The Real America in Romance, Volume 6 | Page 4

to assume to herself a superiority, we know full well she hath her faults."
"Verily, she hath," interposed a female who had her hood drawn low over her face to protect it from the morning sun.
"And I have heard that she does lead poor John Stevens a miserable life. What with her extravagance, her temper, and the way she does hate his old mother whom he loves, his life must be a burden?" continued dame Woodley,
"Little the pity for him, though," interposed the woman whose weak eyes were half-hidden by her hood.
"Why say ye so, Sarah Drummond?"
"The more fool he to maintain such a creature."
"Marry! think you, Sarah, that a wife is like a shoe to be cast off at will? John Stevens hath two children, whom he loves as ardently as ever parent loved."
"I have known Dorothe Stevens to be kind and gentle," interposed a woman who had not spoken before.
"Yet she is haughty, and she would have all the world believe her of superior flesh and blood to ourselves. Doth not the Scriptures say that 'Pride goeth before destruction and a haughty spirit before a fall'? Yea, verily, I wish she would break her neck when she doth fall."
At this moment, one of the petty officers came to the group of gossipers and cried:
"Go to! hold your peace, you prating dames! The prisoner comes."
A confused murmur swelled to a general hubbub as two men appeared over the hill leading between them a woman about fifty-five years of age. She was a strong, thin-visaged woman, whose cheek had been bronzed by sun and weather. She was bareheaded, and her hair was gathered in a knot at the back. Her gown, of a thick woollen stuff, fit closely to her person, as if it had been made on purpose for the punishment she had been adjudged to receive. She was talking in a loud voice and gesticulating angrily with her head, for her arms were confined.
"I will give ye a piece of my mind," she declared to her guards.
"Hold your peace, Ann!" cried the eldest of the guards.
"Hold my peace! Verily, I will, not hold my peace about such a hussy as Dorothe Stevens. That I, a Christian and Puritan, should be ducked for slandering one so foul as she! I choke at the thought."
"Marry! I wish you were silent."
"Silent, Joshua Chard, silent, indeed! Think ye that the fear of all the water in James River will awe me to silence?"
"No, by the mass, it will not," answered his companion.
"Lawrence Evans, unholy papist, do not touch me!"
"I am not a papist."
"Come, Ann Linkon, let us have this execution done with," put in Joshua, dragging the woman along.
The scene was now ridiculous enough to excite the laughter of even the gravest Puritans. The pond and ducking-stool were in sight, and Ann Linkon, with a persistence and strength that was marvellous, began to pull back, and when she had set her heels firmly in the ground it required the united strength of both guards to move her.
"I won't go! I won't be ducked! I won't! I won't!" she screamed at the top of her voice.
"Nay, Ann, bright flower of loveliness, you shall have a soft seat."
"Shame on you, Joshua, to drag an old woman like me by the arm."
"Marry! I am not dragging you, dame Linkon. Your heels do stick like a ploughshare in the ground."
The woman continued in her sharp, shrill voice to upbraid him:
"Ungrateful wretch, is it thus you serve one who fed you in your infancy, when your mother had deserted you? Unhand me, indented slave, and go back to your master, wretch--wretch--wretch!" she hissed, as she went sliding on her heels, her toes horizontal and her knees rigid. Her feet ploughed up the earth and stones, and the crowd hooted and jeered.
"Come on, Dame Linkon, and take your bath," cried some idle urchins, waiting at the water in anticipation of rare sport.
The victim continued to scream in her shrill voice:
"It's for that hussy! She bore false witness against me at the court and had me condemned. I will be avenged for this!"
"Marry! we will be more damp than you," said Joshua, wiping the perspiration from his forehead with the cuff of his coat.
"Joshua, is this payment for what I have done for you? When you were sick with fever I sat by your bedside and cared for you; when no one else would cook your food, it was I who did it, and is it thus you requite me?"
"Peace, good dame, I have my duty to perform."
"Duty; but such a duty!"
She still braced her heels against the ground, and it required all the strength of her guards to push and pull her along.
"Verily, I say such a duty," answered Joshua, on whose grave features there came a smile. "Dame