Hour of the Witch(122)

As for Henry, there were gossips who whispered that he was with Mary, either in Rhode Island or New Haven, but his aunt and uncle defended him staunchly and said he was in Jamaica. Valentine explained that the New England climate—his word, and he knew it was a pun—did not appeal to his nephew.

It all seemed so far away, even when the weather was such that she felt a twinge in her left hand. But she was here. She was alive and she was happy. She kissed Desire again and watched as the child wrapped one small hand around her finger. That night they would eat supper at the great table in her brother’s house, and without shame she would use a knife and a spoon and a fork with three glorious tines.





ACKNOWLEDGMENTS




I don’t own most of the books I bought for classes when I was in college. But one set has survived four moves as an adult: those books I read for the different courses I savored about seventeenth-century America. In some cases, I saved them because I occasionally found comfort in the poetry of Anne Bradstreet. In others, it was because—always a spectacularly anxious soul—I identified with the Puritans’ often desperate self-examination.

And so I want to begin by thanking Barry O’Connell and David Wills of Amherst College—the former a professor emeritus of English, the latter a professor emeritus of religion—for instilling in me a fascination with the Puritan mind.

I am deeply indebted to L. Kinvin Wroth, professor emeritus of law at Vermont Law School. We first had lunch in the summer of 2001—twenty years ago—when I reached out to him to discuss the novel I was contemplating about a Puritan woman’s attempt to divorce her husband for what today we call domestic violence but in the seventeenth century was called cruelty. He pointed out to me the articles it was critical I read about seventeenth-century law and the first New England courts. He read a draft of this novel and patiently corrected my most egregious mistakes. I will always recall fondly our lunches in South Royalton.

The books I read or reread included:

Sydney E. Ahlstrom, A Religious History of the American People (Vol. 1) Josiah Henry Benton, The Story of the Old Boston Town House, 1658–1711

Carol Berkin, First Generations: Women in Colonial America

Kristina Bross, Dry Bones and Indian Sermons: Praying Indians in Colonial America James Deetz, In Small Things Forgotten: The Archaeology of Early American Life James Deetz and Patricia Scott Deetz, The Times of Their Lives: Life, Love, and Death in Plymouth Colony George Francis Dow, Every Day Life in the Massachusetts Bay Colony

Jonathan Edwards, The Nature of True Virtue

Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Scarlet Letter

Carol F. Karlsen, The Devil in the Shape of a Woman

Perry Miller, The American Puritans: Their Prose and Poetry

Perry Miller, Errand into the Wilderness

Perry Miller and Thomas H. Johnson, The Puritans: A Sourcebook of Their Writings (Vols. 1 and 2) Edmund S. Morgan, The Puritan Family

The Norton Anthology of American Literature (Vol. 1)

Glenda Riley, Divorce: An American Tradition

Walter Muir Whitehall, Boston: A Topographical History



The following articles and essays were helpful to the construction of this novel:

Judith Areen, “Uncovering the Reformation Roots of American Marriage and Divorce Law,” Yale Journal of Law and Feminism (Vol. 26) Thomas G. Barnes, “Thomas Lechford and the Earliest Lawyering in Massachusetts, 1638–1641,” Colonial Society of Massachusetts, publications (Vol. 62) David C. Brown, “The Keys of the Kingdom: Excommunication in Colonial Massachusetts,” New England Quarterly (Vol. 67, No. 4) Zechariah Chafee, Jr., “The Suffolk County Court and Its Jurisdiction,” Colonial Society of Massachusetts, publications (Vol. 29) Laura Clark, “The Second Divorce in Colonial America Happened Today in 1643,” Smithsonianmag.com

Lauren J. Cook, “Katherine Nanny, Alias Naylor: A Life in Puritan Boston,” Historical Archaeology, 1998 (Vol. 32, No. 1) George L. Haskins, “Lay Judges: Magistrates and Justices in Early Massachusetts,” Colonial Society of Massachusetts, publications (Vol. 62)

Michael S. Hindus, “A Guide to the Court Records of Early Massachusetts,” Colonial Society of Massachusetts, publications (Vol. 62) Catherine S. Menand, “A ‘Magistracy Fit and Necessary’: A Guide to the Massachusetts Court System,” Colonial Society of Massachusetts, publications (Vol. 62) Elizabeth Wisner, “The Puritan Background of the New England Poor Laws,” Social Service Review (Vol. 19)



And then there is the remarkable team at Doubleday, Vintage, and Penguin Random House Audio: Kristen Bearse, Laura Chamberlain, Todd Doughty, Maris Dyer, John Fontana, Kelly Gildea, Elena Hershey, Suzanne Herz, Judy Jacoby, Anna Kaufman, Ann Kingman, Beth Lamb, James Meader, Nora Reichard, John Pitts, Paige Smith, William Thomas, David Underwood, LuAnn Walther, and Lori Zook.

I am so grateful to my agents: Deborah Schneider, Jane Gelfman, Cathy Gleason, and Penelope Burns at Gelfman/Schneider ICM; to Brian Lipson at IPG; and to Miriam Feuerle and her associates at the Lyceum Agency. Thank you for always having my back and for the great gift of friendship, and—in the case of Deborah and Brian—serving as therapist and confidant. I couldn’t do any of this without those two.

And, of course, there is Jenny Jackson, my editor for over a decade now, who is the definition of wisdom and equanimity. I can only imagine the sorts of train wrecks I would be writing were it not for her insights. She makes the books better when we are first discussing a very broad idea, and she makes them better when she is reading them line by line. She is the ultimate champion of this author and all her authors.