The witching hour

me and call out my name, and in her despair, cheerfully give my disguise away.

But this did not happen.

As I stepped into the cell, lifting the hem of my black cassock so as to appear as a cleric who did not wish to soil himself with this filth, I looked down upon her and saw no look of recognition in her face.

That she did look steadily at me alarmed me however, and straightaway I said to the old fool of a parish priest that I must examine her alone. He was loathe to leave me with her, but I told him that I had seen many a witch and she did not frighten me in the slightest and that I must ask her many questions, and if only he would wait for me at the rectory I should be back soon. Then I took from my pockets several gold coins, and said, “You must take these for your church, for I know I have given you much trouble.” And that sealed it. The imbecile was gone.

Need I tell you how contemptible all these proceedings were, that this woman should be put into my hands thus without guards? For what might I have done to her, had I chosen to do it? And who had done such things before me?

At once the door was shut up, and though I could hear much whispering in the passage beyond, we were alone. I set down the candle upon the only furnishing in the place, which was a wooden bench, and as I struggled not to give way to tears at the sight of her, I heard her voice coming low, scarce more than a whisper as she said:

“Petyr, can it really be you?”

“Yes, Deborah,” I said.

“Ah, but you have not come to save me, have you?” she asked wearily.

My heart was struck by the very tone of her voice, for it was the same voice that had spoken to me in her bedchamber in Amsterdam that last night. It had but a tiny fraction of deeper resonance, and perhaps a dark music to it which suffering imparts.

“I cannot do it, Deborah. Though I shall try, I know that I will fail.”

This came as no surprise to her, yet she smiled at me.

Taking up the candle once more, I drew closer to her, and went down on my knees in the hay before her so that I might look into her eyes. I saw the very same eyes I remembered, and the same cheeks as she smiled, and it seemed this spare and waxen form was but my Deborah made already into a spirit, with all her beauty intact.

She made no move towards me but perused my face as she might a painting, and then in a rush of feeble and pitiful words I told her that I had not known of her distress, but had come upon this place alone, in my work for the Talamasca, and had discovered with great sorrow that she was the one of whom I had heard so much talk. I had ascertained that she had appealed to the bishop, and to the Parliament of Paris, but here she silenced me with a simple gesture and said:

“I shall die here on the morrow, and there is nothing that you can do.”

“Ah, but there is one small mercy,” I said, “for I have in my possession a powder, which when mixed with water and drunk, will make you stuporous and you will not suffer as you might. Nay, I can give you such a measure of it that you will die, if that is your wish, and thereby cheat the flames altogether. I know that I can put this into your hands. The old priest is a fool.”

She seemed most deeply affected by my offer, though in no urgency to accept it. “Petyr, I must have my wits about when I am taken down into the square. I warn you, do not be in the town when this takes place. Or be safe behind a shuttered window, if you must remain to see it for yourself.”

“Are you speaking of escape, Deborah?” I asked, for I had to admit that my imagination was at once inflamed. If only I could save her, cause a great confusion and then take her away by some means. But how could I do such a thing?

“No, no, Petyr, that is beyond my power and the power of him whom I command. It is a simple thing for a spirit to transport a small jewel or a gold coin into the hands of a witch, but to open prison doors, to overcome armed guards? This cannot be done.” Then, as if distracted, her eyes glancing wildly about, she said, “Do you know my own sons have testified against me? That my beloved Chretien has called his mother a witch?”

“I think they made him do it, Deborah. Shall I go to see him? What can I do that will help?”

“Oh, kind, dear Petyr,” she said. “Why did you not listen to me when I begged you to come with me? But this is not your doing, all this. It is mine.”

“How so, Deborah? That you were innocent I never doubted. If you could have cured your husband of his injury, there never would have been a cry of ‘witch.’ ”

She shook her head at this. “There is so much more to the story. When he died I believed myself to be blameless. But I have spent many a long month in this cell thinking on it, Petyr. And hunger and pain make the mind grow sharp.”

“Deborah, do not believe what your enemies say of you, no matter how often or well they say it!”

She did not answer me. She seemed indifferent to it. And then she turned to me again. “Petyr, do these things for me. If on the morrow I am brought bound into the square, which is my worst fear, demand that my arms and legs be freed that I may carry the heavy candle in penance, as has always been the custom in these parts. Do not let my crippled feet wring pity from you, Petyr. I fear the bonds worse than I fear the flames!”

“I will do it,” I said, “but there is no cause for concern. They will make you carry the candle, and make you walk the length of the town. You will be made to bring it to the steps of the cathedral, and only then will they bind you and take you to the pyre.” I could scarce continue.

“Listen, I have more to ask of you.” she said.

“Yes, please, go on.”

“When it is finished, and you leave this town, then to my daughter, Charlotte Fontenay, wife of Antoine Fontenay, in Saint-Domingue, which is in Hispaniola, in care of the merchant Jean-Jacques Toussaint, Port-au- Prince, write what I tell you to say.”

I repeated the name and full address to her. “Tell Charlotte that I did not suffer in the flames even if this is not true.”

“I will make her believe it.”

At this she smiled bitterly. “Perhaps not,” she said. “But do your best at it, for me.”

“What else?”

“Give her a further message, and this you must remember word for word. Tell her to proceed with care-that he whom I have sent to obey her sometimes does those things for us which he believes we want him to do. And further tell her that he whom I am sending to her draws his belief in our purpose as much from our random thoughts, as from the careful words we speak.”

“Oh, Deborah!”

“You understand what I am saying to you, and why you must convey this to her?”

“I see it. I see it all. You wished your husband dead, on account of his treachery. And the demon struck him down.”

“It is deeper than that. Do not seek to compass it. I never wished him dead. I loved him. And I did not know of his treachery! But you must make known what I have said to Charlotte, for her protection, for my invisible servant cannot tell her of his own changing nature. He cannot speak to her of what he himself does not understand.”

“Oh, but … ”

“Do not stand on conscience with me now, Petyr. Better that you had never come here, if you do. She has the emerald in her possession. He will go to her when I am dead.”

“Do not send him, Deborah!”

She sighed, with great disappointment and desperation. “Please, I beg you, do as I ask.”

“What took place with your husband, Deborah?”

It seemed she would not answer, and then she said, “My husband lay dying when my Lasher came to me, and made known to me that he had tricked my husband and made him fall in the woods. ‘How could you do such a thing,’ I demanded, ‘which I never told you to do?’ And then came his answer: ‘But Deborah, had you seen into his heart as I did, it is what you would have told me to do.’ ”

I was chilled to my very bones then, Stefan, and I ask that when you have this letter copied out for our records, that the above words be underlined. For when have we ever heard of such conniving and willfulness from an invisible devil, such wit and such stupidity in one?