The Evil Inside

Jenna could see that the newcomers seemed both fascinated and amused by the fact that they were in “Witch City.” She could also see that Cecilia was accustomed to the attitude and seemed entirely unperturbed. She suggested to the woman that the mortar and pestle were also quite useful for crushing garlic and herbs.

“She’s a good kid,” Sam said softly.

“And a talker…but a lot of help,” she replied. She couldn’t help watching the man in the brown cape. There was really nothing out of the ordinary about him; people were dressed up all around the city. But his outfit reminded her of her vision-the caped, hooded and masked person who had rushed in on Peter Andres, felling him where he stood.

“What’s the matter?” Sam asked her.

She shook her head. She wasn’t ready to tell him what she’d seen. He’d mocked her at the Lexington House, and she could only imagine what he would have to say if she told him a dressed-up and horned demon had killed Peter Andres.

“It’s Halloween. People like to play at being many things,” she said.

“People always like to play at being many things,” he told her. “I’ll let Cecilia know we’re leaving.”

Cecilia excused herself to her customers, hugged Sam and waved to Jenna, and the two left her shop. They walked along the pedestrian street by the museums and other shops. All around them, they could hear the delighted squeals of children as they watched jugglers or paused at various stations to take part in drawing, pumpkin carving or face painting.

Jenna wasn’t sure where they were going, but Sam was thoughtful.

“Assuming Malachi is innocent, what’s going on is calculated,” he said. “First murder a teacher, assuming that everyone would think that Malachi hated that teacher and would easily be suspected-which he was. And then a neighbor. But why the neighbor?”

“According to Cecilia, everyone hated the Smith family,” Jenna said. “So, we can assume that the neighbor hated them a lot.”

“So, it all looks like a series of events, with the killer, Malachi, having lost all hold on reality, and perhaps killing others before lashing out at his restrictive family. The question is…was there a real reason for the neighbor and the teacher, or were they just there, random victims in a plan against the family?”

“Or was there a plan, and they fit right into it?” Jenna asked.

“Well, the fact that Malachi and Peter Andres actually got on well together will help our case,” Sam said.

Jenna heard him speak, but she didn’t reply. She stopped walking.

Just ahead of them, moving through the crowd, was someone in a long brown cape, a monk’s cape with a hood. She couldn’t see the person’s face and she didn’t know if it was a man or a woman-or if they wore a mask or not.

She reminded herself that she had just seen a man in Cecilia’s shop in such a cape.

It was Halloween season, Haunted Happenings. People would be in costumes daily, participating in all the events, and dressing up because it was fun to dress up!

The person paused-almost as if they had felt they were being watched.

He or she turned and looked back.

Jenna froze.

The person was wearing the mask.

The same mask she had seen in her vision of the murder of Peter Andres.

It was the horned devil.

5

The horned devil stared at her a long moment, and then turned.

She couldn’t have begun to explain how, but the person in the costume knew she had recognized him.

If it was a him. It was impossible to tell.

Jenna found herself following the horned devil. Even as she quickened her pace, she wondered what she would say if she caught up with them.

Excuse me, but in my mind’s eye, I saw you murder Peter Andres, or at least, I saw someone in the costume you’re wearing…

“Hey, where are you going?” Sam called. She hadn’t realized that she’d been walking so quickly until Sam had caught up with her. By the time she looked up from where Sam’s arm was on her, she saw that she’d lost her target in the crowd. The horned devil had disappeared by diving through a group dressed as plums and apples and the rest of the Fruit of the Loom underwear set.

Halloween season. The season of the witch, so many thought. And in legend, the night when souls could return to earth…

And try to linger on.

But the dead weren’t really returning; the living created evil.

“Jenna!” Sam said.

“I-I’m sorry,” she said. “I-I thought I saw an old friend.”

“Really?”

“Yes, yes, of course.”

“Someone I might know?”

Jenna dead-blanked on the name of anyone she might have known in Salem.

“Just-just a girl I saw now and then. She might have been friends with Cecilia, too. I actually can’t remember her name.” Jenna tried not to blink, fidget, look downward or to the side, or do any of the things that automatically identified you as a liar.

“Oh,” he said, looking back at her. “Well, I can’t help you there.”

“Oh, nothing to worry about,” she said and shrugged.

Jenna realized that in her pursuit she had turned down the street toward Old Burying Point Cemetery. The cemetery contained the graves of a Mayflower Pilgrim, and John Hathorne, one of the witchcraft trial judges. Nathaniel Hawthorne had added the “w” to his family’s name, and written many of his works, because he’d been disturbed by his ancestor’s involvement in the trials. Jenna mused that it was an interesting place, and she was grateful for the historic preservation there and for the monument of benches and names that had been added just outside the gates for the tercentennial of the trial in 1992.

It was a place steeped in history and the past. A place where the dead had been interred for hundreds of years. Though tourists walked among the gravestones and sought out those of the greatest interest, Jenna could still see the hazy images of a few of the departed wandering about. Most spirits did not remain to haunt burial grounds; their business was seldom at the place where their earthly remains had been interred. Perhaps those who came just did so out of respect to others. The cemetery wasn’t crowded, but she could see a man in a ship captain’s jacket, a few in more puritanical dress, and a beautiful young woman in a gown that belonged in the early eighteen hundreds.

“Ah, the old burying ground,” Sam said.

“I doubt if we’ll find any answers here,” Jenna said, turning away from graveyard itself to look at him, hoping she gave away nothing of what she saw.

“You never know. The past can usually teach us a lot. I always find people amazing-and the trials extremely interesting, as far as the legal process of the time went,” Sam mused. “Those who admitted to witchcraft-dancing with the devil, whatever!-managed to save their lives. Those who denied it to the end, certain in their belief in God or just determined that they wouldn’t admit to such ridiculousness, were the ones who were hanged. Or, in the case of Giles Corey, pressed to death.”

“I know. I’ve always wondered how people managed to stay fast to such a declaration. I wonder about myself. If I believed I could be forgiven and redeemed by stating a lie-and I knew that I’d wind up being hanged if I told the truth-I’m not sure I would have stayed the truth course. But our standards have changed. We know the world is filled with beliefs, and we have to be tolerant of them now. I’m convinced that God would forgive anyone such a lie