Chapter 1720 The Goddess’s Secret Word (Sixty-five)

Samuel Parris is not a bad person, he is just a young pastor who is forced to go to Salem due to the pressure of life.

He hoped to bring a different spiritual civilization to the village, and tried to bring his own comments during his sermons. He would talk endlessly about something, which often made him feel powerless because the believers under the pulpit paid no attention to his speech.

No reaction.

In fact, what the villagers want to hear more from the priest is comfort. This is what the old priests often provided them in the past, but they rarely get it here in Paris.

Paris is a person who does not give up easily, which is also his stubborn side. However, her persistence has not brought any improvement. His salary is in arrears and a movement to fire him is brewing.

Just like he felt when he first saw Salem, he would be buried alive in this place, and worse still, he would freeze to death before suffocating to death. Firewood was still in short supply, and he and his family

I had no choice but to shiver in the heavy snow and howling wind.

The winter of 1691 to 1692 was extremely cold. The bread in the communion plate and the ink in the pen were frozen. The cold wind blew in from the chimney. When Paris was preaching, there would sometimes be a flurry of chants.

There were coughs and loud sneezes, and some people even dragged their feet because of frostbite on their feet.

In order to make each other more comfortable, he shortened the time of his sermon. Apart from quarreling with the villagers, Paris had other jobs. One second he was studying theology, and the next second he was building a building for his mare.

Mao Mao, if he was truly loved and respected by the villagers, someone should have done these tasks for him.

He had to do everything himself, including repairing the garden fence, but he had to give up this job in order to conduct a prayer meeting.

His wife, Elizabeth, five years older than Paris, had been a member of the First Church of Boston before her marriage, and now sat in the church pews in Salem with the five Putnam ladies.

She was a devout, kind, obedient woman, gentle and well-behaved. Since the introduction of the School Act in 1647, every New Englander needed basic literacy skills, and Massachusetts' educational excellence was also attributed to this.

A wise father will not let his children waste food, and a wise mother will not punish and discipline her children. Paris will pray and read the Bible with his family every morning and evening. His servants need to do the same, Elizabeth

The girls will be taught to read and write.

At the same time, she also wanted to make this almost dilapidated house comfortable to live in. No matter what, she would read and discuss the Bible with the children at home. Later, she added a member, 12-year-old Ann Putnam, who was

Daughter of Thomas Putnam, a loyal supporter of Paris.

Paris's stubbornness and preaching still improved a little, although slowly but still progressing. Until the second half of January 1692, the Indians attacked York County and razed it to the ground. The pastor was scalped and died in

On the doorstep of his home, the news was originally blocked by heavy snow, but gradually spread with the arrival of the thaw period.

Indians always love to grunt, and the whispers sound like the devil's music. Therefore, in New England, the word grunt represents evil and rebellion. When there are more people grunting, riots are not far away.

The people of Salem also heard about this, but it had little impact on them. The reason why this village existed was also related to its ability to avoid Indian attacks. The locals called it the city on the hill, which comes from the Bible. They

is blessed by God.

However, even in such a quiet little village, there were murmurs, and people whispered about the strange things happening in the priest's house.

Parris asked the only licensed doctor in town, William Griggs, who had also just arrived in Salem, to treat his daughter and niece, but the doctor was helpless, and to make matters worse, Thomas Putnam's

Daughter Ann and Griggs' maid also fell ill one after another, with the same symptoms as Paris's nieces Abigail and Betty.

The young Dr. William asked the old Dr. Griggs to come forward. This doctor was more experienced and had been to many places. The old Dr. Griggs believed that William had brought the infectious disease home. He gave the Paris family

The girl judged that she had digestive disorder, but he refused to treat the Paris girl on her second visit.

The doctor asked everyone in the village to fast, but people would be idle if their mouths stopped chewing. "Devil's Hand" was a "diagnosis" generally accepted by the townspeople.

The news spread like wildfire like the news of the Indian attack in York County. New Englanders may not believe in unicorns and mermaids, but they believe in witches.

The strange thing is that they welcome witchcraft as long as it does not harm their own family. However, before Paris, the devil had never appeared in a priest's home.

This attracted the attention of another priest, who rushed to Salem without stopping to investigate the matter.

Cotton Mather is ten years younger than Paris, but unlike the unlucky Paris, he is already famous at the age of 29 and is gradually becoming the most famous figure in New England. He is not only tall and handsome, but also talented and unremitting.

Through hard work, he entered Harvard at the age of 11, started his first sermon at the age of 16, and led two exorcisms in Massachusetts.

Such a "superstar" cannot be retained in a place like Salem, and the purpose of his coming to Salem is to see the possessed house.

Paris was full of hostility towards him, and in a public sermon in the church he warned the parishioners that "God has sent out destroyers in anger."

If you put yourself in Paris's shoes, anyone would feel that fate is unfair. Even if his daughter and niece screamed at home for a month, it was still his home, not the "devil's lair" as Mather said.

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Mather regarded exorcism as a game blessed by God but full of dangers. He arrogantly believed that he could cope with any situation.

However, at this time, it started to rain heavily. The rain seemed like the sky was leaking, or someone was splashing water, and it continued to rain.

In such bad weather, Paris and his wife Elizabeth left their home and left their daughter and niece in the care of their neighbor Mary Sibley.

Among the better-off local families, she and her husband, a pipe repairer, could be regarded as the mainstay of the church. Samuel Sibley would intervene every time there was property that needed to be disposed of or a contract that needed to be guaranteed. Mary was in Paris.

The family is also very happy and contented.

The only thing that displeased Mary was the speed with which Paris solved the puzzle, so she arranged a secret experiment.

At this time, due to continuous heavy rain and the melting of winter snow, the river rose, the water overflowed the river bank, flooded homes, washed away Shengchang, washed away mills and bridges, and Essex County became a boiling and

Muddy swamp.

People who were providing disaster relief heard about what happened in Salem, and Thomas Putnam returned to town after saying hello to other Salem pastors.

Paris originally brought slaves over, but one of the young girls died of illness soon after arriving in Salem. Paris then bought an Indian slave, who stayed at home to take care of the children with Mary Sibley.

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Mary wanted to find out what was causing the torture to these children, so she asked Indian slaves to collect the girls' urine, bake it into cakes, and throw it to a dog.

When Paris found out, he was furious. Anti-magic was not allowed in the pastor's home. The pastors from Boston also concealed the experiment for his own sake, or for the sake of the church, and took great pains to suppress people's identification of witches.

Possession is different from a witch's curse. The devil is a spirit that possesses people. If the priest says he is gone, he will leave. The witch must find a living person to bear the blame.

Mary got into big trouble. Even if she was six months pregnant, she would still be hanged. Now that the matter was over, there was no point crying anymore. Fortunately for her, there was a woman in the town who was more suspicious than her.

On Monday morning, several villagers wearing mud-spattered cloaks approached two Salem judges and formally filed witchcraft charges. A few hours later, the village sheriff arrived with a warrant and a black stick.

, pried open a door. The house was located one mile southwest of the parsonage, and Sarah Good lived inside.

On the morning of March 1st, the sheriff took Sarah to the Ingersoll's tavern, where her interrogation would be held. If there is a center in the town, it is the Ingersoll's tavern, which is 50 meters away.

The chapel is just a few steps away, where Paris's congregation rests between Sunday sermons.

The tavern was more crowded than usual that morning. Martha Corey decided not to go to the trial and tried to persuade her husband not to go, but she failed. Giles Corey did not miss a minute of the hearing. After the town judge arrived

, the Ingersoll Tavern could not accommodate any more villains, so the trial was moved to the chapel.

According to Puritan teachings, the theater was a shameful and vain place. At that time, there was not even a single theater in North America. In its heyday, the chapel was just a dark room. It has not been repaired for many years. Now it is dark and bleak, almost unusable, but

It did not affect the "atmosphere of the show" at all. The farmers knew their position on the black wooden benches all too well, but the person at the pulpit table was not Parris, but Justice of the Peace Jonathan Cowin and John Hassan, who was conducting the trial.

Hosted by them.

Sarah soon admitted that she had tortured two Paris girls, Thomas Putnam's daughter and Griggs' maid, over the past two months.

The four girls began to twist violently when they saw her. What else could Sarah do, but Sarah also knew that Hassan had also arrested two other women.

I've always been lonely.

Maybe Sarah thought so at the time, so when Hassan asked for the fourth and fifth time who cast the spell on these children, Sarah Good said Sarah Osborne's name.

The girls who recovered clarified that it was Goode and Osborne who tortured them together. The two men would mutter when walking near other people's houses, as if they were chanting spells or communicating with the devil.

Hassan cross-examines the second suspect in court, middle-aged Sarah Osborne. Osborne has been pursuing an inheritance that her husband left her, and at the same time she began a relationship with an Irish farm.

They dated a worker and soon married, and rumors about her circulated for many years.

Compared with Goode, who has gone through many years of life and looks like she is in her seventies, but is actually only 38 years old, Osborne is much more decent, even though she is paralyzed in bed.

"I haven't met Goode," Osborne said to Hassan. "I don't know her either. I don't want to get her involved."

"But she's already involved you," Hassan prodded further.

In game theory, everyone knows that if everyone invites the most beautiful girl, the girl's other companions will turn away with pride, leaving behind the other unlucky ones who were rejected by the most beautiful "goddess".

They spend "bachelor's night" alone, so the best thing for everyone is that everyone invites the most beautiful girl's friends. As the saying goes, a bird in the hand is worth a flock of birds in the bush.

However, in reality, everyone encounters more of a prisoner's dilemma. If she confesses, she will be released immediately for meritorious service. She will even stand in the witness box like Abigail Hopps. The worst is that both of them will be imprisoned for eight years.

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But if she remained silent, she might be imprisoned alone for ten years.

Do you trust someone who is a near-stranger to you?

If you don't believe it, how can you expect her to remain silent like you?

Osborne said to Hassan, "I don't know her and I don't know why she would frame me."

Seeing that Osborne was not fooled, Hassan asked the girls to stand up and asked them to identify him. Every girl positively identified Osborne.

After his arrest, Osborne was thrown into jail.

That night, the guards at Salem Prison heard Osborne grunting.

The guard didn't hear it clearly at first, but then he heard it as he got closer. Osborne was saying: "It's better to say that I'm cursed than I am a witch."

The guard told Hassan about this, which aroused Hassan's suspicion. What did Osborne's words mean?

One, it was Sarah Good who cursed her.

Second, besides the two of them, there are other witches who have not been caught.

So Hassan decided to continue the "trial" tomorrow. He would catch all the witches in Salem and restore "tranquility" to the town.
Chapter completed!