Magic Lessons

by Alice Hoffman

  They waited through the heat of noon and the dullness of a stifling afternoon into the falling dusk, when the air was thick with black gnats. By then an odd silence had settled, something uncomfortable. Still no crows flew overhead. A band of men was sent ahead to flush out the birds, Hathorne in the forefront, for his neighbors were fighting evil on his behalf. Privately, he wished Maria’s crow would simply disappear, and take her along, like a fever dream that vanished in a blink. But just as darkness was about to fall, a huge number of crows came flocking from the north, a thousand or more. At once, the men began to fire their rifles. They shot wildly and blindly, and several grazed their fellow bird-hunters by accident. One fellow was shot through the throat, and he lay in a pool of his own blood, and not even a kerchief tied around his neck could stop the gushing. The men went wild when they could not rouse their fellow hunter, and they set to firing off rounds as if in war. John sank back from them, for he stood out in the crowd; he was the tallest among them, and the wealthiest, and the reason why there had been a death on this day. He knew how easily people could turn on each other, how a man could be a hero one moment, and the cause of resentment the next. How he wished he had never been to that cursed island, or gone to sea, or told Maria about Essex County. And yet he imagined leaping into the blue-green water, thousands of miles from here, in a land where no one followed the rules set forth, where a sin might float like a flower in a fountain and a man was free to do as he pleased.

  Maria heard the mayhem. The guns, the echoes of death, the calling of men and of birds. She had no choice but to leave Faith asleep on her pallet, so she might run through the dark, barefoot, in her blue dress. The first of the season’s fireflies drifted by, globes of light flickering among the blades of grass, then rising and falling between the trees. Maria felt danger all around her, burning like salt in a wound. It was then she realized she had not seen Cadin all day. She felt her heart beat as fast as his.

  As she came upon the pasture, birds were plunging from the sky, a black rain of feathers. When a crow dies, the others band together and search for the killer, mobbing those responsible. Scores of birds attacked the men from town, diving beak and claw into the fray, their hoarse calls striking fear into the hearts of many of those who had believed themselves brave for the cowardly act of shooting at unsuspecting birds. Maria felt her arm burning, and it was only then that she realized her blood was spilling onto the ground, black and burning. In the mad volley of bullets and buckshot, she had been shot. She backed into the trees, breathing hard, feeling much as she had on the day she hid in the forest and watched Hannah’s house burn. She murmured a spell of protection, in Latin and backwards, quoting from Solomon’s book of magic, and as she did the men’s guns began to misfire. She called to the sky, and banks of roiling clouds appeared in the west, moving in like a wave at sea.

  The crows realized they could not win the fight against the barrage of gunfire, and in response they split apart into two groups, half flying east, the others west. Crows could not be eaten or baked into pies, for their meat was dark and gamey and foul, and their harsh feathers weren’t used in pillows or quilts. They were worth nothing to these men and had only been killed because they were considered pests and scavengers, because it was decided they were evil beings. The men collected hundreds of bodies, whooping with joy, when all that they’d done could have been accomplished by a gang of ten-year-old boys armed with their fathers’ rifles and slingshots. There had been no reason for this to come to pass, but what was done was done and couldn’t be undone. Even a witch knows this. There are not spells for many of the sorrows in this world, and death is one of them. You cannot bring back those who have stepped into the next world, and should you try, they would not be the same beings that had once been, but rather they would become unnatural creatures, created by dark magic and desire.

  Maria found Cadin in the tall weeds, a black heart lying still in the grass. The men in the field couldn’t tell one crow from another, but she knew her dearest friend immediately. She tore the skirt of her dress and wrapped him in the fabric and wept as she did so. Her cries could be heard as far as the wharf, as far as sound could carry, even at sea, and the men collecting crows stopped what they were doing, feeling haunted. Many believed that a female crow was mourning the loss of her mate. A hush fell over them, even though they were soaked with sweat. They had been elated by their hunting madness, but even the most thoughtless among them now felt pricked by fear, embarrassed by their foolish acts of cruelty.

  Beneath a pear tree, where he stood in the dark, John Hathorne knew exactly what he’d heard. A woman’s anguish that was louder than the gunfire, louder than the last calls of the crows in the sky. He knew her voice, and why shouldn’t he? He was the cause of her grief.

  * * *

  She couldn’t bring herself to bury Cadin and leave him forever earthbound. Instead, she set a fire on a flat ledge not far from the lake and burned his body. The smoke was as white as the snow had been in Devotion Field on the day he found her. Her dear black heart, her companion, her familiar, her friend. She sank down and sobbed and didn’t leave his ashes until first light. By then the wind had carried him into the sky where he belonged.

  Maria had been weakened from the metal bullet lodged in her arm, for iron is a bane to witches. In the countryside of England, iron chains were kept in every prison, with cuffs small enough to fit a woman. Maria went to the cabin, and while Faith was still sleeping, she took up a knife to dig out the bullet, though her hand was bruised as well. As she did so, she spoke backwards, asking for justice for Cadin. She made a poultice of balm of Gilead and boiled sage to dress her wound, then fixed a sling for her arm, using the shawl embroidered with birds from Curaçao, the country where it had been so easy to dream of miracles. She wound a white bandage over her hand, but it didn’t hide the bruise in the shape of a crow that had risen on her skin.

  * * *

  When she went to Hathorne’s house, the two silver hairpins were in her hair, one from Cadin and one from her mother, the sort of adornment Puritan women were forbidden to wear, not that such rules mattered to Maria. She wore a black dress, for she was in mourning as surely as any widow. As she walked down Washington Street, her daughter in her arms, the neighbors peered out and began to whisper. People were drawn into their yards, waiting behind the hedges to see what would happen next. Over two hundred crows had been shot, and there were those who vowed that Maria had been among them, and that she wore the sling to disguise what was not an arm, but a wing. “Shapeshifter,” the neighbors whispered. “Look at the hem of her skirt,” they said. She had walked through the fields and there was no mud clinging to her. Surely this had been done by magic, they insisted, and there were those who vowed that every night Maria flew above the treetops, flinging stones upon roofs. Some people said that the red-haired daughter of hers was a demon, not a girl.

  Maria knew what they thought, and as she walked by their houses, she ran a stick along their fences, the sound clattering. It sounded as if crows were calling, and the noise sent chills down people’s spines. Doors slammed shut. Windows rattled. Soon the street was empty.

  She stood in front of the house with black shutters and knocked on the door, calling out for John Hathorne. No one answered, so she pounded harder, breaking a tiny bone in her hand that would always cause her pain on damp days. With Cadin’s death, something inside her had changed. Now she knew she had read the black mirror incorrectly. Perhaps she’d been won over because although she’d been a servant, John seemed to have seen her as something more. Or so she’d wished. She had fallen under water, under a spell, in love with love. She had seen it happen a hundred times before, as she sat in the dark listening to Hannah’s advice to the women who came to her door. Is it the man you want, or the feeling inside you when someone cares?

  In the parlor, Hathorne heard his name called. It sounded like a curse, for it was said forward and then it was reversed. When he didn’t appear, Maria looked in the window
and saw a figure peering out. Ruth Hathorne, soon to have her second child, which she prayed would be another boy. Ruth’s heart was racing. She knew a witch when she saw one. Even Ruth’s little son had known her for what she was. Now the woman had taken a strange black book from her satchel and was reading from it, her lips moving quickly. Ruth knew that books had power; that was why she secretly studied letters so that she might read the Scriptures. But this woman at their door was clearly expert at reading, and therefore even more dangerous than Ruth had first imagined. She hid her son in a wardrobe and told him to be quiet. “If a woman in a black dress comes for you, do not go with her,” she said.

  Ruth had never demanded anything for herself and had never before raised her voice, but now she called for her husband in a frantic tone. “Come here now. She’s looking for you!”

  Maria could hear Ruth Hathorne cry out behind the locked door. Good, she thought. He’ll have to face me. He’ll have to accept Faith as his own.

  By now, Ruth was too frightened to go look out the window; instead, she held a looking glass up to the street, to reverse any spells this witch might set upon her. Her mother had come from the west of England and had taught her folk medicine that she kept to herself, cures her husband would never have approved. Tonight she would bathe with salt and vinegar to cleanse herself and insure that evil thoughts could not cling to her. But Maria held no ill will toward her, only pity. They were sisters, really. Had they held up their palms, one beside the other, the same love line would have run through each of their hands until the middle of their palms, when the lines were diverted. This is how he’ll hurt you, this is the way you will blame yourself, this is your salvation, this is what you can see if you open your eyes.

  Hathorne came into the room in a fury when he heard Ruth demanding that he deal with Maria Owens. Was it his fault he’d been enchanted? He was a victim as much as Adam had been, tempted into sin. “Why have you not sent her away?” he asked his wife.

  Ruth threw him a desperate look, but he insisted.

  “It’s woman’s work,” he said. “Just as you send away a peddler.”

  * * *

  Ruth whispered a prayer to protect herself as she opened the door. She wore a gray dress, with her cap covering her hair. She was pretty and pale and confused, but most of all she was frightened.

  “He said you must go away,” she told Maria. Her voice sounded small and weak, even to her own ear.

  “I’m not here to hurt you.” Maria felt a tightening in her throat. She was the woman she had never expected to be, someone who had broken another woman’s heart. “Please understand. I didn’t know about you.”

  “I beg of you.” Ruth closed her eyes, as if by doing so she could make this dark-haired beauty vanish. She did not wish to see Maria’s eyes; people said they were silver, like a cat’s. “Don’t harm us.”

  Maria took Ruth’s hand and Ruth’s eyes flashed open. Her eyes were so pale, so blue. They could feel the heat of one another’s blood. Maria let go. All she wanted was for this woman to hear her.

  “Let him tell me himself,” Maria said, “and no harm will come to you.”

  Ruth went inside and closed the door, her heart hitting against her rib cage. She was little more than nineteen years old, a motherless child, and now the mother of John Hathorne’s only son. Her own beloved mother had whispered in her ear before she and Ruth’s father were exiled to the wilderness of Rhode Island: Trust no one but yourself.

  John was waiting for her, his expression wary. Tonight he looked older than his years; she could see the man he would be as he aged, his looks gone, his humor turned dark, a man who sat in judgment of all others. When you make certain choices, you change your fate. Look at your left hand and you will see the lines shifting into what you have made of yourself.

  “Well?” he said.

  At fourteen Ruth had been grateful that he’d married her, for she’d had no one, and knew nothing of the world. All she knew was this town. The elm trees with their black leaves, the bricked streets, the houses with their wooden shutters, the fields where the crows came to eat corn, the harbor with its boats straining to be free of their moorings, the endless winters with blizzards of snow. He’d told her to close her eyes and pray the first night they were together. He’d said not to cry, for it would displease God. She had done as she was told on that night and ever since, but now she lifted her chin when she spoke to him.

  “She will speak only to you.”

  “For that I blame you,” Hathorne muttered.

  “And I you,” Ruth said in a soft voice.

  At last he went outside wearing his coat, his face set in a dark expression. He had not seen Maria for who she was in the bright light of Curaçao, but he most certainly saw her now. He’d heard of such creatures, women who were beyond God’s watch and were said to devour a man’s soul and make a mockery out of decency. His wife’s erratic behavior was one more mark of her power.

  “You’re not to come here,” he scolded Maria. He knew the neighbors were watching. They were always watching in this town. He stood on the other side of the fence.

  “What coward asks his wife to do what he fears to do?”

  “We cannot quarrel. No good will come of it.”

  “And yet you came to me often enough.” Maria’s words caused the color to flare in his face. “Would you have ever told me you had a wife?”

  There were features Maria possessed that he’d never noticed before, suspicious qualities. A black mark in the inner crook of her elbow. Silver-gray eyes that glinted in the dark. Hair that was black as a crow’s feathers. Her arm in a sling. Black leaves falling out of season, gathering at her feet.

  “And now you’ve killed him,” Maria said.

  “It,” he said. “It was a crow.”

  “If only you had shared his qualities, you, sir, would have been a better man.”

  Rather than respond, Hathorne reached into his coat and took out a purse. Would he dare to pay her for her heartbreak with a bag of silver? Every woman is a fool at least once in her life, Hannah had told her.

  “For my services?” she said in a tone he had not heard before. She was not a weak girl he could command, though he had done his best to control the situation. She was something more than that.

  “I have a ship leaving tomorrow,” he told her. “This will pay your way. I gave you the sapphire and the diamonds, and now this silver. Surely that’s enough.” He lowered his voice. “I suggest you do as I say. We are not in Curaçao now, miss.”

  Maria nodded to Faith, carried in her arms. “And yet here is the evidence of that time.”

  Ruth was at the window, behind the cloudy glass. She forced herself to watch, not through a mirror but with her own eyes. She would not dare to step out of her house without her husband’s permission, having never gone beyond the confines of her own property unless she was on her way to the market or to church. Later, Ruth would not ask John anything about Maria when he at last came to bed. She would say nothing and bite her tongue, but now she gazed out and imagined she was free, a bird, a ship, a woman on the street with her hair uncovered.

  “Don’t think I don’t know what you are,” Maria said.

  “And what is that?”

  “A liar, sir.”

  You can always tell a liar, for he will not look at you when he speaks, and often he has white spots on his fingernails, one to mark every lie he’s told. But no man enjoys being called by that title, even if it’s the truth. Hathorne took Maria’s arm, but she pulled away. She was not about to do as she was told, as if she were the one who wore a white cap and stood behind the window, too fearful to leave her own yard.

  She spilled out the purse he’d given her. Ten silver pieces. A year’s payment for a washerwoman or a servant. The moment she touched the coins, the silver turned black. She could see his panic as he observed this witchery.

  “You had best never return,” he said.

  “You have it wrong,” Maria told him. “You had
best stay away from me.”

  * * *

  That same night, Maria unwrapped the black mirror and looked into the glass, for at last she could see clearly. She spied herself without the sapphire necklace. She recalled what Samuel Dias had told her, that to his eyes the stone did not appear real. She removed it and went out to the lake, where she set it on a ledge of rock. Then she took her Grimoire in hand, the spine of the book in her grasp as she brought it down, smashing the jewel. The stone shattered into a thousand pieces, as glass does when struck, for the gift had been paste and nothing more, as false as the man who had given it to her. Where there was one lie there would always be another. She slit the hem of her skirt, scattering the diamonds on the rock. She stood to stomp on them with the weight of her boot. They shattered also, worthless paste, trinkets meant to buy her love and nothing more, breaking into bright bits of dust.

  When you look into your own future, you may see only what you want to see, and even the wisest woman can make a mistake, especially in matters of love.

  She’d had the wrong man all along.

  * * *

  Tell a witch to go, and she’ll plant her feet on the ground and stay exactly where she is. Instead of doing as she’s told, she’ll take a knife to her arm and let her blood drip onto the ground, and in that way she will claim the earth for herself and for her daughters and for all the daughters who follow her. It is the future she’s claiming, the right to be a woman who can do as she pleases.