The Reverend Scarlet is officiating this morning at two funerals, Mr Shooks – Nicholas Buckley and his baby son, Tristram. I think he is well aware of what these forces are and what they can do, as am I.’
‘Oh, yes. I have heard it said that you are quite the amateur apothecary.’
‘My father taught me, Mr Shooks, in London. Suffice it to say that I can distinguish the difference between a concoction from hell and one from New Hampshire.’
Jonathan Shooks kept on smiling. ‘You are a very fair young woman, Goody Scarlet. Please have a care, and do try to speak persuasively to your husband. It would be tragic to see you a relict so young.’
With that he climbed with a creak of leather springs into his calash and Samuel gave one of his weird whoops and cracked his whip. Beatrice stood and watched him as he drove away under the trees. She was almost wishing that the brown-cloaked figure would appear out of the shadows as he went past, which would prove beyond doubt that it was neither him nor Samuel acting on his behalf.
/> She was still standing there when Francis came bustling out of the house. His cheeks were flushed and he was tugging on his cream linen coat.
‘Caleb!’ he shouted. ‘Caleb!’
Caleb came hurrying around the side of the house carrying a rake. ‘Yes, reverend? Sorry I’ve took so long weeding the turnip bed. Hard as rock that dirt is!’
‘Never mind that. Please harness Uriel for me as quick as you can!’
‘Francis, where are you going?’ asked Beatrice. ‘You can’t be too long – the funerals start at eleven o’clock!’
‘I’m going after Shooks. I’m going to follow him.’
‘Francis – don’t!’
‘You won’t stop me, Bea. I’m going to follow him and see this demon for myself, and confront it! I refuse to surrender my authority to some crawling creature from hell, even if Shooks is prepared to give in to it!’
‘Francis, don’t you see? There is no demon!’
Caleb had brought Uriel round from his paddock and was fastening his trace buckle and adjusting his tugs.
Francis said, ‘What? How can you say such a thing, Bea? How could an ordinary mortal have hung George Gilman’s slaves so high up in the rafters, as if on Calvary Hill, and then set fire to them? Or melted Nicholas Buckley into broth? Or caused our pigs to die without any trace of sickness, like the Gadarene swine? Or stunned Ebenezer Rowlandson’s fish?’
‘I believe that every one of those events has an explanation, Francis – every one of them, even if we don’t yet understand what all of those explanations are. That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you. I have been loath to contradict you, my dearest, or to question your faith, and several times I have been close to being persuaded myself that the Devil must be to blame. But I’m sure that he’s not. I’m convinced that we can put an end to all of this terrible mischief by other means apart from prayer.’
Francis looked down the driveway. Jonathan Shooks’s calash was out of sight now, and even the dust from its wheels had settled.
‘If you are saying that there is no demon, Bea, then by implication that means that there is no Satan.’
Scarlet Widow Page 23
