Giving up on the documents associated with the trials, Kim turned her attention to another important resource of the institute: genealogical information on families from Essex County.
This time Kim found a wealth of information on the Stewarts. In fact they took up most of an entire drawer of the genealogical card catalogue. As Kim went through the material it became obvious that there were two main Stewart clans, hers and another whose history wasn’t quite so old.
After a half hour Kim found a brief reference to Elizabeth Stewart. She was born on May 4, 1665, the daughter of James and Elisha Flanagan, and died on July 19, 1692, the wife of Ronald Stewart. No cause of death was given. A quick subtraction told Kim that Elizabeth died at age twenty-seven!
Kim raised her head and stared with unseeing eyes out the window. She could feel tiny gooseflesh rise up on the nape of her neck. Kim was twenty-seven, and her birthday was in May. It wasn’t the fourth but rather the sixth, so it was close to Elizabeth’s. Remembering their physical similarities from the portrait and considering the fact that she was planning on moving into the same house Elizabeth occupied, Kim began to wonder if there were just too many coincidences. Was this all trying to tell her something?
“Excuse me,” Grace Meehan said, interrupting Kim’s reverie. “Here’s a list I copied for you of the people who were hanged for witchcraft. There’s also the date of their execution, including the day of the week, their town of residence, their church affiliation if there was one, and their age. As you can see, it is very complete-and there is no Elizabeth Stewart.”
Kim thanked the woman again and took the paper. After the woman left, Elizabeth dutifully glanced at it and was about to put it aside when she noted the date of Tuesday, July 19, 1692. Five people had been hanged that day. Looking back at Elizabeth’s day of death, she noticed it was the same. Kim understood that just because the dates were the same, it didn’t prove Elizabeth was hanged. But even if it were only circumstantial, it was at least suggestive.
Then Kim realized something else. Thinking back to the previous Tuesday, she remembered it had been July 19. Looking again at the paper Grace Meehan had given her, she discovered that the daily calendar was the same in 1692 as it was in 1994. Was this yet another coincidence whose meaning Kim had to ponder?
Going back to the genealogical information, Kim got a book that summarized the early history of her family. In it she looked up Ronald Stewart and quickly learned that Elizabeth had not been Ronald’s first wife. Ronald had married Hannah Hutchinson in 1677, with whom he’d had a daughter, Joanna, born 1678. But then Hannah died in January 1679, with no cause of death listed. Ronald at age thirty-nine then married Elizabeth Flanagan in 1682 with whom he had a daughter Sarah, born 1682, and sons, Jonathan, born 1683, and Daniel, born 1689. Finally Ronald married Elizabeth’s younger sister, Rebecca Flanagan, in 1692, with whom he had a daughter named Rachel, born in 1693.
Kim lowered the book and again stared off into space while she tried to sort out her thoughts. Mild alarm bells were going off in her head in relation to Ronald’s character. Looking back at the genealogy book, she reviewed the fact that three years after Hannah died, Ronald married Elizabeth. Then after Elizabeth died, he married her sister the same year!
Kim felt uneasy. Knowing her own father’s amorous proclivities, she thought it possible that Ronald could have suffered a similar flaw and indulged it with far more disastrous consequences. It occurred to her that Ronald could have been having an affair with Elizabeth while married to Hannah, and an affair with Rebecca while married to Elizabeth. After all, Elizabeth certainly died under unusual circumstances. Kim wondered if Hannah did as well.
Kim shook her head and silently laughed at herself. She told herself that she must have watched too many soap operas, since her imagination was taking unwarranted, melodramatic leaps.
After spending a few more minutes going over the Stewart family tree, Kim learned two more facts. First she confirmed she was related to Ronald and Elizabeth through their son Jonathan. Second she learned that the name “Elizabeth” never reappeared in the family’s three-hundred-year history. With so many generations, such a situation couldn’t have happened by chance. Kim marveled at the opprobrium Elizabeth had brought on herself, and Kim’s curiosity waxed concerning what Elizabeth could possibly have done to warrant it.
Finally, with her superficial genealogical inquiry, Kim descended the steps of the Peabody-Essex Institute with the idea of retrieving her car and heading out to the compound. But at the foot of the steps she hesitated. The passing question that she’d entertained about Ronald’s character and the possibility of foul play on his part gave her another idea. Returning inside the institute, she asked directions for the Essex County Courthouse.
The building was on Federal Street, not far from the Witch House. It was a severe Greek Revival structure with a stark pediment and massive Doric columns. Kim entered and asked to be directed to court records.
Kim had no idea whether she would find anything at all. She didn’t even know if court records were saved from so long ago, nor did she know if they did exist whether they were available to the public. Nonetheless she presented herself at the appropriate counter and asked to look at any court records of Ronald Stewart. She added that she was interested in the Ronald Stewart who’d been born in 1653.
The clerk was a sleepy-looking woman of indeterminate age. If she was surprised by Kim’s request she didn’t show it. Her response was to punch it up on a computer terminal. After glancing at the screen for a moment, she left the room. She’d not said a word. Kim guessed that there had been so many people researching the Salem witch trials that the town’s civil servants were jaded about inquiries from that era.
Kim shifted her weight and checked her watch. It was already ten-thirty, and she’d not even been to the compound yet.
The woman reappeared with a manila pocket folder. She handed it to Kim. “You can’t take this out of the room,” she said. She pointed to some Formica tables and molded plastic chairs along the back wall. “You can sit over there if you like.”
Kim took the folder over to an empty chair. She sat down and slipped out the contents. There was a lot of material. All of it was written in reasonably legible longhand.
At first Kim thought that the file contained only documents associated with civil suits Ronald had filed with the court for debts owed to him. But then she began to find more interesting things, like reference to a contested will involving Ronald.
Kim carefully read the document. It was a ruling in Ronald’s favor involving a will contested by a Jacob Cheever. Reading on, Kim discovered that Jacob had been a child of Hannah’s from a previous marriage and that Hannah had been significantly older than Ronald. Jacob had testified that Ronald had duped his mother into changing her will, thereby depriving him of his rightful inheritance. Apparently the justices disagreed. The result had been that Ronald inherited several thousand pounds, a sizable fortune in those days.
Kim marveled that life in the late seventeenth century hadn’t been as different as she’d imagined. She’d been under the delusion that at least legally it had been simpler. Reading about the contested will suggested she was wrong. It also made her think again about Ronald’s character.
The next document was even more curious. It was a contract dated February 11, 1681, between Ronald Stewart and Elizabeth Flanagan. It had been drawn up and signed prior to their marriage, like a contemporary premarital agreement. But it wasn’t about money or property per se. The contract merely gave Elizabeth the right to own property and enter into contracts in her own name after the marriage.