Ribbons and pearls hung from his breeches and his doublet was dyed a shocking shade of peacock blue. At his chest was an outsized medallion engraved with a family crest, featuring two griffins, a plumed helmet, shield and the scales of justice. (Barty had warned them about the magistrate’s ostentatious leanings. Since his family had been successful wool merchants, the primary motif on any family crest really ought to have been a sheep, Barty told them gleefully. Bulstrode, he said, had networked his way to the position of magistrate through political manoeuvring and gratuitous backstabbing.)

  “I demand to see your authority to investigate here!” Bennett exclaimed. He had a squint in one eye and the other one bulged; it made his head seem unbalanced. He looked older than his years and wore an extravagant periwig.

  Jacob rose to his full height - considerably higher than Bennett - aware that dealing with pomposity and power was his role in the team. “Sir, we are sent here by Mr Samuel Pepys, Clerk of the Acts to the Navy Board, and acquaintance of King Charles himself.”

  For a while, that seemed to do the trick. Bennett visibly shrank, unaccustomed to being challenged, particularly by employees of acquaintances of royalty. However, his arrogance quickly returned. Brampton was his domain, after all. “Must I repeat myself?” he asked, glowering. “Where is your authority?”

  Verbally cornered, Jacob played for time by looking in his leather bag, despite knowing there was nothing in there bar some cheese.

  Abby intervened. “Mr Bennett…”

  The magistrate cut her dead. “Quiet, wench! You shall not address me! I am the magistrate here, and you are a serving girl. Yet you presume to investigate this ungodly act of witchcraft! The only judge in this matter shall be the witch-finder himself, Simon Hopkins, whom I have duly engaged. You two are nought but charlatans.”

  Jacob attempted to speak: “Mr Pepys…”

  Once again, Bennett interjected. “How am I to be sure that you are indeed here on behalf of this Mr Pepys, when you present to me no letter of authority? For all I am aware, you have concocted the gentleman from thin air.” Bennett sneered, enjoying himself.

  Pepys had told the inquisitors that he was acquainted with the magistrate - had referred to him as “an indecent fool” - so it seemed certain that Bennett was lying. But what could they do?

  Preening a dangling pearl, the magistrate continued, “As a matter of fact, I ride to Huntingdon forthwith, to secure from Sir Edward Mallory a Letter of Marque, authorising me to detain those I deem to be obstructing justice.” He smiled slickly. “If you do not leave Brampton by sunset tomorrow, I shall have you jailed.”

  With that, he turned on his expensive heel and returned to his waiting carriage.

  “He’s very keen to see us gone,” Abby noted drily.

  Jacob could not accept his threat as calmly. “What shall we do?” he asked through gritted teeth. “Mr Pepys will never forgive me. And what of his sister?”

  “What we shall do, Mr Standish, is to speak with Helen Bennett.”

  Jacob performed a double-take. “Speak? With the magistrate’s wife? But that would only enrage him further!”

  “Precisely,” said Abigail, grinning broadly.

  Jacob’s expression darkened. “Then I fear we are playing with fire.”

  A servant showed the inquisitors into a grand, high-ceilinged drawing room, as ostentatious as her husband’s garb: a grand piano, gilt mirrors, floor-to-ceiling crimson drapes, and intricate frescoes depicting gods, angels and… indeed there he was: Bulstrode Bennett himself, astride a winged unicorn. The furniture was all rich, upholstered mahogany. Logs blazed in a fireplace the size of a castle portico.

  Helen Bennett, in her early fifties, was seated in a gilt armchair so ornate it could have doubled as a throne. A male servant was fanning her with an exotic feather, while a female servant primped her extravagantly coiffed hair. On noticing Abby and Jacob, she dismissed both servants, who bowed, curtsied, and departed the room like wraiths.

  “I thought my husband would have frightened you off,” she said, regarding them over her nose.

  Jacob bowed and began stammering an apology, which she silenced with a dismissive gesture.

  “Good for you,” she said. “The man’s a bully and a lout.”

  Abby couldn’t help smirking; Jacob merely looked bewildered.

  “Come,” she said, gesticulating towards a footstool. “Be seated.”

  The inquisitors regarded the stool with puzzlement; they would not both fit on there.

  “I am content to stand,” Jacob said loftily, offering Abby the stool.

  Both had noticed a distinctive pungency - top notes of bergamot and mint - the moment they entered the room. A perfume, so liberally applied, it overpowered the aromas of the burning wood in the fireplace and the leather of the furniture.

  “Mistress Bennett,” said Jacob. “I cannot help but notice…”

  “The elegance of the decor?” she second-guessed him. “The style is all mine, I assure you.”

  Jacob adjusted his periwig. “Your taste is indeed exquisite, Mistress Bennett, however I was referring to your perfume, which is… equally exquisite.”

  “It is Bulstrode’s favourite,” she told him. “I wear it solely because it is the only one he chooses to purchase. Unfortunately, my husband has the good taste of a farmyard sow.”

  Reading the room, Abby took a gamble. “Mistress Bennett, you and Master Bennett don’t seem to…”

  “Like one another?” she interjected. “Nay, we do not! Cheeky young wench.”

  Abby realised she had overstepped the mark. “I assure you that was not…”

  Helen lifted a necklace from her throat. It glittered and sparkled as she did so. “I would ask you: how many diamonds and sapphires do you own?”

  “None,” Jacob replied dutifully.

  Helen tutted. “I was aware of that, you silly fellow. My point is this: What are you prepared to endure in exchange for extravagance and luxury? Our days are numbered, after all. Such is God’s way. For certain gentleman, we pray, the count may be mercifully brief.”

  Jacob was dumbstruck. Was she wishing her husband… dead?

  Abby shifted on the footstool. “Mistress Bennett, may I ask…?”

  “You may not.”

  “…What you make of this talk of witchcraft and the death of Goody Grimston?”

  “Oh!” shrieked the old woman, fanning herself as if about to swoon. “Do not mention that vile pickthank’s name in this house! Besmirching the reputation of a lady! Good riddance to foul knave, I say.”

  Jacob’s voice finally returned. “A foul knave besmirched your reputation?”

  “Cease this insolent chatter!” Helen exclaimed. “I will not hear his name in this house!” She rose and began theatrically almost-fainting around the room, all the while shrieking for her servant. “Benjamin! Benjamin!” When Benjamin appeared, she ordered him, “Show the visitors out! They bring nought but pestilent air! I shall have to lie down!”

  Chapter seventeen

  A New Curse

  Abby and Jacob headed back in the direction of the church, with plans to refresh themselves at The Bull. Goody’s funeral, they felt certain - or at least, dearly hoped - would have finished by now.

  “We must discover in what manner Goody Grimston wronged Helen Bennett,” Abby said.

  “Aye,” Jacob replied, “I…” A hacking cough stopped him in his tracks.

  Abby patted his back. “You look drawn, Jacob,” she said, when he had recovered. “Perhaps we should rest this afternoon? We’ve worked tirelessly and accomplished a great deal in a short time.”

  He would hear none of it. “Nonsense! Simon Hopkins may arrive in Brampton at any moment. We must clear Paulina’s name in all haste.”

  Just then, a distant woman’s voice could be heard calling out urgently, “Mr Standish!”

  Up ahead, they saw Paulina Pepys emerge from the churchyard and run towards them. She was clearly troubled.

  Breathlessly, Paulina related how two nights ago, Rebecca Thacker had stormed into her house demanding to speak with her father. An argument had ensued, concerning an alleged overcharge for clothing he had commissioned. Paulina had no idea where the innuendo had originated, she told them (and Jacob wisely did not tell her).

  Harsh words had been spoken by her friend to her father, culminating in her wishing a pox on him and his family. “She was in a rage and did not truly mean it,” Paulina suggested.

  She went on, struggling to maintain composure, “This morning, after you departed, my father became gravely ill. I helped him undress and put him to bed. My mother had not risen since the terrible events of last night. Despite all my attempts with herbal remedies, nothing has cured them.

  “My father is stubborn and he refuses a physician. I fear gravely for his life… It left me no choice. I sought out Archibald Bramwell and implored him to visit, against my father’s wishes.” With that, Paulina’s emotions overcame her, and she began to sob.

  Abby found herself becoming irritated by her master’s sister’s propensity for tears. It paid to be made of sterner stuff, she had learned.

  At length, Paulina was able to continue. “The physician spoke with my mother, and the argument with Rebecca was mentioned. My mother began repeating that she was cursed by a witch, insisting that Rebecca’s witchcraft had confined them to their beds and blighted their souls.”

  “Have your parents not been ill for some time?” asked Jacob.

  “Aye,” Paulina replied, “though it was only today they were confined to their beds.”

  “Perhaps your mother attributed the witchcraft to Rebecca, in the hope it might divert the same charge from you?” Abby suggested, wondering whether family loyalty might explain the outburst.

  “Nay!” wailed Paulina. “They are friends! My mother was suffering from delirium! She did not know what she was saying!”

  Jacob put a comforting hand on Paulina’s shoulder, the touch noticeably calming her. “Then we must ensure that word of this does not spread further,” he said.

  Paulina’s head dropped. “We are too late, Mr Standish. Bramwell, being in the employ of the Ravenscourt estate, informed me he was duty-bound to report any accusation of witchcraft to the local magistrate.”

  “Bulstrode Bennett!” the inquisitors exclaimed in unison.

  The three of them returned to the Pepys home. There, a plan was hatched, which gave Paulina some hope, and at length she brightened.

  They would leave John and Margaret in the care of a trusted friend - not Rebecca Thacker, for obvious reasons - and would walk together into Huntingdon. There, they would seek out Sir Edward Mallory, whom Bennett had mentioned as a senior legal figure, to appeal to him for sense and reason.

  If Bennett’s superior did not harbour the same fervent belief in witchcraft, they hoped he might be a powerful ally. (Actually, Abby, who was familiar with the political wheedlings of her master’s friends in high places, was sceptical. It was her belief that such men were swayed by popular opinion, for the sake of their position of power. She did not let on.)

  As they left the Pepys’s house, Jacob checked around the foot of the door. “No poppet,” he pointed out. “Yet Rebecca’s witchcraft is supposedly at play here.”

  Chapter eighteen

  Hopkins Interrogates

  The tests for witchcraft were simple and effective, as practised by Simon’s father on countless occasions. This first one involved searching the accused women’s bodies for witches’ marks: often teet-like, although any discolouration or blemish might arouse suspicion. It was through these that witches were said to suckle their demonic familiars, having first made a covenant with the Devil himself, to serve him, and to deny God and Jesus Christ.

  The Witchcraft Act of 1541 was the first to set out penalties, including execution and the forfeiture of possessions, for those practising witchcraft. It was enacted during the reign of Henry VIII, and forbade anyone to [translated from the Early Modern English]:

  “…use, devise, practise or exercise, or cause to be devised, practised or exercised, any invocations or conjurations of Sprites, witchcrafts, enchantments or sorceries with the intent of finding money or treasure, or to waste, consume or destroy any person, or to provoke any person to unlawful love, or for any other unlawful intent or purpose…”

  It was repealed six years later but brought back under Elizabeth I as the Witchcraft Act Against Conjurations, Enchantments and Witchcrafts of 1562. This had then been broadened under James I, in 1603, removing a small hope once afforded accused clergymen, that they would be tried by a more lenient ecclesiastical court. (Although witches were predominantly female, around one-tenth of those executed for the crime were men.)

  It was this 1603 Witchcraft Act against Conjuration, Witchcraft and Dealing with Evil and Wicked Spirits that fired and enabled Matthew Hopkins, and would do likewise for his son.

  So he reacted with fury when Faith Jarvis and Hester Quill, sought him out at The Blacksmith’s Inn, to tell him in faltering voices that they had found no suspicious marks on any of the three accused witches’ bodies.

  Jarvis offered, “There was a mark on Sarah Sawyer, in the region of…”

  But Quill cut her off. “That was a mole, sir. I’d swear to it.”

  “The Devil himself works with these witches to conceal their wickedness!” Hopkins thundered, launching his hat against a wall. Then, calming, he beckoned the women closer and spoke in a conspiratorial tone: “But they shall not escape justice, for God is on our side. We shall watch them together on this night. And the next night. And the next, as it may be so necessary. We shall witness the witches conjure their imps, and then they shall confess.”

  So began the second test: watching. It was a laborious process, waiting for the accused women to summon their familiars, which would prove them to be witches. Such was Hopkins’s conviction, he felt assured of success.

  Yet no imps came.

  Faith Jarvis nodded off first, seated in the village hall around midnight, while Hopkins paced the room distractedly. When the accused old woman, Dorothy Kipling’s head fell to her chest, he lunged towards the poor wretch and shook her chair violently.

  “Nay, witch! You shall not sleep!” he told her.

  “Shir,” she pleaded through withered gums. “Why do you shtrike me? I am but an old woman who hash done no evil.”

  “Thou art a witch!” he railed. “Conjure thine imp, the demon Pluck, and we may be done.”

  She shook her head pitifully. “I have no imp, shir.”

  This went on, as Hopkins had considered it might, for three days and three nights. Jarvis and Quill took time out in shifts while Hopkins, powered by righteous fervour, barely slept, catching an hour here or there, and commanding his watchers not to allow a witch to do the same.

  The accused women were walked around the room, shuffling in a trance-like state, as if they were sleepwalking. Quill one time spoke up for them, asking for mercy on their behalf, but Hopkins only threatened to dock her pay, and she fell silent.

  Dorothy Kipling and Prudence and Sarah Sawyer grew pale, scarlet-eyed and feverish, and cried out, begging to be freed, or protesting their innocence. At one point, Prudence began laughing hysterically and was hushed angrily by the witch-finder. Still no imps came.

  On the third night, Hopkins switched to a new tactic: he would take each woman alone into a back room and interrogate her one-on-one. Faith Jarvis would accompany him as a witness and take notes (Hester Quill being unable to read or write).

  It was then that he made his breakthrough.

  As he returned to the hall, Prudence Sawyer shuffled behind him, head bowed, ghostly white. Her mother looked up blankly. Dorothy Kipling had fallen asleep.

  Hopkins, who now resembled something conjured by demons himself, planted his leather boots apart and slammed his staff into the floor, waking Kipling with a start.

  “The girl hath confessed to witchcraft!” he announced.

  Quill gasped. Sarah Sawyer and Dorothy Kipling did not register. Their minds were filled with anguished voices, and their eyes registered only a blur.

  Paying off his two watchers - three shillings apiece - Hopkins locked the condemned women in the hall for the rest of the night and finally, blessedly, they were allowed to sleep.

  Prudence had confessed to him that she had cursed Henry Drayton’s wife, Lucy. That she had sent her familiar, Dainty, to poison the woman’s milk, which had been denied to her mother. And that when Lucy died, they had greatly rejoiced and held a sabbat, attended by their imps, Prickears, Dainty and Pluck.

  Hopkins was assiduous in his work. He was only too aware that many had escaped justice and God’s retribution through a lack of evidence, or by questioning the methods through which that evidence had been obtained. He would dot every i and cross every t. None would slip through his net.

  “You were aided in this witchcraft by Dorothy Kipling?” he asked Prudence.

  “Aye,” she replied.

  “And by your mother, Sarah Sawyer?”

  “Aye,” she replied.

  With that single word, poor Prudence may have condemned her own mother, whom she loved with all her heart, to death.

  Chapter nineteen

  To Huntingdon

  Paulina hesitated to leave her parents’ bedsides, even under the care of her good friend, Mabel Fenwick. As an experienced midwife, Mabel was well-versed in healthcare, yet Paulina feared her parents were so gravely ill that they might not survive even her brief absence.

  Sensing this, Mabel reassured her. “The walk will do you good,” she said. “T’ain’t healthy to be cooped up indoors all day, tending to the sick. John and Margaret will be fine with me, don’t ’e worry.”

  Still the mood was sombre as they passed over Nun’s Bridge and joined George Street, Fairfax’s estate sprawling to their left. Far ahead, they could make out a horse and rider heading also towards Huntingdon.