Children of Salem

The smallest child and babe had frozen. “No amount of deeds or acts can change the course of God’s greater design. We all know this! Those Chosen among us, they’re not selected tomorrow . . . ” He paused to allow this to sink in . . .“nor yesterday, but at the beginning of time, my brethren!”

Halleluiahs punctuated the single voice that now filled the meetinghouse from entry to pulpit, spilling out the windows and doors.

“We all know the faith!” continued Parris, roaming the large space. “Everyone here knows that he or she, whether elder, deacon, husband, Goodwife, child, or maidservant, that one’s fate is sealed. Sealed not by man or dictum or law but by God. Not even the Harbor Town Council can change that.”

This brought about a mix of laughter and groaning agreements among those remaining.

“But we must ever remind ourselves of these facts,” Parris solemnly reminded them, moving up and down the rows, meeting people in the crowd eye-to-eye. “Outward prosperity, outward show whether the richest merchants in our midst with the greatest number of livestock, and yes, children and grandchildren and friends and relatives— these are no indicators of God’s grace! We all know this from birth, correct?”

The elders erupted with a chorus of amens and corrects, punctuated by the sounds of several young girls in the meetinghouse shouting, “True, too true!” Among these was little Anne Putnam and Mercy Lewis.

“What then is an indication that God shines upon us?” asked Mrs. Putnam, surprising everyone. Women seldom voiced a word in meeting, and in a single day, she’d spoken up twice, emboldened by Parris’ words.

As if emboldened by her mother’s question, Anne Junior began barking in the manner of a dog, growling and going onto all fours, crawling down the aisle, where she went into a sudden, uncontrollable fit—limbs suddenly freezing up, turning to wood.

“My God!” cried out Mrs. Putnam, going to her child and falling over her, covering her with her body. “Harm me, take me, not my child!” she pleaded as if to some invisible person. “It’s Mrs. Bailey,” she called out to others. “James Bailey’s poor wife.”

“Why does she attack your, Anne?”

“She’s angry!” cried the child, Anne. “Come back from the grave, angry that none knew she was murdered, too, ’long with her children!”

The crowd shuddered at these words.

Little Anne continued. “Poisoned by her maidservant and husband, ’long with the children.”

“But why? Why?”

“To run off together—her and Bailey! They were lovers, sinners!”

Ingersoll worked hard to recall aloud, “Who was this maidservant? Try as I might, I can’t picture her, nor recall a name.”

“We’ll scour the colonies to find anyone guilty, so as to return the guilty to justice,” Parris assured his frightened congregation, most now on their feet, prepared to bolt yet holding, curious, hoping to catch a glimpse of the spirit, the deceased Mrs. Bailey that little Anne pointed to in the ether over their heads.

Suddenly Mercy Lewis fell to the floor kicking and screaming that some ugly hag was stabbing her with needles, trying to jam one into her brain and another into her heart. She scuttled across the dirt floor like a crab, and she then grabbed hold of Anne, the two hugging one another now in a mimic of how they held one another in private.

At this, the entire congregation became agitated, some rushing for the exit, some knocking others out of the way for a better look at the suffering children. The screams, shouts, and general pandemonium had turned the once peaceful meetinghouse into a snake pit.

Another Nurse man, Joseph, shouted over the din but no one could hear his words: “What uses would you have us make of this sermon, Mr. Parris?”

No one heard but Anne Putnam who looked up at Joseph Nurse with two chilling speckled eyes of coal and hatred. A stark look of loathing that was not lost on young Joseph Nurse, who, among all the Nurse clan, had heard of the false allegations going around about Mother Nurse.

Chapter Three

Two nights later at the Home of Francis and Rebecca Nurse

Francis had come home from Sabbath meeting on the 16^th of April and had relayed all that Parris had said, ending with how he and all the other Nurse men, save Joseph, had stormed from the place in sheer disgust. Only later had the others learned from Joseph how the children had fallen and groveled before the remaining congregation, declaring themselves under attack from invisible forces—witches whirling about like dirt devils invisible to the eye, save those eyes of the children who Parris had immediately christened: the Seer Children.

“Now Ingersoll’s isn’t a large enough playground for them, they must do their antics at the meetinghouse!” he angrily relayed to Rebecca.

All the same, a sense of impending doom had settled in over the Nurse home, and Rebecca and Francis had begun to worry and to miss Serena. Other family members had begun to shun them for fear of being named in an indictment. The numbers coming to Rebecca for bible readings in her room had been dwindling, and now she knew the reason why.

“No man knows his time,” Francis was philosophizing and smoking his pipe at the same time where they rocked on the front porch, listening to birds and squirrels that chased about the trees. April had brought warmth and a pleasant breeze tonight.

“Nor any woman,” Rebecca had added to the rhythm of her slowly rocking back and forth. “As with Israel.”

Francis nodded knowingly. The couple knew every biblical story forward and backward.

Rebecca added, “I’m recalling one of Reverend Higginson’s favorite verses.”

“What is that, dear?” He patted her hand.

The stars lit a clear sky overhead. Insects set up a chorus all round them.

“The stork in the heavens.”

“Ah-yes.”

“The stork knows her appointed time; the turtle and the crane and the swallow,” she continued, rocking lightly. “They all know the time of their coming.”

“I think there is more?” he asked, setting his pipe aside, working to recall the words. “Oh, yes, ‘but my people know not the judgment of the Lord’.”

She snorted. “I think Reverend Parris knows not the judgment of the Lord, but he will one day. One day, we all will.”

“Aye to that indeed.” Francis stood and straightened the shawl about her shoulders and kissed her lightly on the cheek.

“I confess one worldly vanity I cannot escape, Goodman Nurse.”

“And what might that be, Goodwife?”

She hesitated a moment, “Aside from my affection for you, old man, I feel deeply for my children and grandchildren, and I have too much loved Sabbath Days.”

“Not the worst of worldly vanities,” he said and chuckled. He had spent time aboard ships at sea before settling down as a young man, and he had seen true cruelty and true vanity side by side.

“I mean that I care so much for the word, and I wish we’d never left Salem Town sometimes; that we had made our lives there—for the reason I would have seen more of Mr. Higginson’s preaching and less of Parris.”

“Tsk-tskk-tskkk, such a horrible sinner you are!” he joked. “A small vanity, Mother,” he repeated.

“Spring. I truly did not expect to see another spring.”

He put his arm about her from behind, shaking her a bit. “Those nightmares you’d had, eh?”

“Wasting away all winter in my bedchamber, I thought my heart would break, and how you and Serena waited on me! As if a child, urgh! I am no child.”