Orson Card - Heartfire

"He made no threat to me," said Purity.

"His very existence is a menace to all godly souls," said Quill. "You could feel that, even if he uttered no threat, because the spirit of Christ dwells in you."

"Do you think so, sir?" asked Purity.

Quill was writing in his book.

"What do you write, sir?"

"I keep notes of all interviews," said Quill. "You never know what might turn out to be evidence. Don't mind me."

"It's just that... I wasn't giving my evidence yet."

"Isn't that silly of me?" said Quill. "Please, sit down, and tell me about this devil-worshiping slave of hell."

He spoke so cheerfully that Purity almost missed the dark significance of the words. When she realized what he had said, she corrected him at once. "I know nothing of what or how the man worships," said Purity. "Only that he claims to have a witchy knack."

"But you see, Miss Purity, such witchy knacks are given to people only because they serve the devil."

"What I'm saying is I never saw him worship the devil, nor speak of the devil, nor show a sign of wishing to serve him."

"Except for his knack, which of course does serve the devil."

"I never actually saw the knack, either, with my own eyes," said Purity. "I just heard tales of it from the boy who traveled with him."

"Name the boy," said Quill, his pen poised.

"Arthur Stuart."

Quill looked up at her, not writing.

"It is a joke, sir, to name him so, but the joke was made years ago by those who named him. I do not jest with you now."

He wrote the name.

"He's a half-Black boy," she began, "and--"

"Singed in the fires of hell," said Quill.

"No, I think he's merely the son of a White slave owner who forced himself on a Black slave girl, or that's the implication of the story I was told."

Quill smiled. "But why do you resist me?" he said. "You say he's half-Black. I say this shows he was singed by the fires of hell. And you say, no, not at all-- and then proceed to tell me he is the product of a rape of a Black woman by a White man. How could one better describe such a dreadful conception than by saying the child was singed in the fires of hell? You see?"

Purity nodded. "I thought you were speaking literally."

"I am," said Quill.

"I mean, that you literally meant that the boy had been to hell and burned there a little."

"So I say," Quill said, smiling. "I don't understand this constant insistence on correcting me when we already agree."

"But I'm not correcting you, sir."

"And is that statement not itself a correction? Or am I to take it some other way? I fear you're too subtle for me, Miss Purity. You dazzle me with argument. My head spins."

"Oh, I can't imagine you ever being confused by anybody," said Purity, laughing nervously.

"And again you feel the need to correct me. Is something troubling you? Is there some reason that you find it impossible to feel comfortable agreeing with me?"

"I'm perfectly comfortable to agree with you."

"A statement which, while sweet of sentiment, does constitute yet another disagreement with my own prior statement. But let us set aside the fact that you are unable to accept a single word I utter at face value. What puzzles me, what I must have your help to clarify, is the matter of some missing information, and some extra information. For instance, your deposition includes several extraneous persons whom no one else has seen. To wit: a lawyer named Verily Cooper, a riverman named Mike Fink, and a half-Black boy named Arthur Stuart."

"But I'm not the only one who saw them," said Purity.

"So the deposition is wrong?"

"I never said in the deposition that I was the only one who saw them."

"Excellent! Who else was there at this witches' sabbath?"

"What witches' sabbath?" Purity was confused now.

"Did you say you stumbled upon this coven of witches as they frolicked naked on the banks of the river?"

"Two of them were bathing, but I saw no sign of anything more dire than that."

"So to you, when witches cavort naked before your eyes, it is innocent bathing?"

"No, I just... I never thought of it as a... it wasn't a worship of any kind."

"But the tossing of the child toward heaven-- a Black child, no less-- and the way the naked man laughed at you, unashamed of his nakedness..."

Purity was sure she had neither spoken of nor written down any such description. "How could you know of that?"

"So you admit that you did not include this vital evidence in your deposition?"

"I didn't know it was evidence."

"Everything is evidence," said Quill. "Beings who frolic naked, laugh at Christians, and then disappear without a trace-- which part of this experience would not be evidence? You must leave nothing out."

"I see that now," said Purity. "I reckon I didn't know what a witches' sabbath might look like, so I didn't know when I saw it."

"But if you didn't know, why would you denounce them?" asked Quill. "You haven't brought a false accusation, have you?"

"No, sir! Every word I said was true."

"Oh, and what about the words you did not say?"

Purity was even more confused. "But if I didn't say them, how can I know which words they are?"

"But you know them. We just discovered them. The fact that it was a pagan bacchanal, with a naked man molesting a naked boy before your eyes--"

"Molest! He only tossed him in the air as a father might toss his own child, or an older brother might toss a younger."

"So you think this might be incest as well?" asked Quill.

"All I ever thought was to report what they said of themselves, that Alvin Smith is the seventh son of a seventh son, with all the knacks that such men are prone to have."

"So you believe the words of the devil concerning this?" asked Quill.

"The words of what devil?"

"The devil who spoke to you and told you that knacks just happen to come to seventh sons of seventh sons, when in fact witchcraft can only be practiced by those who have given themselves over to the service of Satan."

"I didn't understand that," said Purity. "I thought it was the use of hidden powers that was the crime, all by itself."

"Evil is never all by itself," said Quill. "Remember that when you testify you will take an oath with your hand on the sacred scripture, the very word of God under your hand, which is the same as holding Christ by the hand, for he is the very Word. You will give oath to tell the truth, the whole truth. So you must not attempt to withhold any more information as you have been doing."

"But I've withheld nothing! I've answered every question!"

"Again she must contradict the servant of God even when he speaks the plain truth. You withheld the information about pederasty, about the witches' sabbath, about incest-- and you attempted to pretend that this Alvin's hidden powers came naturally from the order in which he was born within his family, even though it is impossible for any such devilish power to come from nature, for nature was born in the mind of God, while witchy powers come from the anti-Christ. Don't you know that it is a terrible sin to bear false witness?"

"I do know it, and I told the truth as I understood it."

"But you understand it better now, don't you?" said Quill. "So when you testify, you will speak truly, won't you, and name things as they truly were? Or do you intend to lie to protect your witch friends?"

"My-- my witch friends?"

"Did you not swear that they were witches? Are you recanting that testimony?"

"I deny that they were friends of mine, not that they were witches."

"But your deposition," said Quill. "You seem to be retreating from that document as fast as you can."

"I stand by every word in it."

"And yet you claim these men were not your friends? You say that they pleaded with you to go with them as they continued their wicked journey through New England. Is this something they would ask of a stranger?"