Chapter Fifteen
I escape before Callum gets up. I’m suddenly nervous to see him.
Since the moment I woke, even the smallest sound from his room made my heart leap.
I message him once I’m on the road, saying I have an early morning meeting at the East Mill Witch Study Center.
But I left so early I now have a full hour to kill before the place even opens.
I know I’m being stupid avoiding him like this, but I have that awkward, day after the office Christmas party where I drank too much and made out with the boss feeling.
Not that I’ve ever been to an office Christmas party.
Or had a boss. And I didn’t even kiss Callum.
But I wanted to, I really, really wanted to.
Get out of your head, Daniels . So what if I have steamy thoughts about Callum? I’m a grown woman, I’m allowed.
I park outside the Witch Study Center, sighing so heavily I fog up my windshield. A woman with silvery hair in a long ponytail stands on the porch watering flowers that cascade from hanging baskets. She looks up and smiles.
‘Holly?’
‘Louise?’ I call back as I step from my car. She nods. ‘I’m sorry, I’m way too early. I’ll just wait out here.’
‘Don’t be silly, I’ve just boiled the kettle.’
She puts her watering can down, opens the door and ushers me inside.
Louise is statuesque elegance personified: stylish in a crisp, pale lemon pantsuit teamed with ballet flats and an excessive amount of silver jewellery that jangles when she moves. She almost glides across the floor, while I clump behind her in my chunky Docs.
‘I’m a descendant of one of the first women tried for witchcraft in this area,’ she explains as she offers me a seat.
We settle into a pair of gold velvet wingback chairs in front of a fireplace framed by heavy wooden bookcases. A pot of tea steams on the table between us.
‘Her name was Sarah Garlick,’ Louise continues. ‘Her neighbour, Mary Gardiner, a mere child, accused her of being a witch.’ She pours our tea out into mint-green art deco teacups.
‘And was she found guilty?’ I ask.
‘Tragically, yes, and they hung her for it. Mary had fallen ill shortly after giving birth. The poor girl was only just sixteen. She claimed that Sarah, who was unmarried and owned property, something few women did back then, had cast a spell on her out of jealousy, because Mary was married. Mary swore on the Bible that she saw Sarah at the foot of her bed with a dark shape she believed to be Satan.’ Louise rolls her eyes.
‘She said she’d been bewitched by Sarah, that pins were being jabbed into her skin and she was being burned from the inside out.
She was probably dying of sepsis.’ She shakes her head, silver earrings jangling.
‘That sounds so ridiculous.’
‘Ridiculous now, but not in 1657. They believed in things like that back then. Sarah denied everything, of course. By all accounts she was a god-fearing woman, but she was still taken into custody, put on trial and convicted. She maintained her innocence, even as the noose went around her neck. The Gardiners received Sarah’s parcel of land as payment for her crimes against them – or rather, Joshua Gardiner did, because Mary died before Sarah hanged.
I suspect he orchestrated the whole thing to get his hands on Sarah’s land.
The shit really hit the fan after that. Witch hysteria gripped the town, and people were accused left and right.
A witch court was formed. If you’ve ever read The Crucible , well, it was like that. ’
‘And this was prior to Salem and their witch trials?’
‘The Salem trials started in 1692, thirty-five years after the East Mill trials. I want to give a voice to the victims of that time, before their stories are lost to history.’
I nod. ‘I’d never heard of the witch trials out here until the other day.’
‘Our town has decided that part of our history should not be celebrated, publicised or apparently even recognised. But, as a historian, I believe we learn from our mistakes. It’s important to acknowledge the bad alongside the good.’
I nod again. Acknowledging the bad is something I’m sensational at. I’m not so great at acknowledging the good. I need to work on that.
‘How many “witches” were tried here?’ I ask.
Louise explains that, according to the records, seven women were tried and hung. However, those records are less than reliable, thanks to the fire that burned through half of the town.
‘Unfortunately, that fire took out some of the official town buildings, so a lot of important documents were destroyed. Not just the court records around the witch trials but also records around the town itself and the population of the area at the time.’
‘Ola Hutchings mentioned that. That must make your job hard.’
‘I’m working with diaries and letters, the unofficial and official accounts to try to verify what really happened here.
We may never know the full story. History can be a bitch like that.
’ She sips her tea, bracelets rattling. ‘But let’s cut to the chase, shall we? You’re looking into the Westerns.’
There’s a touch of glee in her voice.
‘The Western house,’ I correct, even though she’s right – by both default and instinct, we’re also investigating the family.
‘My colleague, Callum Jefferies, has a successful paranormal podcast where he debunks fake hauntings, and Edward Western reached out and asked him to investigate the stories of disturbances at the house.’
Louise laughs. ‘That entire house and the family that owns it is a disturbance. What have you discovered so far? Have you been inside yet?’
‘We haven’t discovered as much as we would like, and we haven’t been inside. We’re waiting on more information and clearance from Mr Western.’
‘Why am I not surprised? That family is so strange and secretive. You’d think there’d be plenty of available information about the Westerns, given their significance to the history of this town, but there’s hardly anything.
They give me the creeps, to be honest. There’s something just not right about them.
’ She shudders as she leans in closer. ‘We do know that once they were one of the most influential families in this area. Alistair and his brother Garrett came to the colonies already wealthy men, arriving around ten years after settlement was formed. The story goes that they fled Ireland prior to the rebellion, settling on family lands in England. But then had to flee again some years later, this time to America, because Garrett was under suspicion of murdering a local woman.’
‘Did he murder her?’
‘It was never proven. But later rumours swirled that Alistair and Garrett murdered several other women, on the Western property, under the banner of doing God’s work .
That they ran their own private witch trials, outside of the town’s official proceedings, and that they lit the fire that ravaged the town shortly after, to conceal what they’d done. ’
‘And was any of that ever proven?’
She sighs. ‘No. The Western brothers were zealots, no question, and they were up to their necks in the witch trails – as influential members of the community, they served on the witch courts. But it’s hard to believe that after all this time, the fact that they were mass murderers would remain undiscovered.
’ She sits back, her fingertips tapping.
‘Though I often wonder if we dug up that old graveyard on the Western land, would we find more bones than are marked by headstones?’
‘I wondered that too,’ I muse.
Louise hmms. ‘Whatever the truth is, those rumours wound up tarnishing the Westerns’ reputation and, consequently, their influence in this town. Even their appearance made people jittery. The entire family was unnaturally beautiful; both the men and the women. It made people uncomfortable.’
I think of my dreams, and the young woman strangled under the oak tree where I also nearly took my last breath.
My chest tightens at the visceral memory.
The man who snuffed out that young woman’s life was so beautiful he didn’t look real.
And the pain that seeps from every board of the Western house – maybe the secret murders are the source of that pain.
‘Louise,’ I suddenly say, ‘do you know of a young girl of fifteen or sixteen named Elizabeth who was possibly caught up in the witch trials?’
‘Did Ola mention her to you?’
‘Y-yeah,’ I lie.
Louise glides towards a bookcase on the far wall.
‘She would have been talking about Elizabeth Howell.’ She pulls a book from the shelf.
‘Elizabeth was one of the first accused of witchcraft. She was awaiting trial when she vanished. Some believed her father paid someone to get her out of jail and secret her away.’ Louise looks skeptical.
‘But I’m not so sure, because her father accused Garrett Western of being involved in her disappearance.
He was very vocal about it. Apparently Western had been courting the girl.
But if her father had a hand in her escape, why would he draw attention to it by pointing the finger at one of the most powerful men in town? ’
I palm away the cold sweat popping on my brow.
‘Did you say Elizabeth Howell ?’
‘Yes…’ Louise studies me. ‘Are you okay? You’ve gone a bit pale.’
‘I’m fine. It’s just… the name. Howell. It surprised me. It was my mom’s maiden name.’
‘Were your mother’s family early settlers?’
‘Not that I know of. I always assumed they came here from England a few generations ago. They’ve all passed now. Mom included.’
‘I’m sorry for your loss. But Howell is a fairly common name in this country’s history.
’ Then she smiles and says, ‘It would be an amazing coincidence, though. You should look into it. I’d be happy to help.
But first,’ she says, standing up swiftly, ‘we need cookies. To go with our tea.’ She hands me the book, then glides from the room.