Wicked Girls (3 page)

We huddle near the fire.

I clutch Betty Parris's little hand,

and she clasps Abigail.

Whether it was Margaret or me

or the Minister's niece

who first learned to read

egg whites in a glass, I know not.

Margaret cups an egg over the water,

then sets it down and says,

“Go on, Ann, let ye take the first egg.”

I crack the shell, scoop out its yolk,

and ask what husband I will make.

We stare at the floating mass

as if it were a cloud,

and wager at the shape.

“It looks like a ship.

See the mast,” Margaret says.

Betty nods.

“A sailor for Ann?” Abigail says,

pawing for her own egg.

I snatch the lot away.

“Or a royal or merchantman,” I say,

and hand the next fortune to Betty.

I sneak from my work

of spinning and darning

and unlatch the wooden box

wherein hides the necklace

too lavish to be worn upon the neck.

My fingers brush each red stone

of Missus Putnam's necklace,

a necklace that belonged

to her grandmother before her.

It will one day belong to little Ann.

The weight of the gems

clasps heavy round my neck.

In the looking glass

I turn side and side.

The stones change hue

in differing light.

I used to bounce sun

around the room

with my mother's hand mirror,

back when my greatest duties

were learning Mother's recipes

and writing out my passages.

How I despised that endless

copy work and now

what I would not give

to be a lady of correspondence

courted by suitors.

A flicker in the doorway.

I stuff the rubies and gold

deep into the box.

I fall to my knees

as though absorbed in housework.

The baby screams

and the kettle sirens,

and today I miss my mother

and her gentle smile

so far down inside me

I can barely drag myself

up off the floor.

Past the crooked evergreen

and the brook what lost its water,

on my way home from playing

games on who'll make me husband,

I cross Ipswich Road.

I rub my eyes. His two blue ones

be looking straight on me.

My pulse starts to gallop

like a steed. But today I trip not.

I track on up to him and say,

“Be you following me?”

His arms be thick enough

to lift the axe of three men.

Isaac's laughter shakes

through him so fierce

it scatters the snow off his boots.

“Yea, Margaret Walcott,

betwixt tending the stables,

staking out the fields

and bringing wares to town,

I be scouting all the time after you.”

He raises one brow.

“But where hast thou been?”

The color splashes over me,

drenching me red. I hold up my buckets.

“Fetching water,” I say.

“Thou art far from any stream

I know of,” Isaac says,

and shakes his head.

His eyes catch on me

like he be holding lightly

my face with his hand.

“I must then be lost,” I say,

and I pick up my bucket

and my skirts and trot off.

And do so quite a bit like a lady.

Mother never questions where

I have been. She notices not my entrance

into the house. But I note each patter of her foot.

She treadles the spinning wheel

as though she weaves a song

of high tempo. I am mesmerized.

I set to work at her feet.

My hands sting just from drafting her wool.

“There are too many loose fibers.”

Her voice is a whip.

I rub harder the flax between my hands

till the strands be perfect for the wheel.

Mother thanks me not.

“Will you teach me your way

to treadle?” I ask.

But Mother hears me not.

She hears only her own tapping

of the wheel.

She admires her yarn, refastens her bun

and motions me away.

“Go back to your study.”

I check again that we are alone

and crack open the eggshell.

Today what floats to the surface

is shaped like a death box.

I shudder, and we all drop hands.

Perhaps we should have sewn tapestry

or rolled hoops, instead of playing folk magic.

“Maybe your husband will be an undertaker,”

Abigail says.

But a chill colder than winter wind

trembles my arms. I hold in my breath.

Margaret's face turns dust and ice.

She says, “I fear we let loose

a thing what leads to the grave.”

Reverend hands my father

the blue shawl I left

at the parsonage

like some one-eyed fool.

“The girls were

at some sort of mischief

at the meetinghouse.

Betty and Abigail been struck

rightful ill.

Pity Margaret can't act a lady

such as does her cousin Ann,”

Reverend Parris lectures to Father.

I can feel the leather lash my back

before Father closes the door.

If only they knew Ann

be not only with us

but be always first

with the herbs and chants and telling stones.

While I be strapped

it seems rightful unfair

that Ann be sainted.

I nearly wish to confess

what mischief we
all
been about,

conjuring that death box.

I swipe the tears from under my nose.

Step-Mother creaks afore my door

on her stubby legs.

“Maaaargaret!”

She stretches my name

like it were a hide.

“Be at your chores!”

The mound of mending in my basket

and bruises on my knees

from scouring like our maid

cause me ponder whether

I have enough merriment

with them little girls.

Outside the window

snow falls light and graceful

and perfect,

long as none does touch it.

Isaac must be riding

through this snow,

it covering his arms

and his head all white.

All them soft little flakes

landing 'pon his lips.

I touch my own

and wish to be out of here.

I am no gypsy.

I seek but soil

and a place to dry my boots.

The boots I am given

at the Putnams' flap

as I walk.

My toes cannot fill them.

I swaddle my feet in muslin,

pack them to size.

But the stuffing shifts

for the boots are borrowed,

were never intended mine.

A sole stalk that survived

the cruelest winter, I search

for friendly, familiar terrain,

where I can fashion my boots

and trade in the temporary,

a plot of land

where my feet burrow

into the ground

and belong.

Girl just my height

comes rapping on the door.

I've the littlest propped on my hip,

dirt on my apron and sleep

pasted beneath my eyes.

She is as crisp as untrodden snow.

Her smart frock fits as grass

coats a rolling hill.

Each feature on her face

fine as painted porcelain,

save for her expression.

She stares at me like I might disappear.

“Good morn, with what

may I help you?” I say.

“Where is Ann?” She scrunches up

her nose. She has not removed

her eyes from mine.

“Junior or Senior?” I ask,

and stick two fingers

in the baby's mouth to stop it crying.

The girl be transfixed upon my hair;

she stands at the door still unspeaking.

I repeat, sweet as maple jam,

“Pray, ask you after the little,

or the lady Ann?”

“Margaret, you got away!”

I startle a mite when Ann Junior

calls from behind me, and the baby

lets out a great wail.

Ann says, “Mercy,

this is my cousin, Margaret.

Margaret, this is
Mercy
,

the one I told you of.”

Margaret looks to judge me

up and down

with her stone eyes,

but I won't abide it.

I just smile at her, come to play

with a little girl.

I click the door

behind me so none

can hear, especially not her.

“She ain't that pretty,” I say.

Ann's head nods,

but her eyes do not agree.

And neither does her mouth.

Ann says, “Mercy can read and write.

And she has been a servant

since she was eight. She was schooled

when she was only five.

Mercy helps
me
with my lessons.”

Ann offers this to me

like it be flavored sugarcane.

“She'll not make a goodwife

with all that reading and such.

'Tis against the Lord's way.”

I flop down on Ann's bed.

“Then why has Father made

me work at my lessons?” Ann says.

I flip through the scattered

parchment on her bed,

pages and pages Ann copied over.

“What be this about?”

I point at the text.

Ann looks bewildered

as though I have poured

a pitcher of water down her back.

“Why, Margaret, know you not

the Lord's Prayer?”

“Course I do.

I was testing ye, Ann.”

I pick up the page

and say from memory,

“Our Father, who art in heaven.”

Ann relaxes her shoulders and laughs.

“You caught me well there,” she says.

I nod, but as soon as she turns her back

I grab the parchment paper

and slip it into the pocket of my new skirt.

Maybe if I look at it enough, I'll figure

how to read it.

Then like I be reading fortunes

I crack open an empty egg

for beautiful Mercy.

I try to stop the smile

from devouring my face.

“Pity Mercy cannot marry

for she be an orphan

with no dowry or name.”

“Yes, 'tis horrid.”

Ann's eyes dig into mine.

“How would you feel?”

I look down

and shake my head.

“I hope never to know.”

Bones chatter, while branches

snap heavy with ice.

Something stronger than fever

quakes and curls

through Village girls.

Their screams and contortions

be of awesome proportion.

'Tis a sight to behold,

distraction from cold.

Issac motions and we sneak

behind the meetinghouse.

He whispers against my cheek,

“How fare ye, Margaret Walcott?

Needest thou a kerchief?”

I hold up my arm.

“I need not a kerchief

when I have my sleeve.”

His lips do curl up

in a sweet curve of smile.

A shuffle of feet

toward the church and he says,

“We best get back.”

But when I turn to leave,

Isaac holds me by the elbow

and anchors me to his side.

His breath is smoke.

His lips on my neck

cause me stumble.

Quickly he does release me.

Isaac tugs at his sleeve

and readjusts his collar;

then paces far ahead.

He walks toward his father, hat-stiff,

as though he and I never did speak.

But he must be trembling too.