Goodwife Brown

The minutes ticked slowly by. It was five after seven ... ten after ... seven fifteen.

Goodman shuffled uneasily. He was starting to feel concerned.

"I'm sure she got held up at the store," said the Reverend. "Just give her a few more minutes. We'll give her a surprise she'll never forget."

"What could be keeping her? The whole town is here."

Sheila Johnson spoke up. "Her birthday isn't until next week. There's no way she could have guessed."

"Maybe we should go ahead and light the candles." That was little Cleecy. She was a thoughtful girl.

Goodman looked at the cake. Happy 30th, Faith! The letters trumpeted and swirled in a celebratory purple. Flowers and swags decorated the perimeter.

"I'm going to go look for her. What if she's hurt—"

His sentence was cut short by a blood-curdling scream.

"Faith!" He gasped and tore out of the building. The community ran after him.

"Which way did it come from?!"

"The back of the church!"

Everybody raced toward the back of the building. Faith was in the distance, running through the woods as if the devil was at her heels. Branches tore at her clothing.

By the time they caught up, she was half-naked, and badly scratched from brambles and thorns. He face was dirty. Bits of leaves were stuck in her tangled hair.

"Get away from me!" she shrieked. "You're EVIL, the lot of you! Don't touch me!"

Goodman tried to hold her, but she struggled like a madwoman and wrenched away from his grasp. "You fucker! You horrible bastard!!"

It took three men to pin her down, and four to carry her, kicking and screaming, back to the church. They didn't know what else to do, so they locked her in the minister's private office while the town doctor sprinted to his office for a hypodermic.

Faith screamed even louder when they put her in the makeshift jail cell. "It's a place of sin!" She babbled filth and curses, using language that shocked the townspeople. Then she started breaking everything she could get her hands on.

"The window!" The groundskeeper ran back outside. Sure enough, Faith had smashed the panes and was trying to drag herself outside. Blood dripped from her hands and spattered her dress.

Thankfully, the doctor arrived. He ran down the center aisle of the sanctuary. Everybody got out of the way. The Reverend saw him coming and yanked open the office door.

The doctor wasted no time when he saw his patient half out the window. He lifted her dress, yanked down her panties, and jabbed the needle into one pretty buttock. Faith screamed and twisted, caught in the window as well as her insanity.

The doctor replaced her clothing with a physician's professional care and wrapped his arms around the struggling woman's waist. Gently but firmly, he lifted her away from the window.

"Help me," he said over his shoulder.

Reverend Orton and Goodman Brown stepped forward from where they had been staring in fascinated horror. Each man took an arm. Faith had worn herself out, and the drug did the rest of the job. Her struggles weakened as they pulled her back into the room. Finally she went limp and passed out.

They laid her in the big recliner and stretched the footrest all the way out. The doctor set about tending the wounds.

Her husband pulled up a chair beside her and smoothed her brow.

"My darling, my love, what happened?" He tried to hug her. Faith had slipped away into the darkness. She did not respond.

Goodman looked up with tears in his eyes. "Doctor, what happened?"

The doctor gave the grieving man a look of pity. "I don't know, Goodman. I'm just an old country doctor. We'll send her to Marymount, of course. But if I didn't know better, I'd say her mind is completely gone. I'm sorry, my friend. I think she is lost."

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