Read Online A Break With Charity: A Story About the Salem Witch Trials by Ann Rinaldi - Free Book Online

it isn't like you to be uncharitable."
    "Ann Putnam, senior, is just like her older sister who went before her," Mama explained. "You don't remember Mary Bayley. She was married to the first minister in Salem. She went on having child after child. They all died at birth. Mary Bayley blamed her malcontent neighbors because they hectored her husband. For some reason, this town has a way of doing such to its ministers. She blamed them for killing her children."
    Mama sighed. "Ann Putnam, senior, still blames people hereabouts for her sister's death. As well as for the babes she herself lost before she had little Ann."
    "I didn't know she had children before Ann."
    "A number. All dead. Like her older sister's. Instead of thanking the Lord she has Ann, she's made the child into a miniature of herself. Taught that child to blame everyone else for their woes. I tell you, I'll have naught to do with those people."
    It was one of the most passionate outbursts I'd ever heard from my mother. Why, she was red in the face when she was finished. I'd never seen her that agitated, even when she spoke of William.
    "Besides," she said, "I don't want you afflicted."
    "But you and Father don't hold with witchcraft," I reminded her. "Being afflicted by witches isn't catching. Is it, Mama?"
    She smiled at me. "Very well, I'll ask your father when we sup tonight. We'll see what he says."

    "What do I say?" Father spooned his soup into his mouth and cut a generous slice of cheese for himself. "I think, daughter, that I hate the very suggestion of witchcraft. I see it as the Puritan mind at its worst."
    He paused to spoon in more soup. "Four years ago they hung that poor Goody Glover on Boston Common. She was no more a witch than I am. Her only fault was she was a poor Irish washerwoman."
    He eyed me across the table. Mary and I sat open-mouthed. "The Reverend Parris was living in Boston with his family at the time. He attended the hanging. Took the little girls to see it. No wonder those poor children are now daft. Go, child; take your apple tarts and your smiling face, and go visit Ann Putnam. But with one request."
    I waited.
    "Wait until the ministers pray over the girls. Let the holy men do their praying, lest they think I sent you to interfere with their fight against the Devil. And say nothing to Ann Putnam about witchcraft. Be your own happy self. Perhaps you can help her as you helped Abigail Hobbs."
    And so I went. And became part of the madness that had come to Salem. I went, but I never told my parents what it was that I discovered.

8. Apple Tarts and Conversation
     
    MERCY LEWIS , maidservant to the Putnams, let me in to their main hall and took my cloak while Ann Putnam and her mother stood by.
    Mercy said nothing by way of greeting, though I felt her eyes upon me and saw her exchange sly glances with young Ann. Mrs. Putnam was a forbidding-looking woman, tall and big of bone with a sallow face. For a few very uncomfortable minutes, I sensed they all knew why I had come. They must have discussed me at length after my last meeting with Ann, when she told me not to come back to the parsonage.
    "Let's take your lovely apple tarts and go into the company room," young Ann said sweetly. "Mercy, do bring us some hot cider. Mama, Susanna English and I have much in the way of young girls' talk to occupy us. We would like our privacy."
    Why did this make me feel that the girl's mother consented only because she trusted Ann to deal with me as I deserved? I don't know. But there was some undercurrent of understanding between this mother and daughter that had more to do with evil than with love. I was sensible of that immediately. It was as if these two moved together through dark and swirling waters toward some whirlpool they could not avoid. And would not think of avoiding.
    In the company room, before the fire, Ann startled me with her forthrightness. As soon as the door closed, all traces of sweetness left. She did not even bid me to sit, but