PHILIP & MARY ENGLISH
Extremely wealthy merchant and his pregnant wife
REVEREND SAMUEL PARRIS
Salem Village’s controversial minister
INCREASE & COTTON MATHER
Father and son ministers from Boston who write terrifying books about witchcraft
BETTY PARRIS
Afflicted accuser, 9-year-old daughter of Reverend Parris
ABIGAIL WILLIAMS
Afflicted accuser, 11-year-old orphaned niece of Reverend Parris
ANN PUTNAM JR.
Afflicted accuser, 12-year-old friend of Betty and Abigail
THOMAS PUTNAM
Accuser, strongest supporter of Reverend Samuel Parris, father of Ann Putnam Jr.
ELIZABETH HUBBARD
Afflicted accuser, 17-year-old niece of a physician who blames witches for the afflictions
JOHN HATHORN
Interrogator during the preliminary witchcraft investigations
MARY WARREN
Afflicted accuser, 20-year-old servant of Elizabeth and John Proctor
MARGARET JACOBS
Confessed witch who accused her grandfather, George Jacobs Sr.
SUSANNA SHELDON
Afflicted accuser, 18-year-old refugee from the Indian wars
MERCY LEWIS
Afflicted accuser, 19-year-old servant of Ann Putnam Jr., and Indian attack survivor
WILLIAM PHIPS
Royal Governor of Massachusetts
WILLIAM STOUGHTON
Chief Justice—Court of Oyer and Terminer
GEORGE CORWIN
High Sheriff of Essex County
WITCHES! For centuries, these horrid creatures have invaded the nightmares of superstitious souls around the world. Who was to blame for causing a terrible, unexplained pain or an untimely death? What if your farm animals fell into a fit and began to dance and roar, or your milk jug shattered before your eyes for no reason, or your child was born deformed? A wicked witch must have been casting spells to harm the innocent or to settle a score.
In European lore, witches consorted with spirits shaped like animals; vicious cats perhaps, or wild black hogs, or birds. Far more sinister was the idea that witches were the enemies of God—and the agents of Satan himself.
But the most frightening thing of all was this: Anyone could be a witch—your own mother or father, your best friend, your tiny baby brother, or even your dog. And you might never know who was in league with the Devil until it was too late.
CHAPTER ONE
WHEREIN THE STAGE IS SET
A cross the wide ocean they came, European emigrants looking for a new beginning on American shores. Many settled in New England, and among these were the Puritans, an English religious sect hoping to live a simple, God-fearing life and to create a heaven on earth. Even before their first ships set sail for the port of Salem Town, Massachusetts, in 1629, they had bucked the British tide for years in an effort to purify their church, banishing every trace of pomp and circumstance, from priestly vestments and music to incense and colorful stained glass windows.
Yet with all their fine intentions, the voyagers had brought along a stowaway from their former home—a terrifying, ancient idea fated to wreak havoc in their new land. For the Puritans believed in the existence of two entirely different worlds.
The first of these was the Natural World of human beings and everything else we can see or touch or feel. But rooted deep within the Puritans’ souls like some strange invasive weed lurked their belief in a second world, an Invisible World swarming with shadowy apparitions and unearthly phantoms of the air.
To be sure, many spirits in this hidden world were wondrous and benevolent. These winged seraphs were the angels of the Lord, who wished only to protect the living or offer advice in times of trouble. But the Invisible World was perilous too, boiling over with fire and brimstone and legions of evil, malicious creatures. So great was their power that they dared to do battle with God’s own angels—and the leader of them all was the Devil, a fallen angel himself!
The Devil’s malice was most fierce and most cunning when he waged his wicked wars upon God’s Children. To that end, he and his brutes, each one a fiend to the bone, formed a vicious army determined to destroy everything that was good in the Natural World. Among Satan’s soldiers were foul-smelling souls of the dead, horrid imps of darkness cleverly disguised as animals, and a ghastly knot of demonic fallen angels who denounced the word of God. And perhaps worst of all were the Devil’s witches, for they could hide in the land of mortals to cast their spells upon the innocent.
The Puritans were terrified by this Invisible World, whose hideous creatures were every bit as real to them as their own families, neighbors, and farm animals.
Puritan ministers preached that it was God Almighty who controlled these two worlds, and he was fearsome, vengeful, and easy to displease. Though pious Children of the Lord might be rewarded for good behavior, any sinners