“They moved away from her and left her alone in her pew. I could not bear it, so I bade Mary stay in our pew and went to sit beside her. I held her hand. She was trembling.”
[…]
”‘Friend of witches,’ they hissed at me when I left,” Mama recounted. “Oh, I shall never forget it.”
“We went once that week to see Mama in Salem Prison. It was such a terrible place that Mary and I wept openly. But Mama was so busy attending to the other women that she could not abide our tears.”
“Mostly I thought of Mama. And when I first sat here, with my three-year-old boy beside me and the baby in my arms, it was Mama’s face I saw, Mama’s voice I heard, like it was yesterday.”
“After a few moments, Mama raised her head. “One of the things you will someday learn, daughters,” she said to me, “is that parents are never sure if certain decisions we make concerning our children are right.”