"I cannot wait to hear the tale! Let me help you off with your heavy coat, your matchlock, and then sit you down in this warmest corner, and tell me everything," cried Constance, beginning to recover herself, the rich colour of her delight flooding her face as, the first shock of surprise over, she realized that it was indeed Giles come back to her and that her secret anxiety for him was past. "Art hungry, my own?" she added, fluttering around her brother, like a true woman, wanting first of all to feed him. "Well, Con, to be truthful I am always hungry," said Giles, smiling down on her. "But not in such strait now that I cannot wait till the next meal." "Here are our father and Mistress Hopkins, hastening hither," said Constance, looking out the door, hoping for this coming of her father. "You have not seen Father yet?" "No, Con; I came straight home, but the captain has met with him, I am sure. And, Con, I want to tell you before he comes in, that I have seen how wrong I was toward our good father, and that I hope to carry myself dutifully toward him henceforth." Constance clasped her hands, rapturously, but had not time to reply before the door was thrown wide open and Stephen Hopkins strode in, his face radiant. He went up to his tall son and clasped his shoulders in a grip that made Giles wince, and said through his closed teeth, trying to steady his voice: "My lad, my fine son, thank God I have you back! And by His mercy never again shall we be parted, nor sundered by the least sundering." Giles looked up, and Giles looked down. He hoped, yet hardly dared to think, that his father meant more than mere bodily separation. "I am glad enough to be here, yet we had glorious days, and have seen a country so worthy that we wish that we might go thither, leaving this less profitable country," said Giles. "We have seen land that by a little effort would be turned into gracious meadows. We have seen great bays and rivers, full of fish, capable of navigation and industry. We have seen a beautiful river, which we have named the Charles, for we think it to be that river which Captain John Smith thus named in his map. The Charles flows down to the sea, past three hills which top a noble harbour, and where we would dearly like to build a town. I will tell you of these things in order. Captain Myles will have a meeting of the Plymouth people to hear our tale; I would wait for that, else will it be stale hearing to you." "Nay, Giles, we shall never tire of it!" cried Constance. "A good story is the better for oft hearing, as you know well, do you not, little Damaris?" "Well, it hath made a man of thee, Giles Hopkins," said Dame Eliza who had silently watched the lad closely as he talked. "It was a lucky thing for thee that the Arm of the Colony, Captain Myles, took thee for one of his tools."