Marie de Montalvo's BURNING WITCHES
was published in 1927 by J.H. Sears & Company, Inc.
It's a story about an emancipated young woman in New York City, but the
Prologue describes a much earlier American scene.
The family has given Emily permission to upload the Prologue here.
Enjoy!
The men below dispersed silently into the darkness. He heard his father come upstairs to bed. Presently he too went to bed, but the spring moonlight poured in at the window, and he could not sleep.
An hour before dawn he rose and made his way to Joan's, his gun over his shoulder, munching a dry crust as he went. He did not approach the house, but busied himself in the outbuildings; after which he went into the forest, for he felt strangely restless, and tramped for hours in search of game--but returned empty handed because his eye lacked keenness and his aim was faulty. As he crossed the common of the little town a slender spiral of smoke curled upward through the May sunshine--where Joan, the light hearted, had met the fate of a witch that spring morning of 16--, because Phineas had milked her cows and cut her wood while the godly slept. |