Hour of the Witch(49)

Jonathan pulled nervously at his cuffs. “She said one time it was a coat peg. Another time, the spider.”

“Mary did not accuse her husband of hurting her?”

“No.”

“But thou had doubts?” asked Wilder.

“Doubts is too strong a feeling. I wondered at the frequency with which she seemed to hurt herself. But she never said that Thomas hit her.”

So, that was that, Mary thought. Jonathan had chosen his path. It really could not have been otherwise.

“We thank thee,” said Caleb Adams.

“Caleb,” observed Wilder, “I think it’s clear that Mary may have been hoping to protect her husband from the community’s disapprobation. She may have been wanting to spare Thomas a measure of humiliation.”

“Tell me then, Richard,” said Adams, “art thou suggesting that Mary Deerfield was lying then and telling the truth now?”

Wilder looked exasperated. “Yes, she may have been lying when she did not reveal right away to her son-in-law—in the presence of her daughter-in-law—that the man’s father-in-law had struck her. And, if we are to cast aspersions on the likely truthfulness of our witnesses, let us not forget the rumors about Jonathan Cooke. Arguably, we shouldn’t believe a soul in this sordid story.”

    Jonathan looked as if he himself had just been sent to the stocks: crestfallen and embarrassed and scared.

Mary turned to her scrivener and whispered, “Jonathan? What do the gossips say about Jonathan?”

“He gambles with the sailors who come and go. He plays cards with them,” Hull murmured.

Mary had had no idea. Jonathan’s boyishness and cheer seemed different to her now, a signpost that suggested his irresponsibility.

“Jonathan, hast thou more to add?” Adams was asking.

“I do not,” he mumbled, humiliated.

“Very well. Thou canst leave,” said the governor, and Jonathan disappeared into the crowd, resisting eye contact with everyone. Mary wondered who would be next. Thomas? Abigail? Goody Howland?

Instead, however, she watched John Endicott speaking softly with Richard Wilder and Caleb Adams. Daniel Winslow was motioning toward the eastern windows of the Town House. It was black outside. Night had arrived.

“We are going to recess this petition until tomorrow. We will not finish tonight,” Endicott said. “We will resume first thing in the morning. We will expect all parties to be back here then.”

Thomas stepped forward and said, “Governor, I was away from my mill all afternoon. Dost thou expect me to be away from it tomorrow as well?”

“Only if thou hast the desire to preserve thy marriage, Thomas,” Endicott said.

“And the entirety of his estate,” Benjamin Hull whispered into Mary’s ear so that only she heard.

Then the constable banged his pike hard on the floorboards, and Mary realized they were indeed done for the afternoon. Her petition was going to drag into a second day. Now she had to return to her parents’ home—sharing the night once more with the disapproving eyes of Abigail Gathers—and try to rest so she could be a town spectacle again in the morning.





I saw her showing sympathy for a Quaker, and I was disappointed and appalled.

    —The Testimony of Isaac Willard, from the Records and Files of the Court of Assistants, Boston, Massachusetts, 1662, Volume III





Sixteen



As they arrived home that night, Mary and her parents were stopped short when they ran into Peregrine Cooke leaving the Burdens’ dooryard.

“Peregrine, I am sorry we missed thee,” Mary said, “but thou must have known we were at the Town House.”

“Yes. I heard it will take a second day to resolve.”

“Has something happened?”

The woman had dark bags under her eyes. “No. I was feeling bad about how we parted when I visited thee last.”

With her right hand, Mary touched Peregrine’s arm and said, “Shhhhhhh. Say nothing more. I was too curt, as well.” She turned to her mother and father and said, “I will join thee inside presently.”

Her parents looked at the two young women, so close in age despite the fact that one was married to the other’s father, and then Priscilla Burden smiled warily and said, “Very well. Peregrine, it is lovely to see thee. Have a good night.”

“I brought some boiled apples and raisins,” said Peregrine, as the older couple went inside. “Rebeckah Cooper and I made batches. I just dropped some off with Hannah. A peace offering. I am sure thy parents smelled it the moment they opened the door.”

“Oh, I love boiled apples!”

“I know. Rebeckah told me.”

“How art thou feeling?”

Peregrine tilted her head and shrugged. She patted her stomach. “I am sorely tried by this one. But the Lord will give me nothing I cannot bear.”

“Is there anything I can do?”

    “No, there isn’t. I just want thee to know…”

“Know what? Thou canst speak plainly to me.”

“I will not try again to change thy mind. My father might. But I understand the path thou hast chosen. I respect it.”

Mary was so moved that she wanted to embrace the other woman and felt her eyes welling up. “I’m sorry,” she said simply.