"See here, Con, why should I do that?" demanded Giles. "Is there anything in this desolation that I should want to stay here? I've had enough of Puritans; and Eliza is one of the strongest of them. Except for your sake, little Sis, why should I stay? And I will one day return for you. No, no, Con; I will sail for England when the ship returns, and make my own fortune, somewhere, somehow."
"Dame Eliza is not what she is because she is a Puritan. She is what she is because she is Dame Eliza. Think of the others whom we all love and would fain be like," Constance reminded him. "We must all be true to the enterprise we have undertaken, and----"
"Look here, sweet Con," John Billington interrupted her. "There is nothing to hold Giles to this dreary enterprise, nor to hold me, either. I am not in like plight to him. If any one accused me, suspected me as your father has him, and still more my father did it, I'd let these east winds blow over the space I'd have filled in this settlement. I'm for adventure as it is, though my father cares little what Francis and I do, being a reckless, daring man who surely belongs not in this psalm-singing company. Giles and I will strike out into the wilderness and try our fortunes. We will try the savages. They can be no worse than white men, nor half as outrageous as your stepmother. Why, Con, how can you want your brother tamely to sit down under such an insult? No man should be called upon to prove himself honest! Giles must be off. Let your father find out for himself who is to blame for the loss of the papers, and repent too late for lending ear to his wife's story."
Constance stared for a moment at John, realizing how every word he said found a ready echo in Giles's burning heart, how potent would be this unruly boy's influence to draw her brother after him, now, when Giles was wounded in his two strongest feelings--his pride of honour, his love for his father--and she prayed in her heart for inspiration to deal wisely with this difficult situation.
Suddenly the inspiration came to her. She found it in John's last words.
"Nay, but Jack!" she cried, using Francis's name for his brother, disapproved by the elders who would have none of nicknames. "If needs be that Giles must leave this settlement, if he cannot be happy here, let him at least bide till he has cleared his name of a foul stain, for his honour's sake, for the sake of his dead mother, for my sake, who must abide here and cannot escape, being but a girl, young and helpless. Is it right that I should be pointed out till I am old as the sister of him who was accused of a great wrong and, cowardlike, ran away because he could not clear himself, nor meet the shame, and so admitted his guilt? No! Rather do you, John Billington, instead of urging him to run away, bend all your wit--of which you do not lack plenty!--to the ferreting out of this mystery. That would be the manly course, the kind course to me, and you have always called yourself my friend. Then prove it! Help my brother to clear himself and never say one more word to urge him away till he can go with a stainless name. Our father does not doubt Giles, of that I am certain. He is sore beset, and is a choleric man. What can any man do when his children are on the one hand, and his wife on the other? Be patient with our father, Giles, but in any case do not go away till this is cleared."