[Illustration:  Decorative]

CHAPTER XXI

ON THE TRAIL OF A THIEF

Pocahontas, clothed in European garb, was returning to her home at Varina from the river, whither she had accompanied John Rolfe half a day’s journey towards Jamestown.  The boatmen had escorted her from the skiff and now doffed their hats as she bade them come no further.

In the two years which had passed since her marriage, the little Indian maiden had learned many things:  to speak fluently the language of her husband’s people, to wear in public the clothes of his countrywomen, and to use the manners of those of high estate.  She had always been accustomed to the deference paid her as the daughter of the great werowance, ruler over thirty tribes, and now she received that of the English, who treated her as the daughter of a powerful ally.  For Powhatan had seen the wisdom of keeping peace between Werowocomoco and Jamestown and its settlement up the river of Henrici, of which Rolfe’s estate, Varina, was a portion.

Indeed, so stately was the manner of the Lady Rebecca that it was with difficulty that many could recall the wide-eyed maiden who used to come and go at Jamestown.

Now as she ascended the hill her eyes rested upon the home Rolfe had built for her.  It was to the eyes of Englishmen, accustomed to the spacious manor houses of their own country, little more than a cabin.  But to one who had seen nothing finer than the lodges of her father’s towns, it was a very grand structure indeed, with its solid framework of oak, its four rooms, its chimney of brick and its furnishings sent over from London.  Her husband had promised her that they should bring back many other wonderful arrangements when they returned from England.

She was a little warm from her climb and was looking forward to the moment when she could discard her clothes for her loose buckskin robe and moccasins.  Rolfe, though he did not forbid them altogether, was not pleased at the sight of them; and Pocahontas this day was conscious of a slight feeling of relief that there were to be several days of his absence in which she could forget to be an Englishwoman.

She might forget for a while but only for a while for she was a happy and dutiful wife; but she could never forget that she was a mother, that her wonderful little Thomas, not so white as his father, nor so dark as herself, was waiting for her at the house.  She hurried on, thinking of the fun she would have with him:  how she would take him down to a stream and let him lie naked on the warm rocks, and how she would sing Indian songs to him and tell him stories of the beasts in the woods, even if he were too little to understand them.

She had left him in his cradle where, protected by its high sides, he was safe for hours at a time, and the workmen who were helping her husband start a tobacco plantation at Varina looked in often to see if he were all right.