Thirty-Nine
Mary’s scrivener went home first, followed by her mother and father, leaving her alone in the jail. Her mother wanted to remain through the night, and a part of Mary wanted that, too. But the magistrates had insisted that she spend her last night on this earth alone. And so she would pray and write two last letters.
She didn’t expect to sleep.
She was grateful when the magistrates relented and allowed her a candle so she could see the paper as she formed her letters with her quill. The first letter was going to be to Henry and the second would be to Peregrine. In the morning, she would give them to her father. She was confident that he would deliver them without opening them.
It was while she was praying before starting to write, asking her God for forgiveness and thanking Him for her twenty-four years of life and the love of her parents, praying as well that she would die quickly and the agony would be brief, that Spencer Pitts told her she had company. She rose from her knees as he unlocked the heavy door, and there stood Thomas.
He took off his hat and held it boyishly in front of him, as if he were courting a girl he presumed was above his station, either literally or because in some impure, cavalier fashion he esteemed too much.
“I am sorry it has come to this,” he began, his tone uncharacteristically sheepish.
“I am, too.”
It was awkward and strange, but mostly, she thought, because they had so little to say to each other. Here they had lived as man and wife for five years, and now her principal thought when she saw him was this: I haven’t the time for thee.
“I regret much.”
“Is that why thou appeared at the Town House today to speak on my behalf?” she asked sarcastically. “Is that why thou came to visit me so many times this week?”
He shook his head. Instead of answering, he said, “I heard thou accused me of witchcraft today.”
“Not precisely. I simply observed that Catherine and thee were as likely suspects as me to have carved the Devil’s mark into our doorframe.”
“No one was going to believe that nonsense.”
“Thou art quite right. No one did,” she said. “So, thou hast come to say thou art sorry. For what? For the beatings and the cruel words?”
“I always administered to thee with love and the hope that thou wouldst dilute thy pride with obedience.”
“Fine,” she said. She wasn’t going to argue.
“Thy spell, Mary. Why wouldst thou try and hex me? Look how this has ended. And it couldn’t have ended any other—”
“I didn’t, Thomas,” she said, cutting him off.
“Art thou going to insist even now, hours before thou wilt be swinging from a noose, that Catherine—”
“No.”
“Then what? That it was me? It wasn’t me, Mary.”
“But thou were the target. Of this I am sure. I understood this only today, but I know it now as surely as I know my own face in the glass.”
“Thou knowest this how?” he asked, leaning back against the damp stone. He waited. And so she did, too, unsure whether she should share with him what she had deduced, or whether she should let Peregrine try again and, perhaps, this time succeed. Thomas Deerfield deserved to die. But what would happen to Peregrine in the next life if she murdered her father? On the other hand, what would happen to her in this one if she told Thomas what she knew?
She rubbed her arms with her hands. She was cold. So very cold.
The truth was, they preached that a doctrine of works was a fallacy, but they all believed in their hearts that evil on earth suggested one was damned. Did the magistrates suppose that a hanged witch ever wound up beside Jesus Christ in the celestial firmament? Of course not. In her mind, she heard herself informing Thomas, her lips thin, Thine own daughter detests thee with the heat of a blacksmith’s fire. But she did not say that. She would write Peregrine, as she had planned, tell her what she believed was the truth, and then walk with her head held high to the gallows. Someday after she was gone, in the next world, perhaps, she would learn what had transpired here in Boston. She rather hoped so.
“Thou hast grown quiet,” he said finally.
“I have nothing to say.”
“Thy scandal has scarred me, too—and will forever.”
“No,” she corrected him. “We are mortal. Nothing that touches us or we touch here is forever. Even rocks are rubbed small by the river.”
He chuckled dismissively. “Thou hast become a poet in thy last hours.”
“Some white meat ages better than others,” she said. She supposed it would be the last thing she would ever say to him. He turned, put on his hat, and left. They were man and wife, but they hadn’t touched once.
And then Spencer left, too. He said he was going home and hoped she would sleep. She finished her two letters and prayed. When she rose, her back hurt. The days in the cell had done their work.
As she stared into the blackness beyond the bars, she saw a flickering light and supposed that Spencer had not left, after all. But she heard at least two sets of footsteps, and they were moving quietly. And suddenly there stood Rebeckah Cooper and Peregrine Cooke. The women were almost lost in the dark of the jail.
“I am flattered that our farewells will be here rather than when I stand tomorrow on the scaffold,” she said through the bars, “but how and why art thou here?”
Goody Cooper glanced at Peregrine and then surprised Mary by pulling out the keys to the door. She opened it, and the two of them entered the cell. Mary backed away from them reflexively, stunned. She started to ask how they had the keys and what they were doing, but Goody Cooper placed her index finger on Mary’s lips, silencing her, and they each embraced Mary in turn. When they pulled apart Rebeckah said, “Thou art trembling.”
“I am unsure whether it is cold or fear. It’s probably a stew made of both. Thine uncle has allowed this? Spencer gave thee his keys?”
“He did.”
“Do not be afraid,” said Peregrine.
Mary offered a small smile. “Dost thou know my destiny when the noose has done its work?”
“My father is the Devil,” she said.
The words hung there a moment, and Mary realized that the woman had spoken them before; when she looked at Goody Cooper, she understood that Peregrine had shared them with her friend.
“Thou knew?” Mary asked Rebeckah.
“Peregrine told me.”
Mary gazed at her daughter-in-law. “How badly did he hurt thee, Peregrine? How badly did he hurt thy mother?”
“It was no horse that broke her neck.”
“She—”
“He knew she was plotting. Thou were not the first woman in his circle to visit the likes of Constance Winston.”
“And thee?”
“He never beat me. Only her. He did things to me that were worse. Far worse. Unnatural things that I told no one until this Sabbath, when I told Rebeckah.”
The other woman looked at her boots, unable to meet Peregrine’s eyes.
Mary reached down and handed her the letter. “My father was going to deliver it to thee tomorrow. There was enough light in the candle to write it. I believe there is enough now for thee to read it.”
Peregrine nodded and unfolded the paper. As she was reading, Rebeckah said, “Thou spoke well at the Town House.”
“I did not see thee there.”
“I was. I was hoping they would ask me to speak.”
“I was doomed from the start.”
“Before that group? Yes, Mary, I feared that was true. But I hoped and prayed,” said the goodwife, and then she took Mary’s hands in hers and rubbed them ferociously to warm them.
“Thou wouldst have made a fine constable,” said Peregrine, when she had finished reading. She took the letter and put one corner into the flame of the candle, holding the paper so the fire could climb it, reducing it quickly to ash. She dropped the last corner on the floor, watched it burn itself out, and ground the cinders into the stone with the toe of her boot.
“My suspicions were correct?” Mary asked. “Thou planted the forks and the pestle in the ground?”
“Yes. My father was my quarry—not thee.”
“And the boiled apples? Him, too?”
“That’s right. I confused my pots. My father got the harmless one cooked up for thee, and thou ate the poisoned one I meant for my father. He should have died. Hannah should not have been sickened. Thank goodness she ate but a fifth.”
“But the mark in the doorframe. That was not thee.”
“No. That was surely thy servant girl. It was she who carved the mark and claimed to have found the Devil’s tines in thy apron.”
“Because—”
“Because she is afraid of thee, Mary. She wants thee gone from this world. Because, for reasons neither of us shall understand, she does indeed fancy my father. Having thee hanged as a witch accomplishes all of that.”
“We should go,” said Rebeckah, and Mary thought the goodwife meant that it was time for her friends to leave. But Peregrine was taking her hand and leading her from the cell.
“What art thou doing?” she asked.
“What the magistrates didn’t,” the woman said. “Giving thee justice.”
“But Spencer—”
“My uncle is a very good man, Mary,” said Rebeckah. “In the morning, he will tell the constable that he was conked soundly on his way from the jail and when he awoke, someone had taken his keys. Worry not about Spencer.”
And with that they started down the corridor and toward freedom.
The night air was bracing, colder than even the jail, but it was clean and fresh, and a part of Mary wanted only to follow Peregrine blindly; how extraordinary it was to her how badly she had misjudged the woman—and then, when it seemed too late to matter, come to understand her. But another part of Mary, bigger by far, wanted to know the details of the plan.
“Tell me, prithee, where art thou taking me?” she asked.
Peregrine whispered something into Rebeckah’s ear, and the other woman walked briskly down the street ahead of them, and then turned toward the fine homes near the Town House. Her friend would pass the hanging platform. After she had started off, Peregrine answered, “To the Bedmunster, a ship that sails tomorrow for Jamaica,” she said.
“Where has Rebeckah gone?”
“To fetch Henry Simmons.”
“He knows what thou art doing?”
“Only that thy emancipation was being engineered. Nothing more.”
She reached for Peregrine’s arm. “But what will happen to thee? Dost thou plan to come with us and desert thy family?”
“Why would anyone suspect me? I will remain here. It was clear from thy letter that thou only began to see the truth of who I am and what I have been compelled to do because thou knowest my father.”
“And Catherine?”
Peregrine’s eyes were two round jewels in the night. “What wouldst thou like, Mary?”
“She wanted to see me hanged. She has, it seems, made her pact with the Devil.”
“Then it seems to me sufficient punishment for her to spend the rest of her days in this world with my father, before joining her true master in the next,” said Peregrine.
Mary smiled in a way that she hadn’t in days. “Dost thou believe thy father will have her?”
“Yes,” she replied. “And they deserve whatever misery they inflict upon each other. Now, we should hurry.”
“I will not see my parents, will I?”
“No. Not tonight. I want thee on the ship well before sunrise, and I want to be home well before sunrise.”
“Jonathan—”
“Jonathan does not dare question me. Not after all he has done. He has his own sins to answer for.” They were walking quickly now, but still Peregrine had the breath to continue: “Prithee, fear not. I have faith that thou wilt see thy mother and father again. Someday.”
“Someday,” she repeated, and the word rocked her as if she were on the boat on the seas that so long ago had brought her here. Her smile left her, but she saw no alternative as they raced toward the waterfront. “I wish I knew how to thank thee,” she added.
“I wish only that thou wilt forgive me. I should have taken thy hand and helped thee up from thy pit years ago,” she said, and then she stopped, and so Mary stopped, too. She heard it now: horses. A pair.
Peregrine pulled her behind a large, round oak, as cold this time of the year as a marble column, that stood at the edge of a dooryard. There were no candles in the house’s windows, but that didn’t mean that someone wasn’t inside watching them as they stood perfectly still behind the tree, hoping to be shielded from the road by its broad trunk.
There on horseback were Thomas and a fellow Mary didn’t recognize. Was it possible that her husband had left her in her jail cell and then gone to the ordinary until it closed? Apparently, it was. The other rider spotted them behind the oak.
“Who is that? Who’s there?” he asked. Like Thomas, he was a big man. “I can see thy breath.”
The idea came to Mary that she had come so close and yet was, in fact, destined to die here. It was her winter yet. So be it. “I will go to them,” she whispered.
“Come out!” Thomas shouted. “Show thy selves!”
Peregrine pried Mary’s fingers from her arm and shocked Mary by pulling a knife from her cloak. She walked fearlessly from behind the tree and past the first rider to Sugar, her father’s horse, the knife shielded by her side.
“Peregrine?”
“Yes, ’tis me.”
“Why art thou out?” Thomas asked, his tone condescending, as if he were speaking to a toddler that was stretching its leading strings. Mary recognized, even in so short a sentence, the precise enunciation he used when he was drink-drunk.
“We should both be in our beds, Father,” she said.
Thomas spoke to his drinking companion. “Sam, this is my daughter. I have no idea why she is not home. I, of course, have but an empty bed. But this one? She has her gambler to warm.”
“Thy bed won’t be cold long, Thomas,” said his friend, chuckling. “Thy servant will be thy wife.”
“And my life will be much improved.” Then he climbed down from Sugar. “Peregrine, I shall bring thee home. I haven’t a pillion, but we can walk. Thou canst tell me what devilment thou art up to at this godless hour.”
“Dost thou feel nothing about the fact thy wife will be hanged tomorrow?” Peregrine asked.
“No,” he said, his voice ice. “She is the spatter at the bottom of a sick man’s slop pot. I am thankful only that she was barren and brought forth no demons. The Devil can have her.”
“Thy father,” Sam told her, “has endured too much already at the hands of that witch.”
“Come, Peregrine,” Thomas commanded. “Sam, I will see thee soon enough.”
“Dost thou plan to watch her swing tomorrow?” Sam asked him.
“I do not. That face is ugly enough to me while it breathes. In death? It will be a mask too vile to bear.”
“Father, she is—”
Abruptly, Thomas took his daughter by the throat. “Enough!” he yelled, before calming ever so slightly. “Enough. I know thou art out tonight because thou hast plans that will wind thee in the same crater as Mary. Let me bring thee home and save thy soul.”
Sam climbed off his horse, nearly stumbling he was so inebriated. Then, slurring his words, he said, “Thomas, it doesn’t seem thy can manage thine own seed.”
Thomas looked back and forth between his drinking companion and Peregrine, visibly insulted by the idea that he could not discipline his own daughter. And so he did what Mary knew he would do: he took the hand that was gripping the woman’s throat and in a motion that was swift and awful, he backhanded her across the side of her face with it, knocking her to the ground and the knife from her hand, where it bounced like a stone on the frozen earth. He bent over and picked it up, studying it for a moment as if it were but a fallen leaf or flower he didn’t recognize. Finally, he spoke: “I am going to presume thou hast this because of fears of encountering some common scoundrel in the dark, and not because thou hast plans to add patricide to thy ledger.”
“Patricide? Recall what thou just said about thy wife,” she responded, rubbing her cheek where he had struck her. From experience, Mary knew the flesh there was warm. “The words mark thee, too: thy face is ugly enough to me now while breathing. In death? It will be a mask too vile to bear.”
Thomas had to think about what she had said, slowed by the beer he had drunk. But when its import registered, he kicked her in the side, and then Sam did, too, slamming the toe of his boot into her ribs, and even muffled by the weight of her cloak, Mary could hear clearly the sound of each thud, a thump reminiscent of the hard work of tenderizing raw meat. For the briefest of seconds, Mary wondered at Sam’s complicity, how comfortable he was joining in on the beating. But he was drink-drunk and he was Thomas’s friend, and that probably was all the explanation there was. He was a man; he was a harrier.
“Thou hast always been a whore. Look at what thou married,” Thomas was saying.
“Kick my jaw and break my neck! Isn’t that how thou killed my mother?” Peregrine hissed when her father paused his beating.
“Thou dost not believe that.”
“It is the truth. And, coward thou art, thou blamed it on a horse.”
“Thou art a fiend, child, a monster. Thou has a brain that is but white—”
“Meat?” asked Mary as she emerged from behind the tree.
“Mary?” He looked aghast, as if he were seeing an actual demon risen up from Hell, a monster with talons sharp as scythes. And so she became one. A winged Fury. She rushed at him, and he was so shocked by her presence here in the night and the speed of her assault that she was able to wrest his dagger from its scabbard and use both of her hands to spear him with it—a motion as fluid and violent as the crash of a wave. She plunged it deep and hard through the fabric of his coat, between his ribs and into his heart. He looked down at the hilt that protruded from his chest, but then he gazed at her as if seeing her for the first time.
“Yes, Thomas, it is I.” She held up her thumb and its two nearest fingers and said, “Meet the Devil’s tines.” Then with that thumb and those two fingers, she twisted the pommel at the end of the handle, turning the dagger like a knob.
His knees buckled, and he crumpled at her feet and beside his own daughter.
Peregrine rolled away from him and sat up.
“I am sorry,” said Mary. “But only that first he was in thy life and then in mine.”
Peregrine shook her head. “Thou dost not need my forgiveness.”
Sam started toward his horse, but Mary grabbed him by his coat. “Say a word ever about what thou hast seen, and I will be sure that thou dost perish the next day. Remember: they say I am a witch.”
“They hang witches, Mary Deerfield,” he said, but his voice was without conviction.
“But not before we—baleful and bitter—leave behind us a trail of desiccated fields and dead animals. Of babies that rot in their mothers’ wombs and men such as thee who fall like stones from their mounts, their hearts cold and still.”
“Thou art going to be dead in the morning,” he murmured, but again his tone was fearful and weak.
“Then I will bring thee with me,” Mary told him.
He might have said more. He might have attempted to climb back atop his horse. But instead he grunted and stood up straight, turning his head to see Peregrine behind him. She pulled her knife from his back and he winced, and then she slashed it across his neck, the fellow’s blood geysering like a fountain. He sunk to the ground, choking, and then—with a suddenness that surprised Mary—he was gone. Peregrine wiped the blade on the sleeve of Sam’s own coat.
“One hates to lose a good piece of cutlery,” she said.
“And Thomas’s dagger?” Mary asked, pointing at it with the toe of her boot.
“Dost thou want it?”
“No.”
“Neither do I.”
Peregrine took her hand and said, “Let us leave before a sentry comes upon them. Let them think it was bandits or whoever attacked Rebeckah’s Uncle Spencer and set thee free.”
“They will suppose it is me.”
Peregrine nodded. “Perhaps. But if they deem it likely thou left Boston with two dead men in thy wake? Thou wilt be feared as most potent. They will believe that in their lifetime they were indeed present for the hour of the witch.”
“A witch? No, not merely a witch. The Devil.”
“Ah, the Devil Herself,” said Peregrine. “We really don’t know whether the Devil wears breeches or a skirt, now do we?”
Mary contemplated the idea of the Devil in the guise of a woman as they rushed to the wharves, and at one point she looked up into the sky, awed by the stars. There were just so many. She thought how she would see them again from a ship at sea in eighteen or twenty hours, the same God behind them. There were people in the world who were good and people who were evil, but most of them were some mixture of both and did what they did simply because they were mortal. And her Lord? Peregrine’s Lord? He knew it all and had known it all and always would know it all. But the deliberations of His creations? Meaningless. Absolutely meaningless. Still, there was one thing of which she was certain.
“Oh, I think we do know,” Mary said finally. “Yes, this may be the hour of the witch. But the Devil? He most definitely wears breeches. The Devil can only be a man.”