CHAPTER XXI.
AN AFFAIR OF HONOR.
"Thou liest foully, Edward Dotey! Thou liest even as Ananias andSapphira lied."
"Liest, thou son of Belial! 'T is thou that liest, and art a cock-a-hoopbraggart into the bargain, Master Edward Lister! Tell me that ourmaster's daughter gave thee that kerchief"--
"If thou couldst read, I'd show thee 'Constance Hopkins' fairly wroughtupon it by the young mistress's own hand."
"Then thou stolest it, and I will straight to our master and tell himon 't!"
"Hi, hi, my springalds! what meaneth all this vaporing and noise? What'samiss, Lister?"
"It matters not what's amiss John Billington. Pass on and attend tothine own affairs."
"Lister's afraid to tell that he carrieth stolen goods in his doubletand lies about them into the bargain," sneered Edward Dotey.
"I lie do I, thou base-born coward! Lie thou there, then!"
And Edward Lister with one generous buffet stretched his opponent uponthe pile of firewood they had been hewing a little way from the town.
Billington who had wandered in that direction with his gun upon hisshoulder looking for game, helped the fallen man to his feet andofficiously fingered a bruise rising upon his cheek.
"Hi! Hi! But here's a coil! He's wounded thee sorely, Dotey! I'm witnessthat he assaulted thee, with intent to kill like enough. Canst stand?"
"Let me go, let me at him, leave go of my arm John Billington! I'll soonshow thee"--
"Nay Ned," interposed Lister, as Billington with a malignant grin uponhis face half hindered, half permitted Dotey's struggles to free himselffrom the poacher's sinewy arms. "Nay, man, I meant not to draw e'en somuch blood as trickles down thy cheek"--
"He meant to draw it by the bucketful and not in drops," interpretedBillington. "And now he tries to crawl off. Take thy knife to him, man;nay, get ye both your swords and hack away at each other until we seewhich is the better bird. 'T is long since I saw a main"--
"Ay, we'll fight it out, Lister, and see which is the better man in thematter you wot of." And Dotey, who was furiously jealous lest his fellowretainer should have made more progress in the regard of ConstanceHopkins than himself, nodded meaningly toward him, while Billingtonwatched both with Mephistophilean glee.
"Agreed," replied Lister more coolly. "Although thou knowest privatequarrels are forbidden by the Captain."
"Hah! Thou 'rt afraid of our peppery little Captain!" cried Billington."Some day thou 'lt see me take him between thumb and finger and crackhim like a flea if he mells too much with me."
"I heard thee flout at his command t' other day, and I heard him tellthee the next time thou didst so let loose thy tongue, he'd take orderwith thee," exclaimed Lister hotly, and Billington snapping his fingerscontemptuously retorted,--
"'T is no use, Dotey. Lister's afraid of thee and will not fight. 'T isa good boy, but not over-brave."
"Stay you here, you two, till I can go and come, and we will see who isthe coward!" retorted Lister furiously, and before either could reply hesped away in the direction of the village.
"'T is like a bull-fight," cried Billington with a coarse laugh. "Thecreature is hard to wake, but when he hath darts enough quivering in hishide he rouses up and showeth rare sport. Now let us find a fair, smoothfield for our sword play. 'T is not so easy in this wild land."
"I know not why our captain should forbid the duello; 't is ever the wayof gentles to settle their disputes at the point of the sword," saidDotey musingly.
"Ay, and in this place we all are gentles, or all simples, I know notwhich," added Billington. "Certes, one man should here count as good asanother, and 't is often in my mind to say so, and to cry, Down withgovernors, and captains, and elders"--
"Nay, nay, such talk smacks too strong of treason to suit my ear,"exclaimed Dotey, who was, after all, an honest, well-meaning youngfellow, a little carried away just now by jealousy and by theintoxicating air of liberty and freedom, but by no means to the extentof joining or desiring a revolt against the appointed powers of Churchor State.
"Well, here is Lister, and with not only swords but daggers if I can seearight. Ay, that's a good lad, that's a brave lad, Lister! There's nocraven in thy skin, is there, and I shrewdly nip mine own tongue for socalling thee. Come now, my merry men, let me place you fairly, each withhis shoulder to the sun, each planted firmly on sound footing. Therethen, that is as well as may be, and well enow. Come, one, two, three,and lay on!"
But careful as Lister had been in securing and bringing away hisweapons, he had not escaped the scrutiny of two bright eyes hiddenbehind the curtain dividing the nook where Constance Hopkins and hersister Damaris slept, from the main room of the dwelling, and no soonerhad the young man left the house than Constance hastily followed, andrunning lightly up the hill to where the Captain with John Alden at hisside was roofing in an addition to his half-built house she cried,--
"Captain Standish, I fear me there's mischief afoot with Edward Doteyand Edward Lister!"
"Ay? And what makes thee think so, my lass?" asked Standish peering downfrom his coign of vantage. "Where are they?"
"My father sent them afield this morning to rive and pile firewood, buta few minutes agone Edward Lister came creeping into the house and up tothe loft where they two and Bartholomew sleep, and I who was below heardthe clank of steel, and peeping saw that he brought down two swords andhad stuck two daggers in his belt"--
"Aha! Swords and daggers, my young masters!" exclaimed the Captain,hastily descending the ladder beside which Constance stood. "John, dropthy hammer and take thy piece; nay, take a good stick in hand, and wewill soon bring these springalds to order. Whereaway are they, girl?"
"That-a-way, sir; nay, see you not Lister's cap bob up and down as herunneth behind yon bushes?"
"Ay, lass, thou hast a sharp eye. Go home and rest content--thou 'rt awise and good child."
Ten minutes later the captain and his follower plunging through theunderwood fringing Watson's Hill heard the clash of steel upon steel anda coarse voice crying,--
"Well played, Dotey! Nay, 't is naught but a scratch--don't give overfor that, Lister; up and at him again, boy! Get thy revenge on him!"
"That knave Billington!" growled Standish: "I could have sworn he was init! Here you! Stop that! Drop your blades, men! Drop them!"
Lister and Dotey, nothing loth, for both were wounded, obeyed thesummons, and staggering back from each other stood leaning upon theirswords and panting desperately, while Billington dexterously steppingbackward behind an elder bush made his way forest-ward with a stealthyfootstep, and a shrewd use of cover, suggestive of his former calling.
"And now what meaneth this, ye young fools!" sternly demanded Standish."Are ye aping the sins of your betters and claiming the rights of theduello? Rights say I! Nay, 't is forbidden to any man in this colony,and ye know it well, ha?"
"Yea, Captain, we knew 't was forbidden, but we had a quarrel"--
"And why if ye must fight did ye take to deadly weapons? Have ye not apair of fists apiece, or if that could not content ye, are there notsingle-sticks enow in these woods? I've a mind to take my ramrod in handand show ye the virtue of a good stick, but I promise you that if not I,some other shall give you a lesson you'll not forget. Come, march!"
"I'm shrewdly slashed in the leg, Captain," expostulated Dotey; "andfear me I cannot walk."
"Ay? Sit down, then, and let me see. Thou 'st a sore wound in thyleather breeches, but--ay, there's a scratch beneath, but naught tohinder your moving. Here, I'll plaster it up in a twinkling."
And from the pocket of his doublet the old soldier produced a casecontaining some of the most essential requisites of surgery, and with adeftness and delicacy of touch, surprising to one who had not seen himbeside a sick-bed, he soon had the wound safe and comfortable.
"There, man, thou 'rt fit to walk from here to Cape Cod. Many a milehave I marched with a worse wound than that, and no better than a rag orat best my belt bound round i
t. Now you sirrah! Hast a scratch, too?"
For reply Lister silently held out a hand whence the blood drippedfreely from a cut across the palm.
"Tried to grasp 't other fool's dagger in thy naked hand, eh?" coollyremarked the Captain as he cut a strip of plaster to fit the wound. "Nowthe next time take my counsel and catch it in the leathern sleeve of thyjerkin. Better wound a dead calf than a live one."
"Next time, sayst he!" commented Dotey in a mock aside to his companion."So we were not so far astray this time."
"Next time thou meetest a dagger, I should have said," retorted theCaptain with his grimmest smile. "I never said ye were not to fight, forI trow ye'll have chance enough at that before I'm done with ye; butwhen a handful of men are set as we are to garrison a little post on thefrontier of a savage country, for one to fall afoul of another and torisk two lives out of a dozen for some senseless feud of their own is tomy mind little short of treason to the government they've sworn todefend. Now then, march! Alden, give Dotey thy arm to lean upon if heneeds it. Forward!"
That night Dotey and Lister slept in two rooms under guard, and the nextmorning the freemen of the colony were convened in the Common house tojudge their case. With them Billington was also summoned, althoughneither Dotey nor Lister had betrayed his complicity.
Accused of deliberate assault upon each other with deadly weapons bothmen humbly pleaded guilty and expressed their penitence, but to thisBradford gravely replied,--
"Glad are we to know that ye are penitent, and resolved upon amendment,but ne'er the less we cannot therefore omit some signal punishment bothto make a serious impression upon your own memories, and to advertise toall other evil-doers that we bear not the sword of justice in vain.Brethren, I pray you speak your minds. What ought to be done to thesewould-be murderers?"
"In the army they would have earned a flogging," remarked the captainsitting at the governor's right hand.
"Perhaps solitary confinement with fasting would subdue the angry heatof their blood most effectually," said the elder at Bradford's otherside.
"Had we a pillory or a pair of stocks I would advise that publicdisgrace," said Winslow; and Allerton suggested,--
"They might be fined for the benefit of the public purse."
"If the Governor will leave them to me I'll promise to trounce themwell, and after, to set them extra tasks for a month or so," offeredHopkins; and Alden murmured to Howland,--
"Allerton is treasurer of the public purse, and Hopkins will profit bythe extra labor, mark you!"
"What is thy counsel, Surgeon Fuller?" inquired Bradford, and thewhimsical doctor replied,--
"I once saw two fellows in a little village of Sussex lying upon thestones of the market-place, tied neck and heels, and methinks I neverhave heard such ingenious profanity as those men were yelling each athis unseen comrade. I asked the publican where I baited my horse thecause of so strange a spectacle, and he said this was their manner ofdisciplining brawlers in the ale-house. They were to lie therefour-and-twenty hours without bite or sup, and so I left them. Methinksit were a suitable discipline in this case, but I may fairly hope theprofanity of those unenlightened rustics will give place with our erringbrethren to sighs of penitence and sorrow."
"What think you, brethren, of our good surgeon's suggestion?" askedBradford, restraining the smile tempting the corners of his mouth. "Itapproves itself to me as a fair sentence. Will those who are so mindedraise their right hands?"
The larger number of right hands rose in the air, and the sentence waspronounced that so soon as the doctor assured the authorities that thewounded men would take no harm from the exposure, the duelists, boundneck and heels, should be laid at the meeting of the four roads, thereto remain four-and-twenty hours without food or water, and until thattime each was to remain locked in a separate chamber.
"And now John Billington," continued Bradford sternly, as the youngermen were removed, "how hast thou to defend thyself from the charge ofblood guiltiness in stirring up strife between these two?"
"Nay, your worship, it was their own quarrel," replied Billingtonhardily. "I did but chance to pass and saw them at it, and so tarried amoment to see fair play."
"And to hound them on at each other, as if it were a bull-baiting forthine own amusement," interposed Standish in a contemptuous tone. "Nay,lie not about it, man! I heard thee, and saw thee!"
"Surely, Billington," resumed the governor, "thou hast not so soonforgotten how thou wast convened before us some weeks since, chargedwith insolence and disobedience to our captain, and with seditiousspeech anent the government. We did then speak of some such punishmentas this for thee, but thy outcry of penitence and promise of amendment,coupled with the shame of chastising thee in sight of thine own wife andsons, was so great that we forgave thee, the more that Captain Standishpassed over the affront to himself; but now we see that the penitencewas but feigned, and the amendment a thing of naught, and much I fearme, John Billington, that an' thou amend not thy ways, harsherdiscipline than we would willingly inflict will be thy portion in timeto come."
The governor spoke with more than usual solemnity fixing upon theoffender a gaze severe yet pitiful and reluctant, as one who foreseesfor another a fate deserved indeed, and yet too terrible to contemplate.Perhaps before that astute and reflective mind there rose a vision ofthe gallows nine years later to be erected by his own order, whereonJohn Billington, deliberate murderer of John Newcomen, should expiatehis crime and open the gloomy record of capital punishment in NewEngland.
At the present moment, however, the offender slunk away with hisreproof, and the meeting proceeded to consider other matters, for, whilethe new government felt itself competent to deal with matters of lifeand death, it also found no matter too trifling for its attention.
Four days later Edward Dotey and Edward Lister, their wounds comfortablyhealed, were brought out into the market place as in fond reminiscenceof home the Pilgrims called what is now the Town Square of Plymouth, andeach offender was solemnly tied neck and heels together,--an attitude atonce ignominious and painful.
The governor, with Allerton his assistant, the captain, the elder,Winslow, Hopkins, and Warren stood formally arrayed to witness theexecution of the sentence, which Billington was forced to carry out. Theless important members of the community surrounded the scene, and fromamid the fluctuating crowd murmurs of amaze, of pity, of approval, orthe reverse became from time to time audible.
"Nay, then, 't is a shame to see Christian men so served, and they soscarce a commodity in these parts," declared Helen Billington to herneighbor Mistress Hopkins, who nippingly replied,--
"Mayhap we've mistook the men we've put in power."
"Ay," returned the coarser malcontent. "They passed by thy goodman, andput worse men over his head."
"Master Hopkins careth naught for such honors as these have to bestow.His name was made or ever he came hither," replied Elizabeth a littlecoldly as she moved away.
"Glad am I to see that thy goodman leaveth the cord as slack as may be,Goody Billington," whispered Lois, late maid to Mistress Carver, but nowthe promised second wife of Francis Eaton, who stood beside her, andoverhearing the whisper said reprovingly,--
"Nay, wench, thou speakest foolishly. If evil-doers are to go unwhipt ofjustice how long shall this colony endure. See you not that if theseroysterers had each killed the other, there had been two men the less tostand between your silly throats and the hatchets of the salvages?"
"Ay, there's sound sense in that, Francis," replied Lois yieldingadmiringly to the superior wisdom of her betrothed, but Helen Billingtonnodding and blinking, muttered to her boy John, as she leaned upon hisshoulder,--
"Wait but till dark, when all the wiseacres are asleep, and see if thydaddy sets not these men free, ay, and puts weapons in their hands likeenough, to revenge themselves withal."
The offenders bound, and laid each upon his side on the bare ground, thecourt withdrew and the crowd dispersed. But scarce an hour had passedere Hopkins
presented himself before the governor and his assistant, atwork over the colony's records, those precious first minutes, nowforever lost, and with an elaborately quiet and restrained demeanorsaid,--
"Master Bradford, yon poor knaves of mine are suffering shrewdly fromcramps and shooting pains as well as from the ache of their scarcehealed wounds. They promise in sad sincerity to amend their ways, andwhen all is said, they are good and kindly lads, and did but ape thefashions of their betters in the Old World. May not I persuade yourworship to look over their offense for this time, and to remit theirpains and penalties as soon as may be?"
"Thou sayest they are penitent, good Master Hopkins?" asked Bradfordjudicially.
"Ay, and to my mind honestly so."
"We will speak with them, Master Allerton, and if the captain and theelder agree with me, Master Hopkins, thy petition is granted, for indeedit is to me more pain to make another suffer than to suffer myself, evenas a father feels the rod upon his own heart the while he lays it on hisson's back."
"And yet the warning that to spare the rod will spoil the child appliesto the children of the State as well as to the household," remarkedAllerton, whose lively son Bartholomew could have testified to hisfather's strict obedience to Solomon's precept.
The chiefs of the colony were soon reassembled about the grotesquefigures of the suffering duelists, and with their approval, the governorhaving demanded and received ample professions of contrition, andpromises of amendment, ordered Billington to release the prisoners, whoshamefacedly crept away to their master's house, and thus ended thefirst and for many years the only duel fought upon New England soil.
Standish of Standish: A Story of the Pilgrims Page 22