Part 40 (1/2)
”I send you a loving-cup, sir!” exclaimed the girl, her eyes flas.h.i.+ng, and her color rising.
”Yes. Call it by what name you will; I mean the cup Desire Minter brought me from thee, with a message that I should drink thy health.”
”Loth were I to think, Captain Standish, that you would willfully insult a maid with none to defend her, and so I will charitably suppose that you have been forced to drink too many healths to guard well thine own.
Good e'en, sir.”
”Now by the G.o.d that made us both, wench, I'll have an end of this. Nay, not one step dost thou stir until you or I are laid in a lie.”
”A lie, Captain Standis.h.!.+”
”Mayhap my own lie. I say that Desire Minter brought me a silver cup of some sweet posset, such as you have made for our sick folk time and again, and bade me from you quaff it to your health.”
”And that is G.o.d's truth, say you, sir?”
”Mistress Molines, my word has not often been doubted, and you force me to remind you that I come not of mechanical”--
”Nay, nay, stop there, an' it please you, sir! We'll unwind this coil before we snarl another. Fear not that my base mechanical blood shall ever sully your n.o.ble strain; but mean though I be, my habit is a tolerably truthful one, and I tell you once and for all that I sent you no cup, I made you no posset, I desired no health drunk by you.”
”Nay, then, what hath this girl Desire wrought? And truth to tell Priscilla, I fear me 't is poison, for a shrewd pain seizeth me ever and anon, and a strange heaviness is in my head.”
”And there's a sultry color on your cheek--nay, then, we'll see the surgeon”--
”And thou 'lt forgive whatever I have said amiss, Priscilla, for mayhap I'll trouble thee no more. Like enough she hath revenged herself”--
”For your scorn of her love,” interposed Priscilla vivaciously. ”Like enough, like enough. Come to the house, Captain, and let us take counsel with the dear mother. She still knows best.”
”Go thou, Priscilla. It hardly beseems a man and a soldier to seek redress for a wench's love scratch at the hands of an old woman--nay, nay, fire not up afres.h.!.+ No one can honor Mistress Brewster more than I do, but tell me, is she a man or is she young? Sooth now, Priscilla!”
”And still in thy masterful mood thou 'lt have the last word, doughty Captain. But go you home, then, and bid John Alden make a fire and heat a good kettle of water, and I'll away to the mother who will deal with Desire in short measure.”
”'T is good counsel and I'll follow it, for in sober sadness I feel strangely amiss.” And the soldier, who now was as livid as he had been flushed, strode away up the hill, while Priscilla picking up the trenchers fled like a lapwing into the house where she found Desire seated sullenly in a corner, while the elder, his wife, and the governor were gathered together near the fire cozily discussing the events of the day. Standing before them and restraining her natural vivacity that it might not discredit the importance of her story, Priscilla in brief and pungent phrases told the story of the loving draught, and as Desire rose and stole toward the door laid a hand upon her arm that effectually detained her until the elder sternly said,--
”Remain you here, Desire Minter, until this report is sifted.”
”Were it not well to send at once for our good physician, that he may know what hath been done before he sees the captain?” suggested Bradford mildly, and the elder a.s.senting, Priscilla was dispatched for doctor Fuller, who arrived within the minute, and listened with profound attention, while Mistress Brewster, to whom alone the girl would reply, extracted from her a most startling story.
”The captain first of all asked me to wife, and if he had not been wiled away from me by artful”--
”Nay, nay, Desire, thou 'rt not to say such things as that,” interposed the dame with gentle severity, and Bradford added in much the same tone,--
”'T was thine own idle fancy, girl, that set thee on such a notion. The captain hath averred to me as Christian man that he never made proffer to thee nor wished so to do since first he set eyes on thee.”
”He did then,” muttered Desire sullenly, and Mistress Brewster interposed.
”Leaving that aside, tell us, Desire, what didst thou give the captain to drink, and why didst say that Priscilla sent it?”
”Marry, because she hath bewitched him, and I wot well he would take it from her without gainsaying.”
”But what was it thou gavest him?”