SCARLETT (as some of the other Merrymount folk gather about the scene). ’Tis true what Sarah says. The maid is not given to whining. (To Resolute, with an entire change of manner.) Well, then, Mistress, though our feast go forward, you shall not sup with us unless it pleases you. Say but the word, and we will take you back to Wollaston, you and your means of industry!
SARAH (eagerly). Will you not sup with us first?
I thank you, Sarah Scarlett.
(singing, as he puts his fiddle under his chin, while Scarlett tosses a
wreath in the air).
“Fortune, my foe, why dost thou frown on me,
And will thy favors——”
TIB (rushing wildly in from right). Hush your music, Faunch! Down with your trumpery, Simon! The Puritans are upon us—Pritchard and Norcross and Warren and Hilton—all a-marching up the hill! Armed to the teeth they are, Simon, and there’s not an ounce of shot amongst us!
(as Puritans begin to appear, right).
Zounds! They’re upon us!
GILLIAN PRITCHARD (as he and his followers come forward from right background). Make no resistance, ye scum of Dagon’s brood, or Merrymount and all that is within it shall be sacked within the hour! Where is the maid ye stole?
RESOLUTE (dearly). Here, Gillian Pritchard! Here, safe and sound, and courteously treated by the folk of Merrymount. Why use ye such words as stole? ’Tis most unseemly. And why come ye here unbidden? Sure, none sent for you?
GILLIAN PRITCHARD (amazed: disapproving). Resolute!
RESOLUTE (haughtily). Mistress Endicott, so please you, and the governor’s cousin!
GILLIAN PRITCHARD (more and more pained). Resolute!
RESOLUTE (continuing quickly). May I not step from my door to do a deed of kindness for an old woman but what the whole of Wollaston is at my heels? Or give a lesson in spinning without a cry being raised that I am stolen? I do not take it kindly of you, Amos Warren; no, nor of you, Ebenezer Matthews. Pick up my spinning-wheel, Frugal Hilton, and let Fight-for-Right Norcross carry my chair. (To Sarah.) There are herbs in that pocket for your gran’am.
[Gives her herb pocket.
[The Puritans, including Resolute Endicott, exeunt right.
SCARLETT (breaking forth). She saved us! Saved us! Zounds! Was there ever anything like unto it! What dost thou make of it, Sarah?
SARAH. I make of it that Mistress Endicott hath a warm heart beneath her cold white Puritan kerchief, and that in this new land of ours we should better strive to understand each other; for, though our ways be different, are we not beset by the same hopes and fears, doth not the same sky arch above us all? (To Simon.) Think you not so, my brother? (As all begin to go towards background where the feast is in readiness.) Come, gran’am, lean on me. Our feast must be near to readiness. A Puritan hearthstone—sooth, it must be a goodly place; yet right glad am I that we live beneath the stars, and are still the light free-hearted folk o’ Merrymount!