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

her a witch. None other than John Indian accused Sarah of tormenting him.
    And while they were at the task, so as not to waste their time, I suppose, they cried out on John Proctor. For good measure they threw in little Dorcas Good, five-year-old daughter of Sarah. They said the little girl's shape had been running around biting them in retaliation for their crying out on her mother.
    There was nothing I could do now, even if I had a mind to. Anyone who spoke out against them was named or had someone in their family cried out on. The evil the girls had started had taken on a life of its own and was gaining momentum, like a ship under full sail with good trade winds behind it.
    In the beginning of April, sisters Sarah Cloyce and Rebecca Nurse, Elizabeth Proctor and her husband, Martha Cory, and little Dorcas Good were taken across the marshes to Noddle's Island in a carriage and from there ferried to Boston, to prison.
    At our house we settled in. April's cold rains slashed against the windows. Mama went no more to Meeting; nor did Mary. We gathered closer as a family. Thomas Hitchbourne continued to call on Mary. Mama worked in her shop, though trade fell off. Only faithful friends came in to purchase goods.
    In our house we spoke no more of matters of witchcraft. What more could be said? Johnathan Hathorne called regularly and became one of us, sitting of an evening by the fire. He and his father were completely at odds, and that saddened him. Yet he held to his convictions.
    He never spoke of the witchcraft proceedings or what he knew of them. And we never pressed him for information. But one evening, the second week of April, he began to talk quietly of the matter.
    "Mary Warren has been arrested," he said. Everyone stared at him.
    "She is one of the afflicted girls!" I cried.
    "Yes, she is," Johnathan said. "But when her master, John Proctor, was arrested for a witch and sent to prison, she was left to care for his brood of children. Then the sheriff came and seized all the household goods in the Proctor house, as well as the cattle and foodstuffs. He even took the broth in the pot on the fire."
    "How terrible!" Mama cried. "And what of the children?"
    "Mary was left to care for them as best she could. When matters worsened, she recanted her testimony and said she lied in court. So a warrant was issued for her. She is to appear before the magistrates and explain herself."
    "One of the afflicted recanting her testimony against others? That is a good sign," Father said. "Perhaps there is hope."
    Later that evening, I asked Johnathan to take me to see Mary Warren, who was being kept in an upstairs room at Ingersoll's Ordinary. He said yes. I had to see Mary. She must be strong enough to tell the truth, for the magistrates would believe her.
    If I could not speak out myself, perhaps I could lend strength to Mary Warren to do so.

13. Our Last Good Hope
     
    " I DO THIS BE cause I respect your father," Sarah Ingersoll told Johnathan as we followed her up the stairs in the ordinary. "But I'm weary of this whole witch nonsense. People say our business has improved for it. But all we do is feed and quench the hunger and thirst of the magistrates and marshals. And they don't pay their bills. We'll be billing for our services, ye can tell your father that. As well as for keeping the horses out back."
    "My father appreciates everything you are doing," Johnathan told her.
    We found Mary Warren seated in a chair in a corner of her room. No child; I knew her to be twenty if a day. But she looked like a frightened innocent, sitting there. She was a comely creature, her reddish hair escaping in tendrils from her white cap, which was clean and presentable, as were her apron and collar.
    "I've made her proper for her examination later today," Sarah Ingersoll whispered. "I trust ye have come not to gawk at the poor child but to help."
    "We are friends," Johnathan assured her.
    She left us with Mary, who got up as we came into the room. "Why