"So be it, and if Hewes with his men will do their best, and Master Bridges and you will send your crew to help, we also will labor in the common cause until each party shall have a staging of its own, and the bond of Christian charity need not be broken." "That same bond will be all the safer if I may get away from here with as small delay as may be," retorted Standish. "And that too shall be," replied Conant cheerfully. "For I fain would speak with the Master of the Anne before she sails, and I'll e'en take our own pinnace and set you across the bay, and be back again before my mates have well missed me." "So wilt thou save me from some such explosion as befalls when a little pot is tightly closed and its contents overheated," replied Myles with a grim smile, and although Conant stared at the odd simile, he paused not to ask its solution, but so hastened the building of the stage and the other business of the day that when sunset fell, the two men, leaving the rest at an amicable supper eaten in common, spread the wide sails of their pinnace to a fitful western wind, and skimmed southward under the soothing and chastening light of the new-risen moon. The western wind though often sighing in capricious languor never quite deserted those who trusted to it, and at a good hour next morning the pinnace dropped her anchor beside the Anne, and her dory carried the two mew ashore just as Plymouth woke to a new day. CHAPTER XXXVIII. BARBARA. "Wilt give me some breakfast, Priscilla?" asked a well-known voice, as Mistress Alden bent to uncover her bake kettle, or Dutch oven, to see if the manchets of fine flour her husband liked so heartily were well browned. "Lord-a-mercy!" cried she nearly dropping the cover and springing to her feet. "What, 't is truly thee, Captain, and not thy spook? Why 't was but yester e'en Dame Bradford told me thou wert away with Master Bridges on a fishing adventure, and none might guess the day of thy return." "She said so, did she?" replied the captain; "and who heard it beside thee, Priscilla?" "Why--now let me think--yea and verily, Christian Penn was in the room and no doubt heard the sad tidings though she said naught." "And none beside, Mistress Alden?" "None--nay, now I think on 't, thy kinswoman Barbara was in presence. But there, my manchets will be burnt to crusts. Sit thee down, Captain, sit thee down." "And what said Mistress Standish anent my going?" asked Myles seating himself upon a three-legged stool and doffing his slouched hat. Priscilla looked at him with one of the keen glances which John declared counted the cockles of a man's heart. Then she smiled with an air of satisfaction and replied,-- "Barbara said naught, and so told me much."