REVEREND PARRIS is praying now, and though we cannot hear his words, a sense of his confusion hangs about him. He mumbles, then seems about to weep; then he prays again; but his daughter does not stir on the bed.
The door opens, and his Negro slave enters. Tituba is in her forties. Parris brought her with him from Barbados, where he spent some years as a merchant before entering the ministry. She enters as one does who can no longer bear to be barred from the sight of her beloved, but she is also very frightened because her slave sense has warned her that, as always, trouble in this house eventually lands on her back.
TITUBA, already taking a step backward: My Betty be hearty soon?
PARRIS: Out of here!
TITUBA, backing to the door: My Betty not goin’ die...
PARRIS, scrambling to his feet in a fury: Out of my sight! She is gone. Out of my– He is overcome with sobs. He clamps his teeth against them and closes the door and leans against it, exhausted. Oh, my God! God help me! Quaking with fear, mumbling to himself through his sobs, he goes to the bed and gently takes Betty’s hand. Betty. Child. Dear child. Will you wake, will you open up your eyes! Betty, little one...
He is bending to kneel again when his niece. ABIGAIL WILLIAMS, seventeen, enters – a strikingly beautiful girl, an orphan, with an endless capacity for dissembling. Now she is all worry and apprehension and propriety.
ABIGAIL: Uncle? He looks to her. Susanna Wallcott’s here from Dr. Griggs.
PARRIS: Oh? The Doctor. Rising. Let her come, let her come.
ABIGAIL, leaning out the door to call to Susanna, who is down the hall a few steps: Come in Susanna.
SUSANNA WALCOTT, a little younger than Abigail, a nervous, hurried girl, enters.
PARRIS, eagerly: What does the doctor say, child?
SUSANNA, craning around Parris to get a look at Betty: Dr. Griggs he bid me come and tell you, Reverend sir, that he cannot discover no medicine for it in his books.
PARRIS: Then he must search on.
SUSANNA: Aye, sir, he have been searchin’ his books since he left you, sir, but he bid me tell you, that you might look to unnatural things for the cause of it.
PARRIS, his eyes going wide: No-no. There be no unnatural causes here. Tell him I have sent for Reverend Hale of Beverly, and Mister Hale will surely confirm that. Let him look to medicine, and put out all thought of unnatural causes here. There be none.
SUSANNA: Aye, sir. He bid me tell you. She turns to go.
PARRIS: Go directly home and speak nothin’ of unnatural causes.
SUSANNA: Aye, sir, I pray for her. She goes out.
Abigail: Uncle, the rumor of witchcraft is all about; I think you’d best go down and deny it yourself. The parlor’s packed with people, sir. I’ll sit with her.
Parris, pressed, turns on her: And what shall I say to them? That my daughter and my niece I discovered dancing like heathen in the forest?
Abigail: Uncle, we did dance; let you tell them I confessed it – and I'll be whipped if I must be. But they’re speakin’ of witch craft. Betty’s not witched.
Parris: Abigail, I cannot go before the congregation when I know you have not opened with me. What did you do with her in the forest?
Abigail: We did dance, uncle, and when you leaped out of the bush so suddenly, Betty was frightened and then she fainted. And there’s the whole of it.
Parris: Child. Sit you down.
Abigail, quavering, as she sits: I would never hurt Betty. I love her dearly.
Parris: Now look you, child, your punishment will come in its time. But if you trafficked with spirits in the forest, I must know it now, for surely my enemies will, and they will ruin me with it.
Abigail: But we never conjured spirits.
Parris: Then why can she not move herself since midnight? This child is desperate! Abigail lowers her eyes. It must come out – my enemies will bring it out. Abigail, do you understand that I have many enemies?
Abigail: I have heard of it, uncle.
Parris: There is a faction that is sworn to drive me from my pulpit! Do you understand that?
Abigail: I think so, sir.
Parris: Now, in the midst of such disruption, my own household is discovered to be the very centre of some obscene practice. Abominations are done in the forest –
Abigail: It were sport, uncle!
Parris, pointing at Betty: You call this sport? Pause. She lowers her eys. He pleads. Abigail, if you know something that may help the doctor, for God’s sake tell it to me. She is silent. I saw Tituba waving her arms over the fire when I came on you. Why was she doing that? And I heard a screeching and gibberish coming from her mouth. She were swaying like a dumb beast over that fire!
Abigail: She always sings her Barbados songs, and we dance.
Parris: I cannot blink what I saw, Abigail, for my enemies will not blink it. I saw a dress lying on the grass.
Abigail, innocently: A dress?
Parris - it is very hard to say: Aye, a dress. And I thought I saw –someone naked running through the forest.
Abigail, in terror: No one was naked! You mistake yourself, uncle!
Parris, with anger: I saw it! (He moves from her. Then resolved.) Now tell me true, Abigail. Now my ministry’s at stake; my ministry and perhaps your cousin’s life. Whatever abomination you have done, give me all of it now, for I dare not be taken unaware when I go before them down there.
Abigail: There is nothin’ more. I swear it, uncle.
Parris, studies her, then nods, half convinced: Abigail, I have fought here three long years to bend these stiff-necked people to me, and now, just now when some good respect is rising for me in the parish, you compromise my very character. I have given you a home, child, I have put clothes upon your back – now give me upright answer. Your name in the town – it is entirely white, is it not?
Abigail, with an edge of resentment: Why, I am sure it is, sir. there be no blush about my name.
Parris, to the point: Abigail, is there any other cause than you have told me, for Goody Proctor dischargin’ you? I have heard it said, and I tell you as I heard it, that she comes so rarely to church this year for she will not sit so close to something soiled. What signified that remark?
Abigail: She hates me, uncle, she must, for i would not be her slave. It’s a bitter woman, a lying, cold, snivelling, woman, and I will not work for such a woman!
Parris: She may be. And yet it has troubled me that you are now seven month out of their house, and in all this time no other family has ever called for your service.
Abigail: They want slaves, not such as I. Let them send to Barbados for that. I will not black my face for any of them! With ill concealed resentment for him: Do you begrudge my bed, uncle?
Parris: No-no.
Abigail, in a temper: My name is good in the village! I will not have it said my name is soiled! Goody Proctor is a gossiping liar.
Enter MRS ANN PUTNAM. She is a twisted soul of forty-five, a death-ridden woman, haunted by dreams.
Parris, as soon as the door begins to open: No—no, I cannot have anyone. He sees her. A certain deference springs into him., although his worry remains. Why, Goody Putnam, come in.
Mrs Putnam, full of breath, shiny-eyed: It is a marvel. It is surely a stroke of hell upon you.
Parris: No, Goody Putnam, it is –
Mrs. Putnam, glancing at Betty: How high did she fly, how high?
Parris: No, no, she never flew –
Mrs. Putnam, very pleased with it: Why, it’s sure she did. Mr. Collins saw her goin’ over Ingersoll’s barn, and come down light as bird, he says!
Parris: Now look your, Goody Putnam, she never – Enter THOMAS PUTNAM, a well-to- do, hard-handed landowner, near fifty. Oh, good morning, Mr. Putnam.
Putnam: It is a providence the thing is out now! It is a providence. He goes directly to the bed.
Parris: What’s out, sir, what’s – ?
Mrs Putnam goes to the bed.
Putnam, looking own at Betty: Why, her eyes is closed! Look you, Ann.
Mrs. Putnam: Why, that’s strange. To Parris: Ours is open.
Parris, shocked: Your Ruth is sick?
Mrs. Putnam, with vicious certainty: I’d not call it sick; the Devil’s touch is heavier than sick. It’s death, y’know, it’s death drivin’ into them, forked and hoofed.
Parris: Oh, pray not! Why, how does Ruth ail?
Mrs Putnam: She ails as she must – she never waked this morning, but her eyes open and she walks, and hears naught, sees naught, nad cannot eat. Her soul is taken, surely.
Parris is struck.
Putnam, as though for further details: They say you’ve sent for Reverend Hale of Beverly?
Parris, with dwindling conviction now: A precaution only. He has much experience in all demonic arts, and I—
Mrs. Putnam: He has indeed; and found a witch in Beverly last year, and let you remember that.
Parris: Now, Goody Ann, they only thought that were a witch, and I am certain there be no element of witchcraft here.
Putnam: No witchcraft! Now look you, Mr Parris –
Parris: Thomas, Thomas, I pray you, leap not to witchcraft. I know that you – you least of all, Thomas, would ever wish so disastrous a charge laid upon me. We cannot leap to witchcraft. They will howl me out of Salem for such corruption in my house.