Thus, in a little time after Barbara Stafford was led into the house, Elizabeth Parris appeared on the staircase, crowned with artificial roses that glowed crimson in her golden hair, and gathering the white muslin robe to her bosom with one pale hand, as if the inspiration of some old master, when he searched his soul for the type of a heathen priestess, had fallen upon her. Her cheeks were flushed, her eyes shone like stars, and the gliding motion with which she descended the stairs made her presence spiritual as that of an angel. Abigail Williams came after, very serious, and with a look of terrible pain upon her forehead; her eyes, dusky with trouble, watched the movements of her cousin. She seemed a dark shadow following the spirit. Then came Samuel Parris; how white his hair had become! how old and locked were those thin features! He moved like one who felt the curse of God heavy upon him and his whole house. Desolation was in every movement. Old Tituba crept after, quick and vigilant as a fox. She traced back all this trouble to her own story of the martyred Hutchinsons. From the day of her confidence with Abby Williams the curse had entered her master's house. She was the evil spirit that the people sought. She had concocted the roots into the drinks with which Elizabeth had quenched her fever thirst when the disease crept insidiously over her. True, Barbara Stafford had told her they were cooling and wholesome; but what right had she to take the word of a strange woman like that? Was not her darling witch-stricken, soul and body, by the very decoctions with which she had hoped to cure her? Had not the words of her own tongue changed Abigail Williams from a calm, gentle maiden, full of thoughtful affections, to a stern prophetess, such as her people evoked when they thirsted for vengeance? Tituba had pondered these things over and over in her thoughts till she almost believed herself a witch and a demon, and this was the frame of mind in which the poor old creature followed the stricken family into the presence of the magistrates. When Elizabeth Parris entered the room that had once been the favorite retreat of her mother, she bent her slight figure with gentle recognition of her father's friends, and moving toward the old oaken chair, which had been, time out of mind, in the family, sat down, or rather dropped into it, for her strength was giving way. But, feeling that something was expected of her, she looked around, making mournful efforts at a smile. Her glance fell on Barbara Stafford, who sat near the window, watching her movements with a look of gentle compassion. All at once her eyes dilated and shot fire, her brow began to throb heavily under the roses that bound it, and uplifting herself from the chair, she pointed at Barbara with her finger, reeling to and fro, as we remember Rachel when she sung the Marseillaise almost upon the brink of her own grave.