CHAPTER IV
The First Yuletide
Constance had a tender conscience, quick to self-blame. She was unhappyif she could impute to herself a fault, ill at ease till she had doneall that she could to repair wrong. Although her stepmother's dislikefor her, still more her open expression of it, was cruelly unjust andprevented all possibility of love for her, still Constance deeplyregretted having spoken to her with lack of respect.
But when she made humble apology for the fault and begged Mrs. Hopkins'spardon with sweet sincerity, she was received in a manner that turnedcontrition into bitterness.
Dame Eliza looked at her with a cold light in her steely blue eyes, anda scornful smile. Plainly she was too petty herself to understandgenerosity in others, and construed Constance's apology into aconfession of fear of her.
"Poor work spreading bad butter over a burnt crust," she commented."There's no love lost between us, Constantia Hopkins; maybe none everfound, nor ever will be. I don't want your fair words, nor need you hopeyour father will not one day see you, and that sullen brother of yours,as do I. So waste no breath trying to get around me. Damaris isfretting; look after her."
Poor Constance! She had been so honestly sorry for having been angry andhaving given vent to it, had gone to her stepmother with such sincerity,hoping against hope, for the unnumbered time, that she could make theirrelation pleasanter! It was not possible to help feeling a violentreaction from this reception, to keep her scorned sweetness from turningto bitterness in her heart.
She told the story to Giles, and it made him furiously angry.
"You young ninny to humble yourself to her," he cried, with flashingeyes. "Will you never learn to expect nothing but injustice from her? Itisn't what we do, or say; it is jealousy. She will not let our fatherlove us, she hates the children of our mother, and hates our mother'smemory, that she was in every way Mistress Eliza's superior, as sheguesses, knowing that she was better born, better bred, and surelybetter in character. I remember our mother, Con, if not clearly. I'msorry you have not even so much recollection of her. You are like her,and may be thankful for it. I could trounce you for crawling to MistressHopkins! Learn your lesson for all time, and no more apologies! Con, Ishall not stand it! No matter how it goes with this colony, I shall goback to England. I will not stay to be put upon, to see my father turnedfrom me."
"Oh, Giles, that could never be!" cried Constance. "Father will neverturn from us."
"I did not say from _us_; I said from _me_," retorted Giles. "You aredifferent, a girl, and--and like Mother, and--several other reasons. ButI often see that Father is not sure whether he shall approve me or not.It will not be so long till I am twenty-one, then I shall get out ofreach of these things."
Constance's troubled face brightened. To her natural hopefulness Giles'stwenty-first birthday was far enough away to allow a great deal of goodto come before it.
"Oh, twenty-one, Giles! You'll be prospering and happy here beforethat," she cried.
"But I must tell no more of troubles with my stepmother to Giles," sheadded mentally. "It will never do to pile fuel on his smoulderingfires!"
The next day when Constance was helping Mistress Hopkins with hermending, she noticed the oilskin-wrapped packet that her father had leftwith his wife for safe keeping, tossed carelessly upon the hammock whichswung from the side of the berth which she and her stepmother shared,the bed devised by ingenuity for little Damaris.
"Is not that packet in Damaris's hammock Father's packet of valuablepapers?" Constance asked. "Is there not a risk in letting them lieabout, so highly as he prizes them?"
She made the suggestion timidly, for Dame Eliza did not take kindly tohints of this nature. To her surprise her stepmother received her remarknot merely pleasantly, but almost eagerly, quick with self-reproach.
"Indeed thou art right, Constantia, and I am wrong to leave it for aninstant outside the strong chest, where I shall put it under lock andkey," she said, nevertheless not moving to rescue it. "I have carriedit tied around my neck by a silken cord and hidden in my bosom till thishour past. I dropped it there when I was trying to mend Damaris'shammock. Thanks to you for reminding me of it. What can ail that hammockdefies me! I have tried in all ways to strengthen it, but it sags. Somenight the child will take a bad fall from it. Try you what you can makeof it, Constantia."
"I am not skilful, Stepmother," smiled Constance. "Giles is just outsidestudying the chart of our voyage hither. Let me call him to repair thehammock. We would not have you fall at night and crack the pretty goldenpate, would we, Damaris?" The child shook her "golden pate" hard.
"That you would not, Connie, for you are good, good to me!" she cried.
Mistress Hopkins looked on the little girl with somewhat of softening ofher stern lips, yet she felt called upon to reprimand this lightness ofspeech.
"Not 'Connie,' Damaris, as thou hast been often enough told. We do nothold with the ungodly manner of nicknames. Thy sister is Constantia, andso must thou call her. And you must not put into the child's headnotions of its being pretty, Constantia. Beauty is a snare of the devil,and vanity is his weapon to ensnare the soul. Do not let me hear youagain speak to a child of mine of her pretty golden pate. As to thehammock if you choose to call your brother to repair it for hishalf-sister I have nothing against the plan."
Constance jumped up and ran out of the cabin.
"Giles, Giles, will you come to try what you can do with Damaris'ssleeping hammock?" she called.
"What's wrong with it?" demanded Giles, rising reluctantly, butfollowing Constance, nevertheless.
"I don't know, but Mistress Hopkins says she cannot repair it and thatthe child is like to fall with its breaking some night," said Constance,entering again the small, close cabin of the women. "Here is Giles,Mistress Hopkins; he will try what he can do," she added.
Giles examined the hammock in silence, bade Constance bring him cord,and at last let it swing back into place, and straightened himself. Hehad been bent over the canvas with it drawn forward against his breast.
"I see nothing the matter with the hammock except a looseness of itscords, and perhaps weakness of one where I put in the new one. You couldhave mended it, Con," he said, ungraciously, and sensitive Constanceflushed at the implication that her stepmother had not required hishelp, for she never could endure anything like a disagreeable atmospherearound her.
"Giles says 'Con,'" observed Damaris, justifying herself for the use ofnicknames.
"Giles does many things that we do not approve; let us hope he will notlead his young sister and brother into evil ways," returned her mother,sourly. "But thou shouldst thank him when he does thee a service, not tobe deficient on thy side in virtue."
"You know Giles doesn't need thanks for what he does for small people,don't you, Hop-o-my-Thumb?" Giles said and departed, successful in bothhis aims, in pleasing the child by his name for her, and displeasing hermother.
Two hours later Constance was sitting rolled up in heavy woollens like acocoon well forward of the main mast, in a sheltered nook, reading toRose Standish, who was also wrapped to her chin, and who when she was inthe open, seemed to find relief from the oppression that made breathingso hard a matter to her.
Mistress Hopkins came toward them in furious haste, her mouth open as ifshe were panting, one hand pressed against her breast.
"Constantia, confess, confess, and do not try to shield thy wickedbrother!" she cried.
"'Constantia, confess--confess and do not try to shieldthy wicked brother'"]
"Confess! My wicked brother? Do you mean the baby, for you cannot meanGiles?" Constance said, springing to her feet.
"That lamb of seven weeks! Indeed, you impudent girl, I mean no suchthing, as well you know, but that dreadful, sin-enslaved, criminal,Gile----"
"Hush!" cried Constance, "I will not hear you!"
There was a fire in her eyes that made even Mistress Eliza halt in herspeech.
"Giles Hopkins has stolen your father's packet, the pa
cket of paperswhich you saw in the hammock and reminded me to put away," she said,more quietly. "I shall leave him to be dealt with by your father whomust soon return. But you, you! Can you clear yourself? Did you help himsteal it? Nay, did you call him in for this purpose, warning him that heshould find the packet there, and to take it? Is this a plan betweenyou? For ever have I said that there was that in you two that curdled myblood with fear for you of what you should become. Not like your godlyfather are you two. From elsewhere have you drawn the blood that poisonsyou. Confess and I will ask your father to spare you."
Constance stood with her thick wrappings falling from her as she threwup her hands in dumb appeal against this unbearable thing. She was whiteas the dead, but her blue eyes burned black in the whiteness, full ofintense life.
"Mistress Hopkins, oh, Mistress Hopkins, consider!" begged RoseStandish, also rising in great distress. "Think what it is that you aresaying, and to whom! You cannot knowingly accuse this dear girl ofconnivance in a theft! You cannot accuse Giles of committing it! Why,Captain Myles is fonder of the lad than of any other in our company!Giles is upright and true, he says, and fearless. Pray, pray, takeback these fearful words! You do not mean them, and when you will longto disown them they will cling to you and not forsake you, as does ourmad injustice, to our lasting sorrow. What can be more foreign to ourcalling than harsh judgments, and angry accusations?"
"I am not speaking rashly, Mistress Standish," insisted Dame Eliza.
"Not yet three hours gone Constantia saw lying in Damaris's hammock avaluable packet of papers, left me in trust by her father. I asked herto mend the hammock, which was in disorder, but she called her brotherto do the simple task. No one else hath entered the cabin at my end ofit since. The packet is gone. Would you have more proof? Could there bemore proof, unless you saw the theft committed, which is manifestlyimpossible?"
"But why, good mistress, should the boy and girl steal these papers?What reason would there be for them to disturb their father's property?"asked Rose Standish.
"I have heard my uncle say, who is a barrister at home, that one mustsearch for the motive of a crime if it is to be established." Sheglanced with a slight smile at Constance's stony face, who neitherlooked at her, nor smiled, but stood gazing in wide-eyed horror at herstepmother.
"Precisely!" triumphed Dame Eliza. "Two motives are clear, MistressStandish, to those who are not too blinded by prejudice to see. ThoseHopkins girl and boy hate me, fear and grudge my influence with theirfather. Would they not like to weaken it by the loss of papers entrustedto me, a loss that he would resent on his return? There is one motive.As to the other: you do not know, but I do, and so did they, that partof these papers related to an inheritance in England, from which theywould want their half-brother and sister excluded. Needs it more?"
"Yes, yes, yes!" cried Rose Standish, as Constance groaned. "To any oneknowing Giles and Constance this is no more than if you said Fee, fi,fo, fum! They plotting to weaken you with their father! They stealing tokeep the children from a share in their inheritance, so generous as theyare, so good to the little ones! Fie, Mistress Hopkins! It is a grievoussin, you who are so strict in small matters, a grievous sin thus tojudge another, still more those to whom you owe the obligation of onewho has taken their dead mother's place."
Constance began to tremble, and to struggle to speak. What she wouldhave said, or what would have come of it, cannot be known, for at thatmoment the Billington boys, John and Francis, came hurtling down uponthem, shouting:
"The shallop, the shallop is back! It is almost upon us on the otherside. Come see, come see! Dad is back, and all the rest, unless thesavages have killed some of them," Francis added the final words insolo.
The present trouble must be laid aside for the great business in hand ofwelcome.
Poor Constance turned in a frozen way to follow Rose and her stepmotherto the other side of the ship.
Her father--her dear, dear, longed-for father--was come back. He mightbe bringing them news of a favoured site where they would go to begintheir new home.
At last they were to step upon land again, to live in some degree thelife they knew of household task and tilling, walking the woods, drawingwater, building fires--the life so long postponed, for which they allthirsted.
But if she and Giles were to meet their father accused of theft! If theyshould see in those grave, kind, wise eyes a shadow of a doubt of hiseldest children! Constance felt that she dared not see him come if sucha thing were so much as possible.
But when the shallop was made fast beside the _Mayflower_ and Constancesaw her father boarding the ship among the others of the returningexpedition, and she met the glad light in his eyes resting upon her, allfear was swallowed up in immense relief and joy.
With a low cry she sprang to meet him and fell sobbing on his shoulder,forgetful of the stern on-lookers who would condemn such display offeeling.
"Oh, father, father, if you had never come back!" she murmured.
"But I have come, daughter!" Stephen Hopkins reminded her. "Surely youare not weeping that I have come! We have great things to tell you,attacks by savages, some hardships, but we have brought grain which wefound hidden by the Indians, and we have found the right place toestablish our dwelling."
Constance raised her head and dried her eyes, still shaken by sobs. Herfather looked keenly at the pale, drawn face, and knew that somethingmore than ordinary lay behind the overwhelming emotion with which shehad received him.
"Poor child, poor motherless child!" he thought, and the pity of thatmoment went far in influencing his subsequent treatment of Constancewhen he learned what had ailed her on his arrival.
Now he patted her shoulder and turned toward the middle of the ship'sforward deck where his comrades of the expedition were relating theirexperiences, and displaying their trophies.
Golden corn lay on the deck, spread upon a cloth, and the pilgrims whohad remained with the ship were handling it as they listened to JohnAlden, who was made the narrator of this first report, having a readytongue.
"We found a pond of fresh water," he was saying, "and not far from itcleared ground with the stubble of a gathered harvest upon it. Judgewhether or not the sight was pleasant to us, as promising of fertilelands when the forests were hewn. And we came upon planks of wood thathad lately been a house, and a kettle, and heaps of sand, with handmarksupon it, not long since made, where the sand had been piled and presseddown, into which, digging rapidly, we penetrated and found the corn yousee here. The part of it we took, but the rest we once more covered andleft it. And see ye, brethren, there have we the seed for our own nextseason's harvest, the which we were in such doubt of obtaining from homein time. It is a story for night, when we have leisure, to tell you ofhow we saw a few men and a dog, who ran from us, and we pursuing, hopingto speak to them, but they escaped us. And how later on, we saw savagescutting up great fish of tremendous size along the coast, and how wewere attacked by another savage band one night. But all this we reservefor another telling. We came at last into a harbour and found it deepenough for the _Mayflower_ on our sounding it. And landing we marchedinto the land and found fields, and brooks, and on the whole that itwas a fit country for our beginning. For the rest it is as you shalldecide in consultation, but of our party we are all in accord to urgeyou to accept this spot and hasten to take possession of it as thewinter cometh on apace."
"Let us thank God for that He hath led us into a land of corn, andguided us for so many weary days, over so many dreary miles," saidWilliam Brewster, the elder of the pilgrims.
John Carver, who was chosen on the _Mayflower_ as their governor, aroseand out of a full heart thanked God for His mercies, as Elder Brewsterhad recommended.
The _Mayflower_ weighed anchor in the morning to carry her brave freightto their new home. The wind set hard against her, and it was the secondday before she entered Plymouth harbour, as they resolved to name theirnew habitation, a name already bestowed by Captain Smith, and the nameof their final po
rt of embarkation in England.
No sign of life met them as the pilgrims disembarked. Silently, withfull realization of what lay before them, and how fraught withsignificance this beginning was, the pilgrims passed from the ship thathad so long been their home, and set foot--men, women, andchildren--upon the soil of America.
A deep murmur arose when the last person was landed, and it happenedthat Constance Hopkins was the last to step from the boat to the rockon which the landing was made, and to jump light-heartedly to the sand,amid the tall, dried weeds that waved on the shore.
"Praise God from whom all blessings flow," said Elder Brewster,solemnly. The pilgrim band of colonists sang the doxology with bowedheads.
Three days later the shores of the harbour echoed to the ring of axes,the sound of hammers, as the first house was begun, the community house,destined to shelter many families and to store their goods.
"Merry Christmas, Father!" said Constance, coming up to her father inthe cold of the early bleak December morning.
"S-s-sh!" warned her father, finger upon lip. "Do you not know, mydaughter, that the keeping of Christmas is abjured by us as savouring ofpopery, and that to wish one merry at yuletide would be reckoned asunrighteousness among us?"
"Ah, but Father, you do not think so! You do not go with all theseopinions, and can it be wrong to be merry on the day that gladdened theworld?" Constance pleaded.
"Not wrong, but praiseworthy, to be merry under our present condition,to my way of thinking," said Stephen Hopkins, glancing around at thedrab emptiness of land and sky and harbour beyond. "Nay, child, I donot think it wrong to rejoice at Christmas, nor do I hold with theseverity of most of our people, but because I believe that it will begood to begin anew in a land that is not oppressed, nor torn byking-made wars and sins, I have cast my lot, as has Myles Standish, whois of one mind with me, among this Plymouth band, and we must conformto custom. So wish me Merry Christmas, if you will, but let none hearyou, and we will keep our heresies to ourselves."
"Yet the first house in the New World is begun to-day!" laughedConstance. "We are getting a Christmas gift."
"A happy portent to begin our common home on the day when the Prince ofPeace came to dwell on earth! Let us hope it will bring us peace," saidher father.
"Peace!" cried Constance, with a swift and terrified remembrance of theaccusation which her stepmother had threatened bringing against herselfand Giles.