Delusion, or The Witch of New England Part 10

Persons in any way distinguished for any peculiarity were most likely to be accused, and she had secretly made arrangements to send her away, and conceal her, should the smallest indication of suspicion fall upon her.

For herself Edith had no fears. It would have been hard to make this pure and simple-minded creature believe that she had an enemy in the world. She had not read the French maxim, that there may be such a weight of obligation that we can only be released from it by ingrat.i.tude.

Dinah had remarked, for several days, in the little Phoebe most strange and unnatural contortions, and writhings of the body, startings and tremblings, turning up her eyes and distorting her mouth; and also that she took little food, and often was absent from home; but, with her usual tenderness, and fear of giving anxiety to Edith, she had forborne to mention it.

Indeed, the child had always been wayward and strange, and especially indocile to Edith's instructions, although she seemed at times to have a strong affection for her. She was fond of long rambles in the woods, and of basking in the sun alone on the beach, and retained all her love for those vagrant habits she had learned from her grandmother. Edith had too much tenderness and indulgence to restrain what appeared a harmless and perhaps healthful propensity.

She had tried, however, to civilize the poor, neglected child, and had taught her to say her prayers every night, kneeling at her side.

It was a cold, chilly evening in our tardy spring: the little family had drawn around the cheerful evening fire, and the evening meal was just finished: Edith felt happy, for she had been reading a cheerful letter from Seymore. The shutters were closed, and she had indulged the little Phoebe, as she often did at this hour, with a noisy game. Edith was already tired: she looked at the clock: it was the bed hour for the child.

"Come, my child, be serious for a moment, and say your evening prayer."

Phoebe kneeled: the prayer was short, but whenever she came to the word G.o.d, or Savior, she cried out that she could not say it.

Edith concealed her fears, and said, very quietly, "I will say it for you; and now, my child, go peaceably to bed, and pray to G.o.d to keep you from telling falsehoods." Phoebe was awed by her calm, decided manner, and, without further disturbance, went quietly to bed.

Full of anxiety, and even terror, Edith sought her humble friend, told her the circ.u.mstance, and besought her to fly and conceal herself. She had provided the means for flight and concealment, and entreated her to use them before it was too late.

"I do not fear for myself, my dear mistress," said Dinah. "If the child has such design, she has already formed her plan and already accused us; and she will not be content with accusing me; you are not safe. You do not know her hard and stubborn temper. She is like the young hawk in the nest of the dove."

Seeing Edith was dreadfully alarmed, Dinah added, "Do not fear; we are in _his_ hand who feeds the young ravens, and numbers the hairs of our heads."

Edith began to be a little more composed, when a loud knocking was heard at the door. Two men entered, well known to Edith; the officials in all occasions of this nature. One was the deacon of the church, a heated fanatic, full of religious bigotry, whose head was too weak to govern the pa.s.sionate and blind motions of his heart. While he had been under the restraint of Mr. Grafton's calm, enlightened reason, he had been only a zealous and useful officer of the church; but now, that he considered his own light as no longer hidden under a bushel, his zeal burned out with more violence, and he lent himself to all the wild fanaticism of the time. The other was an old man, an elder in the church; with much tenderness of heart; but he was timid, and relied little on his own judgment, which was so little enlightened that he easily yielded to what he afterwards, when the delusion pa.s.sed away, bewailed with bitter tears.

Edith was perfectly acquainted with the characters of both. When she saw them enter, she turned deadly pale; but she pointed courteously to a seat, and placed herself instinctively between them and Dinah, to shield her, for she knew too well that there was no escape for her humble friend if once in their power. She felt, therefore, a sensible relief when she found that she was herself the object of their visit.

Edith had had time to recover a little from her first consternation, and, with much self-possession, she asked who were her accusers, and demanded the right of being confronted with them.

The men informed her that she would be taken in the morning to the meeting-house for examination, and then it would be time enough to know her accusers: in the mean time they should leave a guard in the house, to prevent all attempts to escape.

Escape! ah, there was none for her. But Edith answered that she wished not to escape; that she should demand an examination. Alas! she knew not yet the spirit of the times. She was deluded by her own consciousness of innocence, and she thought fanaticism itself could not attach a suspicion to harmlessness like hers.

Not so Dinah. She was seized with a terror and grief that, for one moment, shook her faith in G.o.d, and took away all self-possession. She knew that innocence, youth, piety, beauty, had been of no avail against the demoniac fury of the accusers. She besought, on her knees, and with floods of tears, her dear child--as, in her agitation, she called her--to avail herself of flight. She convinced Edith that they could easily elude the vigilance of their guard; that they could escape by water. Paul was an excellent boatman, the sea smooth as a mirror, the moon nearly full; they could reach Boston without suspicion. Or she would hide her in the woods: she herself knew a place where she could bring her food and clothing, and form a shelter for her, and keep her safe till all suspicion had ceased.

It would have been better for Edith had she yielded; but her own clear reason, free from the mists of fanaticism, deluded her into the persuasion that, as nothing could appear against her, it would confirm the suspicions against her if she were to avoid by flight a full and open examination.

Before they retired for the night, they kneeled down to pray. Dinah could not subdue her sobs; but Edith's voice was calm and firm as she asked the protection of the Father of the fatherless, and committed her poor friend to him who is no respector of persons.

Dinah entreated her mistress to allow her to sit by her all night and watch, while she tried to sleep. This Edith refused: she wished to be alone. She had much to do to prepare herself for to-morrow, and she justly feared that Dinah's distress would soften her heart, and shake her firmness too much.

As they pa.s.sed through the chamber, Dinah bearing the candle, the little Phoebe, restless in her sleep, had nearly thrown herself out of bed.

Edith stopped, and, bending over, replaced the bedclothes, and said softly to Dinah, "If to-morrow should be fatal, if I should not live to keep my promise to the old woman, I can trust her to you: you will be to her, as you have been to me, a mother; O, more than a mother?"

She stopped; her voice choked. She removed the thick hair from the brow of the sleeping child, but even in sleep her face wore the frown that so often marred its beauty. "Dinah," she said, "she is yours; you will love her as you have me."

"That I can never promise; but I will do my duty," said Dinah.

Edith pressed her lips--thirsting as they ever did for a return of love--on the fair brow, and then, taking the candle from Dinah, entered her own room. Her heart was oppressed with apprehension, and she would not trust herself to say good night to her faithful servants.

CHAPTER XV.

"But ye! ye are changed since ye met me last: There is something bright from your features past; There is that come over your heart and eye, Which speaks of a world where the flowers must die.

Ye smile; but your smile has a dimness yet: Oh! what have ye looked on since last we met?"

THE VOICE OF SPRING.

Before the events mentioned in the last chapter occurred, the winter had pa.s.sed away, and the reluctant footsteps of our northern spring began to appear. The purple Hepatica opened her soft eye in the woods, and the delicate Sanguinaria spread her snowy bosom to catch the pale sunbeam.

Already the maple-trees had hung out their beautiful crimson blossoms, and the thrilling note of the song-sparrow echoed through the forest.

Then came the chilling wind from the east, its wings loaded with frost; and the timid spring hid her tender blossoms, and wrapped herself in a watery veil.

The weather and the spring were unnoticed by Dinah, when she sought, soon after sunrise, the pillow of her mistress. The night had brought no rest to her throbbing temples and anxious heart: she was surprised, therefore, to find Edith still sleeping. She had sat up late, arranging her father's and her own papers, and providing, by a distribution of her little property, for the old age of her two faithful servants. They were no longer slaves; Mr. Grafton had given them freedom at his death. She left the little Phoebe under their guardianship. She had also written a letter to Seymore, to ask him to come and aid her by his counsel in this extremity. It was nearly dawn when she sought her pillow; and sleep, which has been called the friend of sorrow--"but it is the happy who have called it so"--had only for a few moments left her with untroubled dreams. Her sleep was not heavy; for the gentle footstep of Dinah awoke her. When she saw her humble friend's troubled expression, she tried to smile; and, stroking her dark cheek as she bent over her, she said, "We must look bright to-day, my poor Dinah, or they will think we are afraid."

They prepared for the arrival of the officers; and, when breakfast was ready, the little Phoebe was not to be found. Although Dinah looked very grave, this occasioned no anxiety in Edith, when she recollected the vagrant habits of the child.

After breakfast, which was indeed not tasted, the same persons who had visited her the night before came to conduct Edith to the meeting-house, the place of examination. The house was nearly full; and among that crowd there was scarcely one to whom Edith had not been a friend and a benefactor, as far as her humble means would allow. As she entered, there was one by whose sick bed she had watched; another whose infant had died in her arms; and children stood looking on with stupid wonder to whom she had given flowers, and primers, and, more than all, her own gentle smile. But now every eye was averted, or turned on her with suspicion and terror,--so hardening is the power of fanaticism.

I believe I have said that my heroine was not beautiful; but the inward harmony must have given a spiritual beauty to features animated with intellect, and softened by tenderness of heart; and a self-relying innocence and purity imparted something more of grace to her person than the most finished art could have given.

Edith became very pale as she entered; and Dinah, who had followed her closely, begged permission to stand near and support her. This was denied, and she was placed between two men, who each held an arm, and in front of those who were to examine her.

The afflicted--that is, the accuser--was now called in. Edith looked eagerly around, and, with grief and astonishment, saw her little Phoebe, the child of her care, when almost close to her, utter a piercing cry, and fall down in violent convulsions. She started forward to a.s.sist and raise her, but the men drew her rudely back. And this was her accuser!

At the same time with Edith, a poor old woman, nearly eighty years of age, was brought in. Her accuser was her own grandchild,--a girl about the same age as Phoebe. Together they had concerted this diabolical plot, and had rehea.r.s.ed and practised beforehand their contortions and convulsions, excited, no doubt, by the notoriety of wicked children they had heard of.

The poor old creature was bent and haggard. She would have wept, but, alas! the fountain of her tears was dried up; and she looked at her grandchild with a sort of stupid incredulity and wonder. Her inability to weep was regarded as an infallible proof of her guilt. As she stood beside Edith, she shook with age and terror; and Edith, touched with pity, though she trembled herself, and was deadly pale, tried to give her a smile of hope and encouragement. The poor old wretch did not need it: she not only confessed to every thing of which she was accused, but added such circ.u.mstances of time and place, and of the various forms the devil had taken in her person, that Edith almost sickened with disgust.

She could not understand how an old person, on the very verge of the grave, could wish to lengthen out her few years by such base and wicked lies.

The young cannot believe that the old are unwilling to die. But it is an acknowledged truth, that the longer we have worn our earthly vesture, the dearer becomes the thin and faded remnant. The young resign their hold of life with hardly a regret, while the old cling with the utmost tenacity to the wavering and nearly-parted thread.

Edith turned away from the partner of her suspected guilt, and asked to have the child brought near her. She held out her hand, and looked mildly in her face. The moment the child touched Edith's hand, she was still: this was a part of the plot: but the moment her hand was withdrawn, she fell down again in violent convulsions, and cried out that pins were thrust into her. In the midst of this acting, she caught Dinah's stern, reproachful eye fixed upon her, and she instantly became still. But this did not aid poor Edith's cause; for they cried out that the child was struck dumb by the accused.

The old woman also, feeling perhaps that Edith's integrity was a reproach to her own weakness, cried out that she was pierced with pins, and pinched by Edith, although with invisible fingers, as she stood near her; and, turning back her sleeve from her bony and wrinkled arm, she showed a discolored spot, which she declared had not been there when she left her home. It had not, indeed; but every one knows how quickly a bruise is visible in the stagnant blood of age, and the mark had been left by the hand of the person who held her arm.

Edith, wearied and disgusted, desired to be taken back to her prison, there to await her trial before the judges of the Province. Every thing had occurred that was most unfavorable to her, and she felt but too well that she must bear the suspicion of a crime of which she was as unconscious as the unborn infant. Her heart yearned towards the poor infatuated child, and she earnestly begged that she might be permitted to talk with her alone. This was granted, and she was guarded to her prison.

There was no proper prison in our village, and Edith was guarded in one of the rooms of the deacon's house who had been so active in her accusation.

During the night that pa.s.sed after her examination, Edith had time to arrange her thoughts. Before she knew who her accusers were, she had been moving in the dark; and now, when she thought of the whole insane proceeding, she could scarcely believe they would be guilty of the monstrous crime of condemning her on the testimony of that child alone.

When the deacon visited her in the morning, she said, with much warmth, "Have the days of Queen Mary come back? Am I to be suspected, condemned, imprisoned, on the testimony of that poor child,--the child that I took to my home when no one else among you would offer her a shelter?"

The deacon answered, "that the testimony was so much more convincing, as the child had lived in the house with her."

"And is her word to be taken against the testimony of my whole life? You know how I have lived among you from my infancy."

"Yes; but G.o.d may choose the fairest of his works as instruments of his sovereign will."