Children of Salem

Chapter Nine

Jeremiah was surprised to find so many travelers today along the Ipswich Road; while a main thoroughfare wrapping around Salem Harbor in a wide arch, taking people between Village and Town, it’d never seen so much traffic in all its days. People flocking to the area for a glimpse of the excitement—to sit through excommunications by night, trials by day. The heavy traffic made for an already rutted road becoming near impassable when, after a hard rain and an even harder dry spell, the gutted avenue turned into a series of craters instead of the ribbon it was meant to be.

The condition of the road struck Jeremy as a metaphor for the condition of the population and the spirit prevailing in Salem. With Parris handling the church court, dealing with the ‘moral’ issues surrounding witchcraft, the denouncing of anyone’s lying down with the Devil, the man could call anyone in his parish into question to a public defense of banishment. Before the witchcraft pandemic, Parris had handled charges of misconduct of character, lewd behavior, and the occasional drunken brawl. He leveled fines and warnings, and he had the power to subpoena witnesses to his church court. It’s what kept him busy during a normal week, and it brought in money—a split of the fines taken in for the church—and presumably his pocket.

If a parishioner refused to answer Parris’s summons, the charges went to Mr. Corwin, presiding over the civil court in Salem Village. Higginson had the same arrangement with Hathorne in Salem Town, and now it was back to Salem Town for Jeremiah, although the time had grown late, and soon darkness would overtake him.

But he felt a strong urge to get to Reverend Higginson, and he knew that Williard was not guarding the house for the time being, and perhaps with the Boston men gone from Higginson’s bedside, Jeremy’s way would not be barred.

Jeremy entered from the western edge of town, and as before, he was astounded at the sight Salem Town presented. Ever busy, even at this hour, ever growing and prosperous. Salem deserved its reputation as a great seaport, perhaps the best in all the colonies, even over Boston for more whaling ships called it home than any other.

Jeremy managed a smile as he stepped along the boardwalk of Townhouse Lane, passing the Customs House, Judge Hathorne’s main avenue of wealth. Tall mastheads created a skyline filled with upraised spears blending with the freshly built seaport homes and the towering steeple of the First Church of Salem.

Although darkness neared, Jeremy passed open doors and windows, people shouting from each, blocking doorways, talking, bargaining, disputing weights and measures, haggling over prices. “All’s normal here,” he said to himself, comparing this routine array of life with what was going on at Ingersoll’s and the village.

Jeremy tipped his hat as he passed others, his cheek red and blue yet. He passed shops and windows filled with bakery goods, a shoemaker’s, a dyer’s, a tannery, and smoke houses large as warehouses where fresh meat was dried and salted for outgoing ships. The cooking aromas surrounded him, reminding him of nights in his father’s house when all they had to share had dwindled to a fresh loaf of hot bread. And here too was a stonemason’s shop, and a dish turner’s shop. His father had been a simple dish turner.

Jeremy stopped to stare in at yet another bakery window but was shaken from his thoughts when, in the window, he saw the see-through shadow of a dark and sinister form coalesce. It moved across the window, a reflection that made him turn and stare across the street. Samuel Parris had gone by, Nicholas Noyes on his arm. They’d come down the First Church steps. The two conspirators—for this is what they appeared to be— proceeded on to Higginson’s home ahead of Jeremiah.

Jeremy cursed the luck and himself for having dallied.

He pulled up his courage and made for Higginson’s anyway. On arriving, he heard sobbing as it flowed from the door, which stood ajar. He called out, “Hello! May I come in?”

But no one answered. From inside, he heard only the sounds of grief.

He entered. Everyone had gathered in the front room at the big bay window, and surrounding what Jeremy guessed to be Mr. Higginson’s remains. Higginson’s successor, Noyes, Paris, the manservant who’d doubled as coachman, a maid in her midlife years, and some of the Boston ministers surrounded the bed. Despite the well-lit room, despite the crowd, it was cold and empty tomb—this sight, this knowledge. Salem had lost not just a man but her moral compass, her rudder.

Another door closed to me, Jeremy thought as he backed out of the house, realizing that Noyes had sent for Parris on the occasion of his taking charge now of Salem Town’s spiritual needs, and so far as Jeremy believed, no man was less worthy or capable of filling the old man’s shoes. Even a counterfeit minister like me could do a better job of it. Just another blow to Salem; another nail in the coffin.

All this occurring and the colonies still without a legal charter to exist; in essence, without the rule of law. There’d been an overthrow in England and the colonies almost simultaneously in 1689, nearly three years ago. King Charles was reportedly dead, and King William the Conqueror, as rumor coming off seagoing ships had it, had taken the Crown of England. During the same period, the colonials had risen up against King Charles’s overseers and tax collectors here in Massachusetts, and they’d audaciously hung Governor Andros. They’d followed up by voting in Sir William Phipps as acting governor, but now Phipps had rather fight Indians than phantasmagorias. So the new head of state under a charterless colony had rushed off to conquer the ‘heathen and pagan’ threat. The kind of threat that presented a solid target.

In cold fact, Phipps had posted a public dispatch in Boston and Salem, making clear his point: “I’d rather fight the red devils than the invisible ones. These I can see and wield a weapon against. I have no knowledge of how to fight spirits and demons.”

Like Increase Mather, Phipps was no longer home.

Phipps had made it clear that he placed the Salem problem in the hands of Stoughton, Saltonstall, Addington, Sewell, and the local magistrates and ministers of Salem. He simply wanted the contagion contained, and he didn’t like the idea of housing witches in the cells in Boston. Furthermore, general knowledge had it that he’d forbidden his wife to visit the jails for fear of ‘catching’ the disease of the afflicted children of Salem.

When Jeremiah and Serena had been in Boston, and he’d exhausted every avenue, legal or otherwise to get help for Salem, he’d attempted to get word to the Governor as his last resort; it was then he’d learned that, like Increase Mather, William Phipps had abandoned them.

The most powerful man in the colony, and the brightest man in the colony gone. One to ostensibly fight Indians but clearly to wash his hands of Salem, while the Senior most powerful clergyman, Mather was off to fight for a charter—a constitution agreed upon by the brightest minds in the colonies and written up and taken to King William for ratification.

Wishing to avoid any confrontation with Parris and making his way back to the Nurse home and Serena, Jeremy thought 1692 a cursed year. So much was in flux commingling with so much fear—fear of Indian uprising, fear of the new King of England’s sending troops to hang those who’d dared hang the former king’s man and perhaps worse, failing to pay taxes. Not to mention fear of crop failures, and fear of witches, wizards, demons, and the Antichrist himself and all his minions.

During his night ride home, Jeremy recalled the last time he’d seen Increase Mather, whose son had proved such a disappointment to Jeremy. The elder Mather had assured Jeremy that Cotton, his son, was of the same mind as he on the matter of Reverend Parris and the troubles in Salem Village Parish. Obviously, the man misjudged his son or simply didn’t know the other Mather as well as he’d thought, for it seemed the younger Mather, too, had disappeared so as to wash his hands of the Salem matter.

With the night wind rustling through the trees, Jeremy thought of his original mission to Salem, the deal he’d struck with Increase Mather. He recalled the late afternoon sun in his eyes there on the dock where he’d last spoken to the man before he’d boarded the Undaunted for England. His last words to Jeremy had been about the absolute necessity of his gaining favor with “King Willy” and his court for the continued prosperity if not existence of the Massachusetts Bay Colony and the rule of law. “Without a charter, Jeremy, we are still just a colony of rebels, subject to the whims of whomever might be King of England at any given time.”

With the death of Higginson and Increase Mather’s firm hand to guide the colony, with the temptation to replace the Andros issues for the dread of a witch hunt, Jeremy Wakely felt that things were as out of control as a log skidding down a mountainside.

Glumly, fearfully Jeremy arrived at the gate that Serena had enjoyed swinging on, and he saw her rushing out to meet him. She threw her arms around him, and they held one another for some time. “What new trouble is it, Jeremy.”

“Your father is wise; he warned me that you’d be reading my mind!” He kissed her and held onto her. She felt like the only port in a storm.

She pulled free and with hands on his face, she said, “I see trouble in your eyes.”

“Reverend Higginson is gone from us and to his Maker.”

“Oh, my . . . such a good soul.” She hugged Jeremy to her. “Mother will be saddened to learn it, and Father and Proctor were counting on his good counsel.”

“If I were a suspicious man, I’d say they drove the old man into his grave, the vultures. Wonder if he wasn’t poisoned by Noyes.”

“That’s a terrible accusation! Have you any proof of it?”

“No, none, but Noyes has one strong trait—ambition.”

“Father will take this news badly.”

“From the beginning . . . my first day in Salem, dear, even before arriving, I knew of the factions within Parris’ congregation, but only recently have I had my eyes opened to the fact that Judges Hathorne and Corwin are in the Parris-Putnam camp as well.”

“Those who intend to run against the judges in the next election stand with our side.”

“Our side, eh?” Jeremy considered this for a moment. “The witchcraft scare has changed the face of the elections even before they’ve begun.”

Her laugh was hollow and angry. “You mean who’s going to vote for Francis Nurse or any of his cronies so long as his wife is jailed as a witch?”

He nodded solemnly. “So your father was planning to run for Corwin’s seat?”

“Yes.”

“And even should they come to their senses and release your mother—”

“The taint of having been accused, arrested, excommunicated and humiliated would follow her, and Father, I know.”

“And her family, you and me! No matter the real issues as in where Corwin and Hathorne stood during the Andros years.”

“When will it end, Jeremy? When will they come to their senses?”

He smiled and held her close. They shared a warm kiss and turned to walk to the porch, arms locked.

Finally, Jeremy said, “I’m afraid that fat-headed Governor Andros filled positions of state with clergymen, and this has led to widespread abuse of power. Sir William Stoughton is shaping up as a fine example.”

Overhearing from his rocker on the porch, Francis added, “Andros men used the clergy in shrewd measure. Whenever any person was excommunicated from the church, they were typically prosecuted for some exaggerated real offense simultaneously.”

“Evening to you, sir.” Jeremy took off his hat with a flourish. “Know you that the elder Mather, Increase, like myself—and many another man—wants a safe division of church and state, so that such fiends as Andros must never again wield such power over us.”

“But here it comes again, Jeremiah,” countered Francis. “Andros had declared whole tracts of land his on the basis of bogus trials, overturning original land grants. A circumstance that made many a magistrate and minister wealthy.”

“I see the parallels, yes, but we must believe it can’t occur again.”

“Increase Mather himself rose to prominence and great power and influence in the colonies due to the marriage of church and state,” concluded Francis.

“But he abhors the abuses he’s witnessed, especially those committed during the Andros era. He is a man with foresight, who sees the future cannot sustain a theocracy on these shores.”

“I am a simple man, Jeremiah, but what is happening in Salem with these church excommunications and courtroom trials, this is pure theocracy of the deadliest sort.”

“It may’s well be another Papal State!” cried out Serena. “And we can all become Papists if they can run their own bloody Inquisition here.”

This made the men laugh.

“Why do you find that funny?”

“Because it is so true,” replied Jeremy.

“Because it is either laugh or cry,” added Francis.

“Besides, Serena, you are so beautiful when you’re angry.”

“Remember on your firs return home, Jeremy?” asked Francis. “Serena holding you at bay at gunpoint?”

Again the men laughed. Serena frowned, turned, and stomped inside.

# # # # #

At the meetinghouse, the following Sabbath Day, little Anne Putnam Junior shouted above Mr. Parris’ sermon, “Why does God punish the unborn? Tell me that, Mr. Parris!” Anne’s tone was both authoritative and accusatory.

Parris stared blankly at the sickly, thin child who’d suffered so much harm from the invisible agents of Satan. “Anne,” he finally responded, coming around the podium, “you know the answer to that as well as anyone here.”

Mercy Lewis, as if on cue, stood up and spread her arms wide, pleading, “Mr. Parris, why does God allow Satan to have his own kingdom?”

Parris stammered something unintelligible and was cut off by little Anne’s screaming, “Where are my brothers and sisters who died before being baptized? Where is Hopestill’s soul now? William, Henry Junior, Matthew, Luke, all of them?”

Parris composed himself, but then one of his adult congregation asked, “Why don’t you answer these children?”

Parris stared hard at John Tarbell, a relative of the Nurse family. It was a clear challenge.

“And where is Tituba’s child’s soul?” shouted Mercy Lewis.

Parris’s jaw quivered with rage at this. How does Mercy know about the child in Barbados, he wondered.

“She told me,” continued Mercy, “that she never once saw her dead child, not ever!”

“The child was born deformed and dead!” Parris retreated to his podium. “Tituba was only your age then. She didn’t need to see it; it’d’ve done no good. As to the child’s soul—same as with Anne’s brothers and sisters, same as with any who’re un-baptized— every child knows. So say it with me.”

Several adults shouted at once, “Their souls belong to Perdition!”

“And as such—” continued Parris—“out of our hands!”

A chorus of men and women in the pews shouted, ”Amen.”

Others sat unmoved.

Parris sighed heavily at the unmoved people in particular. He picked up his hourglass and turned it over. “It appears we need another hour’s worth of his wisdom.”

After a few muffled groans, the congregation made up its mind to stay.

“Just as the child is born with the mark of Cain, Original Sin, these facts we have no power to change,” the minister spoke extemporaneously. “So too the unborn child has this mark and cannot escape the sinful condition to which it is born. Death, not even stillborn death, nor death by foul means, or murder by demonic interference can expel the mark of Cain, no!”

Most in the congregation sent up an uproar of amen’s that covered the few groans. The majority these days followed Mr. Parris’ remarks slavishly and silently, save for little Anne Putnam who began a low, growling chant.

“Death does not discount the Book of the Lamb.” Parris leaned heavily into his podium. “Death does not offer an escape unless you are among the chosen!”

More halleluiahs and amen’s.”

“The chosen of God.”

“How do you know they weren’t chosen of God before they were born?” asked Anne Junior. “Which means, they could be in heaven right now?” Anne’s glassy stare stopped the minister from another word.

Finally, Parris replied, “God saves the humble, Anne, and the meek shall inherit the earth. There is no one among us who can know who is chosen and who is not. Not even your minister.”

“What about us?” asked Mercy Lewis, standing beside Anne now. “If we’ve been given this gift of sight . . . if we are now seers into the Invisible World of angels and demons, then mightn’t . . . I mean perhaps we are the chosen!”

Everyone in the meetinghouse silently considered this, none more so than Parris himself.

“Then it was even more glorious than we had thought, Mercy Lewis,” Parris calmly replied, “when on that day under Deacon Putnam’s roof when I banished the devil residing within you. Remember that day.”

“Yes! Yes, sir. I shall never forget it, Uncle.”

“I’m not asking if you remember; I am telling you to always remember.”

She shouted as if on cue, “It truly is a miracle of miracles you’ve performed, Reverend Uncle Parris!”

Parris saw the eyes of his congregation settle on him in wonder. “How long have I been your spiritual leader?” he asked them, coming away from the podium again. He awaited no answer. “And how long have some among you, the dissenting brethren among you, denied my sincerity and denounced my character?”

A general consensus followed as many of the so-called ‘dissenting brethren’ had days before, with the excommunication of Rebecca Nurse, left the congregation. Now the remnants of them had quietly inched from the meetinghouse, never to return.

# # # # #

Some of these final holdouts among the dissenting brethren still going to Parris’ sermons—like John Tarbell—went directly to Francis Nurse’s house, daring to report on Mr. Parris’ new role as leader of the seer children, the afflicted girls who’d become cause for celebrity, and gifts, and attention by adults who days before had treated them as invisible members of society—people to fetch their water, scrub their floors, wipe the noses of their children.

The Eastys, the Cloyses, the Prescotts, the Russells, the Tabells, and many of the Proctors stood as the last remaining adult members of the village who questioned the seer children of Salem Village, and their ability to see into and interpret the Invisible World of Satan. But they had too soon and suddenly found themselves no longer among the silent majority of those who stood by, said and did nothing. They were now in the vocal minority.

A minority finding itself making up the bulk of names on arrest warrants. Warrants now coming at a head-spinning pace, and now being executed by the new Sheriff, Herrick.