Patriotic Plays and Pageants for Young People Part 25

DORCAS (importantly).

Aye, since yesternight she hath clean disappeared. The evening meal was set: she did not come. They have searched the woods, and the marshland, and the roadways. 'Tis plain she hath been spirited away, and Goodwife Abigail Williams is nigh out of her mind. But now that they've found the witch----

TABITHA (eagerly).

Found her----

DORCAS (triumphantly).

Aye, found her! And you'll never guess who 'tis! Hark! They're coming!

She was hobbling this way as I pa.s.sed, little dreaming that her evil deeds would find her out so soon! The half o' Salem must be at her heels. Look! Look!

GOODY GURTON'S VOICE (from left, a cry of terror).

I am no witch. Good sirs, I am no witch. Mercy! Mercy!

RENOUNCE (startled).

'Tis Goody Gurton's voice! Why, she is a poor old woman who hath never done harm to any.

CRIES (off stage, left).

A witch! A witch! A-aaaaah! A witch!

[The crowd surges in from left, dragging in the midst of it poor old Goody Gurton. They separate and form a wide semicircle of which Holdfast Bradford and trembling Goody Gurton form the center. In the crowd are Goodwife Williams, Goodwife Hubbard, Mercy Hubbard, Goodwife Brown, Repentance Folger, Vigilant Winthrop, John Giles, Roger Blackthorne, and other people of Salem.

BRADFORD.

Silence, and look! Look, people of Salem! You know this spot right well. 'Tis here that witches are reported to hold their wicked revels.

What better place have we in which to try a witch? Custom hath had it aforetime that we have tried them in the courthouse. Now let us try them on their own ground. 'Twill show that we fear neither them nor their master. Neither their black books, nor their caldron's brew.

Stand forth, Goody Gurton, the accused. What have you to say? There is the woman whose child you have bewitched and stolen.

GOODY GURTON (in a trembling, aged voice).

I stole no child. I have bewitched no one. I am a poor old woman, as you all know. I get my living by my needle, and my brews of herbs.

BRADFORD.

Stand forth, Abigail. Is it not true that half the town hath searched for Barbara Williams since yesterday at sundown, and not a trace of her hath been found?

GOODWIFE WILLIAMS (wildly).

Aye, 'tis true! My child has gone from me! She is bewitched and stolen!

Bewitched and stolen! Everywhere I looked and found no token: but at the door of Goody Gurton I found _this_!

[Holds up small white Puritan cap.

THE CROWD.

A-aaaaaah!

BRADFORD.

How came this cap to your door, Goody Gurton?

GOODY GURTON (in a shaking voice).

The children often visit me for sweetmeats. I gave the child a little barley sugar. She may have dropped the cap. I do not know.

BRADFORD.

Where did she turn after she left your doorway?

GOODY GURTON.

I did not look which way she went. I do not know. Oh, wors.h.i.+pful sir----

BRADFORD. Silence! Who else accuses Goody Gurton?

GOODWIFE HUBBARD.

We've seen strange things about, have we not, neighbors?

ALL.

Aye! Aye!

GOODWIFE HUBBARD.

Last night the wind wailed in my chimney. And when I crossed the fields at twilight I had a feeling _that something followed me._

MERCY HUBBARD (piping up).

And Goodman Folger's cow hath died since yesternight. And Goody Gurton was seen going by the pasture.

VIGILANT WINTHROP.

Aye, there be many signs. Last night the moon rose red.

JOHN GILES.

And the week before there were more bats flying than I have ever seen in Salem.

GOODWIFE BROWN.

And Goodwife Eaton says that all night long in the woods behind her house there is something crying--she cannot tell whether it be an owl or a child.

REPENTANCE FOLGER.

Last eve, when the wind was blowing, something flapped past me like a witch's cloak.

BRADFORD.

What have you to say to these things, Goody Gurton?

GOODY GURTON (quite simply).

Why, naught, sir, naught. I noted myself that last week the moon rose red, and that last night the wind blew shrewdly.

BRADFORD.

How comes it that you were leaving the streets of Salem, and walking here in the forest? 'Twas here in the forest we found you.

GOODY GURTON.

I came to hunt for some simples...for spearmint and checkerberry and tansy.

BRADFORD (with deep sternness).

And for wolfbane and h.e.l.lbore and all other hideous herbs that witches brew in their caldrons. You stand accused, Goody Gurton.

GOODY GURTON (bewildered).

Accused?

BRADFORD.

Of witchcraft.