"It will be better to let her have her way," he concluded. "Marry! she hath never sought advice or shelter save when her trouble overwhelmed her. In prosperity we are strangers, in adversity friends. Alas, poor children!"
The cavalier Price was seen frequently on the streets of Jamestown, and his friends noticed that he spent much of his time with the widow. He was smiling. His fat face and dark brown eyes seemed to glow with happiness. He never looked ugly, save when he encountered Robert's scowling face, and then he felt unpleasant sensations about the shoulders.
[Illustration: The door was thrown open and the boy Robert entered to take a part in the scene.]
Grinding his teeth in rage, he said:
"I will have my revenge on him when he is under my control."
Hugh Price was not in a great hurry. He bided his time, and not even a frown ruffled his brow. He greeted the children with sunny smiles calculated to win their hearts, and under ordinary circumstances they might have done so. But from the first he was regarded with aversion, as an intruder upon their sanctuary and love. The dislike was mutual, for, though Price concealed his feelings, there rankled in his breast an enmity which he could not smother.
Robert was open in his resentment. It was the first time he had ever opposed his mother. Even when younger, in their trouble and sore distress, he was her counsellor. He had not complained when the heaviest burdens were laid on his young shoulders. He had done the work of a man long before he was even a stout lad. Privation and hardship were borne without complaint. He rejoiced on his mother's account when their fortunes so suddenly and unexpectedly changed. Toil was over. Rest came and with it the improvement he desired.
It was hoped by her best friends that the bitter lesson which Dorothe had learned would prove effective, but it did not. Women of her disposition never learn by experience, and she plunged once more into extravagance and folly. The boy was old enough to realize his mother's weakness, yet his great love for her placed her above censure. He was silent and would have borne a second misfortune like the first uncomplaining; but when he learned that she was to bring one to take the place of that father who slept beneath the sea, he rebelled.
Dorothe knew the disposition of her children, and she decided to get them out of the way until after the wedding. At last she hit upon a plan. Once more in her need she had recourse to the relatives of her husband. Her husband's sister had married Richard Griffin, a planter, and lived at Flower de Hundred. The children had always loved their paternal relatives, and, though they had not been permitted to visit them since the restoration, they had by no means forgotten them. They hailed with joy the announcement that they were to go to Flower de Hundred.
One morning in early June three horses were saddled, and Robert and Rebecca, accompanied by a trusty negro named Sam, started on their journey. Most of the travel, especially to a country as far away as Flower de Hundred, was on horseback.