Hester

Reverend Samuel Parris arrives to become the new minister of Salem Village. Major William Hathorne claims Salem is “under siege” by Native Americans, who use “black magic” to battle the colonists in Maine and “refuse to yield” the land the colonists claimed (92). Tituba, an enslaved woman whom Parris brought to Salem, finds Hathorne cruel but feels kinship with a Native American man called John Indian. 

Isobel visits the East India Marine Society Hall and is greeted eagerly by Mr. Saul when he learns she is Darling’s guest. She admires items from all around the world, enjoying her freedom in Edward’s absence. She is particularly impressed with a Polynesian tapestry, and recalling Darling’s comment that Polynesian embroidery is made to be viewed from both sides, carefully lifts the canvas. Nat catches Isobel examining the stitching, but does not tell Mr. Saul. She hurries away, embarrassed, as Nat follows her to ask what she intended with the tapestry. She reveals she is a “needlewoman.” Nat reveals he now knows she is married to Edward, who left. Isobel chafes at the idea that someone has been gossiping about her. In her agitation, she tears a fingernail, which bleeds. Nat offers her a handkerchief to clean the injury, and comments that she is “just like a girl [he’s] been inventing” (99). He confesses he is a writer and has been working on a story during “the witchcraft delusion” (100). Isobel is alarmed as he briefly explains the Salem Witch Trials; she had not thought this kind of persecution happened in America. Nat realizes she is upset and quickly leaves. Isobel returns home and sketches a dress. She imagines herself wearing the dress, and Nat admiring her.

Isobel Gowdie wakes beside a stream after giving birth to her child, who is not alive upon delivery. She sees lights that she recognizes as belonging to “the wee faeries” (102) and follows them for a month, until she arrives at a crone’s house. The crone heals her. Gowdie wishes to stay, but the crone tells her to return to “the world of men” (102) to “give birth to a strong line of women” (103).

Isobel plans to purchase supplies for her dress, but cannot find her coins. She realizes Edward stole them. Enraged, she burns all of Edward’s possessions except his valuable apothecary book. Isobel goes to Zeke and Mercy’s home. Though she doesn’t explicitly blame Edward for the theft, they seem to know he is responsible. Mercy offers seeds on the promise that Isobel trades half the food grown in return, but Isobel offers to make an ointment for cuts instead; Mercy agrees. Zeke helps Isobel plant, and Ivy brings dinner. Isobel resolves to make something for the girl as thanks for both the food and company. She is pleased when she begins to menstruate, meaning she is not pregnant.

The following day, Isobel goes into town and asks a shopkeeper if she can embroider gloves for sale in his shop. He sends her away angrily, saying fabric mills will take “her kind.” Another shopkeeper does not need Isobel’s handiwork but kindly references her to two other possible employers. At a dressmaker’s shop, she meets a friendly Irish girl named Nell who is excited that she is Scottish. Encouraged by Nell, she displays her mother’s gloves and the interior of her cloak. The dressmaker admires Isobel’s work but sends her away when she learns she is a new arrival from Scotland. Nell invites Isobel to visit the Silas house, where she works.

Isobel visits the shop that Widow Higgins recommended, where Felicity Adams is looking for a stitcher. Mrs. Adams hires her to stitch, pin, and embroider three pairs of gloves in a short amount of time. Isobel leaves the shop in good spirits and encounters Nat outside his uncles’ stagecoach offices, where he works. She tells him about her new job, urging him to keep the gloves a secret, then asks about his story. He says he has put it aside in favor of another story, which is to be read by a New York editor; he asks her to keep his writing a secret, as he publishes anonymously. They bond over admiration for Walter Scott, and Isobel expresses liking Rebecca from Ivanhoe, who is tried for witchcraft. Nat confides that his stories are dreary rather than heroic. Isobel offers to return his cleaned handkerchief as is, but he asks her to embroider his initials and hawthorn blossoms, which she takes as romantic. She says the hawthorn tree is called the May tree in Scotland and is a home to faeries. Nat expresses interest in inhabiting “a magical world” (119) and invites her to sew with him as he writes some time.

Isobel consults Edward’s apothecary book and learns hawthorns are purported to heal broken hearts. She sees this as a sign that “magical beings” brought her to Nat. She sees vibrant colors as she stitches Nat’s handkerchief, upon which she includes a small scarlet “A,” as her mother taught her. Nat’s desire to pursue magical worlds offers Isobel a new perspective on her colors, leading her to consider immersing herself in them rather than hiding from them.

Isobel Gowdie remarries and has three sons. Her fourth birth, a daughter, is difficult and tended by a midwife who recognizes her witch-pricker marks. The midwife warns Gowdie that if she is not careful, her daughter will travel the same path as her. Fearing the faeries who rescued her will take her daughter as payment, Gowdie guards the child fervently.

Isobel begins work at Mrs. Adams’s shop and learns to downplay her Scottish accent. She listens to local gossip, particularly about the upcoming Hamilton Hall banquet, a much anticipated social event. She thinks of Nat daily, but hears nothing about him or his family. Isobel encounters Nat a week later, disappointed when he does not seem excited to see her. He is brooding over a rejection from his publisher, who wishes to see something “truly American,” by which he means stories of democracy triumphing over tyranny. Nat wishes to write more mysterious stories and inadvertently insults Isobel’s needlework. She retorts and he calls her intriguing, which flatters her.

The stitcher at Mrs. Adams’s shop, Abigail, comments on seeing Isobel and Nat together, calling Nat odd. Isobel reminds Abigail that she is married and suggests Abigail is the one interested in him. She retorts that though the Hathornes are an old Salem family, they lost their fortune; Nat must marry an heiress to restore it. Abigail credits this loss to “the curse,” and relays Nat’s ancestor’s role in the witch trials. She believes the women killed in the trials were innocent of witchcraft, but with that said, Isobel questions why there would be a curse. She distracts Abigail with talk of the banquet, hiding her struggle with embroidering on gloves.

Isobel embroiders at home, imagining Nat watching her work. She wonders if her needlework might count as witchcraft even if she doesn’t cast spells. She thinks about the power of needles in stitching wounds and recalls a childhood incident wherein she saw a thief’s fingers be stitched together, a punishment she would like to see befall Edward.

Isobel spends a day stitching the word “STRENGTH” into an embroidered leopard on a pair of men’s gloves but is dissatisfied with the result. She feels foolish for considering magic and despairs over being unable to deliver three pairs of gloves by the end of the week. She replaces the ruined gloves with the last of her coins and returns to the East India Marine Society Hall to reexamine the proportions of the leopard on the Polynesian tapestry. Isobel sees poppets and “witches’ needles” displayed, and wonders which were used on women persecuted by Nat’s ancestor. She passes Hamilton Hall, looking inside to see many Black workers preparing for the banquet, including Mercy and Mr. Remond, a leader in Salem’s Black community who is widely well-regarded.

Isobel passes Remond’s Food and Fancy Cakes, and is offered a free cookie by one of Mr. Remond’s daughters, Nancy, whom she recognizes as the girl who helped Widow Higgins the day she arrived in Salem. Nancy says “we” feel grateful that Isobel saved Darling, but doesn’t clarify whom she is referencing. She expresses regret that the shop uses sugar from the West Indies, citing the particularly brutal conditions that enslaved people suffer there. Isobel notices the cookie shapes echo the shapes in Mercy’s stitching.

At the next market day, Isobel visits Mercy’s stall, hoping to learn something from her stitch work. Mercy agrees to teach her to embroider gloves in exchange for some of Isobel’s pennyroyal salve, which she plans to sell at her stall. She shows Isobel how to use a hollow glove frame to maintain the shape of a hand. The women sew together, establishing camaraderie. Isobel offers Mercy a pillow with Zeke’s words “Plant a Rainbow” embroidered on it (143), but Mercy refuses it, as Zeke can’t read.

Isobel delivers her three pairs of gloves to Mrs. Adams, two bearing irises and the third with sea motifs; all three are embroidered with a secret “A.” Mrs. Adams prices them higher than her payment to Isobel, and reminds her to not sell gloves on her own. Abigail echoes this warning, claiming Mrs. Adams is vengeful.

Reverend Parris, who has not been paid his stipend due to disputes in Salem Village, encounters 12-year-old Ann Putnam, who looks ill and nearly faints when she sees Tituba and John Indian. The narration announces that Ann and other local girls will soon begin to “cry out in anguish at the sight of Tituba” (146), which links to Ann’s history of accusations of witchcraft.

Isobel longs to discuss her confused feelings about Salem with Nat. She lingers by the Charter Ale House, hoping to encounter him. He eventually appears, and they converse about Isobel’s experiences with Mrs. Adams. Isobel references Nat’s previous insult of needlework, leading him to apologize. He shares knowledge of women’s fashion gleaned from his sister, offering to ask for more information if he sees her over dinner, though he prefers dining alone. Isobel compares the two of them, saying that though they work alone, perhaps they are not at their best alone. Nat calls her “intriguing” again, and says he changed his story after meeting her, to make the ending less violent. She protests that she is not the same as his character, but he counters that she appeared “with magic of [her] own and witch marks sewn into [her] red cape” (150). The comments make Isobel nervous, though she is grateful for Nat’s offer of help. He tells her to embroider a shawl for the Hamilton House banquet and promises to make it noticed. She protests that Edward will return by then, but Nat dismisses this as having no effect on her work. Isobel agrees to the secret plan.

A blizzard strikes Salem, and Reverend Parris, who has gone unpaid for four months, preaches about approaching destruction. Several days later, his daughter and niece fight “invisible demons.” Reverend John Hale and John Hathorne arrive and order Satan to leave the girls, but this has no effect. A local woman named Mary Sibley tells Tituba to make “a witch cake” to “reveal the true witch” (153).

Isobel cannot afford the expensive camel-hair shawl Nat recommended she embroider, so she purchases a cotton one instead, cursing Edward’s thievery. She encounters Nell with a boy in town, and retrieves an expensive package that the girl dropped, earning Nell’s gratitude. She again invites Isobel to interview for a dressmaking job with her employer, Mrs. Silas. Mrs. Silas recognizes Isobel and asks about the designs on her cape. Isobel admits she is Isobel Gowdie’s descendent. Though Mrs. Silas disavows belief in witchcraft, Isobel detects fear in the woman, who still hires her. Isobel is to secretly alter the wedding gown for Mrs. Silas’s pregnant daughter Charlotte Silas.

Isobel alters the wedding gown and thinks about being free from secrets. After a week, the dress is ready. Charlotte compliments Isobel and lends her a magazine. Zeke drives Isobel home and talks about different traders who come to Salem port. A Black man approaches, asking for directions to Remond’s cake house, which Zeke provides. Isobel wonders why the man would be going to Remond’s at night, but Zeke is evasive. She hopes whatever happens will not bring Zeke and Mercy to ruin. At home, she reads the borrowed magazine, pausing at a story called “The Manuscript, Charles Cunningham,” which references “witchcraft delusion” (164). Isobel feels a strong connection to Nat as she reads.

Tituba, Goodwife Sarah Good, and Widow Osborne are accused of witchcraft by Better Parris, Abigail Williams, Ann Putnam, and Betty Hubbard. John Hathorne, determined to make the accused confess, quotes the Bible: “Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live” (qtd. in Albanese 166). Sarah Good denies the accusations as the girls scream as if being tortured. Sarah accuses Widow Osborne, but William Good accuses his wife, citing a “Devil’s mark” on her shoulder. Sarah’s four-year-old daughter, Dorcas, watches from outside the courtroom.