"Not a wink," said Dame Eliza, rising heavily. "To me it is as if Damaris had died, and that that child there was another. I bore the agony of parting from her, and now must abide by it, meseems, for I cannot believe that she is here and safe. Constance, it is to you——." She stopped and began again. "I was ever fond of calling you your father's daughter, making plain that I had no part in you. It was true; none have I, nor ever can have. But in my child you have the right of sister, and the restorer of her life. Damaris's mother, and Damaris is your father's other daughter, is heavily in your debt. I do not know——." She paused. She had spoken slowly, with difficulty, as if she could not find the words, nor use them as she wished to when she had found them. Young as she was, Constance saw that her stepmother was labouring under the stress of profound emotion, that tore her almost like a physical agony.
"Now, now, prithee, Mistress Hopkins!" cried Constance, purposely using her customary title for her stepmother, to avoid the effect of there being anything out of the ordinary between them. "Bethink thee that I have loved Damaris dearly all her short life, and that her loss would have wounded me hardly less than it would have you. What debt can there be where there is love? Would I not have sacrificed anything to keep the child, even for myself? And what have I done but remember what the doctor taught me, and give her drops? Do not, I pray thee, make of my selfishness and natural affection a matter of merit! And now the doctor is waiting. Will you not go to him and let him treat you, too?—for indeed you need it. And he will tell you how best to bring Damaris back to her strength. I am going out into the morning air, for my long sleep by the hot fire hath made me heavy. I will be back in a short time to help with breakfast, Stepmother!"
Constance snatched her cloak and ran out by the other door to escape seeing the doctor again and hearing her stepmother dilate to him upon the night's events.
The sun was rising, resplendent, but the air was cold.
"And no wonder!" Constance thought, startled by her discovery. "Winter is upon us; to-day is December! Our warmth must leave us, and then will danger of poisoning be past, even in sheltered spots, such as that in which our little lass near found her death!"
She spread her arms out to the sun rays, and let the crisp, sea wind cool her face.
"What a world! What a world! How fair, how glad, how sweet! Oh, thank God that it is so to us all this morning! Never will I repine at hardships in kind Plymouth colony, nor at the cost of coming on this pilgrimage, for of all the world in Merry England there is none to-day happier or more grateful than is this pilgrim maid!"
[CHAPTER XVIII]
Christmas Wins, Though Outlawed
Little Damaris, who had so nearly made the last great pilgrimage upon which we must all go, having turned her face once more toward the world she had been quitting, resumed her place in it but languidly. Never a robust child, her slender strength was impaired by the poison which she had absorbed. Added to this was the sudden coming of winter upon Plymouth, not well prepared to resist it, and it set in with violence, as if to atone for dallying on its way, for allowing summer to overlap its domain. Without a word to each other both Dame Eliza and Constance entered into an alliance of self-denial, doing without part of the more nourishing food out of their scanty allowance to give it to Damaris, and to plot in other ways to bring her back to health.