Eleanor scanned his face, a new flush mounting to her cheeks. Her mind was in a turmoil. Great forces strove one against another in her heart; on the one side her powerful filial devotion, which impelled her to depart from England with her father; on the other her love for the colony, her unflinching resolution to stand by it, her scorn for the husband who sought only selfishly to escape; and, with all these—but no; she would not define that control even to herself. Yet deep, vivid, merciless, a name in her soul defined it whether she would or not.
She said nothing, but withdrew from the window to caress her child. A tear fell on little Virginia’s forehead, and then soft fingers wiped it away as though to obliterate the symbol of Sorrow’s baptism.
And now a low, broken murmur rose from without.
“Yes, as a kind of hostage,” said one.
“A token of good faith,” added another. “And she shall be as a queen unto us.”
“Then, surely,” observed a third, “his Excellency will come back with succor.”
“It is well.”
“And the brave Master Dare must share our fate.”
“Ha! That is best of all.”