A GOAT FOR AZAZEL
197
It
was now early fall. Abigail was expecting her third child,
and the constant excitement had wearied her. She lived in deep
retirement, and no comment of hers is recorded concerning this
episode. Martha was to stay on for a while to insure her recovery.
She spent her afternoons reading pious books in Mather's study,
and the household quieted down.
During this inexplicable period of calm, Mather began pre·
paring his pamphlet on Martha's case, together with a sermon
entitled "The Nature and Reality of Witchcraft." Martha grew
very annoyed at this, and her manner towards him underwent a
mysterious change. Previously she had treated him with some
respect, even in her rages; she had made love to him in her primi.
tive way. Now she was bold and impudent; with her cutting young–
girl wit she slashed at her patron and protector. He was startled
and displeased at the new kind of demon that had got into Martha.
Possibly she had not believed he was taking it all so seriously.
When she discovered how completely she had befooled him, she
was a changed "girl.
In all his life no one had dared to interrupt Cotton Mather
at his holy labors. Martha knocked loudly at his door whenever
she pleased, and invented scandalous pretexts to annoy him. "There
is
someone below would be glad to see you!" she shouted one day.
Mather went down, found no one, and scolded her for telling
falsehoods. She retorted, "Mrs. Mather is always "glad to see you!"
He understood nothing about women, and he never learned
anything about them; this outburst of jealousy confounded him.
A
dozen times a day she was at his door, and would have him out
on one excuse or another. The attention that had been given her was
not going to be diverted to a sermon about her if she could help it.
She threw heavy books and other objects at him, being careful not
to hit him. She would follow him
upstair~
and down, heckling and
ridiculing him about his foolish sermon, vowing she would revenge
herself on him for writing it.
She rummaged through his papers, a desperate impertinence,
and
got hold of his precious document on witchcraft. She had
read it while he was writing it, at least a hundred times, says
Mather. Now she could not get one word of it straight, but made a
parody of it as she went, with such aptness and humor Mather
