“We are not trying her here today, we are examining her.”
“On what suspicion?”
The magistrate sighed patiently. Sloan was, after all, Lord Treveryan—famed for his adventures under King William’s command.
“Witchcraft, my lord, the torture and torment of innocents. She was a known offender once—”
“Do you charge her for England, then?” Sloan’s voice thundered out. “For I have in my possession papers clearing her, signed by our sovereigns William and Mary themselves!”
He should have been ordered out of the room; but no one thought to order him. One of the magistrates spoke up.
“My lord, we do not charge her for England. We charge her for the mischief she causes here.”
“Then I would take her into my custody until her trial.”
“My lord, I cannot allow that to be. She will be remanded to the Salem prison, until such date for trial is set.”
“Ohhhh!”One of the girls screamed. Brianna took a chance to turn about. It was one of the youngest of the accusers, a girl of about twelve. She was clutching her side and twisting around vehemently. “He strikes out, too, I feel his sword. He is angry, and he moves about the room with his blade flashing!”
There was silence. No one had, thus far, gone to such extremes to accuse a lord, a known friend of the king.
In that silence Sloan’s face hardened with the dark fury of a brewing storm. When he spoke, it was with a calm and grating elocution more frightening than the quick barbs of the magistrates.
“Should I hear my name mentioned—just once—I’ll have a writ sworn out immediately charging two thousand pounds for the defamation of my good character!”
He looked magnificent standing there, rigid with his fury, green eyes like a rage of fire. He wore a blue velvet frockcoat, fawn breeches, and high black boots. No hat adorned his head and his hair was dark and neatly clubbed. Never had he appeared so much the nobleman, or the knight ready to do battle.
“Now, then.” He turned back to the magistrates. “When will we see legal procedures here? When will concrete evidence be laid, and those who wish to testify in her behalf be given the chance to speak?”
The magistrate cleared his throat. “At the trial, my lord.” Brianna believed that if they hadn’t already come this far, the man might well have let her go, convincing the girls that they were “mistaken” about her identity. Powerful names had been mentioned before, without the accused ever being charged. It was one of the reasons that people were beginning to whisper on the street.
And Brianna was certain it was also a reason she could not be set free now; damning testimony had been given against her. If she did not appear for trial, the common folk would be wondering how it was possible that someone influential—or with an influential friend—could escape the net of the godly men determined to clear Massachusetts of the devil’s clan.
“Then I will see you at the trial, gentleman,” Sloan said simply. He turned about and strode out of the room.
Brianna realized bleakly that he had never looked her way.
Salem prison was not so bad, she tried to tell herself. The jailors tried to keep it clean; but even so, it was summer, and it was hot. She refrained from lying on her bunk until she was exhausted, because she was certain it crawled with bugs; she could occasionally hear the shuffle of rats about the walls.
She was in a small cell with two other women, sisters from Andover, still stunned that they had been charged. They were very godly women, calm and stalwart, and told her immediately that they would surely hang, for they would not confess to such “cow’s manure!” as was being bandied about. Brianna had not known anything about Andover, but the sisters told her that Ann Putnam and Mary Warren had been sent there as seers, since the town had none of its own. But after signing over forty arrest warrants on the say-so of their touch, Justice Bradstreet had refused to sign any more, and was now in peril himself.
Brianna was glad to be in with these unshakable ladies, because from the cell next to them frantic cries and moans could be heard; a young girl thrashing out and crying that she was “bewitched” rather than a “bewitcher.” Across the tiny hall an older man groaned with pain, but for what reason Brianna could not tell. The sisters told her in hushed whispers that constables sometimes came to take people away from their cells, and when the victims returned, they were half crazed and ready to say anything.
“That is illegal!” Brianna protested.
“It is not ‘torture,’ so say they,” offered Mathilda, the older of the two.
“It is ‘confinement’ for the purpose of confession,” Emily said scornfully.
“There is greater judgment,” Mathilda said with a grim smile.
Brianna was sorry that the two elderly women were as severely shackled as herself, for movement was very difficult. They had their Bibles with them, and they spent their time finding psalms that brought comfort.
Late at night, when the sisters were sleeping and she lay in darkness, she heard a whisper, and her heart soared, for she was certain it was Sloan.
It was not. Philip Smith was down the hall a bit, and across from her. He was calling out her name. She struggled out of her cot, wincing as the irons chafed her flesh, and hobbled to the grate.
“Philip?” She couldn’t see him in the darkness. “I didn’t know we were so close!”
