The Witch of Salem Part 12

"'Come, John Louder, mount behind me,' said Rebecca Nurse, and I was compelled to get behind her."

"What was she riding?" Charles asked.

"A broomstick."

Charles, by an effort, restrained the laughter, which the answer had so nearly created, and John Louder resumed:

"She uttered a strange, terrible cry, and we all rose in the air on the broomsticks and away we sped like birds. I was in constant fear lest I should fall and be dashed to death on the ground. I clung to her, and she, uttering strange screeches and cries, sped on like a bird through the air. Her broomstick rose and fell at her command.

"At last we descended to a valley, and all the witches save Goody Nurse disappeared. Here I soon learned that, instead of riding, I was to be ridden. By a few magic words, my face became elongated, my body grew, my hands and feet became hoofs, my body was covered with hair, I had a mane and tail, and I was a horse, with a saddle on my back, and a bit in my mouth. Mounting me, the old witch cried:

"'Be going, Johnnie, I will give you sore bones ere the c.o.c.k crows.'

[Ill.u.s.tration: "We all rose in the air on broomsticks."]

"I was goaded to desperation. I ran, I leaped, I sprang from precipices so high, that, had I not been held up by the spirits of the air, I must have been dashed to death on the rocks below. I was agonized, and I wanted to die.

"At last we came to a valley and a house, which I recognized as the old Ames Meeting House. Here a number of poor wretches like myself who had been changed to beasts and ridden almost to death, were tied up. Some of them were horses, some were bulls, and one had been changed to a ram, another to an ostrich. I was tied to a tree so near to the door of the house, that I could see within.

"Verily, it was such a sight as I pray G.o.d I may never witness again.

There were the witches at their infernal feast. The liver and lungs, torn warm and bleeding from some helpless wretch, lay on the table. They partook of the food, also the diabolical sacrament, and then commenced their dance. I saw them dancing with their feet up to the ceiling and their heads hanging down.

"In my agony of spirit, I seized the tree nearest me in my mouth, and bit it so hard that I broke out the tooth," and here the narrator exhibited his teeth, one of the front ones being gone. "You see the tooth is missing. A week later I went to the Ames Meeting House and found the tooth sticking in the tree.

"After they had kept up their infernal dance for an hour, Goody Nurse again appeared and, mounting on my back, did ride me most grievously hard over the hills and plains, until we came to my home. Then she suddenly slipped from my back and hurled me head first through the window, where I fell in my own shape by the side of the bed."

Charles Stevens, feeling a.s.sured that he had a solution to the marvellous story, said:

"It was no doubt a frightful dream, which to you seemed real."

"Dream, was it?" cried Louder. "I sprang to my feet, ran to the window, and, sure as I am a white man, there was Goody Nurse soaring away through the air on a broomstick."

When he had finished his story, the horrified group shuddered and gathered closer about the fire which had burned low on the hearth. Pete tried to lay on a stick with his trembling hand, but was not equal to the task. The lamp-wick burned low in its socket, flickered and threatened to go out, while the storm without howled with increasing fury, the rain beat against the side of the house, and the thunder crashed overhead.

A shuddering silence seemed to have seized upon the group, and they sat watching the flickering lamp and smouldering fire, when suddenly all were roused by a loud rapping at the door. The entire group started up in alarm, the negro howled, and Bly gasped:

"G.o.d save us!"

"The whole armor of G.o.d shield us against the witches," groaned John Louder.

"Heaven help us now!" whispered Gray.

Charles Stevens, though scarcely more than a youth, was the most self-possessed of all. He rose and opened the door. A blinding flash revealed a pair of horses with drooping heads in the rain and storm, while a man and young girl, the late riders of the horses, stood at the door holding the reins.

As soon as the door was opened, the man, holding the little maiden's hand in his own, stepped into the house to be out of the gust of wind and rain.

"We are belated travellers, kind sir, and seek shelter from the storm,"

the stranger began.

At sound of his voice, John Louder sprang to his feet, and, seizing the lamp, held it close to the man's face. Starting back with a yell, he cried:

"Away! wizard, devil, away! You are he who offered the book to me. Away!

away! or I will slay you!"

The startled stranger answered:

"I never saw you before."

John Louder insisted that he was the evil one who had met him at the lake while he was stalking the deer, and had offered him the book to sign.

"I never saw you before in my life," the stranger answered, his theatrical tones making a strange impression on the superst.i.tious Louder. He read in his face the look of a demon, and continued to cry:

"You must, you shall go away! Prince of darkness, back into the storm which your powers created!"

Charles Stevens was too much amazed to speak for some moments, for, by the combined aid of the lamp and firelight, he saw before him the very features of the man whom he had found wounded and almost dying at the spring. The wanderer turned his sad and handsome face to the youth and asked:

"Can you take us to shelter?"

"I did once, and will again."

"You did once? Truly you mistake, for I never saw you before. My child will perish in this storm."

"It is five miles to my house; but if you will come with me I will show you the way."

They tried to dissuade Charles from going out into the driving storm; but he was not moved by their entreaties. He only saw the young maiden's pale, sweet face and appealing blue eyes, and he set off with the two through the storm, which beat about them so that they were quite wet to the skin when the house of widow Stevens was reached. The man and the maid were given beds and dry clothing.

Next morning, Charles asked the stranger:

"Are you not the man who came here in 1684, wounded?"

"I am not. I was never here before. What is your name?"

"Charles Stevens."

"Have you relatives in Boston?"

"Yes, my grandfather, Mathew Stevens, who was a Spaniard by birth and called Mattheo Estevan, died in Boston twenty years ago, and I have uncles, aunts and cousins living there."

"Have you relatives in Virginia?"

"I have cousins."

"Is one Robert Stevens?"

"He is."

"I know him, he befriended me and sent me here."

Then the stranger told how he had been an indented slave in Virginia, and escaped from a cruel master through the aid of Robert Stevens.