Hope was clearing dirty dishes as I washed tables. The ordinary was full of patrons who had flocked here, knowing today was the first day of questioning the accused women. Though John had little choice about being there, since Father paid Reverend Parris for his labor, I suspected he appreciated being close to his wife, who had slept upstairs, under guard, the night before with Sarah Good and her children.
“Grace,” Father called to me, motioning for me to join him near the door where he had greeted the constable who brought Goody Osborn. His face was stern as I approached. The weight of today’s proceedings was heavy upon his shoulders—though he didn’t mind the business it brought his way. “Escort Goody Osborn upstairs.”
Sarah Osborn turned her heavy gaze to me, pain and confusion in her every move. She was in her late forties and had been bedridden with melancholy for years. She was wobbly on her feet, requiring assistance, and looked as frail as a newborn colt.
“Yes, Father,” I said as Hope came to take the rag and bucket from me. “Come with me, Goody Osborn.”
“Do you not see me?” Goody Osborn clutched her servant’s hands as she looked from Father to the rest of the silent gawkers. No one spoke. “I am more likely to be a victim of witchcraft than to be a witch. I have not strayed far from my bed in years, afflicted with a malady that cannot be cured. How could I afflict anyone else?”
“Pray, silence your tongue,” Father said to her, his voice a hushed rumble, “if you know what is good for you.”
Father nodded at the servant and the constable, and they followed me up the narrow stairs to the guest room above. A guard stood outside the smaller of the two upstairs rooms.
I did not realize that Father had followed us until the constable opened the door and Goody Osborn passed by me, making more room in the upper hall.
“You’re to examine the accused,” Father said to me. “You’re to look for images or devil’s marks upon their bodies.”
“Father?” I frowned. I’d heard of such things, but I didn’t know what they might look like. More importantly, I didn’t believe they existed.
“Witch’s teats,” he hissed under his breath, causing the guard to look our way. “Preternatural excrescence of flesh where the devil or his familiars doth suckle.”
Revulsion turned my stomach. Familiars were small spirit animals, like toads, birds, snakes, or most commonly, cats, sent by Satan to aid witches in their cruel acts. People believed the familiars sucked blood from the witch to gain nourishment, especially where they might have warts or other skin imperfections.
My first instinct was to run—but where would I go? Hope and I had discussed leaving Salem Village many times, but two single women in Puritan Massachusetts would be destitute and turned away from paying jobs. Besides, there were few places where Father couldn’t find us.
“Please do not ask this of me.” I swallowed, my throat dry. “I cannot do such a thing.”
“You will aid the magistrates in this way,” Father said, taking an intimidating step forward.
It struck me that if I didn’t examine them, then someone else would. I could not ensure their dignity if the examination was undertaken by someone who did not care for their plight.
I nodded and cast my eyes down.
“It must be thorough,” Father warned. “Every inch must be inspected.”
I entered the room where Goody Osborn was being lowered to one of the hard beds. Tituba stood by the window, cradling her right arm, and watched everyone with a wary expression.
Goody Good, standing defiant in the center of the room, turned her steely gaze on me in a sort of challenge. She held her baby boy on her hip, and her daughter, Dorothy, sat in the corner of the room, quietly playing with the frayed hem of her gown.
“Grace will examine each of you,” Father said as Goody Osborn’s servant was escorted out of the room by the constable.
All three women stared at me.
“The magistrates will be here to start questioning them soon.” Father gave me a pointed look. “Be quick but thorough.”
He strode out of the room, closing the door behind him with a thud.
My hands trembled as I faced the three accused women. I wanted to weep for them—and for what I knew was to come. How could I stop this madness without willfully changing history and forfeiting my place in time? It was a risk I couldn’t take, no matter how much I wished to save these women.
But I could not degrade them by examining their bodies for something that did not exist.
“Well?” Sarah Good asked as she lifted her chin at me. “What will you do, Grace Eaton?”
Each woman was in a precarious position, and though I knew them to be strong and capable, they were filled with fear—and rightfully so. Tituba was a black slave from Barbados in Reverend Parris’s home. Goody Osborn was a widow who had purchased the contract of indentured servant Alexander Osborn—and then scandalized the village by marrying him. She had been related to the Putnams through her first husband and was in a legal battle over the land her husband had left in a trust for her sons—a legal dispute the Putnams were still embroiled in. Sarah Good was married, though she had been betrayed by her husband and was destitute. It was no wonder the afflicted girls had accused them. Tituba, Sarah Good, and Sarah Osborn were already outcasts in Salem Village—ostracized and feared. The type of women historically accused of witchcraft throughout the ages.
“I will wait here for an appropriate amount of time,” I told them, keeping my voice low so the guard didn’t hear, “and then I will go below and tell the men I have found no markings on you.”
My disobedience could not possibly change the course of events that would play out in the coming weeks and months, but perhaps it would spare these women a small amount of shame.
