3
From Sundown to black Night the battle continues. The Witch is thrown to confusion. Justitia triumphans. Deus regnat.
Now was the courtroom, empty and vast, silent as the grave. Only twenty remained in the room where a minute before had been many hundreds. The day had worn to sunset and the room was dark. Flares were lighted and candles were set where there was need. But the light of flare and candle made the far reaches of the room and the dark corners behind the scaffold even blacker. Such humanity as was present were huddled about the platform and the great chairs of the Judges. By candlelight Judge Bride glanced over the notes that he had taken, and by candlelight Titus Thumb looked to the witch upon the table. She stood there ghastly pale and like to swoon. Her eyes were round and struck terror to all. She did not look again to Titus, only to Judge Bride, whom she in her simplicity thought to be her friend.
Judge Bride bade the sheriff fetch a chair—a good chair with a back to it, for he said he saw that the accused was tired past human strength. Captain Buzzey got a chair. It was a great chair similar to those in which the Judges sat. Judge Bride had it placed on the platform between himself and Judge Lollimour. The three sat thus for a moment in silence, a judge, and next a witch, and then a judge. So they sat in great chairs and upon crimson damask cushions. The witch’s feet could not reach the floor. Judge Bride gave her wine to drink from the silver goblet set out for his own use. She drank the wine and was grateful to him.
Little by little—tenderly—he questioned her. And little by little she told him all. Of the Thumb twins he asked no word, he asked her only of her own self, and of that demon who had but so recently gone from her. She told in so low a voice those but a few yards away could not hear, and Mr. Mather several times cried out, ‘Louder—an it please the wench.’ She told of her father and mother in Brittany, and the night that Mr. Bilby died. She told of the long winter, and the expectations of the spring and the fulfilment of these expectations—for the messenger had come, a most vigorous and comely fiend. Sometimes she reddened and turned away as might a modest Christian woman. Sometimes she sighed, and once or twice she smiled a small and secret smile. And three times she said she loved and did not fear the demon, and that he had been kind and pitiful to her.
Judge Bride: You say this devil was your lover and that he conducted himself as has many a shameless mortal man to many a woman, for he loved you, and when he had stayed himself of you he went away, whistling, we may presume, and shrugging his shoulders—ah, gentlemen, how shocking is the conduct of the male, be he demon or tomcat! And now, Doll Bilby, we are almost to the end. Do not fear to weary us with the length and detail of your history. Come, tell us more. The ears of Justice must ever be long and patient ears.
She told more. There was nothing left untold, and where she would have turned aside, Judge Bride encouraged and helped her. Mr. Zelley moaned and cried out, and his head was in his hands. Titus went ghostly white and, trembling, staggered from the room.
Judge Bride: But did not your conscience hurt? Did you not know that you lived with this strange lover of yours in sin?
Doll Bilby: I begged him to marry me. So he did.
Judge Bride: A most virtuous and homely fiend. And did you find clerk or magistrate to register your vows?
Doll Bilby: No, we married ourselves.
Judge Bride: Ah, the Governor of Connecticut but recently gave you example.
And he pointed out to Judge Lollimour with much leisure how evil is bad example in high places. He questioned Doll further. She told him all there was to tell about the marriage, and it humiliated her to tell that she had accepted this fiend before marriage.
Judge Bride: Come, come, is it then so sorry a sin for two young people to be too hot and previous in their love? Surely honest marriage may be considered salve to such misconduct.
He glanced through his notes. There was not a sound in the room, not the scamper of a mouse, not the taking of breath, no sound except the fiery rustle of the flares and the crackle of the paper.
Judge Bride: Doll Bilby, I notice that the children spoke often of a pretty babe—which they called yours. Now to what do they refer?
Doll Bilby: Sir, I cannot be sure.
Judge Bride: You may guess, perhaps?
Doll Bilby: Oh, sir, sir....
Her eyes sought Mr. Zelley, but his face was in his hands.
Judge Bride: Speak freely.
Doll Bilby: I think it was to my own babe they referred.
Judge Bride: And where now is this child?
Doll Bilby: It is not yet born.
Judge Bride: And to whom the honour of its paternity?
Doll Bilby: Who else would it be but the fiend who came to comfort me?
Judge Bride: Do not hang your head, young Bilby, for to conceive is natural to woman. Rather should you redden and look down if after such expenditure of infernal ardour you had proved sterile. Conception is the glory of woman.
He stood up and dismissed the hearing. Then Captain Buzzey in a great sweat of fear took the witch back to her cell, and all others went home. That night the Boston Judges lay at the Black Moon. The barmaid heard Judge Lollimour say to Judge Bride, as these two sat by the hearth and drank their sack-posset: ‘Sir, this hearing is done as quickly as ever you prophesied. We will be back to Boston on the third day. I warrant the finding is more than any expected. There is enough against the wench to hang her three times over—but that is yet for the magistrates of the Superior Court to decide. We, at least, shall hold her without bail or bond.’ Then he said in wonder, ‘To think that God has vouchsafed to our eyes the sight of a woman who has embraced a demon....’ The Judges whispered. The barmaid would not repeat what they said.
These learned men called for ink-horn, sand, and pens. By ten o’clock they had written thus:
Doll Bilby of Cowan Corners, (Essex County,) being this day brought before us upon suspicion of witchcraft and upon the specific charge of afflicting Labour and Sorrow Thumb, twin daughters of Deacon Ephraim Thumb, we heard the aforesaid, and seeing what we did see, together with hearing charges of the persons then present, we committed this same Doll Bilby (she denying the matter of fact, yet confessing herself a witch, also confessing having had carnal knowledge of a fiend, also to being at this time pregnant by him, also to being married to him by the ceremony of Max Pax Fax) unto their majesties’ jail at Salem, as per mittimus then given out in order to further examination.
| Adam Bride | Magistrates | |
| Ralph Lollimour |
By eleven they slept upon their beds.