Hour of the Witch(83)

“My supper will be ready when I get home?” he had asked.

“If Reverend Eliot should allow me to accompany him?”

“Yes.”

“I will be sure it is,” she had assured him, and then she looked at Catherine, who was staring down into her trencher as if the chicken bones there had regrown their flesh.

And that was that.



* * *





    John Eliot was not tall, but he was massive: he was round like a pumpkin, and his face was a plump almond with a mustache that he waxed into curlicue tips. He was fifty-eight years old, but his hair—though streaked with white—was lush and thick and hadn’t begun to recede. He parted it perfectly in the middle, and it fell in two waves down the sides of his face to his shoulders. His eyes were feminine and kind, and he rose from behind his desk when Mary entered his study, guided there by an indentured servant no more than fifteen who was, like her master, portly and attractive. After Eliot dismissed the girl, he threw another log on the fire. His house was as impressive as her parents’ home.

“I do not know thy father and mother well, but James does great service to the colony,” he said. He had a shelf of books on the wall, most about Indians, including two he had written. On the tabletop was a well-thumbed Bible, ink, a quill, and a thick stack of paper. Though the sun was still high and the desk was near the window, he had two candles burning. The study had but the one ladder-back chair, and Eliot insisted that she sit in it while he stood by the window.

“My father’s work is of little concern compared to the efforts thou art making on behalf of the savages,” she said.

“Do not underestimate the value of importing civilization. In the woods, I see the need for enrichment all the time. Sometimes that enrichment comes in the word of the Lord; sometimes it comes from a chair,” he said, smiling, and he motioned at the fact she was seated. “Thy father brings us ships rich with such civilizing amenities.”

“I will share with him thy gratitude.”

He nodded. “I spoke to John Norton yesterday,” he said.

She knew that the reverend was going to mention her to Eliot, but felt the need to suggest her humility that these two great men were discussing her. “I am flattered. Thou both did me an honor I do not deserve.”

“Nonsense. He told me thou dost wish to work with the Hawke children.”

“I do.”

“Is it because thou hast not yet been blessed with children of thine own?”

    “The fact I am barren—”

“That word is needlessly harsh. Thou art young. Thou may yet have a child.”

She started to stroke the back of her left hand where Thomas had broken the bone, worrying it through her glove, but stopped herself. It was becoming a habit. “The fact I have not yet had a child,” she said, correcting herself, “gives me time to do the Lord’s work in ways I might not have contemplated had I been already blessed with girls or boys of my own. But there are other motivations.”

“And they are?” His tone was benevolent.

“When the magistrates were weighing my petition to divorce Thomas, there was much discussion of Lucifer. It reminded me how present He is even here—in our world on this side of the ocean.”

“Thou dost not fear the woods?”

“I have far greater fears.”

“Thou wouldst be surprised by what grows there.”

“I rather hope so.”

The reverend chuckled. “That’s the spirit.”

“And if the Devil wants me, He will as easily come for me here in the city as He will in the forest,” she replied, and she thought of the forks and the pestle in the dooryard of her home.

“Perhaps. But the woods are a labyrinthine world in which the Indians see paths we never shall. And people like the Hawkes? They are as savage and unschooled as the Indians.”

“I will not lose myself,” she promised. “I understand there is a community of praying Indians east of Natick.”

“And thou wouldst like me to bring thee to the Hawkes on my way there?”

“I would.”

“Those savages are becoming accustomed to the light of the Lord. It is a small community, but one with promise.”

“Perhaps someday, I can be an asset with them, too.”

“In time. Feel no weight on thy shoulders.” He went to the books on his shelf and handed one to Mary. “Hast thou read it?”

She looked at the title: The New England Primer. “I have not. But my grandchildren have a copy. The books arrived from England this summer.”

    “One of thy father’s imports, perhaps.”

“I believe that is true.”

“Bible stories. A catechism. Absolutely beautiful woodcuts of John Rogers and his family being burned at the stake.”

“Peregrine and Jonathan’s older girl finds them gruesome, and so she turns always to those pages first.”

“I am not surprised.”

“I own a copy of Spiritual Milk for Boston Babies. Shall I bring it?”

Eliot handed her his copy of the primer. “That would be a good idea, yes. Read this and bring it, too.”

She thumbed through it, pausing on her granddaughter’s favorite woodcut: the burning of the Rogers family. “Spiritual Milk has no pictures,” she murmured.