Read Online The Lace Reader by Brunonia Barry - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Brunonia Barry
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feel sorry about a lot of things today.
Dr. Ward clears his throat. “Eva Whitney swam every day, beginning in the late spring. Before many of the boats were in the water, she would be there. People started putting their boats in when Eva started her daily swims, because they knew that the weather would stay warm, that the season was upon us. Eva’s first swim of the season was this town’s version of Groundhog Day. When she went into the water that first time, we held our collective breaths. If she went back again the next day, we’d put away our snow shovels for good—spring had sprung.” He looks around the room, making eye contact. “And now the season has changed. Summer is here again, but Eva is no longer among us.” He looks at Auntie Emma, then at Beezer and me. Beezer shifts uncomfortably in his seat. “ ‘To every thing,’ ” Dr. Ward says, “ ‘there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven.’ ”
He doesn’t finish the verse but steps down, gesturing to Ann Chase, who moves toward the pulpit, her speaker’s notes in hand, The Lace Reader 59
black robes brushing against the corner of our box as she passes. Dr. Ward remembers his manners, extends an arm to her, helping her up the steps, a polite gesture from an old gentleman. As she takes his arm, I can see that her hand is the supporting one. She’s helping him down more than he’s helping her up. Dr. Ward walks slowly to the front row and takes a seat facing the coffin. He looks straight ahead.
I haven’t seen Ann Chase since the summer that Lyndley died. She is a little bit older than I am, maybe four or five years. She looks slightly muted but otherwise unchanged these last fifteen years. Her features are less clearly defined, like a copy of an old master done by an art student, one off, more suggestion than reality. She doesn’t introduce herself. She doesn’t have to. With the exception of Laurie Cabot, Ann Chase is the most famous witch in Salem and a direct descendant of Giles and Martha Corey, who were once prominent members of the First Church (until they were executed as witches during the hysteria). They were not witches, of course. Their pardons hang now in the back of this church for everyone to see, pardons issued by Queen Elizabeth II at the end of this century, way too late for Giles and Martha and (some people would say) too late for Ann as well. “The sins of the fathers,” someone whispers, loud enough for everyone to hear. But if Ann hears it, she doesn’t flinch. Most people in this town think that Ann became a witch as some kind of family protest taken to the extreme, a “can’t beat ’em, so join
’em” kind of justice, an “I have the name, so I might as well have the game” type of thing. I’m not sure about that. Ann Chase was already practicing witchcraft by the time I left town, living in a hippie house down by the Gables, growing herbs, and brewing magic-mushroom tea for all her friends. She didn’t wear black then; she wore long, flowing Indian-print skirts made out of the same kind of material as the bedspreads Lyndley and I bought in Harvard Square. She usually went barefoot and had henna tattoos across her knuckles and a 60 Brunonia
Barry
toe ring that wound all the way up her ankle like a silver vine. Part of the time, Lyndley and I thought she was very exotic. The rest of the time, we thought she was just plain strange. Like that day we saw her way out at the end of Derby Wharf standing huge against the tiny lighthouse, incanting love spells for her girlfriends, who followed her around like puppies. We used to spy on them from out in the harbor, from the Whaler parked on someone else’s mooring. We would laugh as we watched them, covering our mouths so they wouldn’t hear us. But those spells must have worked in the end, because Ann’s friends started having little hippie babies, which they dressed in tiny tie-dyed T-shirts and nursed in public places. Never mind that the
Dr. Ward clears his throat. “Eva Whitney swam every day, beginning in the late spring. Before many of the boats were in the water, she would be there. People started putting their boats in when Eva started her daily swims, because they knew that the weather would stay warm, that the season was upon us. Eva’s first swim of the season was this town’s version of Groundhog Day. When she went into the water that first time, we held our collective breaths. If she went back again the next day, we’d put away our snow shovels for good—spring had sprung.” He looks around the room, making eye contact. “And now the season has changed. Summer is here again, but Eva is no longer among us.” He looks at Auntie Emma, then at Beezer and me. Beezer shifts uncomfortably in his seat. “ ‘To every thing,’ ” Dr. Ward says, “ ‘there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven.’ ”
He doesn’t finish the verse but steps down, gesturing to Ann Chase, who moves toward the pulpit, her speaker’s notes in hand, The Lace Reader 59
black robes brushing against the corner of our box as she passes. Dr. Ward remembers his manners, extends an arm to her, helping her up the steps, a polite gesture from an old gentleman. As she takes his arm, I can see that her hand is the supporting one. She’s helping him down more than he’s helping her up. Dr. Ward walks slowly to the front row and takes a seat facing the coffin. He looks straight ahead.
I haven’t seen Ann Chase since the summer that Lyndley died. She is a little bit older than I am, maybe four or five years. She looks slightly muted but otherwise unchanged these last fifteen years. Her features are less clearly defined, like a copy of an old master done by an art student, one off, more suggestion than reality. She doesn’t introduce herself. She doesn’t have to. With the exception of Laurie Cabot, Ann Chase is the most famous witch in Salem and a direct descendant of Giles and Martha Corey, who were once prominent members of the First Church (until they were executed as witches during the hysteria). They were not witches, of course. Their pardons hang now in the back of this church for everyone to see, pardons issued by Queen Elizabeth II at the end of this century, way too late for Giles and Martha and (some people would say) too late for Ann as well. “The sins of the fathers,” someone whispers, loud enough for everyone to hear. But if Ann hears it, she doesn’t flinch. Most people in this town think that Ann became a witch as some kind of family protest taken to the extreme, a “can’t beat ’em, so join
’em” kind of justice, an “I have the name, so I might as well have the game” type of thing. I’m not sure about that. Ann Chase was already practicing witchcraft by the time I left town, living in a hippie house down by the Gables, growing herbs, and brewing magic-mushroom tea for all her friends. She didn’t wear black then; she wore long, flowing Indian-print skirts made out of the same kind of material as the bedspreads Lyndley and I bought in Harvard Square. She usually went barefoot and had henna tattoos across her knuckles and a 60 Brunonia
Barry
toe ring that wound all the way up her ankle like a silver vine. Part of the time, Lyndley and I thought she was very exotic. The rest of the time, we thought she was just plain strange. Like that day we saw her way out at the end of Derby Wharf standing huge against the tiny lighthouse, incanting love spells for her girlfriends, who followed her around like puppies. We used to spy on them from out in the harbor, from the Whaler parked on someone else’s mooring. We would laugh as we watched them, covering our mouths so they wouldn’t hear us. But those spells must have worked in the end, because Ann’s friends started having little hippie babies, which they dressed in tiny tie-dyed T-shirts and nursed in public places. Never mind that the
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