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Image from Malerie Yolen-Cohen
You find a village
You find a village
You walk along this pathway until you come to a small village with people dressed in clothes similar to the clothes you are wearing - the clothes given to you by the time-traveling car. You decide that this must be Salem, Massachusetts.
You pull down your sleeve to cover the watch that will alert you to meet your ride back to Vista Heights.
You do your best to blend in as you walk into the village. You try to think back to what you learned about the Puritans from history class and from the talking car.
You start to get a little nervous as you walk into town and see a man being punished in the stocks in the middle of town. You quickly walk past as he stares at you.
It is snowing and cold and you start looking for somewhere to get warm. You see smoke coming from the chimney of a nearby house and you take a look in the window to see if anyone is home.
You look inside and see two Puritan girls. They are both younger than you are - one looks to be about 9 years old and the other seems to be about 11 years old. You hear them talking to each other and soon discover that the older girl's name is Abigail and that the younger girl's name is Elizabeth.
At first the girls are just talking, but soon they start acting strangely. They are yelling, diving under furniture, and crying out that they are in pain and having a fever. This seems strange to you and you start to wonder what could be happening. Just then, a Puritan man bursts into the room and demands to know what is going on.
Your watch starts buzzing
Your watch starts buzzing
You decide that it might be best if you get away from the window before this angry man sees you and gets mad at you, too. Just as you are about to run from the window, your strange watch that was given to you by the time-traveling car begins to make a buzzing noise.
You are soon surrounded by that strange swirling tunnel that brought you here. In the middle of this tunnel, you hear the strange voice of the time-traveling car: "You are in Salem, Massachusetts in the winter of 1692. You just witnessed the beginning of what eventually turned into the Salem Witch Trials."
You remember hearing about the Witch Trials in school. Something about innocent people being accused of being witches. You also remember something about these people being killed.
"The two girls you saw are Elizabeth Parris and her cousin Abigail Williams," the car voice continued. "The man you saw is the Reverend Samuel Parris. He is a strict man, and he is not very happy about what his daughter and niece just did."
This image of Reverend Parris appears in the swirling lights and you recognize this as the angry man in the house.
The car voice speaks again. "The people in Salem do not like Reverend Parris very much. They have stopped paying his salary at times and have even stopped providing him firewood to heat his home during the winter. To get back at them, he preaches that there is a conspiracy against him and the Devil has power over the people of Salem. The actions of these two girls won't make him look very good to the people in his church."
As you are thinking about what the voice has just told you, the strange car starts speaking again: "I am going to move you through time and drop you off in Salem again. One month has passed since Elizabeth and Abigail were acting strangely in front of Reverend Parris. He has tried to get help for them from the town doctor who has been unsuccessful in treating them. The doctor has told Reverend Parris that the cause of their strange actions must be supernatural. During that time, other Puritan girls in Salem have started having similar symptoms as Abigail and Elizabeth. Please try to stay out of trouble"
Before you can say anything to the car, the spinning lights suddenly fade away and you find yourself on the ground outside of a large building.Â
You realize that you need to look inside.
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