As Hester stands by the scaffold, she sees a strange figure in the crowd. He is slightly deformed physically, a seeming visitor to the area, standing besides an Indian dressed in Native garb. The man is costumed in an unseemly mixture of civilized and native dress. Although, for the most part, he is staring impartially at the scene before him, for a moment, his eyes are convulsed by horror. Perhaps disguising his true feelings, he queries information from a fellow spectator. As the spectator reveals certain pertinent information about Hester Prynne and her abhorrent deed, the newcomer affects certain sympathy for the spectacle, an endorsement of the justice imposed on the victim.
After speaking with his neighbor, the stranger catches the eyes of Hester Prynne, whose absorption in the glance, excludes all other thoughts.....
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