The Salem Witch Society

by K. N. Shields

  “And Gould actually thought he’d find something like that sitting on the library shelves?”

  “It shows they don’t know exactly what it is they’re looking for. Gould sought Mrs. Prescott’s help in finding an old book on witchcraft. He could not offer a name, an author, or a description. They don’t know the details. They know only that there is a book they must find. The temperance union’s understanding of the case is less complete than our own.”

  Lean shook his head. “We’re searching for clues to when and where the killer will strike next. Why are they looking for it? The only clear motivation we’ve seen on the colonel’s part has been to hide his delusional son away from the public’s gaze.”

  “The incident in the library was right after Maggie Keene’s death. The first local murder, the first they would have heard of. Something about that murder must have alarmed them. The details were certainly distinctive enough.”

  “They realize that Geoffrey is involved. They know something of his interest in the occult; perhaps he’s mentioned a book on witchcraft.” Lean let the implications churn and shift in his mind.

  “Are you talking about witches?” Owen’s muffled voice rose up from beneath the table with great enthusiasm.

  “Course not,” Lean assured him in a firm tone.

  “I suspect they’re not looking for the book because they want information,” Grey said. “They want to hide it. Something about the book threatens them. It must contain some sort of incriminating evidence. Something linked to these murders.”

  Lean nodded. “The same as Boxcar Annie. They paid McGrath plenty to keep her tucked away. Perhaps her description of the killer sounded too much like Geoffrey Blanchard.”

  “Gould’s not the type to ever crack and confess, and Boxcar Annie will never reveal her secrets. But there’s still the book. If no one could ever read it, no one could know that there’s any connection between all these killings. No connection means no case to investigate, and so Geoffrey Blanchard will never be arrested or ever prosecuted unless he’s caught red-handed. That’s why Gould was in Danvers. Making sure Geoffrey doesn’t get into trouble.”

  Lean considered that for a moment. “Do you suppose Gould was ready to silence Geoffrey for good to prevent him from committing another murder?”

  Grey’s head tilted as he mulled over the possibility. “That may explain the skirmish in Blanchard’s hotel room. It seems extreme, but it would ensure there was no public scandal tying Geoffrey Blanchard to the murders—and no resulting drought of donations to the temperance union’s coffers.”

  “If we can get evidence of Gould’s involvement in any of this, we may be able to force the colonel’s hand as to Geoffrey Blanchard’s activities,” Lean said.

  “Of course, he’ll insist that nothing be made public.”

  “I don’t care if it’s made public,” Lean said, “so long as we can stop the killer.”

  “Agreed. Though if Geoffrey Blanchard is our killer and the colonel’s been concealing evidence of his son’s crimes, then he’s allowed additional murders to occur.…”

  Lean and Grey regarded each other for a long moment. In his mind Lean was weighing what he knew against what he could possibly hope to prove if Geoffrey Blanchard or his father were ever brought before a jury.

  Grey raised his cup of coffee in salute to Lean, smiled, and took a sip. “They’re waiting for us at the historical society. Perhaps it’s time for you to return the boy home.”

  59

  Upon entering the research room of the historical society, Lean and Grey greeted Helen and her boss. “Thank you for agreeing to help us with this matter,” Lean said to F. W. Meserve. “I hope you’ve got some ideas, because the story of this burned page is a complete riddle to us.”

  “A riddle?” Meserve’s eyes glowed. “Ha! Why, that’s exactly what I think. A very specific riddle indeed. If my theory is correct, this is the start of what has been called the ‘Riddle of the Martyrs.’ I must say, gentlemen, the page you’ve sent me is the most incredible. I don’t know where to begin.”

  “At the outset would be fine,” Grey said.

  Meserve took several deep breaths, his bulbous frame trembling with the effort to constrain his excitement. “There is a book whose title translates to something like the ‘Black Book of the Secret Journeys of the Great Mage Arrelius,’ or just the ‘Black Book.’ It was reportedly written by a dark wizard named Jacobus Arrelius. In it, he chronicles his travels from England to the Holy Land during the Crusades. He studied magic and alchemy while in Arabian lands and supposedly died there. Tortured and killed as a heretic.”

  “Do you have a copy of this Black Book?” Lean asked.

  “Heavens no. It’s the source of many rumors and stories, but I’ve never even been sure that it actually exists. I researched it a few years ago in connection with another project of mine. I’ve only ever found veiled references to it. Anyway, the book is not so special for what Jacobus Arrelius originally wrote. That part is said to be something of a mishmash of standard incantations and whatnot. What makes the book so infamous is an addendum from the early 1600s. A descendant of Jacobus reportedly copied the original text but made several alterations, including, somewhere in the body of the work, a most dreadful and powerful spell. He called it the Riddle of the Martyrs.”

  “What’s so dreadful about it?” Lean asked.

  “Its purpose was supposedly to raise the spirit of Jacobus, who had died four hundred years earlier. But it was not just your regular séance-type spirit visit we’re talking about. Legend has it the spell actually produced Jacobus into the living flesh. A full and complete conjuring of an actual live person. Literally raising the dead. And this could be accomplished only by a series of human sacrifices.”

  “And you think this is it?” Grey asked.

  Meserve’s head bobbed up and down. “Oh, yes, I daresay I do. Look again at the page you sent me.” He fumbled through a series of papers until he produced the photograph. “It says here, ‘In the first month of my travels in service of the ascension of my Master, James …’ Given the date in the early seventeenth century, this could be taken as a reference to King James—himself a noted devotee of the study of demonology. But the clincher is here in the handwritten note to the side. Barely legible. Someone has given Master James the surname of Arrelan.”

  “James Arrelan. Jacobus Arrelius.” Grey nodded. “Similar names.”

  “Very similar. Especially when you dig and find that there was an English lord who died in the Crusades named James Arrelan. Whoever had this copy thought he had finally identified the passage in the book that is the Riddle of the Martyrs. The most unholy spell in the book.”

  “Each paragraph does mention an offering.” Grey’s eyes were fixed on the page. “A series of human sacrifices?”

  “But the rest is nonsense,” Lean said.

  “The entire book is reputed to be filled with such nonsense, but don’t be deceived. There are two possible explanations,” Meserve said as he pushed his dipping glasses back over the bridge of his nose. “First, it could be genuine nonsense. An expert scholar on the subject of black magic once noted that you can often make no pretense of understanding a spell’s meaning; most spells likely possess none, which is reasonable since they avail in evoking the devil, who is the sovereign unreason. Or it could be that much of the Black Book simply serves as blinds.”

  “Blinds?” Lean said.

  “He means intentionally obscure or misleading passages,” Helen said. “Their only purpose is to distract and hide from the uninitiated those few significant portions of the text. If this section is indeed the riddle, it certainly is well hidden. It sounds rather innocent. You wouldn’t think this is meant to raise an evil witch from the fires of hell back into human form.”

  “So that leaves us with what?” Lean said. “Part of a riddle that may just be gibberish?”

  “Complete gibberish, no doubt,” Grey said. “But our man believes he has solved thi
s evil riddle and is acting accordingly. We must attempt to come to the same solution he has.”

  “How?” Lean asked. “By going mad, so we can think the same as him?” A dull pain was beginning to pulse in his temple. He reached for a cigarette and his matches. “Even if we could equal his insanity, he has the complete riddle. We have only a piece of it.”

  “Ah!” Meserve’s normally molelike eyes grew wide behind his thick lenses. “That brings me to my most important question for you. Where exactly did you find this page?”

  “Within the city,” Grey said.

  Meserve’s hands fidgeted like those of a child ready to claw open a birthday gift.

  “Good news?” Lean asked.

  “It squares with another theory of mine, regarding the possible location of a copy of the Black Book.”

  “Let’s have it, then.” Lean took a deep drag on his cigarette.

  “Bear with me. Hundreds of hours of research over the last five years deserve more than just blurting out my suspicions.”

  Lean started to protest but felt Grey’s hand on his arm. He shut his mouth and resigned himself to being regaled with the odd little historian’s tale.

  “Several years ago I came into possession of a rather unique collection of papers. Letters, diary entries, and whatnot that essentially chronicle the life of one of the earliest settlers in this area, Caleb Pierce. He was a servant to Mr. Henry Jocelyn, the proprietor of Black Point, now Prout’s Neck in Scarborough. Anyway, the papers recount the fascinating life of this young man who soldiered his way through forty-odd years of Indian wars here in Maine, starting with King Philip’s War in 1675. I plan to edit and compile the history for publication.”

  Lean raised a finger, but Meserve cut off his protest. “Anyway, what starts to bring this all around to the business at hand are a few odd remarks and notations by Caleb Pierce that relate directly to the Salem witch trials. You see, one of his compatriots here during King Philip’s War was none other than the Reverend George Burroughs.”

  Lean and Grey each exchanged a quick look with Helen, who gave a conspiratorial smile.

  Meserve paused, apparently expecting something more like a gasp of recognition, then continued, “As you know, Burroughs was one of the nineteen victims hanged as witches. In fact, he was alleged to have been the ringmaster of the whole devilish conspiracy. Both before and after his time in Salem, he held posts as a minister in Maine. He was in Portland, or Casco, at the time war first broke out with the Indians. His life was at risk several times, but he always came through unscathed.”

  “That was part of the evidence against him at his later trial—how he was able to survive the wars, often absenting himself just prior to the calamities that befell the colonists,” Helen said.

  Meserve plucked up a paper and held it close to his face. “This is a letter from Caleb Pierce to Mr. Jocelyn, dated August thirteenth, 1676. The town of Casco had just been decimated by a surprise Indian attack. Many of the colonists were killed or captured. Pierce was with a group that escaped to one of the islands in the bay.” Meserve adjusted his glasses and squinted as he focused on the page in his hands.

  “We here having little provision, the next night some men did cross back to the remains of the town and by virtue of the Lord’s guiding hand, did manage to come away with provisions, including shot and powder recovered from one of the storehouses and more from Wallis’ house. On our return to Andrews Isle, I was gladdened to find the Reverend Burroughs having by virtue of his own hands begun construction of a stone wall for defense. You yourself know the surprising strength in the Good Reverend’s frame. The business was trying enough that all our hands were sorely cut by the jagged rocks and work of digging out the stones for use. It is to be hoped that no more English blood shall stain that wall before the Lord sees fit to favor us with redemption.”

  Meserve set the paper down and looked over the top of his spectacles. “It goes on, but the part I read shows that Burroughs and Pierce were comrades-in-arms. Men who had placed their lives in each other’s hands. Thus, when the witchcraft panic spread sixteen years later and Burroughs’s life was threatened again, this time by his fellow English, it is perfectly reasonable that he turns once more to Pierce. This next bit is dated just a week before Burroughs was arrested for witchcraft.” Meserve set the letter down, took up a new page, and once again adjusted his spectacles.

  “‘G.B. came visiting to Black Point in a state of great distress. He delivered to me a parcel and bade me swear a great oath that I would neither destroy nor ever open it. He stated only that it had come to him under strange circumstances and there were those who would see him brought to harm by it. To reveal it could be to forfeit his life and possibly my own.’

  “This next entry, by its substance, we can place in late August 1692. Pierce writes, ‘G.B. hanged this week past. I returned home directly and, with only my own life to risk, did break my oath and open his parcel. It is a book of foul magick. May the Good Lord forgive me that I ever held in mine own hand such a thing as this.’”

  Meserve’s face had taken on a pinkish tinge, his growing excitement very much in evidence as he continued to read from a new page. “‘I brought the book to Rev. T. today. He had scarce lifted the cover before I heard him gasp most terribly, exclaiming that it be the Devil’s own. I denied all, daring not speak the truth, saying only it was left that day by a stranger at the tavern. I read the first page and knew it spoke of evil things and so brought it here. Rev. T. bade me never to speak of this. That oath I gladly swore, much relieved to be free of that cursed volume.’”

  Meserve set the pages down. “The Reverend T. refers to a Thomas, who was here in Portland in the early 1700s. I was able to track his descendants as far as 1840. If the Black Book stayed in the hands of the Thomas family, we can trace it as far as fifty years ago, with every reason to believe it has remained in the vicinity.”

  Lean stared at Meserve for a minute, waiting for the payoff. “That’s an awfully long stroll of the tongue for you to tell us you don’t know where it is.”

  “O ye of little faith. In the course of my research, I raised some eyebrows. Because the same questions had been asked twenty years ago, by some learned-looking fellows who claimed to be private collectors but were rumored to actually be from Harvard’s Divinity School. And it was said that somewhere in this city they eventually got a copy of what they were looking for.”

  Lean glanced at Grey and saw a satisfied smirk appear on his face.

  “Of course,” Meserve continued, “when I took the train down to Cambridge to see about the truth of that, they wouldn’t give me the time of day. Acted like they were surprised we even had books in Maine, let alone one they’d be interested in copying.”

  Grey still look pleased. “Perhaps we might have better luck.”

  “If you do manage to get a copy …”

  “Agreed, Meserve. One good turn and all that.”

  There were many thanks offered, and then Grey invited Helen to step outside with him and Lean. Once on the street, free of the cloistering effect of the research room, with its imposing mounds of clutter and books, Lean took several deep breaths of fresh air. “I didn’t think the idea of Harvard Divinity School would bring such a smile to your face.”

  “I was involved in a small matter at the university library a few years ago,” Grey said.

  “I suppose certain unpleasant revelations came to light,” Helen said.

  “They always do.”

  “Are you still welcome on the grounds?” Lean asked.

  “I do have one contact at Harvard who owes me a rather large favor. Unfortunately, my presence might cause him some embarrassment.”

  “Would a police deputy be better?” Lean asked.

  Grey considered the options for a moment. “A historical researcher might be best. Perhaps one accompanied by her distinguished uncle.”

  60

  Following an early train departure the next day, Helen and Dr. Steig we
re greeted by Newell Scribner, a Harvard professor and a scarecrow of a man. His large head was propped up on a thin neck and looked as if it might tumble aside and crash into a shoulder at any moment. He held a chair out for Helen and then gestured toward Dr. Steig to take the only other seat at the table. They were in a small, private study room away from the library’s public areas. The leaded windows set into the plain white walls provided ample light.

  “I know that the sensitive nature of this volume has been explained, but I simply must reiterate: We were allowed to make a copy only under the strictest confidence and a personal vow of secrecy from the president of our divinity school that the book would be made available to a select few scholars. As far as the general public is concerned, Harvard University does not possess a copy of this book.”

  “We understand,” Dr. Steig assured him.

  “So why isn’t it housed at the divinity school’s library?” Helen asked.

  “They haven’t the necessary security. Would you believe that it wasn’t even fireproofed until the new building was completed five years ago? Besides which, the students practically run that place, and for them there’s just the one Good Book. Apparently, every other text is free to be handled like penny serials. Here we can ensure the proper discretion and care of delicate volumes.”

  “In any event, we do certainly appreciate your assistance,” Dr. Steig said.

  “Only the fact of a certain prior service to the university by Mr. Grey—as well as your own professional reputation, Doctor—has persuaded the director to allow you this opportunity.” Scribner held out his hand palm up, looking as if he expected a gratuity. “I hope you understand that I must ask you to relinquish any pencils, papers, or other writing implements.”

  “We understood the terms, Mr. Scribner. Neither of us has brought any such items.”

  “Splendid. Well then, just one moment.” He passed out through a narrow door set inconspicuously in one corner of the room. Helen heard a lock turn, and a minute later Newell Scribner returned with a dark, leather-bound book that he set on the table in front of them.