“Mrs. Proctor must have won her claim of pregnancy,” Serena told the other prisoners. It had taken her the entire night to get used to the odors in the communal cell.

“We should all be so lucky,” replied Martha Corey—who’d been in the village jail now longer than anyone, and whose ‘confession’ had gotten her husband arrested and dead from torture. She’d also managed to lose control of her land and property, the mill. She’d been one of those who’d escaped the night Serena, Jeremy, Ben and Tarbell had opened the jail, but she’d been run to ground, caught, and returned. She now said unbidden, “Your mother, Serena, is sore missed. She led us all in prayer here.”

Another prisoner added, “A wonderful soul was she.”

“Thank you, Goodwife Corey, Goodwife Nels.”

Giles Corey had laughed at the antics of the accusing children, and he’d publicly joked that if any witch lived in Salem, it was his wife. This had led to Martha’s arrest, and angry, she in turn spoke out against Giles as a witch man. After he had been arrested, he’d sought to keep his mill and lands for his sons. He hit on the little known right of an Englishman faced with accusation could plead innocent, guilty, or put in no plea whatsoever. He would ride it out on a plea of No Plea. If he chose to remain mute, he decided, they could not take his property, and once this witchcraft nonsense passed, he’d be set free having lost nothing.

Unfortunately, the judges ordered the man be made to plea, and to do that, they left the methods to the sheriff and his men. Corey stood mute against the fear of his property’s being confiscated. He’d seen how the goods, provisions, cattle, crops planted, home, and lands of others had been taken by the court. Much of the accused’s cattle and provisions had been sent to auction in the West Indies—Barbados in particular.

Someone, and Serena had a pretty good guess as to whom it might be—Jeremy—had counseled Corey to remain the deed holder to his mill and lands, grain sacks, provisions, and animals that he could refuse to enter a plea of innocence or guilt. For one night, Jeremy had explained to Serena about this an old English tenet that a man had the right to stand mute. For a long time, Giles had done just that. He’d been hauled before the judges several times, and each time he simply refused to enter a plea. This behavior stymied the court and its plans to seize Corey properties.

So when Giles Corey, giant and simple man, refused to state himself guilty or innocent, the judges were thrown into a quandary. They had to consult their dusty law books to determine how to proceed. Meanwhile, they held Giles in one jail, his wife in another—so as to have no opportunity for Martha’s becoming pregnant as had occurred with the Proctors.

One by one, the crackling gunshot noise of the opening traps at the gallows reported back to the jail. One, two, three, four, five, six. Six more executed, bringing the number to twelve condemned ‘witches’ executed by official ceremony.

Over the months of this horror, Serena had seen a brave John Proctor, like her father, speak out and write eloquently for appeal to mercy and forbearance and understanding and time. First for his wife, secondly for Serena’s mother, and finally on his own behalf before going to the gallows in her place. Serena had read some of his writings, and for a country farmer, his language had moved her to tears and to hope. He had made her father believe in hope as well. He’d been a strong voice for reason and time, but those who’d condemned both John and Elizabeth Proctor had condemned his words as evil and twisted in purpose as well. Their chief first accuser among the children had been Mercy Lewis, followed by Mary Wolcott—both of whom had been, at one time or another, maidservants in the Proctor home.

At every turn, Serena saw only frustration and loss.

And where is Jeremiah? Has he made any headway in Boston whatsoever? God help him. God help me.

Chapter Seven

Jeremiah had been held up in Boston when Dancer had shown signs of hobbling rather than trotting. He had pulled up and taken a look at the leg Dancer favored. Blood oozed from her left-front hoof. On close examination, he saw that the horse needed a fresh shoe as stones had gotten under the older shod work. The stones had worked into the flesh.

As it must be done, Jeremy returned to Boston, located a smithy, and decided to have all four hooves shod. It meant another day in Boston, but now he was back in the vicinity of the Nurse home.

He now stood on a high rise overlooking all of Salem Farms, rising up on his stirrups, peering through his spy glass for any signs of life down at the Nurse home, any sign of Serena in particular. But the stillness and darkness of the place even now in early sunlight created an odd, painful fear in his chest, a feeling of déjà vu, as in the time he and Serena had returned only to learn that Rebecca had been taken. Nothing looked normal down there.

His immediate thoughts and fears raced to Serena.

He settled back into the saddle and drove toward the house. Dancer felt good beneath him, as if happy to see home as well.

When he pulled up at the gate and tied Dancer to, he noticed that the gate had been broken off its hinges. He rushed up the stairs only to be met by big John Tarbell, a look of terrible pain coloring his face. “It’s bad news, Wakely. Bad news all round.”

“Serena? Where is she?” He rushed past and inside the dark interior.

“Father Francis is dead.” Tarbell stood behind him.

“I hear no wailing, no one!”

“The house is empty save for me and now you.”

“And Serena? Where is my wife, man!”

“Taken.”

“Taken?”

“She was arrested as a witch yesterday.”

“Yesterday I was supposed to be here! Damn me!”

“You couldn’t’ve stopped them taking her, and Francis died trying. His heart gave out. I think he could not see his daughter done the way of Rebecca.”

Jeremy stood staring at Tarbell, unable to believe all this had come about only in the past twenty-four hours. “Ben?”

“Away.”

“Joseph?”

“Walking around in circles.”

“What do you mean?”

“He’s walking a petition for Serena, door to door. And there was another hanging yesterday as well—John Proctor among them, along with Williard.”

“Both the Proctors? And Williard?”

“Mrs. Proctor survived, but John, the others on the list, Martha Carrier, George Burroughs, Old Jacobs, Williard, yes, and a man who bravely stepped forward when they were going to go ahead with the execution of the pregnant Elizabeth Proctor.”

“A brave man who stood in for her?”

“They really wanted to use all six of those traps this time,” Tarbell muttered.

“Who stood in for Mrs. Proctor and her unborn child?”

“Samuel Wardwell.”

“Known since I was a lad as the Wizard of Andover.” Jeremy went back outside, unable to look on the sad sight of Francis Nurse’s corpse any longer where Tarbell and Joseph had laid him in a newly built coffin. From behind him, Jeremy heard Tarbell say, “We intend burying him alongside Rebecca.”

“One secret that has been kept around here,” Jeremy muttered, staring out at the spot where Rebecca lay. “The bastards are decimating our family, John.”

“Not sure what that means, but I can guess.”

Jeremy leaned into the railing here on the front porch. His heart sank as the sun rose higher, realizing how horrible it must be at this moment for Serena. “So side by side they hang a minister and a wizard,” he said and coughed out an angry laugh.

Tarbell stood alongside him. “And they would have killed an innocent babe, had not the wizard stepped forward.”

“Aye. They’ve their own notions of innocence and guilt these days.”

“No doubt the unborn child will make a witch once free of the womb.” Tarbell spat.

“And Serena? Where’ve they taken her? Which of their bloody holes?”

“She sits in the same jail her mother once occupied.”

“Damn them! Damn them all! I’m going for her!”

Tarbell grabbed him and shoved him against a wall. “Not by day, and not alone, brother.”

It was the first time any of the Nurse boys or brothers-by-marriage had called Jeremiah brother. “What do you propose?”

“I propose this time we do what we failed doing last time.”

“Right, good!”

“We carry her out of there, and you, sir, you take her as far from here as you can.”

As Mother and Father had asked me to do, he silently chastised himself. “I shouldn’t’ve gone off to Boston. I should’ve taken Serena and disappeared.”

“Right . . . right. Look, man, she wouldn’t go without Francis in there, and he wouldn’t leave Rebecca out there.” He pointed to the stand of oaks.

“Away to Connecticut then, once we have Serena back.”

“We may follow,” replied Tarbell.

“We’ll take new names, and once there no one will know us.”

“The fools behind this terrible mischief have allowed the children to reach too far in their accusations.”

“Are you saying those in control of the bratty accusers have lost any control they may’ve once had?”

“Most certainly true with this latest mad accusation.”

“Against whom?”

“Against Mrs. Hale of Waverly.”

“Not the minister’s wife!” Jeremy grasped his brother by the arm.

“Yes, the terror at Reverend Hale’s doorstep now.”

“My god, but then perhaps the lunacy will be at an end. I mean if they can call out that dear lady, a minister’s wife . . .”

“All the same, you and Serena must disappear.”