That night she had again spoken of her parents, and expected to see her brother. During the hours that she waited, old Tituba had crept to her feet, with new revelations and more startling surprises. The young girl listened, seated in the very chair that had been her mother's death-couch. She was a creature of sensitive feeling and keen imagination, a thoughtful, ardent girl, to whom such knowledge came like fire to steel, melting and hardening at the same time. CHAPTER XXIV. AMONG THE SHADOWS. Now Abigail Williams sat waiting for her brother, in vague expectation, for Wahpee had given no account of his chief's movements, and Abby could only listen for the sound of his footsteps on the forest turf. All at once, as her eyes wandered toward the woods, she heard a movement, but not in that direction. The meeting-house stood close on the verge of the forest, and the arched window, back of its pulpit, was almost touched by the swinging tree-branches. Between them and the building Abby saw a human figure moving swiftly through the gloom. "Tituba, Tituba--look up," she whispered, hushing her very breath, for the figure came out into the starlight, and glided toward them like a ghost. Tituba lifted her face, and held the chant trembling on her lips; they were both in the deep darkness of the pines; but the woman who came forward had the starlight on her face. "Is it--is it my mother?" whispered Abby, prompt to believe any thing strange in the excitement of the moment. "See how sad, how beautiful she is." Tituba pressed back against her young mistress, striving to bury herself more deeply in the darkness. "Is it my mother--or the one you loved so much?" Tituba drew a long breath, but did not answer; for the figure came close up to the two graves, and stooping down, tried to make out the moss-grown letters on the stone, tracing the outline with her fore-finger when the light proved insufficient. "Mother!" The word died on Abby's lips, and was carried off in the whisper of the pine leaves. Tituba lifted her hand, grasping that in Abby's lap with a warning force. "Elizabeth--yes! it is Elizabeth--Elizabeth Pa-r-ris! The moss chokes up the name, but it is here. Poor girl--poor young wife!" murmured a low, sweet voice from out of the shadows. "And this grave, so close, with the vines creeping over both. Who can this be? Elizabeth Parris was an orphan, a beautiful charity child of the church--who can be lying so close?" The woman knelt down, as she uttered these disjointed words, and touched the foliage on the two graves lightly with her hands. "Here it was they buried the old man's heart. I almost feel the blossoms springing out of it!" murmured the voice. "Oh, if there were only a place for another here--surely this spot would be quiet and roomy enough for us all!" The strange woman took a ribbon slowly from her waist, as she spoke, and held it in the starlight.