CHAPTER XVII.
“TWO IS COMPANY, THREE IS TRUMPERY!”
And so it fell that about three o’clock that afternoon, as Sir Christopher Gardiner and Betty Alden wandered along the southern foot of Burying Hill, then called Fort Hill, searching under the lee of every rock and clump of bushes for the epigæa, as often to be found by its pure spicy fragrance as by sight of its coy clusters of pink and white blossoms, Prissie Carpenter, a little basket in her hand, came strolling along the brookside, rather ostentatiously bound upon the same errand.
“Now would I like the skill of a painter fellow I knew in Holland, one Martin Ryckaert, a man I could take by the heel and eat him body and bones as I would a prawn; but give him his charcoal and his paints and his canvas, and he’d picture out this scene for you as if you saw it.”
So spake Sir Christopher, who, old swashbuckler though he was, possessed a real love of nature and a real appreciation of beauty in whatever form it revealed itself, as he stood upright with folded arms and looked about him, while Betty, her little fingers grimed with soil and scratched with briers, delved amid the thickset ground pine to find the flowers hiding there.
It was one of those early April days which redeem the character of the froward month, and make one almost love its capricious yet prophetic gleams better than the assured joys of June. A high wind from the west drove before it great white cumuli, glittering like silver in the strong sunlight, and careering across the sky and dropping down behind Manomet as if in an illimitable game of hide-and-seek and catch-who-catch-can. The waves, uneasy at beholding liberty they might not have, and games they might not join, leaped as high as they could toward that azure playground, laughed back to the sun who laughed with them, or, breaking hoarsely upon the shore, sent up their voices of sturdy discontent. The trees, moved by such gigantic melody to bear their part in the grand antiphony, clashed their bare branches in a rhythm too vast for the human ear to comprehend, while the evergreens murmured and sobbed and whispered together, lamenting that they had not even dried leaves to send whirling down that wondrous dance. The brook, its icy winter shroud still clinging to the banks, rose up to assert that life defies the shroud, and that there is a power of spring which shall vanquish death again and again forever; and as the brown waters went tumbling and leaping down toward the ocean which the icy shroud can never compass, their sweet voices joined in the universal song like children in the choir. On sheltered slopes and sunny hillsides the grass was springing green, and though no flowers disputed the epigæa’s precedence, the violets and anemones, the snowdrops and the Solomon’s seal, stood with finger on lip and foot on the threshold, waiting for courage to cross it.
Coming up the brookside in her blue skirt and mantle, a white handkerchief tied over her hair, which in spite of it escaped in a hundred little dancing tendrils, Prissie seemed a part of the great sweeping harmony of sky and wind and sea and shore, and the knight, as with his extended right arm he swept in the lines of a magnificent imaginary landscape, felt, as his eyes first lighted upon that figure, more as if it were the fitting centre and motif of his piece than a real personage.
“A red cloak would be better,” muttered he. “And yet no,—no,—the cold purity of blue is more harmonious, and marries well with sky and sea, but— Aha, Betty, there’s your friend Mistress Carpenter!”
“Is it? Oh, yes! I’ll call her.”
“Nay, we’ll stroll that way and see the brook near at hand, and you may search for gooseberries while I exchange a word with pretty Prissie.”
“There are no gooseberries as yet, sir,” replied Betty, bewildered; but the knight only laughed and strode farther down the hill toward the brook.
At that very moment Myles Standish pushed his round head and square shoulders through the trap door leading from the interior of the Fort to the flat roof, along the parapet of which his beloved guns were ranged, and lightly stepped off the ladder, saying,—
“Come out hither, Wright, and I’ll show you through the perspective glass the beginnings of my new house. Ha! Does not the hill show fairly against the sky?”
“The Captain’s Hill, all men call it,” said William Wright, carefully coming out upon the roof, and shading his eyes with his hand as he looked across the water to the bold eminence, tree-crowned and majestic, upon whose skirts Standish had already erected a summer cottage soon to be solidified into a dwelling.
“I know they do,” replied his companion absently, while he adjusted the clumsy glass solemnly deposited in his charge by the chiefs of the colony. “But I better like to call it Duxbury, for it minds me of hills I knew of old.”
“I know no hills called Duxbury in England,” objected Wright cautiously.
“Nay, the hills are called Pennine, but the place where I first saw them is in the manor of Duxbury. Ha! look you here, Wright, here’s matter close at hand more nearly concerning us than the Pennine hills. See you yonder?”
“’Tis Mistress Carpenter and—and the man Gardiner,” stammered Wright, staring down into the valley at his feet.
“Ay, and little Betty Alden picking posies so far away that she might as well be at home. Mind you, now, my friend, how close the rascal walks to the maiden’s side, and how those hawk’s eyen of his stare into her fair face; and by my faith, he’s grasping her hand and she, poor maid, knows not how to pull it away!”
“She might an’ she would,” muttered William Wright jealously.
“Oh, I know not, I know not,” retorted Myles, teasing him. “She’s but a withy lass, and mayhap afraid of him. Is it true she’s troth-plight to you, Wright?”
“Yes—that is no; she never would give her promise sure and fast, but I had hoped”—
“Then, man, if you will be said by my advice, you’ll make down to the brook at best speed and secure that faltering hope before it is floated away like the flowers the silly maid is stripping off and flinging into the brook, not knowing what she’s about. Go down, Wright, and claim your own.”
“Nay, Captain,” returned Wright, whose thin face had grown tallow-pale, and whose thin lips refused to take moisture from a tongue almost as dry. “If Mistress Carpenter finds her pleasure in such company and such folly I’ll not trouble her with mine. No, I’m not for a young gentlewoman who brings such manners and such morals from the wicked courts of kings.”
“Come, come, Wright, I’ll not listen to your light-lying of Mistress Bradford’s sister. ’Tis a good girl as ever stepped and a pure maid as lives in Plymouth, but she’s young, man, a score of years younger than you, and doubtless she’s known the man in England, and they’ve met by chance, and he is parley-vooing after the fashion of his kind, and she knows not how to be rid of him. Come, go you down, man! Or go with me, if it suits you better.”
“No, Captain, I’ll not go.” And the stubborn face hardened in the utterly discouraging way some faces can. “But I’ll ask this much of your kindness, friend: go you and meet them, and find out, as you so well can do, what is the meaning and the intent of it all; and especially tell me if you as an honest man will say to me that this maid is such a maid as a cautious, God-fearing man may crave for his wife. I will trust to your discretion rather than to mine own fears, Standish.”
“Well, man, I’ll try to warrant your trust,” replied the captain, laughing a little, “although I do not feel it in myself to be the judge in a Court of Love such as they hold in France and those parts. But you may be sure I’ll deal fairly both by you and the maid. Come after sunset and I’ll tell you how I have fared.”
“Nay, Pris, sweet Pris, ’tis such a pretty name I fain would dwell on’t since I may not take sweeter dews upon my lips, believe me, fairest, I have forgot nothing of that fair memory; all I then said I say now and again and again! I came to New England for naught but to find thee once more, and to woo thee for mine own dear wife and lady paramount so long”—
But upon the smooth and dulcet tones of the knight suddenly intruded a strident and mocking voice:—
“Good-e’en to you, Mistress Prissie; so you are looking for mayflowers already?”
“Ah! Oh, Captain Standish, how you startled me! I knew not you were here.”
“Nay, I’m grieved to have startled you, mistress, but why should not I take my walks abroad and look for mayflowers as well as you, or at least as well as this gentleman, whose walks in life have not always led him in such pleasant paths, more than mine own. How say you, Sir Christopher? We did not gather posies much in those stirring days among the Turks wherein I first met your knightship.”
“I do not remember meeting you, Captain Standish, before I came to New England,” replied the knight coldly.
“No? Well, you are an older man than I, and your memory more laden, so like enough a little matter may well slip out of it. But when I saw you there at Passonagessit t’other day I was sure ’twas not the first time. And how is the fair lady we saw with you? Your wife, is she not?”
“No, sir, she is not my wife!” thundered Sir Christopher, and the captain’s face assumed an expression of dismay and embarrassment.
“Not your wife!” echoed he. “Nay, nay; if I’d known that, I would not have named her in presence of this modest gentlewoman. But how is it, then, that she spake of you as her lord? Nay, I’ll not push the matter, sith I see ’tis an over-delicate matter. Wow! this wind cuts through one’s blood. Mistress Prissie, I much fear me you’ll catch a megrim if you linger longer by the brookside, and Betty, ’tis high time thou wert helping thy mother with the supper; run home, little maids, and Sir Christopher, I’ll show you something more to your taste than spring flowers and young lassies. Come up to the Fort and help me fire the sunset gun.”
Sir Christopher’s face was very dark, and possibly enough the captain had not so easily taken his captive, but that Prissie Carpenter, ashamed and terrified at the meaning she suspected under the captain’s debonair look and voice, had already fled toward the village, followed by Betty with a basket full of flowers, but a conscience full of thorns.
Seeing that resistance had thus become useless, the knight gloomily accepted his defeat, and clomb the hill beside the captain, whose jovial manner suddenly dropped into silence, nor did he speak until the two men stood upon the roof of the Fort. Then, while the sun, disdaining the mantle of gold and purple officiously presented by the western clouds, sank in undimmed glory to the horizon, and resting there an instant seemed to view once more the fair domain he now must abandon, Standish, his lighted match in one hand, laid a finger of the other upon his companion’s breast.
“Sir Christopher Gardiner,” said he, “we breed no Mary Groves in these parts, and yon young gentlewoman is the sister of our governor, and the promised wife of one of our worthiest citizens. ’Twould go hard with the man that trifled with her, and well do I hope no more hath been said than is soon forgotten and will leave no blot behind.”
“Since when hath Myles Standish added the duty of father confessor to his other cares?” demanded Gardiner with a sneer.
“Ask rather, what sin hath he committed so notable as to call for the penance of listening to thy confession, my son?” retorted the captain good-humoredly. “Nay, man, take my hint in good part, as indeed ’tis meant. This maid is not for thy fooling, and thine own affairs are like to give thee trouble enough without mixing and moiling them further. Ha! the sun is going”— Puff! and the dull boom of heavy metal resounded across the quiet town, and startled the eagle circling above his nest on Captain’s Hill.
Then the two men went silently down the hill, and whatever may have been the knight’s secret resolves of virtue, he never again found the opportunity to test them.
“Now, Betty,” said her mother, as the family rose from that meal we call tea, but they named supper, “I will put the babies to bed, and then step up the hill to Mistress Standish’s to see little Lora, who is worse of her measles to-night, and thou wash up the dishes and redd the kitchen, and then go to bed like a good little lass. I’ll take in the gentleman’s supper, and ask what he fancies for his breakfast. John, you’ll find me at the captain’s when ’tis time for lecture.”
“Ay, dame; and meantime I’ll smoke a quiet pipe here with Betty and dry my wet feet.”
But hardly had the mother disappeared when John Alden felt two tender arms about his neck, and heard a broken whisper,—
“Oh, father! I’m so sorry!”
“What! Betty, child, is’t thou? And crying! Nay, then, little woman, what is it all about? Come sit on father’s knee and tell him thy trouble. What makes thee sorry, my little maid?”
“I—don’t—know—father.”
“Don’t know! Nay, how canst thou be sorry and not know why? That’s naught but foolishness, Betty.”
“Please, father, will you speak to mother, and not have me carry the gentleman’s sarver into the fore-room, nor make his bed any more?”
“What! what!” exclaimed Alden, pushing the child back until he could look into her wet and troubled face. “Nay, then, Betty, I ’ll have the truth of thee; has the man been rude to thee, or said a word amiss?”
“I—oh, don’t look so angry, father; you frighten me.”
“But I will be answered, Betty! Why dost thou fear to go into this man’s room? What has he said to thee?”
“He’s said naught but kindness, father; he never spoke a cross word, not one. What should he scold me about?”
And the innocent wonder of the sweet face filled the man with fear lest his child might have understood him. Yet still with his own persistence he asked,—
“But why dost thou not want to take him his victual, poppet?”
“I may not tell you, daddy dear, because I promised sure and fast I would not tell, but I’d rather he asked mother or you”—
“Asked us what, child?”
“To help him— Nay, father, please do not ask me, for I promised I would tell nobody, and he said they’d cut off his ears and burn his cheeks”—
“Tut, tut, he’s been scaring thee, thou silly little maid, and I doubt not asking thee to help him escape. Now isn’t that the great secret?”
“No, daddy—that is, perhaps he thought Pris would help him escape”—
“Pris? Why, what has she to do with this man, or thou with either of them?”
“Mother’s coming, and I don’t want to tell her, for she’d chide me so sharply if I did not give up the secret, and I promised, father dear, I promised, and you said I ought to die rather than tell a willful lie.”
“And so I did. Well, I’ll think on’t; go back to thy dishes now.”
And as Priscilla bustled into the room and hastily put on her outdoor gear she noticed neither how grave her husband looked, nor how little progress Betty had made with the dishes.
A little later, as John Alden brought his wife home from the lecture, he said,—
“William Wright was telling me that he saw Prissie Carpenter and our Betty with Sir Christopher Gardiner by the brook picking posies this afternoon.”
“Why ’twas you that bade me send Betty out with him!” exclaimed Priscilla, forestalling the objection in her husband’s voice.
“I know it, and I’d better have left the matter to you, wife. It was ill thought on, and we’ll not have our little maid called in question if the man is plotting an escape”—
“Talking with Pris Carpenter, was he?” interrupted Priscilla sharply.
“Yes”—
“Then it wasn’t escape he was talking of, but his own captivity to her charms. She knew him in England, John; she told me so, and showed me a token he gave her. Mayhap he’s come to marry her!”
“And the woman Mary Grove, what make you of that, wife?”
“Oh, a body must have charity, and many a mare’s nest is naught but a tangle in the hedge. We’ll see.”
“Ay, but we’ll not have our Betty mixed in with any such matter, Priscilla, and I pray thee keep her away from this man while he is in our house. Do not send her to the fore-room again; one of the boys can carry in the sarver, or I will do’t myself, but Betty is not to go in thither again.”
“As thou sayest, John,” replied Priscilla with a meekness reserved for the rare occasions when her husband chose to assert his authority; so thus it came about that not again during the week he remained at Plymouth did Sir Christopher Gardiner find speech with the child, who never to her dying day revealed the secret she had promised to keep, and never quite comforted herself for the duplicity into which she had been led.