ARTHUR MILLER: The Crucible Read this extract, and then answer the question that follows it: 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 5 10 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 Walcott's here from Doctor Griggs. 15 Parris: Oh? Let here 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. 20 Parris: [eagerly] What does the doctor say, child? Susanna: [craning around Parris to get a look at Betty]: He bid me come and tell you, reverend sir, that he cannot discover no medicine for it in his books. 25 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. 30 Parris: [his eyes going wide] No – no. There be no unnatural cause here. Tell him I have sent for Reverend Hale of Beverly, and Mr 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.] 35 Abigail: Speak nothin' of it in the village, Susanna. Parris: Go directly home and speak nothing of unnatural causes. Susanna: Aye, sir. I pray for her. [She goes out.] Abigail: Uncle, the rumour of witchcraft is all about; I think you'd best go down and deny it yourself. The parlour's packed with people, sir. I'll sit with her. 40 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 witchcraft. Betty's not witched. 45 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. 50 Parris: Child. Sit you down. Abigail: [quavering, as she sits] I would never hurt Betty. I love her dearly. 55 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? 60 How does Miller make this such a powerful opening to the play?