Page 115 of The Witch

We walk away from the grave, hand in hand. Henry is humming a song under his breath that I recognize as another Frank Sinatra number: “Witchcraft.” I cast one last look over my shoulder at the stone that looks surprisingly new and polished compared to the rest of this colonial graveyard. “Goodbye, Caroline. See you next time.”

There is one thing we haven’t been able to entirely explain. When the police dug up the backyard, looking for human remains, instead of the two skeletons they expected to uncover, they found three. One belonged to Ethel, of course. And there were two others that were estimated to be about three hundred years old. Of the two of them, one was thought to be male and the other female.

Presumably, the female skeleton belonged to Caroline. But who was the man? Why was there another person buried in the backyard of Pemberton? And who killed him and put him in the ground?

I guess we’ll never know.

1717

CAROLINE

It has been twenty-five years since the last time I set foot in Pemberton.

As we ride in the carriage out to the town where I spent the first twenty years of my life, I wonder if I am making a mistake coming back here. After all, the townsfolk of Woodhaven believe Caroline Eldridge and Jonas Reeve to be dead. Our absence has kept anyone from discovering the truth, but once they see us in the flesh, that could change.

I look at my husband sitting beside me in our carriage. Soon after leaving Woodhaven, we were wed in a small church ceremony. Or I should say, Archibald Eldridge and Molly Howe were wed. It has been hard getting used to being called Molly, just as it has been hard calling Jonas by the name of my dead husband. He is still Jonas in my head, even after all these years. And when we are all alone—especially now that our four children have grown and married—he calls me Caroline.

He is the only person who does.

“They will not recognize us,” Jonas tells me, the reins of our horses firmly in his hands as he guides the carriage. “Most of those who knew us are long gone.”

This is true. We received word that Hiram and Judith Hatch died many years ago. Sheriff Bixby died only five years after we left, collapsing suddenly and never waking up. Five years later, there was a flu epidemic that hit Woodhaven particularly hard, and close to half the townspeople perished. It was after this epidemic that I thought there might be a chance I could someday return to Woodhaven, but by then, I had little ones to worry about.

But now that even Susanna, my youngest, has a husband and family of her own, Jonas and I are all alone in our house. In our own younger days, he was employed in the carpentry trade, but now his jobs are few and far between. There are always endless chores to do about the house, especially since I refuse to hire a servant, but it is so much different now that the children are grown. My days feel empty.

Jonas is also aware of the way I long for Pemberton. It was my first home as a grown woman and the one I believed would be my last. I felt protected there—I still believe it was the fierce bear on the door that called to Jonas to save me. I always longed to grow old there.

Now I wonder if we’re making a mistake.

“There are so many memories there,” I say.

“Good or bad?”

I look at my husband, examining his profile. He looks so much different than he did the day he was arrested and brought to the jailhouse. When we fled Woodhaven, I was twenty, and he was three and twenty. Now we are both nearly half a century in age, and we scarcely resemble the people we were all those years ago, which is part of the reason we felt safe making our return. That and the fact that we received word that both Caroline Eldridge and Jonas Reeve were declared dead after the fire—rumor had it that Caroline was burned at the stake for witchcraft.

Jonas now has a deep groove between his eyebrows and fine lines around his eyes and mouth. He keeps his graying hair closely shorn, and while he still has a beard, he takes care to keep it neatly trimmed and tidy. He has a most respectable air now, akin to Archie himself. He takes his dedication to playing the role of Archie Eldridge very seriously, because he knows a misstep could mean our lives.

“Both good and bad memories, I reckon,” I say. “How about you?”

“I have set foot in Pemberton but once,” he says. “And I shot a man in the face. So I would say my memories are all quite grim.”

“You know what I mean,” I jest lightly. “Your memories of Woodhaven.”

Jonas is silent for a moment. Like me, he fell in love in this town, and it ended in tragedy. He never speaks of Leonora. But I know from my own experience that the feelings never go away.

“I prefer our new memories,” he finally says.

Pemberton finally comes into view, and Jonas casts worried glances in my direction. The house looks very much the same as it did last time we were here. The same two-story dwelling, built by Archie’s father with his own two hands. The snarling bear knocker is still on the front door, just as terrifying and protective as it ever was.

He brings the carriage right up to the front door. He leaps out and then darts around to the other side to help me out of my seat. Verily, he has become quite the gentleman. But he enjoys treating me like a lady, so I do not deprive him of it.

I was not in love with Jonas Reeve on the day the two of us fled Woodhaven. After he rescued me from Archie’s grasp, I understood he was a good man, but I did not love him. I hoped one day I would, but for most women, love is not requisite for marriage. He would be good to me, and that was enough.

By the time we were married, only a short while later, I still did not love him. By then, he had started to love me. I saw it in the way he looked at me on our wedding day. I lay with him, and he was gentle and eager and passionate in all the ways he should have been.

I wondered at the time if the part of me that could feel love had been fractured forever on the day that my first husband tried to strangle me.

But then, six months after Jonas and I were wed, I missed my monthly blood. After all those years of trying with Archie, I did not dare hope it could be so. But when I missed another month and my stomach began to swell, I knew that my dream had come true.