Excellency, I think they be aboard a ship. My daughter tells me how she heard them speaking of ships last week, and tonight I discover my – my strongbox is broke into…Thirty-one pound is gone. I am penniless.
– Arthur Miller
The Crucible, Act 4. When rumors of rebellion against the court spread, Abigail Williams knows that it’s time for her to leave Salem. Here Reverend Parris tells Danforth how his niece broke into his safe, robbed him of all his money, and disappeared with another servant Mercy Lewis. In Abby’s last desperate act of self-preservation, she typically thinks only of herself. After her plan to win John Proctor backfires, she flees, leaving behind a trail of destruction and her former lover Proctor to hang.