Children of Salem

BOOK TWO

Chapter One

Late evening, April 13,^, 1692

“A challenge to every Puritan,” said Reverend Parris where he stood drinking ale at Ingersoll’s Inn. He’d come uncharacteristically late to the Inn. Ingersoll was in fact closing, but when he found the minister at his doorstep, he remained in business, his light on. He had poured a pint of ale for Parris, whose bill with Ingersoll had been settled recently with a bushel of beans and potatoes, goods others had paid the minister in. Parris had need of someone’s ear and Ingersoll had been elected. He informed Ingersoll of the truth of Jeremiah Wakely’s identity and his true purpose in the village, and that he’d been sent in to spy on the minister, and all those letters he asked you to post, Nathaniel—I was right to intercept them. He was a fraud from the beginning, and he thought I didn’t know.

Ingersoll solemnly nodded. “He is an arrogant scoundrel, that young pup.”

“It’s the same with the Falllen One.”

“Aye, he’s the ultimate arrogant angel.”

“What angel?” asked the carpenter, Zachariah Fiske, who’d seen the light on and had stopped in for a dram.

“Satan, of course!”

“Aye, indeed.” Fiske put down a coin on the counter, and Ingersoll poured him a pint.

“So how do the judges intend to proceed?” asked Ingersoll, pressing Samuel Parris for information.

“As precisely and as carefully as they should!” continued the uncharacteristically prudent minister.

“And how is that, precisely?” nudged Ingersoll with a wink for Fiske.

“Why, as men of honor,” replied Parris, “courage, and integrity.” He lifted his pewter cup and toasted.

Ingersoll nodded and met the minister’s eye, and all three men drank to this. “I’ve always heard it said, Samuel, that Bridgett Bishop’s a witch if ever there were one, so why was she not kept in jail?”

“A scarcity of evidence there, but they’ve got their eye on her, that one.”

“They’ve found it with the others but not Bishop?”

“The innkeeper on North Ipswich road here?” asked Fiske, his face pinched in confusion.

“The very one,” replied Parris, taking another drink. “If that witch is shut down, Nathaniel, imagine the business you’d have here.”

Ingersoll added, “Aye, but that’s no good reason to cast aspersions.”

“The one whose husband, Malachi Bishop—may he rest in peace— died in the throes of something horrible, Mr. Fiske,” continued Parris, nursing his drink.

“Horrible and mysterious, so far as anyone’s able to determine,” Ingersoll felt compelled to admit with Fiske searching his features.

“I recall it, I do,” replied Fiske, nursing his own ale now. “Happened just before your arrival here, Mr. Parris.”

“Three years,” muttered Parris. “Yet no one thought to bring the woman up on charges back then?”

“Oh, but there was charges made,” Fiske disagreed, “but there weren’t no evidence, so they let her go free, and ever since she’s run Bishop’s Inn.”

“Some say she spins her witchery down below the floor of that inn,” muttered Parris. “Maybe hides the evidence down there.”

“Do you think so, Mr. Parris?” asked Fiske, swallowing hard. “I run afoul of that woman once; she run me outta her place with that club of hers.” Fiske looked about, shaken at the idea a witch might have it in for him.

“I have it on good authority, Mr. Fiske, Nathaniel. Can you keep a secret among us?”

“By my word,” replied Ingersoll.

“You can trust me, Mr. Parris,” added Fiske.

“We’re going to need a good deal of carpentry work done here in Salem.”

“You mean a gallows?” asked Fiske.

“I mean the sheriff and his men will be taking Bishop’s Inn and the woman’s quarters apart for the evidence they need—and soon, very soon.”

“Four for the gallows?” asked Nathaniel.

“If not more.” Parris finished his ale and bid the others goodnight. “I must be at my child’s bedside. She suffers the agony of the bewitched as we speak.”

This same conversation—or one very nearly the same—was taking place in every corner of Salem Village, and the same sort of talk had crept into neighboring villages and towns from Wenham and Topsfield to Beverly and Salem Town Harbor. Every municipality had jailed at least one witch and some two by now. The fever pitch reflected the fear that raged like a fire when news of what had gone on behind closed doors at Mr. Corwin’s home over the past two days had got out.