Page 57 of The Battle of the Bookshops
“And are they often quite, well, old?” asked Charlie.
“Absolutely.”
“So, you’re saying they had Alzheimer’s or something?”
Brynlee nodded and leaned back in her chair, confident she hadsuccessfully sold the others on her theory. “We may not have had a name for it three hundred years ago,” she went on, “but there’s no reason to think Alzheimer’s and other forms of dementia didn’t exist. We think of Alzheimer’s as causing memory problems—and of course it does—but other signs absolutely include psychosis: having unshakable but illogical beliefs, having visual and auditory hallucinations, aka seeing things, hearing voices. Of course, dementia won’t have been as common then, because people tended to die from something else before they got old enough to develop it.”
“These poor women,” Jules murmured. “This poor woman. My own ancestor.” She thought of Flo getting older, perhaps starting to develop strange beliefs, to manifest odd behaviors. At least nowadays she would have a chance to get a diagnosis and proper care. Not so for poor Bridget Capelthorne.
“And, of course, there was downright ignorance and superstition,” explained Brynlee. “There is definitely stuff where these poor, vulnerable, and suggestible women are confessing to putting spells on people, casting enchantments,causingbad things to happen. And yet, disasters—like a cow dying or a man being injured—are obviously ordinary, everyday bad luck. There was just no reason to attribute these things to magic at all.”
“And the other document?” Jules asked, turning again to Robert. She thought she might know what was coming.
He cleared his throat. “So, as the confession indicates, she went to trial. I looked in some materials we have regarding trials at the Exeter Assizes around this time, and it seems a Biddy Capelthorne was convicted of witchcraft in September of 1685 and”—Robert swallowed—“she was executed by hanging the following day. I’m so sorry...”
“The following day,” echoed Jules faintly. “They didn’t mess about, did they?” She pressed her fingertips to her eyes. Tears?How ridiculous. It was sad, of course it was, but this was a woman who, as she already knew, had died more than three hundred years ago. She needed to get a grip.
She opened her eyes to see Brynlee and Robert across the table looking anxiously at her.
“I’m fine,” she said, flapping her hand in dismissal.
“It was brutal,” said Brynlee in solidarity. Of course, Brynlee had no idea what else Jules had to be upset about, and Jules wasn’t about to fill her in.
Charlie was wide-eyed. “So, that explains why we can’t find her in the churchyard. She must have been buried at the Middlemass crossroads, by Hangman’s Lane,” he said, with unseemly relish, Jules felt, but then realized she was being unreasonable. Charlie’s fascination—the palpable delight of the three of them at uncovering the mystery—was understandable enough.
“Yes, you say that,” Robert told Charlie, “and it’s plausible she was taken back to Portneath for hanging and burial, but given that she was tried at the Exeter Assizes, it’s also more probable she was buried in an unmarked grave here in the city—we do know the location of one burial site here. It’s rather special, actually, for reasons I’ll get to.” His eyes glinted.
“Either way, I suppose we now know why she isn’t in the graveyard at Portneath,” mused Jules.
“Not necessarily, though,” Brynlee interjected. “Try looking on the north side of the church. It was common for the less favored burials to be to the north. Pauper’s graves, criminals, suicides...”
“Why the north side?” asked Charlie.
“Because it was the norm for parishioners to follow a path through the churchyard from the south, and it was thought that the graves that were walked past would be remembered in the parishioners’ prayers, but those to the north would be forgotten, which would act as a punishment for those sinners. It was quite awidely held belief, but particularly common in Devon. Also, bear in mind, many of the burials to the north would not be marked.”
“Why?” asked Jules.
“Again, so that, as a punishment, they would be forgotten.”
Jules sighed. She couldn’t convince herself poor Bridget was there at all. If she was, she reasoned, her death would have been recorded in the burial records. “An outcast from her own community, even in death,” she mused aloud. “How incredibly sad. Especially when you think she was helping people with their health issues as best she could.”
“So, what now?” asked Charlie. “We know she was tried and executed, even if her burial site is unknown. Still, I suppose that’s the kind of thing I was hoping for.” He glanced apologetically at Jules. “Not ‘hoping for,’” he explained, “but just to add provenance to the grimoire. You’ve been a real help, Robert, thanks.”
Charlie looked disappointed there wasn’t more, but Robert wasn’t finished. He cleared his throat again. “There’s one more thing,” he said. “And I think it makes your grimoire a rather significant document. Your Bridget Capelthorne was one of several supposed ‘witches’ tried in Exeter at that time, but there’s something that makes her extra special. She was killed just as the witch trials—in England, at least—were dying down due to a sudden outbreak of reasonableness, and not before time. Anyway, it turns out the final executions for witchcraft in England were actually the ones in Exeter in 1685.”
He paused, looking at the three of them, waiting for the penny to drop.
“So, poor Bridget was one of the last witches to be killed?” said Jules.
“Unlucky,” chipped in Charlie.
“Ah, well, so, what if I told you Bridget was notoneof the last but almost certainlythelast?” said Robert.
“So, um...reallyunlucky,” ventured Jules.
“But also kind of cool, though,” contributed Charlie. “The last witch in England.”
“Exactly,” said Robert, looking at Charlie. “Well, not the last witch, because there are still people who claim to be witches now, but I have looked at every paper published on this subject, and I really do believe I can make the argument that Bridget Capelthorne was the last witch in England to be hanged.”
