“Would not have it!” repeated his wife contemptuously, while with the scissors hanging at her girdle she cut the thong of deer-hide painfully binding the wounded wrists of the captive. As she approached, one of the Indians growled a remonstrance and muttered something, of which Alden understood only the words “Big Chief,” but with one stride he placed himself between his wife and the remonstrant, and first laboriously evolving Indian words equivalent to “Stand back! It’s all right!” he added in English,-- “The Big Chief isn’t at home, but I’m here, and my wife will do as she sees fit. It’ll be bad for the man who tries to hinder her.” “And did not you want my husband to unbind your hands, friend?” asked Priscilla, as she gently removed the thong which had sunk deep into the bruised flesh. “My thanks to you, fair dame,” replied the stranger, breaking silence for the first time. “No, I did not wish to be released until the Governor or the Captain of Plymouth had seen my plight and told me if it was by their command these savages had thus dealt with me; I knew not what might be the authority of this gentleman”-- “My husband is John Alden, lieutenant of the colony’s forces, and second in command to Captain Standish.” “My service to you, Lieutenant Alden, and I crave your pardon for what may have seemed surly silence under your first advances; but truth to tell, I am a little overborne with fatigue and annoyance”-- “Indeed, sir, you are fit to drop,” broke in Priscilla indignantly. “Here, sit you down in the roundabout chair, and say not a word more till I fetch you a cup of cordial-waters. John, do get rid of these Indians. I hate the sight of them! Let them go wait at Master Hopkins’s until the governor comes home to take order with them”-- But at this moment, and while Priscilla, half filling a small silver cup with Hollands gin slightly tempered with water, held it to the lips of the fainting man, the door suddenly opened, and Bradford, followed by Standish and Hobomoc, entered the room. “My wife and Christian Penn sent me up to ask about--ah yes--why--Captain, this gentleman is--Your name, good sir?” “My name is Sir Christopher Gardiner,” replied the captive, rallying his strength to reply with dignity. “And as you seem to recall, we met once before at my poor home in the Massachusetts. Well enough I know that my hospitality then was not such as befits either your quality or mine, and yet methinks your response is even less courteous.” “We knew not who the fugitive might be of whom the Indians told us,” returned Bradford gravely. “But evil entreated though you seem to have been, your case would have been even worse had it not been for us.” “They went about to kill you, man,” broke in Standish bluntly. “And if the hound the Bay Colony laid upon your track had not fallen in with one of our own Indians, you had long since tumbled across your own camp-fire, with an arrow through your heart.”