by Megan Chance
I heard the pastor talking to Susannah—she was nodding her head and seeming to listen, though I wondered if she really heard him, or if she was thinking of her home in London. I prayed it wasn’t so. She had no real reason to stay now that Mama was gone—except that I needed her. I watched her now and wondered what I could say to keep her. I was so caught up in trying to imagine the words that when Jude jerked hard on my hand, I jumped in surprise.
I looked down, thinking she’d tripped on the rocky ground, but she only pointed to a place near the edge of the crowd. “Look, Charity,” she said. “There’s Mary.”
I forgot about my aunt Susannah. I should have been prepared to see Mary Walcott, but I was not. She was walking beside Elizabeth Hubbard, who was everything I was not—plump and sweet and seventeen. They were talking as if the two of them were the oldest of friends.
I should have known the moment I saw Thomas Putnam and his wife that Mary would be here too. She was Sergeant Putnam’s niece, and she’d lived in their home as a servant since her stepfather had put her out for lack of room. It had been months since I’d spoken to her. Not since Mama had taken to her bed. Now I heard my mother’s voice: When you open the door to the Devil, child, he doesn’t fail to come in.
I wished there were some way I could disappear. Even as I had the thought, I saw Mary whisper something to Elizabeth and look at me. Her glance was sideways and sly, and I looked away. I focused on my mother’s coffin, but it was just an expanse of blurred purple broadcloth before my eyes, and I quickened my step until Jude protested.
Nothing so easy ever kept Mary away. I was not surprised when I felt her come up behind me. She yanked at my cloak, hard enough that my hood fell down around my shoulders. I wrenched it back and kept my gaze straight ahead. As evenly as I could, I said, “Mary, ’tis good to see you. I’m grateful that you came.”
“My aunt was a great friend of your mother’s.” Mary came full up beside me so I could see her smile. “She is grieving so, you see.”
I glanced back to Sergeant Putnam’s wife, walking huddled beside her husband while their eldest daughter, Annie, herded the rest of the children behind. Mistress Putnam did look pale and wan, but she always looked that way. Mama had often said Ann Putnam was as like to be sick as well.
Mary leaned close. “But the truth is, I think she wanted to meet this mysterious aunt of yours. The whole village is talking about her, you know. ’Tis said she was an actress in London. Tell me, is it true?”
I jerked to look at her. “They say she’s a what?”
“An actress.” Mary smiled again. She put me in mind of a cat, with her satisfied smile and slanted eyes and that little tongue that flicked constantly at her lips. With the gray of her hood pulled tight around her face, the image was even more pronounced. “You know, a mime, a player upon the stage, a—”
“I know what it is,” I snapped.
“Well, is she?” Mary glanced over at my aunt. Susannah’s heavy hair was covered by her hood, but it was impossible to miss the fine beauty of her face. In the light, her cloak was a deep, true blue, unlike the muted colors I saw every day. She stood out among my neighbors as a cock pheasant among drab hens.
“Of course she’s not.”
“You sound so sure.”
“I am sure,” I said. “It cannot be. Why, I’ve talked with her. She is a godly woman—”
“Is she? Has she been praying with you, then?”
Unbidden, the images sneaked into my mind. Susannah standing at the fire, refusing to come listen to my father’s nightly sermon; then again, stepping away, murmuring to little Faith as we knelt by my mother’s bed and sent her to God.
“She’s a godly woman,” I said again, as forcefully as I could.
It was not a lie, but it was not an answer, and I saw that Mary heard it. I saw that faint triumph in her eyes.
“Why, ’twould be terrible if she is. Can you imagine? Look at the pastor talking to her now. He looks truly lovesick, don’t you think? Ah, I should like to see his face when he finds out the truth about her. An actress! In Salem Village!”
“Hush, Mary,” I said. “’Tis not true, not that I know. How much worse it would be if you were caught telling lies about her.”
“You don’t know it isn’t true, do you, Charity? You don’t know for certain.”
“I do know. I’ve talked to her—”
“She’s an actress. Perhaps she’s dissembling.”
“No.” I shook my head. “I know her. And even if I didn’t, my father would never allow it.”
“Perhaps he doesn’t know,” Mary said.
“Of course he would know.”
“Why? Do you think your father cannot be fooled?”
The question was unexpected. I could not answer, and I was dismayed to see that Mary saw it.
“Perhaps she’s fooled him. Perhaps she’s lying.” The slyness was in her eyes again.
I told myself to ignore her. Mary had shown her colors to me already. She had been my closest friend once. That was over, but I knew how she could turn the most innocent things wicked. I knew how easily she could sway me. I struggled to turn from her the way my mother had urged me to.
She could plant doubt in me only if I allowed her, and I would not. I knew what my father said about actors, what the preachers said. The theater was Hell on earth, and stage players were the Devil’s minions. Certainly my father would never permit an actress in his own home.
I turned to Mary, meaning to tell her so, confident in my conviction, when a puzzle came into my head—a small piece, but it was disturbing. Then there came another image, and another: the way my father snapped at Susannah as if just the sight of her made him angry, the way she spoke to him, without deference or respect, as if she were afraid of nothing. My mother had not seen her sister for eighteen years—why was that?
I glanced to where my aunt walked with Master Parris, suddenly desperate to see her face, to have her smile reassure me. Her back was to me, and the preacher was talking to her, and doubt crept like a hard little seed into my heart.
“You could find out, couldn’t you?” Mary gave me a conspiratorial smile, the one I’d once treasured because it included me. “You could ask her.”
“No,” I said. How faint my voice was. “I’ll do no such thing.”
“No, of course you would not.”
“What do you mean by that?”
Mary shrugged. “You would never believe your aunt was something so terrible as an actress, would you? Why, no, of course not. You are such an innocent.”
I did not know what to say. I watched her, trying to find her sarcasm, waiting for her blow, but she only smiled and said, “Betty’s calling to me, so I’d best run back.” She took a step away, and then she stopped and said, “Oh, Charity, I’ve been meaning to ask you for weeks now—’tis so odd the way Sammy just disappeared. So suddenlike. ’Twas as if the Devil himself were after him, don’t you think? Or maybe…Maybe ’twas something else altogether. But I imagine you would know that better than me.”
She laughed then and twirled away. I was so stunned I stopped short, and Jude bumped hard into me. Just a word from her, and the images I’d tried so hard to forget flooded my mind as if they’d been waiting for the chance. Sammy bending close, his hands on my body, the warmth of his breath…
“Go on, Charity,” Jude complained. “Why are you stopping?”
Tears came to my eyes, and I dashed them away with the back of my hand and held the rest back by sheer force of will. I pretended Mary had not shaken me with her rumors and insinuations, or with the name that I wanted desperately to mean nothing to me. But I felt weak and afraid as I followed the bier over that stony road. I would have given the world to have my mother beside me again—or even just her specter, if that was all to be allowed me. Oh, Mama, I thought. Why have you left me?
It seemed forever before we came to the grave site. The hole was deep and wet from the storm, with mud pooling at the bottom, and the ide
a that we were putting my mother into it was horrible. I would have looked away except for the fact that my father came over beside Jude and me at that moment. He put his hand on my shoulder.
“Come along,” he said quietly, leading us to the very edge of the grave. “Gaze down and mark it well. ’Tis what waits for all of us. Remember how it feels to stand here now and face mortality. Never forget how your mother died. You should pray for God’s blessing, that you may have as joyful a death as she.”
Jude’s little fingers tightened on mine.
Master Parris came forward and rested his hand on the pall over Mama’s coffin. His dark hair fell forward, and the wind blew it back again from his sharp cheekbones, his angular face. “My beloved flock,” he began. “In life, Judith Fowler was holy and prudent, a woman of sincerity and humility, a woman of great patience and public spiritedness. Who among us ever suffered an unkind word from her? Who among us has ever gone to her for help and found her lacking? Judith was truly a visible saint, and a faithful one. She revealed to me often how uncertain she was of her salvation—would that the rest of us be so uncertain and yet practice such faith and charity! As Jesus Christ to our Lord…”
He went on, but I was caught by the sight of my aunt on the other side of the open grave, standing behind the pastor. She was not listening to him. She was looking at my mother’s coffin, mouthing words—a prayer, but one I did not recognize—and her hands were held tight, palm to palm before her chest. I caught sight of Mary Walcott. She and Elizabeth were staring at my aunt, whispering to each other, and I felt my skin grow hot and had to look away. All I could think was an actress. It could not be. Of course it could not be. My good mother would never have brought Susannah here had it been true. To be an actress…’twas such a sinful thing. She knew my father would never accept it.
Perhaps my secret was not the only one Mama had kept. The thought shook me.
Master Parris finished, and the underbearers moved forward to pull away the pall and tilt my mother’s coffin into the grave. I did not think to step back until it nearly grazed my toes. They pushed the casket in, and it landed with a creak of wood and a muffled splash. Droplets of mud covered the fine white pine, and the coffin settled in crookedly, but no one seemed to care about that. They were spading the dirt over, so quickly that before I knew it they were done, and my father was standing before me, sweating in the cold wind. He took off his hat and swiped his arm across his forehead. His curly hair was pressed flat and straight to his head.
“’Tis time to go back,” he said to Jude and me. “The two of you go on, help your aunt and the other women prepare for the crowd.”
I did not move. I felt frozen there.
My father frowned at me. “What is it, Charity?”
I hardly knew what to say. My thoughts were torturous, and I had nowhere else to turn. “Do you think there was sin in her?” I whispered.
My father stared at me. I saw his concern for me, and I took a desperate hope from it. I wanted his reassurance so badly I was half afraid to say the words. “If she kept…secrets…that is not much a sin, is it? Is it?”
His expression changed; I could not read it. He did not take his gaze from me when he said, “If ’twas wickedness she hid, then indeed she sinned. God shuns any weakness—’tis no difference between the big and the small.”
Tears of disappointment came to my eyes.
I turned and nearly fell into my aunt. Susannah was standing behind us, the blue of her cloak shining in the cold sunlight, her fine straight nose pink from the cold. She was gazing at my father, two spots of red high on her cheeks. She put her hand on my shoulder. “Come,” she said in a hard voice. “Your neighbors are already on their way to the house.”
We’d hardly taken a step before the parson was there, smiling at Susannah before he said distractedly to Jude and me, “If ever there was a woman chosen by God, ’twould be your mother.”
He went past us without waiting for an answer. To my father, he said in a quiet voice, “Ah, Lucas, I know ’tis merely that you’ve forgotten…”
I looked over my shoulder at them. My father was frowning as he reached into his pocket and took something out, something wrapped in a small cloth, and handed it to the minister. I watched Master Parris open it with quick, greedy hands, and I saw the shine of the sun on gold and knew it was a funeral ring—a gift for the words said at Mama’s graveside, and for the sermon the pastor would deliver on Sunday.
My father’s face was tight, his eyes cold. I heard the pastor say, “The ministers in Boston are receiving gloves now as well—”
“I haven’t the money to spend on frivolities,” my father said brusquely. “Gloves are for those richer than I and more important than she was. I’ve paid you enough for the prayers, Parson, and I thank you for them, but do not expect this means anything has changed between us.”
I could not see the parson’s face. He bowed, and then he turned away with a quiet word I couldn’t quite hear.
I was so busy listening to them that when my aunt touched me again and said, “Come then, shall we go?” I jumped. She looked past me to my father as if she were trying to see what I’d been watching. When she glanced back to me, there was curiosity in her eyes.
“Your minister is an interesting man,” she said mildly.
“Father doesn’t like him,” Jude said.
Susannah smiled. “Oh? Why is that?”
“He says he has no taste for the pastor’s preaching.”
“I imagine your father has many opinions on that score,” Susannah said.
’Twas an insult, I realized. It startled me; I could not believe she’d said it. I said, “My father has a great reverence for the word of God.”
Susannah touched my cheek, just a brush of her soft skin. “Of course he does. I meant nothing by it, Charity.” She smiled, so I forgot what it was that disturbed me so. “We should go. They’ll be home before us otherwise.”
It did not take us long to get home—or at least, it seemed that way to me, because my thoughts were so full. ’Twas a lucky thing that we had laid out the food and the barrels of beer and cider before we’d left, because when we got to the house, neighbors had already congregated, ready to drink and eat to my mother’s memory. Unexpectedly, I thought how only a few days before I’d been helping Mama bake groaning cakes. Now we were here, feasting on funeral cake and bread and meat, while she was gone forever, so far from me that I would never again feel the soft touch of her hand on my hair or hear her quiet “Hand me the eggs, Charity, my dear” as together we made dinner.
I was so sad suddenly that I could not take another step. My aunt hurried past to greet those just arriving. I let go of Jude’s hand, and she ran up the path to the house, calling out to some friend she saw hovering near the door while I stood there feeling weak beneath the weight of my sorrow.
The dark woods beyond the house looked suddenly inviting, but I knew the darkness would come too soon, the shadows on the narrow pathways would lengthen until they took the shapes of demons and savages. Night was an evil thing, and dangerous besides. Lately there’d been much talk of Indian raids not so far from here.
No, I would not run. I trudged up to the house. The door was open, and when I stepped inside, I was surprised to see more people than I’d thought. In the corner, passing a tankard of beer to Jude and her little friend Polly Martin, was Elizabeth Hubbard. I did not have to look far to see Mary Walcott standing just beyond. I backed up a little, hoping to disappear into the shadows before she caught sight of me.
I hit my hip hard on something—a corner, a cupboard that hadn’t been there before. In confusion, I turned around. It was no cupboard. There, just inside the door, were two large chests, each heavily carved, brightly painted. On top of one was the thing I’d bumped into, something small and rectangular, covered with canvas.
Slowly I reached out. I pulled back the canvas to reveal keys glowing with the fine polish of ivory—an instrument. It was a virginal, and I knew
who it belonged to, just as I knew these trunks held clothes brought all the way from London—more clothing than I, or anyone in my family, had ever had.
I looked up, right into the mean gaze of Mary Walcott, who made a little prancing curtsy like a stage player, and I heard her voice again in my head. They say she’s an actress, and those words seized and took hold—all these clothes, music, an instrument…
Suddenly I was afraid. I did not know how I should feel or what I should do. I turned to the door and saw my father come in, and I waited for him to see these things. He glanced at me. “Are you well, child?”
When I nodded dumbly, he looked beyond me to the chests, to the virginal keys glistening in the candlelight. I held my breath. He looked away again, as if the sight did not distress him—or as if he hadn’t even seen those things sitting there, though there was no way to avoid them. He crossed the room to where our neighbor Samuel Nurse stood drinking from the bowl of beer, and clapped a welcoming hand on the man’s shoulder as if nothing was amiss.
I looked again behind me, thinking I’d been mistaken, that perhaps I was seeing things. But the virginal was there. I touched one of the keys, unable to help myself. The ivory was smooth and warm, as if it had just been played, when it should have been cold, and that was so disconcerting I drew back. ’Twas an evil thing, I knew, but my father seemed unmoved by it, and that was so strange I did not know how to reconcile it. Mama had once told me that my father could spot wickedness in any man, and I believed that. I knew he saw it in me. Why else did he spend every night drilling prayers into my head, girding me against the Devil? If he saw it in me, why could he not see it in Susannah?
Because it wasn’t there. ’Twas the only answer. My aunt Susannah was no actress; Mary had been passing on vile rumors without truth. Gossip spread so easily in this village. Were Susannah a stage player, even my mother’s pleas could not have brought her here.
I looked toward my aunt, who was taking a joint of beef off the fire, reminding me of Mama with every movement, and I was relieved. Mary was wrong; there was nothing to fear. The only wickedness in this house was my own.
