Familiar Spirits

by Leonard Tourney

  In the street, Joan thought back to the unnerving experience in the barn, and her disquiet returned to do battle with the skepticism aroused by Margaret’s account of ghostly happenings. She thought Margaret’s encounter with her dead brother had all the earmarks of a fraud—perpetrated doubtless by the clever girl for whom Joan had come to feel less sympathy than before. Ursula’s brother Andrew, she suspected, was also involved, and probably played the part of Philip, disguising his voice and using the childish name he and his sister might have discovered from any of a number of persons who had known Margaret as a child. Given Margaret’s state of mind, she might have supposed any young man of her brother’s years, height, and girth, to be Philip

  were the suggestion made strongly enough. And the suggestion had been strongly made. The darkened chamber, the promises to secrecy, the offerings, the meaningless incantation—all would have been overpowering given Margaret’s desire to believe it was indeed her brother she heard.

  But Joan could not explain away so easily her own unnerving experience in the Waites’ barn. It was not so much the mysterious whispering she had heard, the obscene image she had found, or the unsettling recollection of what had passed within on any of those nights when Ursula gathered her circle of intimates to show off her powers. Nor was it the brindled cat with its strange, hostile glare. It was rather a strong sensation—a kind of glimmering, as she called it. Since childhood Joan had experienced unaccountable moments of insight that came to her unbidden from time to time as warnings or assurances. This glimmering had been a particularly strong one. She had sensed a presence in the barn, something insidious and malevolent, and what she had sensed she felt sure was not of this world.

  • EIGHT •

  THE five men summoned by the magistrate had been ushered into the library of the manor and were now waiting for its lord to appear. Each man sat in a high-backed chair of sturdy oak, with walnut inlays and ornately carved legs and armrests, and quietly admired the other furnishings in the spacious chamber. All except one of them. The exception was the bailiff, a little transplanted Frenchman named Henry Moreau. With his long, sallow face and heavy-lidded eyes, Moreau seemed curiously indifferent to the splendor about him. His complacency suggested that he had been in the library on many other occasions—as in fact he had, being the lord’s chief officer—and that he would not, like the simple burgesses around him, gawk at the splendid urns and amor-ini, the caryatids and heraldic beasts adorning floor, wainscot, ceiling, and chimneypiece in such profusion that one would have thought the artificers who had designed and decorated the chamber could not abide a plain, unpainted surface. Waiting with the bailiff were two somber-faced aldermen, Mr. Trent and Mr. Walsh; the parson, Mr. Davis; and Matthew Stock.

  The magistrate entered, and the men rose. The magistrate was a stout gentleman of about fifty. He was dressed in a long satin robe of ash color, thickly covered with gold lace chevronwise, and a rather long cloak of black cloth, lined with velvet. On his head he wore a tall hat, adorned with a single jewel. In a voice rich with authority and awareness of

  place, he greeted each of the men by name, inquired of his health, and then invited him to be seated. The magistrate sat down at his desk, a massive piece of furniture with well-ordered stacks of papers and books, a large, leather-bound ledger, and writing materials at hand. The post had recently arrived and a bundle of letters lay before him with their seals unbroken. For a moment he examined the letters; then he looked up at the constable from under heavy brows. “Well, now, Mr. Stock, I have it there was some little broil in the town this morning, which thing I regret to hear and hope that it has since been made right.”

  “No broil, sir,” Matthew said. “A gathering of sorts . . . at the Waite house. Some thought they saw a ghost at the glover’s window and fled in great alarm and confusion, but the crowd has long since disbanded and the street is at peace.”

  “A ghost, you say? In broad daylight!” The magistrate seemed amused. “Pray, whose ghost was it supposed to have been?”

  “Ursula Tusser’s, sir.”

  “Oh, the witch,” said the magistrate, more serious now. “But you say the crowd has disbanded?”

  “It has, sir. I have posted a deputy before the house—just to be safe.”

  “Good. Yes, that’s good.” The magistrate leaned back in his chair and looked satisfied. A more relaxed atmosphere began to prevail. A servant entered with a decanter of wine and goblets, and while each man was served the magistrate spoke of the merits of civil order. He was a man of strong convictions, a bulwark of the law. He took his magistracy with great seriousness. The five men listened intently. Then the magistrate turned to the pastor. He wanted to know what the young cleric made of the supposed spirit. The parson admitted he had not been present. All he knew was what he had heard later, garbled stories made more so by the terror of the tellers. Of course, he did have his opinion nonetheless.

  Before he could deliver it, the magistrate put the same question to Matthew. Matthew told him what had happened,

  what he had seen and what confirmed later from the lips of Brigit Able herself.

  “But those in the street construed the face to be that of Ursula Tusser?”

  “They did, sir. After that, there was no reasoning with them. A panic followed.”

  “To which they were all too prone from the beginning,” the magistrate added. “Witchcraft has set all our teeth on edge, and since they had congregated at the house to see some wondrous thing, their fancies would not be appeased until such a wonder occurred. Tell me, did this Brigit Able resemble the witch?”

  “They are of the same years—or were. Both were spindly. There the resemblance ceased. Ursula I would have called fair to look upon.”

  “Ha!” said the magistrate, slapping his silken-hosed knee. “Well do the ancients speak of the unruly multitude with contempt when one hysterical outcry can move an entire assembly to a delusion such as this.”

  “With all respect, sir,” ventured the parson, who had been itching to have his say. “I would not too readily dismiss this remarkable occurrence as a delusion.”

  “How so, Mr. Davis?” returned the magistrate, regarding the cleric with an expression of mild curiosity.

  “Some I spoke to swore upon their lives it was indeed the Chelmsford witch whose shape appeared at the window. I mean not to contradict our good honest constable, but is it not possible that it is he who is mistaken rather than the others?”

  “It was Brigit Able I saw,” Matthew insisted, not sure but that he ought to feel offended in having his word disputed. Had he not seen the girl with his own eyes? Had she not admitted to having looked from her window and then withdrawn her face again when the outcry began?

  The parson made a conciliatory gesture with his hands and said, “But see, Mr. Stock, you have told us that the two young women were of the same age and figure. Is it not possible, therefore—”

  “It is not possible,” Matthew repeated, feeling his face flush. I spoke to Brigit Able and her mistress afterward. Brigit said she had peered from the window and, seeing the noisy multitude below, had been startled by it.”

  “So says she,” remarked Alderman Trent. He was a largefaced man of muscular build who had made his money as a butcher. “The Devil hath power to assume a pleasing shape, and if he has such power as the proverb holds, then it would follow his minions may do likewise. Who are we to say it was not the witch at the window?”

  No one took exception to this principle, and there followed a brief account by the several persons present of remarkable incidents of supernatural metamorphoses, the most amazing of which was Peter Trent’s story of a Norwich woman who regularly turned herself into an owl for the purpose of spying on her neighbor from an upstairs window.

  “You suggest then, Mr. Trent,” said the magistrate, “that the spirit of Ursula Tusser took possession of the living body of Brigit Able.”

  “Stranger things have happened, sir,” said the butcher.

&nb
sp; “Marry, one wonders what the witch could not do!” exclaimed Mr. Walsh, visibly shuddering at the very thought. “It is said she had the power to turn herself into a toad or cat, and that was while she lived. What powers can she have now attained, now that her soul is in hell, where it most certainly

  • 99

  IS.

  There was a general agreement that Ursula Tusser’s soul was in hell. Then the magistrate turned to the parson and asked, “But surely the Devil has no power to possess the body of a virtuous person?”

  Looking pleased to have been asked for his opinion, the parson shifted in his chair and nodded shrewdly. He said the question was one that had been much written of. Fortunately he had made a study of the matter. The answer was not simple. “If we presume that Brigit Abie’s soul is virtuous, then that would preclude satanic possession. On the other hand—”

  Trent interrupted with a cynical guffaw. “If we presume, if we presume. Now these are very good words indeed, these

  presumes. Surely they are wasted on Brigit Able. Why, she was one of the witch’s confederates! She testified against Ursula to save her own neck. Is it not possible that she is as steeped in the black art as the creature that was hanged? And if so, then she has no more power to resist possession than did that herd of swine from which a legion of devils was cast, as the Scriptures speak.”

  “In faith, I have heard ill things of her,” offered Mr. Walsh, shaking his head.

  Matthew said Brigit had no evil reputation that he knew of, save for her part in the trial, at which he heard she had acquitted herself well enough, responding to the questions put to her and not denying her own attendance at Ursula’s ceremonies.

  “It seems Brigit Able has found a stout defender in our constable,” said Trent archly. “Who undoubtedly knows her better than we.”

  “You hold then, Mr. Stock,” said the magistrate, “that what appeared at the upper window of the Waite house was the serving girl and none other?”

  “That is my opinion,” said Matthew, at once irked with himself for labeling what he had seen as an opinion and not a fact.

  “And you, Mr. Trent and Mr. Walsh and good Parson Davis, hold to the contrary, that it was the spirit of Ursula Tusser in the shape of Brigit Able?”

  “We do, sir,” said Trent and Walsh in unison.

  The parson said he could not say what had been seen, since he was not present. He did suggest, however, that such manifestations were neither uncommon nor without scriptural precedent.

  Matthew felt the urge to point out that in that respect the parson was very much like the aldermen. None had seen the alleged spirit, but each had become a great authority on the subject.

  Trent said he thought it was a terrible shame that honest Christians should be subject to such enormities, and Mr. Walsh agreed. Trent suggested that Brigit Able and the en-

  tire Waite household be summoned for questioning. “Our cattle, our wives, our daughters, and our maidservants will all fall victim to this base hellhound, this secret and pernicious witch,” Trent declared indignantly.

  At this, the bailiff, who had sat quietly all this time with a superior air, joined the discussion, saying he thought this last suggestion a very proper one. “There’s rarely one witch in a town,” he said, “for they are like unto fleas, rats, or other noxious pests. Should you see one in a corner, be assured a multitude of his kinfolk make merry behind the wainscoting.”

  “It would ease the mind of many in the town were a jury impaneled,” said Mr. Trent.

  “Yes, a jury—that would do it,” agreed the bailiff with enthusiasm. “These vulgar broils make us look very bad in London, I think.”

  For a moment the magistrate sat pensive, while the other men waited his decision. “Well,” he said at last, “I don’t know the origin of this tumult—whether it; be from the sinful brain of man or the connivance of Satan—but I do know such unruly behavior as occurred today cannot be tolerated, and if an investigation will pacify the town, then you shall have one. Yet no jury, for I want someone I can hold responsible and direct. Constable Stock, I empower you to undertake such an investigation into these doings. Let your commission include the discovery of whatever dealings the Waites or their servants had or are now having that might reasonably require my warrant and the town its trial. All England will have its eyes upon us here to see how we acquit ourselves, so let us above all else be judicious in our proceedings and yes, Christianlike as well, neither tolerating evil nor persecuting the innocent.”

  The servant returned to remove the decanter and goblets and the magistrate rose to signal that the discussion was concluded. There was a quick exchange of farewells and the men were shown to the door. Moreau went off to see about some business of his master’s. The parson excused himself to visit a

  parishioner who lived not far from the manor. Matthew and the two aldermen were left to walk back to town together.

  They had gone about a half mile, conversing desultorily, when Trent brought the subject back to the Waite affair. “This is a great charge that has fallen upon you, Mr. Stock, a very great charge indeed.”

  Matthew assured the alderman that he understood just how great a charge it was, but Trent continued to discourse on the subject. Matthew suspected he regretted not having been appointed to the task himself. “This Brigit, this serving girl,” Trent went on, glaring at the road before him, his voice contemptuous, “her reputation is stale. It would be well to speak to her, make her tell you all she knows of this business. Squeeze it out of her. The jury was too eager to hang Ursula Tusser—they should have examined Brigit Able more closely.”

  “I have already spoken with her,” said Matthew, relieved to see the town ahead.

  “I mean speak to her with authority,” returned Trent. “Let her know your power. If she refuse to divulge what part Mrs. Waite had in this, she must understand we have ways of making her talk. You are in all things too softhearted, Mr. Stock. Hear now, the rigor of the law must serve or the town will be undone by these women.”

  Matthew bristled at the criticism but let it pass without rebuttal. Moulsham was at hand, the bottom of High Street. Within minutes the three men would part company.

  Walsh joined in with similar counsel. He mentioned the names of several persons who he claimed had personal knowledge of Margaret Waite’s witchcraft.

  “The persons you name,” replied Matthew stonily, “I know as well as you, and will consider whatever information they can give. Don’t worry, either of you. I’ll satisfy the magistrate’s expectations.”

  “Well, sir,” said Trent as the three men crossed the bridge, “it is not only the magistrate you must satisfy but the town. You saw the mood of the people. They are deathly afraid and beyond patience with this tribe of hellcats and

  their familiars. They'll brook no more, believe me. They will not be satisfied unless your inquiries uncover what their fear tells them is fact—that there is more than one witch in Chelmsford and of them Margaret Waite is chief. The serving girl is but a disciple, believe you me. As to what punishment awaits them, the law is clear.”

  Though Matthew sought to defend Margaret Waite of what he believed was an unfounded and malicious charge, the aldermen would not be persuaded otherwise but that she was a pernicious woman as these recent events made plain. They also made it clear they thought the less of him for disputing about it. “A fine investigator you will make, Mr. Stock, of this filthy business,” said Trent. The three men stopped in the street. Trent began railing. “What? Does Margaret Waite already have you in thrall? Has she put a spell upon your cow and caused its milk to curdle or its teats to wither? Why else, pray, should you be so vocal in her defense, she who has been visited by a malign spirit, as a dozen honest citizens and more of the town are prepared to testify?”

  “Ridiculous! It was Brigit Able at the window, I tell you. I saw her myself,” answered Matthew, growing heated.

  The two aldermen regarded him with the implacable countenances of men determ
ined in their convictions and outraged that they should be questioned. “You are a fool, Matthew Stock, and as easily led about as a lamb,” said Trent. “Watch that you are not served up for sacrifice.”

  “Would you have me arrest the woman forthwith?” Matthew asked caustically. “Or at least wait upon the magistrate’s warrant? I have been commissioned to investigate. I shall do it, God help me. Let me remind you this is my commission, Mr. Trent, not yours.”

  “We well know it is yours” said Walsh, “but wish only that you carry it out. There are tests to prove a witch beyond reasonable doubt. Her body may be searched for the Devil’s mark, or she may be dunked, for a witch cursed to scorn the waters of baptism may not sink in the water. God will aid the innocent, if Margaret Waite and her servant be so.” “Shall I then persecute the poor woman that grace may

  abound?” asked Matthew, not bothering to hide his contempt for the alderman’s suggestions.

  “We ask you to persecute no man, nor woman either,” replied Trent, whose flushed sweating face indicated his own temper was mounting. “We ask only that you do your duty. I hope you don’t suppose that excludes inquiries at the Waite house just because you and the Waites happen to be old friends.”

  “I suppose no such thing,” answered Matthew hotly. “But neither do I think my commission a license to undermine the reputation of a family just because some in authority in this town like them not.”