The Witch of Salem Part 44

Everybody realizing that the madness had run its course, Charles Stevens and his mother went back to their home at Salem, confident that they need fear no more persecutions from Parris, whose power was gone.

[Ill.u.s.tration: George Waters cut stout sticks as crutches.]

Next day after his arrival, while going down a lonely path near the village Charles suddenly came upon Sarah Williams.

Her eyes were blazing with the fires of hope, fanaticism and disappointed pride.

"Charles! Charles!" she cried. "Nay, do not turn away from me, for, as Heaven is my witness, I did not have your mother cried out upon!"

"Sarah Williams, I am as willing as any to forget the past, or, if remember it I must, only think of it as a hideous nightmare from which, thanks to Providence, we have escaped forever."

"Charles, let us be friends."

"Far be it from me to be your enemy, Sarah Williams."

"Can you not be more, Charles?" said the handsome widow, her dark eyes on the ground, while her cheek became suffused with a blush.

"What mean you, Sarah Williams?"

"You used to love me."

The young man started and said:

"You mistake."

"I do not. You told me you did in the presence of Abigail Williams. At the same time you confessed to killing Samuel Williams in order to wed me."

Charles Stevens was thunderstruck, and could only gaze in amazement on the bold, unscrupulous woman, who had trained under Parris, until she was capable of almost any deception to carry her point.

"Sarah Williams, what you say is a lie!" he declared, in a voice hoa.r.s.e with amazement and indignation.

"We shall see! We shall see!" she answered, in a hoa.r.s.e, shrill voice.

"I will prove it. See, I will prove it and hang you yet. Beware! I do not charge you with witchcraft, but with murder. Either take the place you made vacant by the death of Samuel Williams, or hang!"

As least of the two evils, Charles Stevens intimated he preferred to hang, and, turning abruptly about, he left her. Next day he was met by Bly and Louder in the village, who interrogated him on his recent trouble with Sarah Williams about the dead husband. Knowing both to be outrageous liars, and unscrupulous as they were bold, he sought to avoid them; but they followed him everywhere and interrogated him, until he was utterly disgusted and finally broke away and went home.

Charles Stevens did not tell his mother of the threat of Sarah Williams, for he considered it too absurd to notice. Three or four days later, when he had almost ceased to think of the matter, he and his mother were startled from their supper, by hearing a loud knock at the front door.

"Sit you still, Charles, and I will go and see who this late visitor is."

She rose and went to the door and opened it.

Three or four dark forms stood without.

"Is Charles Stevens in?" asked one.

"Yes, sir."

"I want to see him."

"Who are you?"

"Don't you know me, Hattie Stevens? I am the sheriff," said the speaker boldly, as he, unbidden, entered the house.

"You the sheriff! What can you want here?"

Turning to the men without, he said in an undertone:

"Guard the doors."

The dumfounded mother repeated:

"You the sheriff! What do you want here?"

"I want to see that precious son of yours, widow Stevens, and I trow he will guess the object of my visit."

"My son! Surely he hath done no wrong. He hath broken no law."

"Where is he?"

The voice of the sheriff was pitched considerably above the ordinary key, and Charles Stevens, hearing it in the kitchen, became alarmed, and hastened into the front apartment, saying:

"I am here. Is it me you want to see?"

"Yes, Charles Stevens, I arrest you in the king's name."

"Arrest me? Marry! what offence have I done that I should be arrested by the king's officers?"

"It is murder!" he answered.

"Murder!" shrieked both the mother and son.

"Verily, it is," answered the sheriff. Then he produced a warrant issued on the complaint of Sarah Williams, charging Charles Stevens with the murder of one Samuel Williams.

Charles could scarcely believe his ears, when he heard the warrant read.

He had for a long time known Sarah Williams to be a bold, scheming woman; but that she would proceed to such a bold, desperate measure as this seemed impossible.

"I am innocent!" he declared, while his mother sank into a chair and buried her face in her hands.

"It is ever thus. The most guilty wretch on earth is innocent according to his tell," the sheriff answered.

Charles Stevens besought the man not to confine him in jail, but was told there was no help for it, and he was hurried away to prison, leaving his mother overcome with grief in her chair.

It was some days before the news of Charles Stevens' arrest reached Boston. The prosecution was interested in keeping the matter from the friends of the accused, for the Stevens family were known to have many friends in high places in the colonies, and they might interfere in the coming trial.

Cora Waters lived for weeks in ignorance of the peril of the man she loved. Her father had come home, her uncle was with them again, and she was almost happy. Poor child of misfortune, she had never known real happiness.