Giles hung the coat on his arm, carefully, to keep it from wrinkles, a most unusual thoughtfulness in him, and hastened away.
"No more work to-day, girls, or at least of this sort," cried Constance gaily, her heart lightened by Giles's unmistakable pride in their father. "We shall be called upon to cook and serve. Many Indians come with Massasoit, Squanto?"
"No, his chiefs," Squanto raised one hand and touched its fingers separately, then did the same with the other hand. "Ten," he announced after this illustration.
"That means no less than thirty potatoes, and something less than twenty quarts of porridge," laughed Constance, but was called to account by her stepmother, who had come in from the rear.
"Will you never speak the truth soberly, Constantia Hopkins?" she said. "We do not count on two quarts of porridge for every Indian we feed. Take this child; he is heavy for so long, and he hath kicked with both heels in my flesh every step of the way. Another Hopkins, I'll warrant, I've borne for my folly in marrying your father; a restless, headstrong brood are they, and Oceanus is already not content to sit quietly on his mother's hip, but will drive her, like a camel of the desert." She detached Oceanus's feet from her skirt and handed him over to Constance with a jerk. Constance received him, biting her lips to hold back laughter, and burying her face in the back of the baby neck that had been pitifully thin during the cruel winter, but which was beginning to wrinkle with plumpness now.
Too late she concealed her face; Mistress Eliza caught a glimpse of it and was upon her.
"It's not a matter for laughter that I should be pummelled by your brother, however young he may be," she cried; Dame Eliza had a way of underscoring her children's kinship to Constance whenever they were troublesome. "Though, indeed, I carry on my back the weight of your father's children, and my heart is worse bruised by the ingratitude of you and your brother Giles, than is my flesh with this child's heels. And Mistress Bradford is proud-hearted, and that I will maintain, Puritan or no Puritan, or whether she be one of the elect of this chosen company, or a sinner. For plain could I see this afternoon that she held her husband to be a better man, and higher in the colony, than my husband, nor would she give way one jot when I put it before her--though not so that she would see what I would be after--that Stephen Hopkins it was who was chosen with Mr. Winslow to make the treaty, and not William Bradford. Well, far be it from me to take pride in worldly things; I thank the good training that my mother gave me that I am humble-minded. Often and often would she say to me: Eliza, never plume yourself that you, and your people before you, are, as they are, better, more righteous people than are most other folks. For it is our part to bear ourselves humbly, not setting ourselves up for our virtue, but content to know that we have it and to see how others are lacking in it, making no traffic with sinners, but yet not boasting. And as to you, young women, it would be better if you betook yourselves to your proper homes, not lingering here to encourage Constantia Hopkins to idleness when I've my hands full, and more than full, to make ready for the Indian chiefs' supper, and I need her help."