Salem Recap: S1E2 The Stone Child
Cotton
believes that most of those who have lived and died are in hell. He thinks that Hell has
enlarged itself, and she is America. Three witches have already hung, but there
seems to be more. He has obeyed every instruction, and possibly even pressed an
innocent man, but God still does not answer him.
The dead
litter the woods, and Isaac has come out to add to the bodies. He asks for
forgiveness as he throws another one a top the pile.
Cotton lays
with Gloriana again, fearing that some holes cannot be filled. He fears his
father’s boot, and she laughs. Grown men should not fear their fathers. John
Aldon sends his whore away, still angry over Cotton’s actions for killing Cory.
Cotton has been expecting death since the age of 10, and he’s fully prepared to
burn in a pit of burning black tar like hell. An image that sounds familiar,
John asks him about it. Hell is not the bondfires, but the puddles of tar. He
tells Cotton to get dressed, he has something to show him. John has seen them
as Cotton described them. John is detained by the Magistrate, for his violent
display the previous night, he tells Cotton to have Isaac take him to the spot.
He tries to fight off the men, but ultimately John is detained.
Mary isn’t
pleased that John was detained by the Magistrates men. She warns him that he
should do nothing without her okay. His job would be to find out who broke
their circle, to speak with the seer, and not worry himself with John.
Isaac takes
him into the woods, tells Cotton how they bled a single dove, and it was the
saddest display in the world. They find what looks like a witch’s cauldron, and
worse a severed hand that has carvings on it. As they inspect it, bugs escape
out of its palm.
Mary goes to
see John, the guard opens the door for her before she tells the guard to leave.
She tells him that Salem still hangs men for what he did to the selectmen. She
claims that she would never let them do that, but he wonders where her
indignation was when she let them kill Cory, an innocent man. She tells him
that he should leave, that the selectmen suggest that he leave, but he knows it
is her that is suggesting it. She’s trying to save him, that he doesn’t belong
there, but he thinks that she doesn’t either. Her husband is not standing in
their way he knows. She waited for him a long time, but his time has past,
there is nothing left in Salem for him, and she doesn’t want him there. He
almost believes her. He leaves his cell, and gives his half of the silver coin
to a beggar. It breaks Mary’s heart.
A girl tries
to give birth, but struggles as the midwife encourages her. Mary does not want
her to have the baby until she reveals the name of the baby. Salem will not
shoulder the cost of another bastard. Anne is there watching Mary’s and
Bridgette’s exchange. Bridgette pleads with Mary, she was a poor person once
too. Mary turns to Hannah directly, telling her that she should not suffer for
any man, and Hannah gives up the name of the father, Billy Balen, apprentice to
the Cooper. Hannah pushes out the baby, as Anne sketches her, and Mary has
flashbacks of her own baby’s “birth.” Mary stumbles out as another girl goes
in.
Hale traipses
through the woods lost when Petrus finds him. The seer brings him back to his
home. The home seems to have moved, but the seer tells him that eyes are for
seeing not being seen, that they find him when they need to. Hale needs to find
out who broke their circle, who saw them. He looks upon his taxidemy animals to
find the one that was there. He chooses the lizard. He will find out who saw
them in the woods last night but it will take time.
Mercy
remains strung up on the cross. Mary wonders if their prayers have been
answered. Bridgette knows that Mercy is not possessed, but rather sick. She
thinks that they should be giving her medical attention rather than using the
girl to whip the people into a hysteria. Mary warns her that her words could be
construed as those of the devil himself.
Mary’s tears
fall as she allows the toad to suckle her. Titula warns her that her tears
could sour the milk. Once Mary had a chance for something more, and now she is
on this harsh path. Now she needs to make a sign, one of the doom that has come
upon Salem. A woman carries a dead baby in her womb, and she will make a sign
of her. She only needs to kill nine more innocents before full hunter’s moon.
Kitty
struggles to deliver her baby. She thinks the baby will tear her in two, when
the midwife Brigette is summoned, but she’s already there, having heard the
girl’s screams. One of the girls tries to turn the baby when, Kitty sees the
hag. She struggles against the girls, tearing herself from their grasp, and
delivers her baby.
Cotton tells
John that he witnessed a real witch’s Sabbath. He looks at his books, and finds
an image that look familiar. If it is true, then it is far worse than Cotton
thought. There is little to go on, all of the books have little more than
confession. Everything that a witch does is fueled by lust and death. Cotton
asks Isaac to speak of his duties. He delivers not only packages, but also bodies
that aren’t fit to be buried in Salem. Cory’s body is there, and John goes to
retrieve the body.
Mary speaks
with Kitty, asks her about the fear she felt, that something was trying to hurt
her baby. Mary confesses about her child, that she lost. She presses the girl,
and Kitty tells her that she felt the presence of evil, that she saw a foul hag
and she was touching her belly. Kitty reveals that the midwife and the hag was
one and the same.
Isaac and
John go to find Cory’s body, and Isaac worries about being out in the middle of
the night with John again. Cotton throws up on the bodies, and the men locate
the bag holding cory. They bring it back and bury him in the cemetery behind
the church.
Cotton goes
to see Mary, and she frets about her husband, a horrible happening that could
kill him. She tells him of a monstrous birth in Salem, like something straight
out of his books, delivered by their very own midwife. The baby has been
preserved in a bottle, and Cotton sees it as a declaration of war from the
devil. Mary asks if there is anything that they can do. Cotton plans to protect
Salem and her, and Mary is satisfied with his answer.
Anne rushes
after Magistrate Hale, to stop him. She does not think that Bridgette is guilty
of anything. Cotton uses the dead baby to prove that Bridgette is guilty.
Bridgette was doing everything that is normal in the realm of widwifery. Even
Hale finds these claims ridiculous. Cotton knows that the devil’s minion are
everywhere, and Kitty pointed her as the hag during her delivery. Cotton asks
for a plea, and she proclaims herself innocent. John comes to her aide, asking
if Bridgette made the sign or if God did. Bad things happen in the world, and
blame cannot always be assigned. He ponders if they should hang a woman for his
pondering. He suggests that they should hang more women, all who was there,
because that makes as much sense. The other women, whores, proclaim their
innocence. When the people start to find holes in the logic, Mary suggests that
they take all those who may be guilty before Mercy who can sense the witches.
One by one they are brought to Mercy, and Mercy makes no move until Bridgette
is brought forth. Mercy spits blood and nails down one Bridgette as Mary calls
for a vote. Bridgette is stung up, still crying about her innocence, but God is
not answering her either. They hang her and John congratulates Cotton on
another innocent death. Cotton isn’t sure whether she was innocent, but he
knows that the witches must die.
Hale sees
that they were almost felled by the man who Mary cannot leave alone. He doesn’t
want to be burned at the stake, and with every misstep, he and the elders
wonder if Mary was the right person for his job. He watched his family burn
once, and he does not want that same fate, he tasted their ashes. He fears for
his daughter’s safety. It’s too late to go back now though.
The seer
sees who stopped the Sabbath, sees Isaac’s face.
Anne
confronts John at the tavern. She wants John to rally for justice, she knows
that more innocents will die during this hunt. She wants him to do something,
and her fire reminds him of someone he once knew.
Mary gets a
visit from John. He’s less patient than he use to be. She thinks he’s leaving,
but he isn’t. He doesn’t hate Salem, but the people who run it. He plans to fix
things. There’s an extra seat on the council, one with the Aldon name, and he
thinks it’s time he claimed it. Titula makes her presence known, and John takes
leave. Mary puts a lock of hair into doll, and squeezes the babies from a mouse,
After crushing the babies, she puts them into the dolls, and sews it up.
Anne sits
sketching a portrait of John in her room. She hears a noise, and thinks its her
cat, but it’s a creepy doll, Mary’s doll.
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