A Break With Charity: A Story About the Salem Witch Trials by Ann Rinaldi

Salem speak of anything else?" I asked.

    Johnathan came to call on the first Lord's Day in April, the third. I was not well enough yet to go to Meeting, and truth to tell I didn't want to go and hear Reverend Parris tell us how sinful we all were. I had lost all faith in the man. But Mary and Mama had gone thither. Father was in his library, studying or praying or doing whatever it was he did when the weather was too raw to row across the bay to St. Michael's.
    Deborah took Johnathan's cloak and served him some claret and cakes. He kissed my hand, then presented me with a book beautifully bound in red leather.
The Pilgrim's Progress.
    He brought the outside world in with him, in the color in his face, the wood-smoke fragrance on his clothes. Seeing his broad shoulders and strong wrists and hands, his wind-tousled hair, I felt truly alive.
    "I have missed you, Susanna."
    I had missed him, too, I realized, seeing him standing before me. I was tongue-tied.
    "I have thought of you often and prayed for your recovery."
    "Thank you, Johnathan," I said politely.
    He sipped his claret and nibbled at the cakes. He spoke of sundry matters, but there was a deadness in the air after those first few words, as if we were both mindful of our distressed last parting.
    Finally he set down his mug. "You mustn't bear me ill will because of what my father is doing, Susanna."
    "You agree with everything he does," I reminded him.
    "I don't. I am here today to tell you I have had doubts."
    I stared at him as if he'd taken leave of his senses. "About what?"
    "This whole business is foul. I was in court the day they examined Rebecca Nurse. She is a dear woman. She shines with an inner light."
    "It will serve her well in prison."
    "Ann Putnam, the elder, accused Rebecca of murder. She said her dead sister's children had come to her in a dream in their winding-sheets, telling her that Rebecca murdered them."
    "The Putnams are evil, Johnathan. All but Joseph and his wife, Elizabeth. When will you become sensible of this?"
    "Elizabeth Putnam is my cousin. I am sensible of it. And much more. My father said in court that an innocent woman would weep before charges of murder. He counted Rebecca a witch because witches cannot shed tears."
    Johnathan rested his elbows on his knees and put his head in his hands. "That same day the afflicted girls named Elizabeth Proctor. People go from court to Ingersoll's Ordinary like the whole business is a traveling carnival. At Ingersoll's they fill up on rum and cider and gossip about who will be named next."
    "How terrible," I said.
    "The afflicted girls go there and have fits. John Indian joins them."
    "John Indian?"
    "He rolls on the floor. He guides newcomers who come to gawk at the girls through the history of the outbreak of witchcraft in Salem. He boasts that his wife is a witch."
    John Indian? I could not believe it. He must be acting so to avoid being cried out on, I thought. Like Tituba, he must have decided that the only way open to him was to give the people what they wanted. "Who named Elizabeth Proctor?" I asked.
    "All the girls. Her husband, John, announced one day at Ingersoll's that he'd cured his maidservant, Mary Warren, of her fits by setting her down at her spinning wheel and threatening her with a whipping. But the magistrates sent for her to come to court to testify. After that, the girls cried out on Proctor's wife. Proctor defended his wife in court. But his voice was lost in the screams of the girls. The magistrates believe the girls, not him."
    "And you? What do you believe, Johnathan?"
    "I started having doubts about the whole witchcraft business after Rebecca Nurse was accused. I went to talk to Joseph Putnam. His sentiments are like a fresh wind. The man keeps his head. I'm so glad my cousin Elizabeth married him and he is near kin. Joseph went to his brother's wife and warned the elder Ann that if she dared touch anyone in his household with her foul lies, she would answer for it."
    "Bless