Then, unheeding his proffered aid, Erma descends from the carriage, and going into the house, he following her, she turns, and says haughtily: "I wish to see your mother as soon as she comes from the theatre; but, before that, I must see him," and mutters, "If it is not too much of a service to me, in my extremity, go back to the meeting and tell my father to come to me at once. It may be the last favor I shall ever ask of you," and strides to her room.

So, he leaves her to go on her errand; but chancing to pass a barroom, he goes in, a thing which is unusual for him, and, calling for a glass of brandy, gulps it down, his hands trembling a little.

Thinking the matter over as he drinks, he concludes his mother should be told first, and going to the Salt Lake Theatre, purchases a ticket.

It is fortunately an entr'acte, and he very shortly finds Mrs. Livingston's seat. Walking down the aisle to her, he whispers, "Bring Louise and Ferdie at once. Something terrible has happened!"

Looking at the white face of her offspring, the widow suddenly gasps, "Good Heavens! Erma has eloped with that awful Captain Lawrence, the Vigilante," and grabs helplessly for her wraps.

"No," he says grimly, as he supports her to the door, Ferdie and Louise following them; "but it is almost as bad."

"Tell me," whispers his mother, and seeing that he does not answer, goes on hysterically: "Tell me or I shall faint right here." But he finally gets her to the sidewalk, where the breezy air cools her nervous system, and putting her into the carriage he has brought with him, where, if she so elects, she can faint comfortably, he tells her in a few words what has happened.

Then, unheeding her exclamations of surprise and horror, as likewise those of Louise and Ferdie, he whispers, "Go back to the hotel. I am going to find this Mormon and bring him there," and leaving the carriage to drive back to the Townsend House, starts on foot for the meeting in the Twenty-fifth Ward.

But Salt Lake City blocks are long, and Mr. Livingston's episode at the theatre has taken some time. When he reaches the meeting-house, its windows are dark, the festival has ended, and there is nothing left him but to return to the hotel.

On his way back, however, his mind being on other things than his footsteps, he wanders into one of the streams that flow in this peculiar city where gutters would be in ordinary towns, and it being knee-deep, comes out of it in a very bad humor. This is not decreased by the dust which settles upon his immaculate inexpressibles, and gives him a very sorry appearance.

As he enters the hotel, Louise comes to meet him with a frightened face, and whispers, "Mamma is talking to her in her parlor," then suddenly cries out, "Goodness! Have you been fighting with her father?"

At which he snaps at her, "Go to bed, you little idiot," and pushing past her, enters his mother's sitting-room in by no means the frame of mind to properly meet, even for his own interest, the situation before him.

The room is but slightly illuminated,—the Townsend House gas, manufactured on the premises, being only strong in odor.

By it he can see Miss Travenion standing near the centre of the apartment, so white she would seem a statue, were it not for the dazzling brilliancy of her eyes, that appear to have burnt up the tears that were in them, and a slight nervous twitching of the hands, such as comes to us when hope is no more.

Mrs. Livingston, seated on a sofa, is speaking in a tremulous sort of way, for the girl's manner just at this time frightens her.

She is saying, "You had best leave this awful place to-morrow morning, and come with us to California. I have ordered your maid to pack your trunks. My maid is doing the same." Then she turns to her son, remarking, "You think it will be best, also, Oliver?"

But Erma prevents his reply. She cries, taking a step towards him, "My father!" and seeing no one behind him, gasps, "What have you done to him, or what has he done to you?" for Mr. Livingston's pale face and disfigured trousers suggest ideas of combat that would make her laugh at other and happier times.

To this he replies curtly, "Nothing; I could not find him."

"Why not?"

"Their blasphemous meeting-house was closed." Then he says in a nasty, sneering tone, for the young lady's manner has added to his anger, "Your father and his Mormon brats had gone away."

"His Mormon brats?" This comes from both Mrs. Livingston and Erma, though one gives it with a shriek and the other with a shudder.

"Yes, your five little brothers and sisters," he sneers at Erma. "Didn't you see them? They got the Sunday-school prizes, I think. They look like your father, and one of the girls has your eyes," and would go on with some more such scoffing pleasantries, did not his mother spring to him and whisper, "Idiot!" for the girl has sunk down sobbing upon a chair and is wringing her hands at this last cruel revelation.

Not liking his mother's word, Oliver grows more angry, and says sternly, "Remember, I am the head of the family, and shall take this matter into my own hands." To this, Mrs. Livingston, who since his father's death has grown to look upon him as the director of the family, saying nothing, he continues: "Erma, I have been thinking this matter over as I returned. Your father's crimes have placed him outside the laws of this land. Under these circumstances, I feel it incumbent on me to take charge of your life." This peculiar assumption of power he makes very placidly, turning to the young lady, who answers him not, his last revelation still overcoming her.

Noting this, Mr. Complaisant thinks: "My manner has subdued her. Crushed by this blow, Miss Haughty, who has defied and jeered me for the last few days, is now submissive to my authority," and the pangs of jealousy and rage that had been administered by Harry Lawrence come into his small mind to make him take a smaller revenge.

He says, "I think it is best, mother, that we postpone our visit to California, and immediately return to the East, until I can make proper arrangements for Erma. It will take her a long time to live this scandal down."

"Ah, you are very kind to the friendless daughter of a Mormon," interjects the girl, sarcastically; but he being full of himself, does not heed her, and continues: "A proper retirement from society is due to it."

"Retirement!" she exclaims, "to expiate my father's crimes!" then says sadly: "You seem to think that I am sullied by his sin;" next sneers, "Perhaps you imagine a reform school or a convent would be the proper place for me, Mr. Livingston."

"Not exactly that."

"No, but something like it," cries Erma, and rising, she towers above him, and goes on in mighty scorn: "And you dare arrogate authority over me? You are neither my guardian nor my trustee;" next jeers at him, for her torture makes her cruel: "If every girl in New York society expiated their father's social crimes, how many would escape? Little Louise, for instance—eh?"

This awful shot brings tears to Mrs. Livingston's eyes, for her dead spouse had been of such a peculiar social nature that he had been known by his intimates as "Mormon Livingston."

"Hush! Your father's sins are open ones," says Oliver.

But she turns on him, crying: "It is not your place to criticise him. If atonement is in order, atone for yourself, Mr. Immaculate!" and this is another facer for Oliver, who has had his weak moments in which he has listened to sirens' voices, as many men in New York society have.

Then, a second after, the girl says, slowly: "You go on with your trip, Mrs. Livingston, as if nothing had happened."

"But you?" asks the widow, who, knowing that Miss Travenion's remarks have been made in frenzy, forgives her and pities her.

"I go to my father."

"To do what?"

"To drag him from his iniquity! Good-night, and—good-bye," and saying this, the young lady sweeps from the room, brushing past Louise, who is standing outside the door in childish astonishment and dismay.

But Mrs. Livingston is whispering to Ollie. "Idiot! You have driven her and her million away from us. Think of Louise and me."

To this he answers surlily, "I don't believe it wise to wed a girl society will look down upon."

"Fool!" cries his mother. "How long do you think it will take in New York society for a girl with sixty thousand dollars a year to live anything down?" and leaving him to digest this truthful platitude, she pursues Miss Travenion, overtaking her at the entrance of that young lady's room.

Here, diplomat as she is, she makes a mistake. Louise has also followed, and Erma impulsively seizes the girl, whom she loves very well, and kisses her tenderly and whispers, "Good-bye!"

Coming upon this, Mrs. Livingston, anxious for uninterrupted interview, thoughtlessly says: "Louise, go to bed at once! We leave on the early train to-morrow morning!"

At this, Erma, whom humiliation makes sensitive, draws back and mutters, "Do you fear my touch will contaminate her?"

"Not at all," says Mrs. Livingston. "You mistake me, dear Erma. I want to beg you to come with us to California. You mustn't think of what Ollie in his agitation said to you."

"I don't," answers Erma. "Thank God that wounded my pride, but not my heart!" For in all this cruel humiliation she has been conscious of one joy—that any chance of union with Oliver Livingston is now forever ended.

"You must reconsider your rash determination," entreats the widow.

"Impossible!"

"In your present excited state you had better not see your father."

"Now it is necessary that I see my father—more so than ever."

"You cannot live with him with those awful women."

"Oh, don't fear for me," says the girl. "There are others who will protect me here, if he will not."

"Who?" gasps the widow.

"The man I love!" And opening her door, Erma Travenion flies in and locks it; then starts aghast! and cries in a hoarse and rasping voice, "Tranyon!—Bishop Tranyon! the wretch Tranyon! who has ruined him! My God! what will Harry Lawrence think of Tranyon the Mormon's daughter?" And sinking down upon the bed, she writhes and moans, for at this thought, which has been mercifully kept from her till the last, nothing seems left her in this world.

During this time, Ferdie has been abstractedly sitting in a neighboring barroom, every once in a while walking up to the barkeeper and whispering "Brandy!" then muttering to himself over it, "Miss Mormon is having a high old time with auntie and Ollie." The rest of his time he whistles meditatively. Just about midnight, he thinks: "She is through with Mrs. Livingston. I wonder if I could not do anything to help her?"

So, there comes a knock upon Miss Travenion's door, and she opening it herself, for she has not undressed, finds Mr. Chauncey, who looks sheepishly at her and says in confused tones: "Oliver has told me your determination. We are going to San Francisco to-morrow morning. You remain here to see your father."

"Yes, Ferdie," answers the young lady.

"Any way, you are better off away from that prig till he gets over the shock," replies the boy. Then he laughs a little, and says suggestively, "You can have him back whenever you want, I imagine," nodding towards Mr. Livingston's apartment.

"I don't want him back."

"No, I presume not," returns Mr. Chauncey, trying to smooth matters, "not since you have seen our hero, Captain Lawrence." So he unwittingly gives the girl another stab, but tries to correct it by muttering:

"By Jove, I had forgotten! Your dad is the man who is busting him. Harry isn't stuck after Tranyon, is he?" To this getting no reply, he goes on hastily: "If you want me, I will stay here and look after you. I don't care to go to California."

"Oh," says Erma, "don't fear for me. My father has taken care of me till now. You don't suppose he would injure a hair of my head?" then sobs, "And he was so good to me. I expected such joy at meeting him."

Here Ferdie desperately turns the subject, for girls' tears always embarrass him.

He says, "Can't I do anything for you? Tell me—just anything."

"Yes," says the young lady, shortly. Then she considers a moment and asks:

"You know where this Bishop Kruger lives?"

"No, but I can easily find out."

"Very well. Will you take a note to him for me?"

"With pleasure!" he cries, as if glad she has given him a chance to do her service. So, sitting down, she writes a few lines hurriedly, and gives the epistle to Mr. Chauncey.

Half an hour afterward he returns, and knocks on her door. She is engaged with her maid, who has become frightened at being left behind the Livingston party, and says she wishes to return to New York.

Answering his summons, Erma asks anxiously, "Did you deliver it?"

"Yes; he was in his shirt sleeves, but he read it, and said he would be down in the morning. He seemed to chuckle over it. I don't think I would trust your father's friend any too much," suggests the boy.

"Thank you," cries the girl, "for your advice and your kindness," and being desperately grateful for this one act of consideration shown to her this night, she says to him suddenly: "Good-bye. God bless you, Ferdie!" and gives him an impetuous kiss—the sweetest he has ever had in his life, though with it she leaves a tear upon his cheek.

Then she comes in and says with business-like directness to her faltering abigail, "You wish to leave me, Marie, here alone?"

"Yes, I am afraid. Mademoiselle will pardon me."

"Certainly. Here are your wages! Here is money for your ticket to New York. Now go."

"Mademoiselle will pardon me?"

"Yes, leave me," and Marie departing, Erma Travenion feels that she is indeed alone in a strange country, for she hears the noise of the Livingstons' trunks as they are packing them and getting ready to depart in a hurry that does not seem altogether flattering to her.

Early the next morning, the widow, Louise, Mr. Livingston, and Ferdie depart for Ogden, though the California train does not start from that town until the evening; they are so desperately anxious to shake the dust of Salt Lake City from their feet.

At the depot, Ferdie notices Bishop Kruger, who gazes at the party as they board the train, and approaching Mr. Chauncey, remarks, "I'll see Miss Ermie up at the hotel. She ain't going with ye, sure?" peering about with curious eyes, as if to be certain of this fact. Then the train runs out, bearing the Livingstons toward the Pacific Coast, and Bishop Kruger, about eight o'clock on this day, finds Miss Travenion waiting for him at the Townsend House.

The girl comes down into the parlor very simply dressed, but perhaps more beautiful than ever, to his pastoral eyes, for he remarks to himself, "Be Gosh! She looks homelike and domestic."

"My father!" she says shortly. Then gazing round, she goes on impetuously: "He is not here—he feared to see me—he is ashamed!"

"What! that he's a Mormon?" yells Kruger, savagely. "A true man glories in that; so does your daddy. Perhaps some day you'll jine him."

"Hush!" says Erma. "Don't speak of it," and she shudders. Then she asks, "Where's my father now?"

"In town! But I ain't told him you was here yit. I thought he might be——"

"Ashamed!" cries the girl, but suddenly pauses. Kruger's looks alarm her.

"If I thought as how R. H. Travenion was ashamed of the holy Church of our Latter-Day Saints, I'd cut him off root and branch in this world and the next," he says, the wild gleam of fanaticism coming into his deep eyes. "I swear it, by the Book of Mormon!" Erma knows this man means his words, for Lot Kruger is a fanatic, and believes in his creed and in Joseph Smith, as truly as the Dervish believes in Allah and Mahomet. "Your daddy is in town," he goes on more calmly, "but I feared he might be flustered if he knew you had come upon him, as it were, in the night, and so I kept my mouth shut."

"Will you bring him to me now?"

"Yes, in an hour!"

So, Mr. Kruger departs on his errand, but shortly re-appears, and says, "We have missed him agin. Your daddy's left for Tintic on the stage this morning at eight o'clock."

"Very well," answers Miss Travenion shortly. "I'll go to Tintic also."

This suggestion pleases Bishop Kruger so much that he cries, "Right you are! Ye're true grit, Sissy! You'd better go down by private conveyance. It'll be much more pleasant for ladies."

"Oh, I am alone now; my maid has left me," answers Miss Travenion; and this remark delights her auditor more than he would like her to guess. He goes on happily, "It's only seventy-five or eighty or perhaps ninety miles from here. You can drive down in a day with a good, tough bronco-team, but still you had better take it slowly and stop over night at Milo Johnson's."

"Alone in a Mormon house?" shudders the girl.

"Oh, you'll be as safe thar as if you were in your bed on Fifth Avenue. You can travel all over here, provided you do not hurt our feelings, as safe as if you was in Connecticut—more so—we don't have no burglars around here!" says Lot, reassuringly.

Making inquiries at the hotel office, Miss Travenion finds that the Mormon bishop's advice has been good. Then, being provided at the hotel with a private team, she comes down at ten o'clock in the day, to depart for Tintic, and is surprised to see the attentive Kruger ready to assist her into the light wagon, which has a top to keep off dust and sun.

"You didn't expect any one to see you off!" he remarks. "But most every one here would do a heap for Bishop Tranyon's darter." Then he chuckles: "Ye're kind o' one o' us now!" and drives the iron into Erma's soul.

"Thank you. I suppose you mean it for a compliment," she says, attempting lightness, though her lip twitches. "But I am a little different still, to a Mormon girl!" and gets into the carriage before he can aid her.

"So you are! Ye're a prize-book picture," he mutters, looking at her till his eyes blink from some subtle passion, for Miss Travenion is dressed in a cool, gray linen travelling costume, that fits her charming figure with a "riding habit" fit, till it reaches white cuffs and snowy collar, and a little foot, that in its French kid boot looks as if it had come out of a fashion plate. Thus attired, she makes a very breezy, attractive picture; though there is no one to enjoy it, save Kruger, for the heat, even on this October day, has driven loungers from the sidewalk.

Then turning from her, as she drives down the State road, this Mormon fanatic remarks: "Gee hoss! Don't this give the Church a pull upon the daddy, and Lot Kruger a hold upon the darter!" and so goes to a little building on South Temple Street devoted to the business affairs of the Latter-Day Saints.

Miss Travenion, raising a little sunshade over a face made beautiful by conflicting emotions, journeys down the State road, which leads towards the south—past the Utah Southern Railway, that is now being graded, and after a dusty seven hours' ride comes to the Point-of-the-Mountain. Here she is very hospitably entertained, and well treated, by one of the many wives of Milo Johnson, who lives at this place.

Then the next morning, so as to travel in the cool portion of the day, leaving almost at daylight, after a hot breakfast, and taking her lunch with her, she crosses the ford of the Jordan—the river that runs from the fresh lake of Utah to its salt inland sea. So coming to its western shore, she journeys along the banks of beautiful Utah Lake—placid as a mirror—leaving Ophir and Camp Floyd and Tooele far to her west.

To the east, across the limpid waters, she notes, buried in their orchards, the Mormon towns of Provo, Springfield, Payson, and Spanish Fork. Behind them the great Wahsatch range, and, further to the south, the great mountain that they call "Nebo," which rises snow-capped, dominating the scene.

About midway down the west side of the lake, she and the driver of the carriage eat their lunch. Then proceeding onward till almost at the upper end of this quiet water, she leaves its banks, and, after two or three miles of sage brush, enters a little caÑon, with a brawling stream running down it. Very shortly to her comes the odor of garlic and arsenic from the smelting works at Homansville, whose great furnaces she soon sees, giving out clouds of smoke.

Passing these, three miles further up the valley she comes to Eureka. Here, making inquiry at the store of Baxter & Butterfield, she is directed to the Zion's Co-operative Mining Institution, whose works stand a mile or more beyond, towards Silver City.

So, in another half an hour Miss Travenion, turning from the main road and driving up a little spur of the mountain, past one or two dug-outs and miner's cabins, gets out of the wagon at the door of a house built of rough lumber, and says nervously to a man in high, muddy boots and blue shirt, greasy with candle drippings: "Is Bishop Tranyon in?"

"Yes, he is in the back room," and, pointing to the door, the miner goes off to his work.

She enters, and seated upon a wooden chair, looking over some accounts at a deal table, is the man they call Bishop Tranyon, and she says to him:—"Father!"

At her word, Ralph Travenion, once New York exquisite, now Mormon bishop, staggers up, trembles, and, gazing on her, cries: "Erma! my God! You here?"

Then, forcing back some awful emotion, his voice grows tender as he says: "Why, this is a surprise, darling! You have travelled all the way from New York to see your father. God bless you, child of my heart!" and there are tears in his deep eyes, and he would approach her and put his arms about her, giving her a father's kiss.

But she starts from him, shudders, and gasps: "Don't dare to kiss me!"

"Why not?"

"Because I know what you are."

"My God! You know—" and the strong man turns from her, and hides his face in his quivering hands.

Then she goes on, faltering a little over the words, but still goes on: "Why have you disgraced our name? Why have you become a Mormon—a Polygamist?"

Here he astonishes her by whispering, with white lips, these curious words: "I did it that I might settle upon you a million! For your sake I became Mormon—for your sake I became polygamist. I DID IT FOR BUSINESS PURPOSES!"