A Devil in Mayfair

The Pastor looked out at the townsfolk before him.

“I now call a Mrs. Merrith Grady to the stand to come and testify before us.”

A plump, dark haired woman in the third row stood up and squeezed through a tight row of knees and wood and walked up to the bench.

“You may sit down, Mrs. Grady.” The Pastor directed her to the bench.

She dutifully sat down.

“Now, Mrs. Grady,” the Pastor asked. “You had come into this house of worship last week and expressed to me a disturbing story that had caused such great stress in your life as of recently, correct?”

“Yes, Pastor, that is.”

“And I have brought you here today to tell this story to the fine people of Mayfair, as it would be of great contribution to the case against the accused. And, as such, it would also honor the Lord to know that one of his flock would be so brave as to testify against those who would defile his laws through their blasphemies and heresies against him.”

Mrs. Grady silently nodded.

“Good, Mrs. Grady, good,” the Pastor reassured her. “Please, share with us.”

“Well,” Mrs. Grady meekly spoke. “I have a husband and three children.” She stopped for a moment and looked in the space she once occupied: two girls, and a boy to right of it, and a middle-aged man sitting to the right of them. The man looked at her briefly, then looked over at Mary Belle with a prolonged gaze. She looked away.

“Go on,” the Paster insisted.

“Well, my husband,” Mrs. Grady continued. “My husband recently had been acting strange. He didn’t seem like himself. He used to be so loving, so attentive to me and the children. But lately, he has just seemed to be the opposite. He just seemed uninterested. Like we didn’t matter to him like we used to.”

Mrs. Grady stopped for a moment and squeezed out a few tears.

“That’s when, that’s when he brought her up.” She pointed at Mary Belle, who was shifting uncomfortably in her restraints.

“One night I had had enough of his neglect, so I asked him what the matter was,” Mrs. Grady went on.

“He said he didn’t know. He said he couldn’t say. I looked at him and asked him again and again. I knew he knew. It was like he was ashamed to say something. But I had to know. I had to for me and my children’s sakes.”

“And what did he tell you, Mrs. Grady. What did he say was the source of his problems, his neglect of God’s gifts to him,” the Pastor pried.

“He said that it was as though he had been lured away. I asked him who, who could have made this upright, god-fearing man turn to sin, turn to lust and consider betraying his heart and his God. And he told me. He told me that he had gone to deliver some milk and butter to Miss Mary Belle Rose over there,” she pointed once more at her.

Mary Belle struggled more now, and the man holding her tightened his grip, digging into her shoulder to cease her struggling.

“Go on, Mrs. Grady, then what happened.”

“Then, she answered the door dressed like she is standing before you, dressed to entice a man to sin. She asked him once that he should come in and try a slice of fresh bread she had baked. Being a man of God, a faithful man to myself and his children, he refused. But she insisted. She even went to great lengths to trick him by deceiving him into thinking that she couldn’t bear to bring in his delivery by her own strength. She took advantage of the selfless, good-willed nature of my husband and, reluctantly, he entered.

Inside, he told me, she gave him bread and then welcomed herself to his sore muscles. She placed her hand on his arms, shoulders—.”

“No. Lies! That’s not true! That’s not true,” Mary Belle screamed at Mrs. Grady, at the Pastor, and at the townsfolk.

“Quiet, you temptress, you whore of Babylon!” The Pastor grabbed his bible tightly in his hands and rapped her crown with it.

“One more outburst like that and we’ll remove that vile, serpentine tongue from that pestilent mouth of yours.”

Mary Belle sobbed profusely. The Pastor looked at her once more and raised the bible above his head. She quieted but a little, sobbing under broken gasps of breath.

“Go on, Mrs. Grady. Then what happened.”

“Well, my husband became quite uncomfortable and as his kindness had been returned with sin, he quickly ran out of that place and home to his loving family,” Mrs. Grady concluded.

“And there you have it, good people of Mayfair. The accused standing before me has tried to break apart a loving, righteous, God-fearing family by trying to bewitch the morally upright Mr. Grady into committing adultery through her promiscuity.”

The Pastor looked back at Mary Belle, his face began to grimace in disgust.

“What say you, everyone. Shall we allow this accused a chance to speak?”

“Please,” Mary Belle murmured. “Please.”

The townsfolk all had mixed reactions, the Pastor could not justifiably determine what their consensus was. He looked back at Mary Belle.

“As the Lord may grant leniencies, so then shall I. I will give the accused a defense to Mrs. Grady’s testimony. And as you are all witnesses to my leniency, may you also be witnesses to the Lord’s through mine.”

The Pastor looked to Mary Belle once more.

“You may speak, but make it short.”

“These words that Mrs. Grady speaks are untrue. Yes, Mr. Grady came over to deliver my milk and cream as he was scheduled. But I did not grant him permission into my home. He insisted that he wash his hands. He said that they were dry and dirty and he couldn’t bear to make any more deliveries with them in such a state. Being generous as I am, I allowed him access to my washbasin. He did wash his hands, but after he came up to thank me, and instead tried to kiss me. I pushed him away and told him that he needed to leave, but he wouldn’t. He pushed me down and—.”

“Enough, heathen,” the Pastor shouted.

“He bit my leg, he tried to ra—.”

Her statement was interrupted by Mrs. Grady’s hand smashing against her cheek. Her nails tore into it, leaving bloody streaks in their wake.

“You blasphemous bitch,” Mrs. Grady screamed. “My children are here and you poison their innocent minds with terrible lies and accusations against their father, my husband?”

The Pastor now approached her.

“I give you a chance to defend yourself, to repent to the Lord so that your name may be suitable once more for his ears to receive. Then you stain these righteous walls with more lies, more slanders against the Lord and his good people?”

“It’s true. It’s all true! Look!” Mary Belle grabbed the end of her nightgown and pulled it up enough to reveal her thigh.

“Look,” she cried. “Look!”

There was an oval mark on her inner thigh where the scars of horizontal slits surrounded by red, bruised skin appeared.

“That’s where he bit me when he tried to—.”

And in the brief second that Mary Belle saw the townsfolk scream and turn away the view that lay before her blurred and was drowned in a sea of black.