The House Where It Happened

by Devlin, Martina

  “She’s much better,” the mistress put in. “Her appetite is returning, and last night is the first in weeks where she managed to sleep right through.”

  “Mary says she thinks the witching is over now, Frazer,” said my master. “Everything can get back to normal as soon as the trial is done with.” Frazer let out a snort at that, and my master asked heatedly, “You appear to be some doubt about what’s been happening here. How can you explain it, except by witchcraft?”

  “I can’t explain it. It perplexes me, all the same.”

  Silence fell, and I went to slip out to scrub the front step, grimy from all the comings and goings. The movement caught my master’s eye. “Have you settled with Noah to take you in the cart to the Assizes tomorrow, Ellen?”

  “Aye, sir. He’s bringin’ Mercy Hunter as well.”

  “See? The trial is an exhibition. ’Tis entertainment,” said Frazer Bell.

  “I’m not going to mock or to crow, sir,” I said.

  “You’re going to see justice done, like a sensible lass,” said my master. “Frazer, Mister Sinclair tells me a Good Samaritan is paying for a hot meal to be sent in every day to those witches. His initials wouldn’t be FT, would they?”

  Frazer picked up his hat. “Surely their poverty is proof they aren’t in cahoots with the Devil? But folk are too blind to see it.”

  “Still, if they can’t pay their bills in gaol, their possessions should be seized. That’s only fair. Folk accused of crimes mustn’t become debtors to the county.” My master smiled with those white teeth of his, to take the sting from his words. “Cheer up – you look like a man who’s been eating underdone mutton all week. Stay and dine with us.”

  “Thank you, no, James, I must be on my way.”

  When he was gone, my master said, “Frazer’s a sound man, but he broods on things. Hang the whole damn lot of them, I say, and dump their bodies in a cesspit. If they hadn’t been tricking about where they had no business, my mother’s grave would never have been defiled.”

  Chapter 14

  It was screek of day when Noah and me left Islandmagee to go to the witch trial, picking up Mercy Hunter on the way. Early though it was, we weren’t the only ones on the road. As it grew lighter, we found ourselves in a procession of carts and carriages heading into Carrickfergus. That morning, I knowed it would be wet, because smoke came down the chimney. A dog eating grass is another sign of rain. But the weather did nothing to dampen our spirits, and conversation was gay between pilgrims. Among the women, there was a sense of relief at danger lifted: the witch hunt was over, and we not among those denounced.

  We rattled through Kilroot, passing scores of folks on foot. The world and his wife were making their way to the same place as us. Many’s the woman had her shoon tied round her neck, to save on leather till she reached the town.

  Soon, the castle was ahead of us, with the sea behind it. No matter how often you saw Carrickfergus Castle, you couldn’t help but be awestruck. Dark grey and mighty it stood against the sky – letting folk know they were in the most important town in these parts. The castle had a long, low keep stretching out into the waves, and whoever built it was a canny man because he gave it curved walls. No blind spots, see? My da told me that as a wee cuddy, and I never forgot it.

  Traffic slowed right down, but we were happy to watch the militia practising their drill. Three mastiffs were chained to a gatehouse, with jaws that could crunch through bones as if they were blackberries.

  Noah Spears had left off his usual torn smock, intending to make a good impression in the town, despite saying it was nothing but a den of thieves. And the town was making a good impression on him, or at least the castle was. “Them walls are twelve foot thick,” he said. “Let the Frenchies try their tricks here, and see how far they get.”

  Some say the castle has stood in Carrickfergus these five hundred years and more. But I don’t know if there’s any truth in that. It sounds a powerful long time.

  The crush meant we moved at a snail’s pace. Noah told us to go ahead while he found a place to leave the ass and cart, and he would catch up on us. So out we hopped and joined those on foot. The courthouse was less than a cannon shot from the castle, but it took us a brave while to make our way to it. The crowd pushed and pulled us this way and that, but we gave the odd dig when we needed, holding our own.

  Mercy stopped for a loaf of bread, but when the baker said he was looking tuppence for it, she laughed at him. “A bawbee’s as much as it’s worth. You’re a robber, so you are.”

  At the courthouse, a crowd lined up. The double doors of oak, thrice the height of a man and studded with metal, were shut tight. Still, folk were in a holiday mood, eating and laughing and chittering about this and that – mostly the witches. If you put your nose in the air you could smell springtime, and it made folk itchy.

  A woman in striped linen in front of us was ready for a chat. “Never let a witch’s shadow touch you – it brings bad luck.”

  Mercy’s eyes turned roundy. “What would happen?’

  “Your fingers might drop off. Or you could loss the child you were carryin’. Ach, you’d never know how the evil would fall on you.”

  “I heared a witch has no shadow,” said another woman. “The Devil keeps it for her.”

  “Why do you suppose them witches bothered tormentin’ the Dunbar lassie? Had they not more important folk to pick on?” said a man, wiping crumbs from his mouth with his sleeve.

  “Jealousy,” sniffed a woman you could see was a right blab. “I heared she’s a pretty piece, and them witches all have faces on them like turnips.”

  “Will they hang?” asked a half-grown lad. “I’d give anything for to see a hangin’.”

  “Whatever they do with thon pack of she-devils, they darsent transport them – that’s for sure,” offered a man with a runny nose.

  “Why not? On’y the other day a fellow was transported to a plantation in the Americas for house breakin’. Witchin’ folk is worse.”

  “Witches can raise storms at sea an’ wreck ships. No ship’s master wud risk takin’ them on board.”

  “My uncle says you want to see ’em kick when they’re strung up,” said the boy. “He watched a horse thief hang. Danced for a good half-hour on the end of the rope, so he did.”

  A rattle came from inside the courthouse, followed by a creaking, and a pair of soldiers opened the doors. When the crowd pushed forward, Mercy and I held hands to stay together.

  “No sign of Noah,” I said.

  “He’ll have to shift for hisself,” said Mercy.

  By now we were through the great hallway and inside the courtroom. I never saw such a high ceiling, nor so many domed windows – yet in no time it felt stuffy, the air stale from too many folk breathing it. The horse dung on the boots of the man in front didn’t help. It was a brave handsome room, wainscoted from floor to ceiling, with great slabs of stone on the floor. Half the chamber was taken up with benches, and we followed the folk squeezing onto them. However many they were intended for, twice as many again crammed in.

  There were men of the cloth wherever the eye fell. I never knowed the County of Antrim could hold so many. Grim-faced soldiers were everywhere, forbye. They were at the door, inside and out, and more of them standing round the walls. The only one who looked as if he had any use for gaiety was a drummer boy. You could see him longing to give a right old rat-a-tat-tat on the goatskin. Three or four haughty officers in jackets with a double row of polished buttons walked here and there between the troops. Spurs clashing and swords clanking, they turned heads. Mercy Hunter was in heaven when one of them gave her the eye.

  A woman a few rows away from us took out a pasty and bit in, but a soldier knocked it from her hand. “No eating in the courtroom.” She dusted it off and put it back in her pocket, complaining under her breath. But who can gainsay a man with a musket?

  A buzzing went round when Mary Dunbar came in with my master, the mistress and Mister Sinclair. Everyo
ne craned for a look. After all, it wasn’t every day you saw someone who was witched. She seemed overwhelmed by the attention, peeping out from behind her cap with the lace lappets.

  “Isn’t she a poppet,” said a woman nursing a baby at her breast.

  “I wonder how she stood up to them besoms at all?” said another.

  A hidden door opened in the wainscoting, and through it stepped a fellow in livery, wearing a powdered grey wig and shoes with red heels. He was lugging a staff as big as himself. He looked us over closely, before nodding at one of the captains, who nodded at a lieutenant. Out went a couple of soldiers, returning with a line of men at their heels. Twelve, in all. Well-got, they were, merchants or landlords or some such by the cut of them. Somebody said they were the jury. Red Heels tapped his staff again, and this time half a dozen solders and the drummer boy trotted out. They were gone no time before we heard the drum, followed by a tramp of feet, and the prisoners were led in. The drum beat made a solemn procession of it, though the wee drummer boy couldn’t keep his face straight and a grin kept breaking through. The crowd was worked up by their arrival. “The witches,” they hissed, and the soldiers had to push folk back and warn them to stay in their seats.

  The prisoners squinted against the daylight. Their bonnets had been taken off them, though there was no call to show such disrespect, and their heads were close-cropped like wee scaldies. The scissors had sliced too close in places: scabs clumped where the blood was dried in.

  “It’s too bad they’ve been sheared,” I said.

  “Don’t talk daft. A witch’s familiar can cling to her hair,” said Mercy.

  I spied Lizzie Cellar behind Margaret Mitchell. Gaol had thinned her down so there wasn’t a pick on her. She can’t have done justice to those hot meals sent in by Frazer Bell. As for her beautiful nut-brown hair that used to fall to her waist, it was a sin to see it hacked from her scalp.

  They were herded to a stand opposite the jury. Mary Dunbar let out a whimper as they passed near-hand, and the mistress put an arm round her kinswoman’s waist. Another gentleman and his lady made their way across the room to them, and from the way they greeted Mary Dunbar I guessed them to be her parents. I was on the look-out for them. The mistress had invited them to stay at Knowehead for the trial, on account of the scarlet fever having passed over in Armagh, but they preferred an inn in Carrickfergus. Uncle Dunbar was a merchant, like his brother the glover, and liked to visit other shops when the occasion arose. There’d be no such chance in Kilcoan More.

  “Order, order, order!” Red Heels banged his staff on the ground. “Pray be upstanding for their honours, Lord Justice James Macartney and Lord Justice Anthony Upton!” The concealed door was opened again, this time from the outside by a court official in the same livery as Red Heels, and two coxcombs appeared in scarlet robes and shoulder-length white wigs.

  “Did you ever see such grand fellows in all your live-long days?” whispered Mercy.

  Up they sat on thrones on a dais, under a coat of arms, and their conceit knowed no bounds.

  “The court is in session!” bellowed Red Heels. A fine pair of lungs he had on him.

  The judges looked to be about fifty. One wore spectacles and the other didn’t. One had a yellowish complexion and the other didn’t. Except for that, I found it hard to tell them apart.

  The judge with glasses, Macartney, nodded to another fellow with more ruffles at his throat than you’d find on any petticoat. He was Clerk of the Assizes.

  “We will open proceedings with a prayer,” announced the frilly fellow.

  A minister came forward and cleared his throat, covering his mouth with a hand, dainty-like, and hadn’t he a ruby ring on it. Some men of God are closer to fops – Presbyters would never put up with such nonsense. “Christ Jesus, we ask you to bless this court and guide its deliberations towards a just and righteous judgment. We will now recite the Lord’s Prayer.” He squeezed his eyes shut. “Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be Thy name . . .”

  Everybody joined in, nobody wanting to be thought ungodly.

  I stole a keek round while the praying was going on, and saw faces from Islandmagee dotted here and there. Mary Dunbar looked a picture of innocence in dove-coloured cloth. The mistress was wearing her new cloak of plum velvet lined with rabbit skins, brought by the master from Dublin. The weather was mild, if damp, but she had to wear it on account of her need to turn heads. Mind you, she was pink in the face already from the heat of her fine feathers, and fanning herself constantly.

  After prayers, the jury was sworn in, whiles the judges shuffled papers.

  “Do we have any confessions among these documents?” asked Judge Upton. My, but his speech was polished.

  “None, my lord. We have depositions from witnesses, and the plaintiff is in court to give evidence.”

  The judge studied the prisoners, who shrank beneath his notice. All except the big one. She gave him back look for look. “How do you plead?” he asked.

  None of them answered. They seemed not to know they could speak up.

  “All the prisoners deny the charge,” said the clerk. “They have each lodged a ‘not guilty’ plea with the court.”

  “Stubborn hoors!” shouted a voice from the courtroom, and Red Heels banged his staff and called for order.

  “We must hear how they plead from their own lips,” said Judge Upton. “Prisoners have been known to change their pleas. Read out the charge to them.”

  The clerk lifted a parchment, and gabbled his way through it. He could read fast, I’ll grant him that. It would have taken me half the morning, with all them long words.

  “‘There being complaint made before us by Mistress Mary Dunbar of Armagh in the County Armagh, that diverse women are under high suspicion of sundry acts of witchcraft done against the laws of our Sovereign Lady Anne, by the Grace of God Queen of Great Britain, France and Ireland, Defender of the Faith, in the tenth year of her majesty’s reign. These detestable acts, contrary to the statute of the first King James, were wickedly, maliciously and feloniously committed upon the body of the aforesaid Mistress Dunbar in the house of James Haltridge esquire of Islandmagee inthe County Antrim. Whereby great hurt and damage has been done to the said person above named, who therefore craves justice.’” Then he read out the names of the eight accused.

  Judge Macartney peered over the top of his spectacles. “You have been denounced as witches. What say you? Guilty or not guilty?”

  “Spare me!” burst out one.

  “All in good time. First you must answer the charge. Be you guilty of witchcraft, of which you are suspected? Yes or no? You must answer, so it can be recorded in the court documents.”

  One by one, the women said “Not guilty”. Each time, Mary Dunbar shook her head and winced. Most of the accused answered in a mumble, irritating the judges. They wanted everybody to sing out loud and clear. But Margaret Mitchell called out “Not guilty!” right and plain, and didn’t leave it at that, neither. “She has wronged me an’ what she says agin me is false.”

  “The prisoner will confine herself to answering the question,” ordered Judge Macartney.

  Up jumped a skittery fellow in a bob-wig, with a visog on him like a kicked cur. He turned out to be the lawyer for the prosecution. “These women did shameful violence to the afflicted, the particulars of which I have here before me.”

  “Mister Blair will also kindly confine himself to addressing the court when he is invited to do so,” said the judge. “We have not yet heard the formal indictment read into the record. Then, and not before then, does he have our leave to proceed.”

  The lawyer was a wee crawley-boy, thanking the judge for slapping him down. Up he popped again as soon as he was given the say-so, going on about all the torture done to Mary Dunbar, between “body-arching spasms” and “bodily humiliations”. Then he called the first witness to take the stand. There was a dose of ministers giving evidence, and before ever they were allowed to speak their piece they had
to take an oath: “The truth to tell and no truth to conceal, as I should answer for it on the Great Day of Judgment.” Every chance they got, they slipped in sermons about the Devil being an arch-deceiver, until even the judges were yawning.

  The most preachy one of all was Robert Sinclair. Expecting to be on show, he had made an effort with his appearance: his coat was brushed, his boots scraped and blackened, and his wig put on straight. This was his big day, and he made a right song and dance about the part he played in battling Beelzebub.

  “How did you first come to recognize these women as witches, as alleged?” asked Judge Upton.

  The pockmarks stood out white on Mister Sinclair’s cheeks. “The very fact of the accusation against these creatures damns them. Witchcraft is such a grievous sin that God would never allow an innocent person to be accused of it. Ergo, they must be guilty. These degenerate gets of the Devil must be brought to remorse for denying God’s sacred commands. And they must be punished, mortifying their flesh for the sake of their immortal souls.”

  “It is up to this court to decide whether and how they deserve punishment, Mister Sinclair,” sniffed the judge.

  “Mistress Dunbar told me the coven had the power to raise Satan. He delighted in taking sods of peat, and throwing them at meeting-house windows.”

  “Why would Satan let himself be summoned up, and then be content with schoolboy pranks?” asked Judge Upton. “Surely he’d prefer to provoke war, famine and pestilence?”