Page 34 of The Witch

“They’re completely different,” he insists, but he doesn’t elaborate, which makes me think that they’re not actually any different at all.

After about ten minutes, we arrive at what looks like a ’50s diner with the word Roxie’s written in bright red lettering over the door. It seems to be a relatively popular location, given that the parking lot is more than half full. Henry pulls into a spot, and he looks utterly disappointed when I’ve already managed to get out of the car before he is able to race around to my side to open the door for me.

The diner has a dizzying black-and-white checkered floor, with red and white countertops and barstools. A waitress in a poodle skirt leads us to a booth, and the vinyl seat squeaks embarrassingly as I sit down across from Henry.

“You should get a burger,” Henry tells me. “This place has the best burgers.”

I have to admit, a big greasy burger would really hit the spot. I put down my menu to wait for the waitress to come take our orders.

“So how is it staying at Pemberton?” Henry asks me.

“Interesting…” Now is my chance to pick Henry’s brain. Because of Gram’s failing memory, it almost feels like the past was in danger of being lost, so talking to Henry is a golden opportunity. “It’s strange staying in a house with such a long history.”

He grins at me. “I bet you know all about it.”

“I used to…” Before that fateful night at Pemberton when I was nine, I gobbled up every detail about the old estate. But afterward, I refused to listen to any more of Gram’s stories and forgot many of the ones she’d told me. “I know it was built in the 1600s.”

He nods eagerly. “The oldest house in this country was built in 1640, and while this one isn’t quite as old, it’s pretty close. The estimate is around 1660, give or take a few years. And it’s incredibly well preserved, as you can surely tell.”

“I remember learning about that time period in school,” I say. “The colonists were Puritans, weren’t they?”

“Most of them, yes.”

“And that was around when the Salem witch trials took place, wasn’t it?”

Henry’s eyebrows shoot up at the question. He surely knows about the Salem witch trials, but I’m not sure if he knows about Archibald Eldridge’s second wife being executed for witchcraft. Before he can respond, we’re interrupted by the waitress coming by to bring us water and take our orders. Cheeseburgers with a side of fries all around.

“Do you know much about the witch trials?” I prompt him after the waitress has taken off with our orders.

“Of course I do.” He looks almost as offended as when I didn’t know who Frank Sinatra was and thought he wore a fedora. “I work at a museum that catalogs the history of New England. Is there something in particular you want to know?”

“Well…” I don’t want to tell him outright that I’m worried that the ghost of a convicted witch could be haunting the house where I’m staying—I have a feeling he won’t take those concerns seriously. “I’m just curious how it all came about. Obviously, witchcraft isn’t real.”

“Obviously.”

“So how did so many women get executed for being witches?”

He lifts a shoulder. “You know how conspiracy theories spread on social media? It shouldn’t be too hard to believe that it was relatively easy for mass hysteria to grip a community. Especially since they didn’t have the medical knowledge we have now. If somebody has a fever these days, we understand it’s an infection. But they didn’t have that knowledge back in the seventeenth century.”

“True…”

“Anyway.” Henry takes a sip from his water glass. “In Salem, which is actually geographically now Danvers, a few young girls were playing a game to predict their future. You know, one of those things where little girls look at tea leaves and say that their future husband will be rich and that they’re going to drive a Ferrari. Did you do stuff like that when you were a kid?”

“No,” I lie, remembering a fortune teller I constructed out of a piece of paper that predicted I would live in a mansion and have eight children.

He gives me a skeptical look but then continues. “Well, while they were performing this little ritual, the girls started having fits. Arms and legs flailing, all that stuff. They claimed that they were being tormented by some unseen force. And naturally, when the doctor showed up, he had no idea what was going on.”

“So they decided it was witchcraft?”

“They certainly did.” He toys with the napkin in front of him, but his eyes are still on mine. “And of course, if witchcraft was the culprit, there had to be a witch. The girls started accusing women from the town of being the witches who caused their fits. It quickly snowballed, with accusations popping out all over the woodwork.” He sighs. “In the end, nineteen innocent people were executed for witchcraft.”

Nineteen people. Nineteen people killed for crimes they did not commit with no way to defend themselves. “So the girls were faking the whole thing?”

“Not necessarily,” he says. “One early theory was that the fits were seizures caused by ergot poisoning. Rye was one of the most common grains harvested in New England back then, and the ergot fungus can form after a bad winter and damp spring. Ergotism causes convulsions, muscle spasms, and a feeling of crawling under the skin. It’s not that dissimilar from being on LSD.”

“Is that what you think it was?”

Before Henry can answer, the waitress returns with our burgers. I grab mine with both hands and take a bite, quickly wiping away a drop of juice that dribbles down my chin. It’s the best thing I’ve tasted since I moved here, but right now, I’m more curious to hear Henry’s answer to my question.