MRS. MARY W. HUDSON.
 
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 ESTHER THE GENTILE 
 
 BY 
 
 MRS. MARY W. HUDSON. 
 
 
 TOPEKA, KANSAS: 
 
 OEO. W. CRANE A CO., PRINTERS AND BINDERS. 
 
 1888. 

 
 COPYRIGHT, 1888, 
 BY J. K. HUDSON, TOPEKA, KAB.
 
 TO MY HUSBAND, 
 
 J. K. HUDSON, 
 
 WHOSE ENCOURAGEMENT AND APPRECIATION HAVE BEEN THE MAIN-SPRINGS OF 
 
 THIS EFFORT, AND IN WHOSE COMPANIONSHIP I HAVE LEARNED 
 
 THE BLESSINGS OF A HAPPY HOME A 
 
 WOMAN'S BEST INSPIRATION.
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 CHAPTER L 
 
 IN" an out-of-the-way community like Pineborough 
 there are not many students of character, but there 
 are always to be found some odd people who are inter 
 esting studies themselves, and who immediately attract 
 the attention of men of the world when they come 
 in contact with them. 
 
 Ezekiel Blounce, the teacher of the district school, 
 was one of these. He had neither family nor home, 
 though everybody was his friend. He had taught 
 the Pineborough school for many years, and during 
 all the time had "boarded round," in the fashion 
 that had long before been abandoned in more enter 
 prising districts, except one summer when he was 
 sick and Betty Wainwright nursed him in her spare 
 room, and one other summer when he went away on 
 an unannounced and mysterious visit, carrying with 
 him only a change of linen tied up in a bandana hand 
 kerchief and his staff. When his neighbors and the 
 school boys whom he passed on the road that sum 
 mer morning asked where he was going, he only an 
 swered, "On a little jaunt; Pll be back before you 
 want to see me." 
 
 But he was gone three months, and the district
 
 'ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 had about made up its official mind that a new 
 teacher must be secured for the winter term, when 
 Ezekiel Blounce trudged back again, deposited his 
 bundle, apparently neither increased nor diminished 
 by an ounce weight, in his small "black chist," as it 
 was familiarly known, stood his stout staff in the 
 corner of the kitchen which came next in turn as 
 his home, and, at the proper time, called school as 
 if nothing had happened. 
 
 All the surmises that had been made by the quiet 
 country folk concerning his absence were wasted, 
 and they had had so little else to think and talk 
 about than the routine of the days, the weeks, and 
 the crop seasons, that the old man's unexplained re 
 turn seemed almost an affront. For a time he did 
 not seem to be the man they had in turn imagined 
 murdered, and drowned, and restored to a lost inher 
 itance and a grief-stricken family. The closest scru 
 tiny of his large-featured, unimpassioned face failed 
 to make a hero or a martyr of him in these good 
 people's eyes, and they respected him too highly to 
 ask any questions. He had been the architect of 
 every barn erected in that region since his advent 
 there. He had estimated all the crops and intro 
 duced all the innovations in rotation that the fields 
 thereabout had known for years, and the people 
 trusted him wholly. But now he had presumably 
 been out in the world where he had seen and heard 
 much that would be new to them, but of which he 
 told them nothing, and time alone could heal their 
 wounded feelings.
 
 ESTHER THE O EN TILE. 
 
 Mr. Blounce had hardly yet recovered from this 
 disturbance of the estimation in which he had so 
 long been held in Pineborough, when something else 
 occurred which made it impossible for him ever to 
 regain his old interest in the community. 
 
 One pleasant afternoon in early springtime a 
 young man strolled up to the little school house 
 and stepped to the door to ask for a cup in which to 
 take a drink from the brook close by. 
 
 A little pool had been scooped out in the pebbly 
 bed and a rough shelter of stones built up on the 
 sunward side so that the water was clean and cool 
 and quiet, and as the young man stooped over to fill 
 his cup he caught sight of his reflected self and hes 
 itated an instant to look, perhaps to admire, when 
 the thought must have come to him that that was a 
 girlish trick, for he dashed the cup into the mirror 
 ing surface. "When he returned to the door Mr. 
 Blounce invited him in to rest, but he was not tired, 
 he said, and preferred to sit outside, which he would 
 do if it was nearly time for school to close, and if 
 the teacher would then have leisure to give him a 
 little information about the surrounding country. 
 Of course Ezekiel Blounce had both time and incli 
 nation to impart any knowledge, or give any help, 
 he could, and the stranger accordingly took a seat 
 on a log near by and waited for the school to be dis 
 missed. 
 
 He had not long to wait. A general shuffling of 
 books and slates and feet, announced the day's tasks 
 done, and a huddling group of little girls came out,
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 some with their sunbonnets drawn over their eyes 
 and shrinking behind their mates, and some with 
 their bonnets under their arms and their eyes staring 
 at the stranger as if to make the most of a rare op 
 portunity. Then a crowd of small boys pushed 
 through the doorway, all at once, and, instead of 
 huddling together, flew off in as many tangents as 
 there were boys, shouting, tumbling, jumping and 
 otherwise exhibiting their various accomplishments. 
 Next came the larger girls, showing all the phases 
 and degrees of character and culture the rural com 
 munity afforded, for here came high and low, proud 
 and humble; every family for miles around was rep 
 resented in the district school. The young man 
 watched this group with some more interest than he 
 had the others, but yet he had the self-possession 
 to congratulate himself with remarkable indiffer 
 ence, considering that it was composed of young la 
 dies whose ages could not vary far on either side of 
 sweet sixteen. 
 
 "What a wonderful difference it does make, where 
 and how," he was just saying to himself, in a cold 
 and philosophical way, when he caught sight of one 
 girl who seemed caricatured by the ungraceful gar 
 ments and heavy shoes which fitted the others well 
 enough. 
 
 "She must be astray here," he thought; "she is 
 like a wild gazelle in a flock of tame sheep; she is 
 evidently not one of the natives. Which way does 
 she go, I wonder I" "A fine evening, sir," inter 
 rupted the teacher, who, together with the larger
 
 ESTHER THE Q EN TILE. 
 
 boys, had by this time come out unobserved by the 
 soliloquizing stranger. 
 
 "Yes, sir, it is a fine evening indeed," assented 
 the young man, pleasantly, as he arose, and then, 
 rather awkwardly, as if it was not the subject he in 
 tended to speak of, he said: 
 
 "You have quite a large school for so isolated a 
 neighborhood." 
 
 "Yes, yes, so I have," a little impatiently, on the 
 part of the teacher, and they both turned to look af 
 ter the departing scholars. 
 
 "I noticed a young girl that like a not like the 
 others she was with those large girls, a tall, slender 
 oh, yes, there she goes down the road." 
 
 The varying shades of expression with which this 
 disjointed sentence was delivered were appreciated 
 by Mr. Blounce, and his amusement was so apparent 
 when he answered that the stranger's face flushed 
 quickly; nobody saw it, though, for the scholars were 
 all too far away and the teacher kindly contemplated 
 the ground. 
 
 "Oh, that is Esther "Wainwright," he answered, 
 comprehending the young man's wish; "she is not 
 like the others, as you say." 
 
 "And that young fellow, the boy with her, is he a 
 brother?" 
 
 " Oh, no ; that is young Barbold, Tom Barbold. If 
 you knew the old Squire, or any of the blood, as you 
 do not, I reckon, if you are a stranger in these 
 parts, you would know Tom by his walk. Proud as 
 Lucifer, and not lacking, not lacking, unless it may
 
 6 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 be in fellow-feeling. Generations of riches, you know, 
 will dull most men's sympathies with poverty and 
 struggle; the old Squire I was thinking of; Tom, 
 there, is but a bit of a boy; nobody can tell what he 
 may make, but he promises to follow in the old 
 tracks." 
 
 "Are these families connected in any way the 
 "Wainwrights and the Barbolds ? " 
 
 " Oh, no; bless your heart, there's a gulf as deep as 
 the Hellespont between them, and about as hard to 
 swim, I venture." 
 
 "But you think young "What's-his-name there will 
 attempt it, do you ? " 
 
 ""Well, an old man's head must be whiter than 
 mine before he can forget that he was once young, 
 and there are no barriers inside those narrow walls," 
 pointing to the school house, "even between Bar 
 bolds and Wainwrights. "What do you think about 
 it?" turning sharply to the stranger. 
 
 "I? Well, I have not had much chance for obser 
 vation, but since you ask me, and since I have seen 
 Hero, I don't mind telling you that I think he'll be a 
 fool if he doesn't try it, and I've a notion to say I'll 
 swim him a race." 
 
 "Good! you show a knightly spirit, but it might 
 only make trouble for all. They are strangers to you 
 and you to them, you have all the world; what brings 
 you here?" 
 
 This abrupt demand brought the hot blood to the 
 stranger's face, as had the old man's first question, 
 but this time a little of anger was mixed with the
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 blush of youth, and he answered: " My business, sir; 
 which for the present is merely to botanize a little 
 among these old hills. I belong to the surveying 
 party that is locating the new railroad down the creek 
 valley, and I wandered off here because we were de 
 layed in our work and had a day off. duty, and now 
 I believe I have, lost my bearings. I promised to re 
 join the party at Rocky-ford to-night or in the morn 
 ing, and I have gone up and down hill so often I am 
 confused. Can you give me the short cut to that 
 point?" 
 
 "So you are somewhat of a scientist, then?" 
 
 "No, I cannot claim that distinction, but I have a 
 taste for finding out something about the plants and 
 trees of different parts of the country. Surveyors are 
 apt to pick up some knowledge of that kind, as well 
 as the geological formation of the land they measure, 
 you know." 
 
 "Are you a practical surveyor?" 
 
 "Yes, though I have not practiced much. I was 
 with a party out West and roughed it in the moun 
 tains and alkali deserts one summer, and I learned 
 several things then; in fact, if the truth must be 
 told, I am a kind of Jack at all trades, not very good 
 at any." 
 
 "A bad recommendation for a young man. "What 
 else have you done?" 
 
 "I spent six months in a law office in H once, 
 
 and while I was there I learned to know your hand 
 writing very well. Mr. Blounce, I believe," the 
 stranger said, bowing with an ease of manner becom-
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 ing an older man. "Judge did a great deal 
 
 of business for the farmers all down through this 
 country, and we handled papers of various kinds, 
 wills and other legal documents, which you had writ 
 ten and to which your name was attached as a wit 
 ness. I recognized your name when I was talking to 
 the men at work in the field yonder; they said you 
 taught the district school. If you were to take a fee 
 for all the legal work you do it would bring you quite 
 an income, I should think." 
 
 "Yes, yes, perhaps it would; but if I had charged 
 a fee for all the things I might have done in this 
 world and have not done, I should be as rich as Croe 
 sus." 
 
 " Oh, no offense, I hope. I want to ask you a little 
 more about that young lady, Miss Wainwright, before 
 I go. Does she " 
 
 "I have nothing more to tell." 
 
 "Why, what is she to you, Mr. Blounce?" 
 
 " No more than she is to you ; but she is a poor, 
 motherless girl, who might almost better be father 
 less, too, for that matter." 
 
 "Does the old wretch abuse her?" 
 
 "No, no, not that; he thinks the world of her. I 
 believe the poor fellow looks upon Esther more as an 
 angel than as a human being. But, you see, he is a 
 little weak here," tapping his own massive head. 
 "Comes of good stock, too the "Wainwrights; no 
 better to be found here forty years ago ; but Elias was 
 the not the black sheep, exactly, for he is as innocent 
 as a lamb, but the weakling of the flock. He did
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 what none of his smart brothers had the sense to do, 
 however. He married a good little woman, who was 
 as tough as a nut, and with wits enough for both of 
 'em. Some people wondered that Betty Simpson 
 would have him, but there is a kind of fascination in 
 an aristocratic name, even for a sensible woman; it 
 is something like marrying a title; and so Betty mar 
 ried him, for that or some other reason, maybe be 
 cause she really loved him. I will not say it was not 
 that, for she was always a good wife to him. She 
 was not a pretty girl, but she had bright black eyes 
 and a cheery look about her. She managed the farm 
 mainly, after they were married, and managed it well, 
 and she saved herself and her family from a great 
 trouble a few years ago, and their good name from 
 everlasting disgrace." 
 
 "Why, how was that?" the stranger ventured, 
 hoping that since the old man's tongue was loosed 
 he might be led in this roundabout way to the sub 
 ject of which he had said he had no more to tell. 
 And sure enough he went on to say: 
 
 "When the main line of the railroad was built 
 through this part of the country, the contractors 
 brought a lot of Welsh people here to work at the 
 grading. Many of these men had their families with 
 them, and they made quite a settlement down in the 
 bottom lands beyond Rocky-ford, and while they were 
 there a party of immigrants, their countrymen, too, 
 just over, joined them, and settled down temporarily 
 in board shanties and a kind of barracks they put up, 
 while their leaders looked about for a permanent lo-
 
 10 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 cation. It happened that a hard winter came on 
 early that season, so that they could not do much but 
 huddle together to keep warm, and while they were 
 all there some Mormon elders came among them 
 proselyting. They had not done much at this work 
 openly in the United States for several years pre 
 vious; it was too soon after the Joseph Smith excite 
 ment. You do not remember that; but after the 
 exposure of his depravity they let the subject die 
 down a little in this country, and brought most of 
 their converts from England, and Wales, and Scot 
 land, as they do yet. But these two elders, as they 
 called themselves, had been across the water and got 
 a kind of hold on these "Welsh people in the old 
 country, and when they came over here they followed 
 it up, and converted dozens of them, too, some of the 
 wealthiest among them. One old man had 4,000 in 
 good English money, and they got it all, and him in 
 the bargain. To the poorest of them they promised 
 farms and cattle if they would go out to the Land of 
 the Honey Bee. But I am getting off my story. It 
 got to be quite the fashion to go to the Mormon 
 meetings. The people for miles around became 
 curious to hear what could be said in defense of 
 polygamy, that being the dominant idea in their 
 minds connected with Mormonism; and when they 
 went to the meetings, and never heard that subject 
 even remotely alluded to, but instead listened to 
 warm appeals to come into the Church of the Latter 
 Day Saints, and espouse the revealed religion, and 
 accept the great worldly advantages that would be
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 secured to them in Utah, many of them were con 
 verted, and among them was poor Elias Wainwright. 
 He is just the man to be influenced by religious ex 
 citement, and if it had not been for his wife he would 
 have gone off with them, sure. As soon as she found 
 out that the meetings were really making an im 
 pression upon his mind, she insisted upon going with 
 him whenever she could not prevail upon him to stay 
 at home. But they succeeded in making a believer 
 of him, and it was finally only her determined refusal 
 to go with them to Utah that kept him here. There 
 was a good deal of talk about stopping the meetings 
 and lynching the elders, but it did not amount to any 
 thing more than talk; there was no charge upon 
 which they could be arrested and tried. They were 
 smart enough, too, to get out of the way before the 
 excitement ran too high. Betty Wainwright always 
 claimed that her husband had entirely recovered from 
 his Mormon folly, but there are others who say he 
 never has, and the elders claimed that no one ever 
 does, or that if one loses faith for a time he is sure 
 to return to it sometime; that they are like the Jews 
 once a Jew always a Jew, once a Mormon always 
 a Mormon. Of course I do not believe that nonsense, 
 but I know that when Elias Wainwright lost his good 
 wife he lost the best half of himself." 
 
 "She is dead, then?" 
 
 "Yes, she is dead. She took cold two or three 
 years ago and. never got over it. She was a hard 
 worker, and thought she was proof against serious
 
 12 ESTHER THE O EN TILE. 
 
 sickness, but she proved to be mortal like the rest of 
 us." 
 
 The old man leaned forward and rested his head 
 on his hands as they were clasped over the knob of 
 his staff, and seemed to give himself up to the con 
 templation of Mrs. Wainwright's domestic virtues and 
 to his sorrow over her untimely taking off. 
 
 Suddenly the stranger started and uttered an ex 
 clamation that caused Mr. Blounce to look up at him 
 in amazement. 
 
 "It must be the same," he said, "the very same 
 man we heard travelers talking of at the little coun 
 try tavern where we put up last night. There were 
 two guests besides ourselves who seemed to have a 
 great deal to talk about; they sat out under the trees 
 on a rustic bench till late in the night. They seemed 
 respectable enough, well dressed, common sort of men, 
 who looked as though they might be pork or wool 
 buyers, strangers evidently; but I remember now the 
 last thing I heard before going to sleep, as I lay near 
 an open window in the second story, was the sound of 
 their voices, and one of them said with a good deal 
 of emphasis, 'Well, he'll go this time. I've got him 
 fixed. The girl is all that troubles me. She'll make 
 a fuss, I calculate, but I guess we can manage her.' 
 Then they went on to say that he was a firm be 
 liever long ago, and something about the New Zion, 
 and I paid no more attention to them. I had just 
 thought that I was about to hear some secret romance 
 when they began to talk of religion, and I suppose I 
 soon fell asleep. Let me see: I must have heard
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 13 
 
 them say something about coal, too. Coal, coal 
 yes, but the whole conversation is confused in my 
 mind now; I was half asleep all the time." 
 
 The old teacher looked up at the stranger aghast, 
 and when he had ceased speaking groaned aloud as 
 if a great weight had fallen upon him, and then said 
 in a broken voice : 
 
 " My God, my God, they are after him again." 
 
 His head fell upon his hands again, and the youug 
 man saw that he shook in every limb. There was 
 nothing he Could do; no consolation he could offer; 
 he could not understand the old man's deep feeling 
 for this girl and her father; he could only stand and 
 wait, almost frightened at the grief he had caused. 
 With a spasmodic effort Mr. Blounce stood up, and 
 with an attempt at his former abruptness, said: 
 
 "I can not talk of this to-night. I must think. 
 Is it possible that you are interested at all in this 
 girl? Will you meet me here in the morning?" 
 
 "Whether I was interested at all in Miss Wain- 
 wright before or not, the story you have told me of 
 her father and the Mormons would interest me in 
 her now. I told you I had been out West, and I 
 know something of their doings in Utah. If I can 
 help you in any way to save this girl you have but 
 to command me." 
 
 "I will be here early in the morning," the old man 
 said ; and without a word of parting, or even so much 
 as a glance at the young stranger, Ezekiel Blounce 
 walked heavily down the road. So long as he was 
 in sight his astounded companion stood and looked 
 2
 
 14 ESTHER THE GENTILE, 
 
 after him. He moved as though he had been set go 
 ing by some involuntary power, turning neither to 
 the right nor to the left, never raising his eyes from 
 the ground nor his empty left hand from his side, 
 where it hung motionless. A chance observer would 
 have thought him but a dull and weary old man, if 
 he had thought of him at all; but the stranger whom 
 he had left so unceremoniously knew that within that 
 breast lay a picture so vivid that it absorbed every 
 faculty. The old man knew not the familiar trees 
 and meadows, nor the passers by; his vision was 
 turned inward upon a scene so sharply retouched 
 that it blinded him to all else; some old memory, 
 never forgotten, perhaps, but for many years so ha 
 bitually crowded down that when something forced 
 it uppermost, it took possession of him like an evil 
 spirit. The occupants of the house in which he had 
 his home at that time saw him pass by, on and on 
 down the dusty road until the woods enclosed him; 
 but none of them thought it strange; he was accus 
 tomed to take long walks. After he was out of the 
 sight of the stranger, that young gentleman folded 
 his slouch hat for a pillow, locked his hands together 
 behind his head and lay down on the log to think, 
 also. 
 
 About the old man? Yes, for a time, for he had 
 impressed him strongly and strangely. He tried to 
 imagine what kind of a life he had lived, what it was 
 that connected him with these people the Wain- 
 wrights and then to think of himself as a lonely 
 old man. But he had seen a vision that makes
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 15 
 
 youth powerless to comprehend old age as applied to 
 itself. Others, perhaps some among his friends, must 
 live this old man's life over again; but he! he was 
 strong, confident; he had a hundred great expecta 
 tions; the world was before him, the old man had 
 said, and he was free to choose. There was no rea 
 son why he should seclude himself in a lonely, quiet 
 place like this, and live without home or aught that 
 he could call his own, a wifeless and childless old 
 man. He had never thought of that fate as espe 
 cially sad before, nor thought of it at all, perhaps; 
 but now nothing he could imagine seemed so sad as 
 this old man's lonely lot. Surely his could never be 
 such; he would order it otherwise. It was true he 
 had not found the queen whom he did not seek, but 
 who, he trusted, would some day appear, who was to 
 be the sun which should glorify his existence, and for 
 whose sweet sake all his ambitions would be pros 
 pered, unless and for the first time the flight of his 
 free fancy seemed tethered by an intangible some 
 thing, an invisible cord, that would have snapped in 
 twain with a breath, had it not passed through the 
 hand of that graceful girl with the plain name and 
 the homely dress. As he closed his eyes and tried 
 to look oft' as he was fond of doing, being some 
 thing of a dreamer into the unexplored fields of 
 his after years, and to trace for himself a prosperous 
 journey over the golden highways of his imagination, 
 he found he must first go by way of the narrow lane 
 in whose shaded depths Esther Wainwright had dis 
 appeared. He had seen her but a moment he was
 
 16 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 perfectly conscious of that but every line of her 
 sweet face, every motion she made, was photographed 
 on his mind. He saw her eyes fall before his own 
 after the swiftest stolen glance; he remembered the 
 white parting in her hair, and the smooth waves over 
 her temples; the oval of her cheek reminded him of 
 the loveliest Madonna face he had ever seen. 
 
 Thus he took up the sweet burthen. Some learn 
 to love; others see, as a vision, the bright spirit that 
 enters in and makes home of the heart. 
 
 The stranger lay still, forgetful of all about him. 
 The sun sank low behind the hills, the shadows 
 deepened in the forest, and the whip-poor-will's 
 mournful note took up his last thought and repeated 
 it strangely, "Life is good, there is no ill except we 
 make it." Farther and farther off echoed the weird 
 refrain until he heard it no more.
 
 CHAPTER H. 
 
 WHEN" the young man awoke, far in the night, he 
 knew, though he had heard it in his sleep, that 
 he had been aroused by a human voice, but whose or 
 where it was he could not think. He could not even 
 make out where he was himself, for a time. But as 
 the leaves and branches took shape around him, and 
 the stars revealed themselves above, he recollected 
 the incidents of the evening, and comprehended that 
 he had fallen asleep on the log. It was as still as a 
 night in the forest ever is; not a breeze stirred, but 
 the little night animals ran with swift feet here and 
 there among the bushes, all unsuspicious of an in 
 truder's presence. A horned and tawny owl flapped 
 its wings and circled round a tree near him, catching 
 nocturnal insects, and as he rubbed his eyes and 
 watched it he remembered that it was the favorite of 
 Minerva, and that the ancient Athenians regarded it 
 with veneration, and considered it a bird of good 
 omen. 
 
 " So may it prove to me," he added aloud, and then 
 started at the sound of his own voice, because there 
 was no one to answer it. 
 
 The whip-poor-will had sung itself to sleep, and 
 the air seemed heavy and oppressive. He was just 
 thinking to himself that it must be the calm before a 
 storm, when the tree frogs set up their ominous 
 
 (17)
 
 18 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 croak, and the sound was echoed and reechoed from 
 everywhere. Then he knew it was time to seek shel 
 ter. He had intended to find lodging in some farm 
 house near by, but it was too late for that now. The 
 thunder began to roll, more under the ground than 
 above his head, he thought. A hissing sound came 
 from the tree tops, and they began to writhe in a sud 
 den wind. The sultry air which a moment before 
 had held him, with all nature, in a sort of stupor, 
 was quickly filled with the subtle life that flashed 
 from the coming storm, and every living thing disap 
 peared in the thick foliage as the stars went out be 
 hind the spreading cloud. 
 
 The stranger had fairly gathered his wits by this 
 time, and hastily found his way to the school house. 
 He raised his hand to try the latch, resolving, mean 
 while, to break a window if he could not make an 
 entrance otherwise, when a flash of lightning just 
 behind him showed the door wide open, and some 
 one within. He had time neither to ask nor to 
 conjecture who it was; the wind was driving hard 
 against him, and great drops of rain came splash 
 ing in his face. He stepped inside, and found that 
 the rain followed him for several feet; he moved out 
 of its course and waited for the lightning to give him 
 another view of the interior and of its occupants, if 
 it really had any besides himself. He had but an in 
 stant of suspense before the light seemed to enter 
 like a gleaming blade and sweep round the little room 
 and out again as swiftly and mysteriously as it came. 
 What he saw while it flashed was the old teacher
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 19 
 
 sitting in his accustomed place behind the high 
 sloping desk, his head bowed in his gnarled and 
 wrinkled hands, oblivious to him, to the storm, to 
 everything outward. The stranger hesitated to dis 
 turb him, but fearing that he might startle him by 
 closing the door to keep out the fast increasing storm, 
 he ventured to ask if he might remain until the rain 
 was over, and then added apologetically that he had 
 fallen asleep where he had left him the evening be 
 fore. The teacher heard the voice, but did not seem 
 to comprehend anything it said, for he called out in 
 a loud tone, " Who's there?" 
 
 " The stranger with whom you talked last evening. 
 Can I have shelter with you until the storm is past?" 
 the young man repeated, but the only answer he re 
 ceived was a long sigh, and "Ah, I did not expect 
 you so soon," and then sternly, " Come again when 
 it is broad daylight." 
 
 Evidently the old man had heard nothing, only 
 that he had come, so he shut the door and sat down 
 near a window, where he could watch the storm. 
 
 The lightning was now a continuous yet ever- 
 changing glare, and the terrific force of the wind 
 bent the great trees before it until they looked as if 
 they must break; the tottering old chimney fell with 
 a crash on the roof and rolled to the ground, and yet 
 the old man moved not, nor spoke. 
 
 The stranger was fascinated by the awful scene, 
 and strained his eyes to watch the writhings of the 
 stiffened branches, which seemed like live things in 
 the contest. Amidst it all he observed how pliantly
 
 20 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 the saplings bent almost to the earth, and lay safe 
 in their non-resistance while the fury of the storm 
 passed over. And then he reflected that thus the 
 storms of life pass harmlessly over youth; that pain 
 and sorrow depress the young quickly and easily, but 
 like the sapling they rebound with the clearing of the 
 sky, and stand upright, ready and defiant for the next 
 battle. Once, as he watched, he saw the tawny owl 
 whirled from a great oak and past him in the clutches 
 of the storm, and then came a thunderbolt that 
 numbed him to all sense and sound. A crash that 
 was not heralded by flash or rumble, a dart so swift 
 and close his brain was stunned, and he neither saw 
 nor heard. 
 
 When his dazed wits began to return he saw that 
 the storm was broken. The thunder still muttered, 
 but it rolled away in the distance and left him alone 
 in the ghostly dawn, for the old teacher, too, was 
 gone; he had fled like a dream, less real than the 
 raging night of storm, and far less comprehensible to 
 the young man. The stranger had discovered him 
 self lying prostrate on the floor, and when he arose 
 and started towards the door he found he could with 
 difficulty support himself; he shook in every limb 
 and would have fallen but for the support of the rude 
 benches. The door stood open again, showing that 
 the old man had gone out in the same state of 'ab 
 straction that possessed him when he entered, and 
 leading from it were the tracks of his unsteady feet 
 in the wet earth. The young man sat down wearily 
 on the threshold as if he could go no farther, but in
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 21 
 
 a moment he was aroused by the waking forest. The 
 filmy storm fringe was rent here and there by the tar 
 rying wind, and through it the sky of early morning 
 was revealed, seeing which, the birds fluttered on 
 their perches and sent up an ave from every tree. 
 From far and near, and high and low, piped the 
 sweet thrush; the linnet twittered its treble; the lark 
 flew from its drenched couch and darted into the 
 sky caroling its morning song; the robin chirped 
 her domestic pip, pip; the oriole swung lightly from 
 its suspended nest, and sent from the slender 
 branches a shower of heavy drops with which they 
 were yet laden; the tiny wren warbled its unexpected 
 score; the quaint sweetness of the cat-bird's voice 
 the mocking bird of the north was carried from 
 bush to bush and echoed by its cheerful mate; the 
 blue-bird and the red-bird fluttered from tree to tree 
 like rays of the coming glory; the darkness and the 
 storm were past, life and joy were resurrected, and 
 gave new strength to him who had experienced such 
 a strange and memorable night.
 
 CHAPTER IIL 
 
 WITH the fullness of day our young friend felt 
 a greater return of his strength and knew 
 that he had only been stunned, but he felt also the 
 need of some breakfast before his interview with 
 the old teacher, so he started off towards Rocky-ford, 
 intending to get something to eat on the way, and 
 then, if he felt inclined, go on and report to his 
 comrades and return to the school house. It would 
 be but a walk of a couple of miles, and that was 
 nothing to him. His breakfast refreshed him greatly 
 and he sped over the dewy fields with buoyant step. 
 Rocky-ford was a little, clustering village, lodged 
 at the foot of a great tree-covered hill. It boasted a 
 small tavern; a Post-0 ffice-store; a smith-shop; a 
 small red meeting house, with a modest spire set 
 squarely in the middle of the roof, and a double front 
 door flanked by two substantial scrapers whose goodly 
 heap of mud chips testified to a church-going neigh 
 borhood; a doctor's sign ; a low window from which 
 hung suggestively a quarter of sole leather and a 
 tattered boot; and the name of "Jane Winn, Milliner 
 and Dressmaker," on the smallest and neatest house 
 in the street. There was just room for these impor 
 tant business establishments on the narrow terrace 
 which lay a few feet above the creek bottom. The 
 comfortable houses where, presumably, the minister, 
 
 (22)
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 23 
 
 the postmaster, the blacksmith, and their principal 
 patrons lived, were built over cellar-kitchens on the 
 sloping hillside, higher up, and a few cabins where, 
 evidently, that portion of the population lived from 
 which future census returns must be mainly made 
 up, were set in the sand on the lower flat. Even at 
 the early hour at which the brisk-stepping stranger 
 entered the short street of Rocky-ford these cabin 
 doors were filled with tow-headed children. And 
 when he looked up from them it seemed that not 
 only the youngsters, but the whole town, was up and 
 out doors. That was natural, of course; they were 
 really country people and accustomed to rising early. 
 But that knot of men in front of the Post-Office, and 
 the women standing in the yard by twos and threes, 
 what could they be doing? There was some excite 
 ment in the air; he felt it, and quickened his pace. 
 There were his companions, all talking excitedly, 
 and could it be? Yes, there was the old teacher, 
 looking aged many years in that brief night, and 
 wild and haggard. As soon as his friends saw him 
 they started toward him, and the villagers came after 
 them with more or less alacrity, to witness the effect 
 of the news. 
 
 "Have you heard it?" asked one of them. 
 
 "Heard it: heard what? No, I have heard noth 
 ing. What is it ? " 
 
 "A party of Mormons leave here to-day for Utah. 
 It seems nobody knew there were any about until 
 last night, when an old man who lives out here a mile 
 or two told his daughter they would go to-day with
 
 24 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 the Mormons, and she took on so they had to call 
 the neighbors in; then they found out all about it. 
 They say she is a mighty pretty girl. The old school 
 master, Ezekiel Blounce, is desperately worked up 
 about it. He says it's as bad as kidnaping the girl, 
 but there does not seem to be any way to prevent it. 
 The elders have been working around on the sly 
 lately, and have a party of six or eight ready to start 
 to-day. There was a great excitement here about 
 Mormonism some ten years ago, they say, and these 
 people who are going now were about half converted 
 then. It appears that this girl's father Wainwright 
 is his name was afraid she would make a fuss about 
 it, so the elders persuaded him to keep quiet until 
 they were about ready to start." 
 
 "Why don't the girl let her father go, and stay 
 here? has she no friends?'"' asked the stranger, im 
 pulsively. 
 
 " Oh, it is of no use to speak of that, the old teacher 
 says, and he seems to know more about them than 
 anybody else; the girl has gone to school to him for 
 a long time and she would not part from her father, 
 he is sure. The father is a little queer, they say; had 
 a severe illness when he was a youngster, that left 
 him weak-minded. No, I guess there is nothing to 
 do but to let them go; there is no law to prevent 
 people from going to Utah if they want to. And, 
 by the way, we have no time to look after them any 
 how; I had a letter from the General this morning, 
 and he wants us to hurry on down to the end of this 
 line and get in again as soon as possible; he has a
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 25 
 
 bigger job waiting for us. We have not had break 
 fast yet; come and get some coffee and we will be 
 right off." 
 
 There was no school at the little district school 
 house in Pineborough township that day. The chil 
 dren came and looked at the fallen chimney, walked 
 about among the broken trees, and went away again. 
 But Ezekicl Blounce, the teacher who had so long 
 and regularly met his little flock there, had a meet 
 ing that morning with but one pupil. He had 
 guessed that Esther would make a farewell visit to 
 her old haunts in the pine woods; he knew that she 
 strolled over the hills alone amid the ferns and trick 
 ling waters, and often sat for hours on the overhang 
 ing crags and gazed into the peaceful valleys, at she 
 knew not what, to be sure, but she enjoyed it, her 
 mates did not; and her mother had always tried to 
 indulge her quiet moods, realizing, perhaps uncon 
 sciously, that she had to deal with a finer nature than 
 her own. Esther's complexion was not lily and peach- 
 bloom. The winds and suns of her native hills had 
 toned it to a golden brown and carmine; bat neither 
 time nor the elements, joy nor sorrow, could ever 
 fade or intensify the blue of her eyes; it was the blue 
 of deep water under a cloudless sky. All her life 
 since she was a lisping, white-haired, dainty child, 
 clad in a blue cotton frock and a linsey petticoat, she 
 had gone to the district school, down the hill and 
 across the brook, by way of the fallen tree, and then 
 along the stage road to the old, familiar door, where 
 Mr. Blounce always met her with a smile. It was
 
 26 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 natural that he should be greatly interested in her, 
 motherless, too, as she now was. But when he found 
 her among the swaying pine trees, weeping alone in 
 the unanswering solitude, he showed something more 
 than a friendly feeling a love that was greater than 
 she could understand, but which she did not ques 
 tion. It was some comfort to have the good old man 
 by her side, and in the short time she could steal 
 from her hurried preparations she told him the farm 
 had been sold to Col. Barbold; that the Mormons 
 had shown her father where there were good indica 
 tions of coal in a stony patch of his land that had 
 never been cultivated, and had insisted that he ask a 
 much larger sum for it than any value he had ever 
 before put upon it. The Colonel objected strongly 
 at first to paying such a price, but after a quarrelsome 
 interview, of which she could only hear the tones 
 and an occasional word, she distinctly heard one of 
 the elders say that " Brother "Wainwright would not 
 take a cent less that he was one with them now in 
 the fold of the Latter Day Saints, and they would 
 stand by him and see his rights protected." 
 
 Then Col. Barbold said he would take the place, 
 and the other elder told' him sneeringly that he de 
 served to be rewarded for waiting so long to get hold 
 of it. Everthing was to go, the house and all the 
 dear belongings except Esther's and her mother's 
 clothing, this she was generously allowed to retain. 
 She grew calmer after she had told this sad story to 
 her old friend and turned to take a last look at the 
 picture spread out beneath them. The old man's
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 7 
 
 eyes followed hers, and at the same instant they dis 
 covered a surveying party crossing the meadow at 
 the foot of the hill. Quickly and involuntarily they 
 glanced at each other, and the teacher remarked that 
 that was the company to which the young man who 
 had called at the school house belonged. "Last 
 night, was it?" he queried piteously, "it seems so 
 long ago." 
 
 "Yes, last night," she said, in a tone which showed 
 that she, as well as her aged companion, was con 
 scious of an experience in that brief time that had 
 changed them both. Yesterday she was a thought 
 less girl, climbing the hills and strolling through the 
 meadows, carelessing seeing as she passed, the burst 
 ing buds, the fringing willows near the streams, and 
 the purpling oaks on the ridges, with no care beyond 
 her present loitering. To-day her heart was heavy 
 with grief, but in the flash of consciousness that went 
 from her eyes to the old man's he saw something 
 more. It spoke in the unmistakable language of a 
 woman's heart of a presence without which her life 
 would be barren indeed, but which would make her 
 dreaded journey to Utah yet harder to bear. 
 
 They said good bye to each other there under the 
 sighing trees, and the old man's last words were like 
 a benediction to Esther. 
 
 "God protect you, my child," he said; "I cannot 
 go with you, but while I live I am your friend and 
 will come if you call." 
 
 A mutual but unexpressed understanding that it 
 was the better way, caused them to separate there,
 
 28 ESTHER THE O EN TILE. 
 
 and when he was gone Esther looked up at the scarred 
 and familiar faces of the rocks, and at the bare old 
 trees, until the tears flooded her eyes again and she 
 stretched forth her arms in a long and loving farewell. 
 It was as if an untouched fountain had broken in 
 her heart and was washing from her eyes the aurora 
 of youth. Once more she went back to bathe her 
 face in the "witches' bowl." Many times she had 
 watched for an hour the tiny stream as it fell into the 
 rocky basin and spread in graceful, softening waves 
 over its smooth surface; many times she had gazed 
 into its depths to watch the floating clouds ; many a 
 bright bit of moss and water-cress she had trans 
 planted in the crevices of its moist edge and then 
 leaned over to see the leaves wave their answering 
 shadows in the limpid water; often she had laved her 
 bonny hands in its coolness for pure delight, but 
 never before this farewell visit had she asked the 
 "witches' bowl" to mirror her own beauty. Even 
 under the shadow of her great, fresh sorrow she had 
 tasted fruit of the knowledge which alone brings the 
 fullness of either joy or woe to a woman.
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 44 /CERTAINLY they admit the divine revelation 
 \^ of the Bible, they have never denied or ques 
 tioned that; in fact they teach it in common with 
 other religious sects. Oh, my friend, you greatly 
 underestimate the strength of the Mormon church 
 and the hold it has upon the minds of the devotees, 
 if you suppose it seeks to substitute the Book of 
 Mormon for the Scriptures. All the proselyting that 
 has ever been done by the Mormons has been begun 
 by preaching Christ crucified and the teachings of 
 the Bible. The name of the sect as known among 
 themselves is the Church of Christ of the Latter Day 
 Saints, and the faithful among them are just as firm 
 believers in the Revealed Scriptures as you are. The 
 colonies of ignorant foreigners that are brought over 
 from the old countries by the Mormon elders were 
 nearly all pious people before they became Mormons, 
 but, being ignorant, after they were worked up to a 
 high pitch of religious excitement they were easily 
 led on to believe in the finding of other inspired 
 writings besides the Bible, the supplement of the 
 New Testament, as the Mormons call it, or the Bible 
 of the Western Continent. There is nothing in that 
 idea radically inconsistent with the theory of the 
 Christian religion that I can see." 
 
 "No, perhaps not, from your point of view, but 
 3 (29)
 
 30 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 directly opposed to the spirit of the Christian relig 
 ion, as I understand it. You seem to be familiar 
 with this strange people; may I ask if you have been 
 among them much? " 
 
 "Yes, I have spent a good deal of time in Salt 
 Lake during the last ten years, and for the last five 
 years I have resided there constantly. I am engaged 
 in the practice of law, among the Gentiles exclu 
 sively, however; the Saints do not go to law; the 
 Church settles everything for them, and settles it not 
 according to the law necessarily, nor the law and the 
 prophets, but according to the Prophet, strictly. 
 The President of the Mormon church combines the 
 powers of both church and state; he is elected 
 by the whole people, and his decree is absolute in 
 all things. Of course many questions of both a tem 
 poral and spiritual nature that affect the welfare of 
 the people and the safety of the Church are decided 
 without being referred to him, but they are pretty 
 sure to be decided as he would have decided them, 
 for all officers, priests, elders, bishops, and even the 
 Patriarch, the highest position in the church govern 
 ment after President, are accountable to him. Did 
 it ever occur to you that it was a politic idea in pro 
 mulgating a new religious sect in this country to 
 call its ruling power a presidency, rather than give it 
 a name that would suggest a priesthood or a mon 
 archy? Ah, there have been some sharp wits at the 
 head of this Mormon business, there is no doubt of 
 that. The longer you stay among the Mormons, and 
 the more you see of them, the more interesting they
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 31 
 
 will become to you. You stop at Salt Lake, I sup 
 pose?" 
 
 "Yes, I shall stop there for a short time. But 
 do you not see some of the Mormon people on the 
 train sometimes? I supposed we should pick up 
 some at these small stations occasionally." 
 
 " O yes, so we do sometimes, but seldom; the Mor 
 mons are not great travelers, they do not mix much 
 with the outside world in any way, and then their 
 settlements are scattered farther north and south and 
 west, but especially south, from Salt Lake City, than 
 east. I suppose every step in that direction seemed 
 to them like a retrograde, a sort of compromise with 
 the persecution and civilization they fled from. There 
 is, however, a small party of Mormon converts, and 
 a couple of elders, in the forward car, but they are 
 through passengers from some place in the East. I 
 did not pay much attention to them, but I noticed 
 that they are Americans, or at least they speak Eng 
 lish, and show by their dress that they do not belong 
 to any of the classes which usually compose these 
 parties. We do not often see any but old-country 
 peasantry now-a-days, with a sprinkling from a some 
 what higher walk as leaders. Perhaps you would 
 like to go in and take a look at them. I do not 
 happen to know either of the elders, but they are 
 generally a worldly sort of fellows who enjoy a chat 
 well enough if you can get them away from their 
 people." 
 
 Esther and her father sat on the back seat of a 
 car that was bearing them rapidly towards the beau-
 
 32 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 tiful city which was to one a veritable Mecca, and to 
 the other, she knew not what. Mr. Wainwright's 
 face beamed with the light of the simple faith that 
 had inspired him to take such an important step on 
 his own responsibility, and he turned to his daughter 
 with the assuring words that all would be well when 
 they arrived at their journey's end. He did not al 
 low his eyes to dwell long on her face, however, for it 
 told a sad story, and Mr. "Wainwright was evidently 
 afraid to trust himself to contemplate it. She had 
 endured the long journey silently and uncomplain 
 ingly for the most part, but once or twice she had 
 said to her father in the brief moments they had 
 been permitted to speak alone, "It is not too late 
 yet, we might go back. Do you not think you 
 would be happier in the old home?" 
 
 But he had shaken his head and told her it would 
 all be right when they got there. Then, if one of 
 the elders did not come to speak to them, he would 
 go away from her, and for the last day he had wholly 
 avoided being -alone with his daughter and had con 
 stantly sought the refuge of the more incisive minds 
 of the elders. Both these shepherds had looked 
 well after their little flock during the entire journey, 
 conversing first with one and then with another, 
 sometimes on the preeminent claims of their pe 
 culiar religion, and sometimes on the beauties and 
 natural advantages of the country to which they 
 were going, but always in a cheerful and encourag 
 ing spirit. The women of the party had not affili 
 ated much. Esther's undisguised sadness, and her
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 33 
 
 apparent distrust of the whole movement, affected 
 them all more or less, and they seemed to avoid any 
 necessity of explanations or exchange of opinions, 
 though some of them were the most determined and 
 faithful of the band. The party rode in the dingiest 
 and shabbiest car in the train, not because they were 
 traveling as second-class passengers, but by common 
 consent, to more surely avoid critical observation. 
 Esther did not know enough of herself nor of other 
 people to formulate the idea that she was with a class 
 who were naturally her inferiors in sensitiveness of 
 mind, though the child had an instinctive feeling of 
 shame, and a vague comprehension that her father 
 was being led by the elders and was really not ac 
 countable for what he was doing, but she was help 
 less and powerless. When two gentlemen entered 
 the car and took seats near them, Esther knew, 
 though she cast but one hurried glance towards 
 them, that they were looking at her and her father, 
 regarding them curiously, and she could feel her face 
 growing red and her eyes blinding with tears. She 
 would have been glad to shrink out of sight, but 
 even had that been possible, her place was by her 
 father's side; that was the one thought that sustained 
 her. After a few words had been spoken in half 
 audible tones between the two strangers, the citizen 
 of Salt Lake City crossed the aisle and took a seat 
 directly in front of Mr. Wainwright and Esther. 
 Turning to them he addressed them pleasantly and 
 asked if they were going far. 
 
 "We have come a long way, but we stop at
 
 34 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 Salt Lake City," answered Mr. Wainwright, and he 
 brightened visibly at the sound of a friendly voice 
 and looked at Esther as if he would encourage her 
 to speak. "It has been a tiresome journey for my 
 daughter and we will be glad when we reach the end 
 of it. We have not many miles to go now, I be 
 lieve?" 
 
 "!No, it is but a short distance now. How does 
 the country compare with the locality you left?" 
 
 " 0, it is new, very new and strange, but it will all 
 be right. I tell my daughter it will all be right 
 when we get there, but, you see, we left as pretty a 
 place as there is any where, and her mother died a 
 year ago, and we are, we may say, alone in the 
 world." 
 
 Then, glancing out of the window and back again 
 at Esther, Mr. Wainwright seemed to understand 
 that his answer to the gentleman had been some 
 what incoherent and he repeated: "The country. is 
 strange, everything is strange, that is all; we have 
 never been much away from home; she will be satis 
 fied I am sure when we get there." 
 
 The only interest Mr. Wainwright seemed to have 
 in the country was that it should please and satisfy 
 his daughter, and he went on volubly to tell of her 
 love for the old place and to make excuses for her 
 sorrowful face. But he had not talked long before 
 one of the Mormon elders arose and came down the 
 aisle and took a seat by the stranger. As he did so 
 that gentleman exchanged a significant glance with 
 his companion across the way, as if to say, "You
 
 ESTHER THE Q EN TILE. 35 
 
 see, the elder is afraid to trust me," but he continued 
 to talk about the country and the climate and the 
 people, until he had quite cheered both Esther and 
 her father. And then came the first view of the city 
 of the valley of the Great Salt Lake. Spread upon 
 the mountain slope, watered by the mountain streams, 
 fanned by the mountain winds, it appears a haven of 
 rest to thousands of weary pilgrims who journey 
 over land and sea to reach it. Its founder chose 
 wisely this spot from whence the everlasting hills can 
 be seen in such magnificance. Children that are 
 born and bred in sight of a mountain range have 
 more veneration in their souls than those whose lot 
 falls on the level plain. Enthusiasts and romancists 
 are fostered by mountain air and nurtured by the 
 sublime spectacle that surrounds them.
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 IN THE twilight of a summer evening Mr. Wain- 
 wright and Esther sat on the doorstep of a comfort 
 able little house on an unpretentious street in Salt 
 Lake City. They had heen at home there for three 
 months, and it was midsummer now. The warm 
 air was stirred by a balmy south wind that came la 
 den with the scent of the hay fields. The tree-lined 
 street was perfectly still except for the muffled voice 
 of the water that ran in the ditches, rubble, rubble, 
 rubble, ever the same monotonous complaint or glad 
 cadence, according to the temper of the listener. 
 Esther had heard it for a long time, and to her it 
 seemed to be beating against its narrow walls, impa 
 tient for its native wilds. They were sitting hand in 
 hand, the loving daughter and the gentle father. 
 Their life in this new world had been quiet and not 
 wholly unhappy up to this time. They had seen 
 much that was novel and interesting to both of them, 
 and they had made some friends, but they had been 
 comparatively undisturbed in their own home, and 
 Esther had allowed her thoughts to dwell fondly upon 
 the dear old hills. She pined more for them than 
 for her old friends, though sometimes she wished for 
 something else, she scarcely knew what, at first, but 
 in time she found her thoughts taking shape in a 
 pair of dark eyes and an unfamiliar name. A name 
 
 (36)
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 37 
 
 that she had heard but twice, and eyes that she had 
 never looked into as eyes that know each other look. 
 But on the whole she had not been miserable, and 
 that was better than she had anticipated. Her father 
 was absorbed in his new religion. He had given the 
 fifth of all he owned to the Church cheerfully and 
 gladly, and would have doubled this first tax that is 
 exacted from every member, if Esther had not de 
 murred. He was a daily worshiper in the tabernacle, 
 and either a priest or an elder was always by his side 
 when he went on the street. His faith had com 
 pletely filled him, and he told Esther as he sat there 
 with her hand in his, how sure he was that they had 
 done right in leaving the old home for the New Jeru 
 salem. 
 
 " I am glad for your sake, father, that it is so," she 
 had said, and then they both sat still thinking, until 
 they heard the well-known foot-fall of Elder Bean 
 coming down the street towards them. Esther made 
 some motion as if to go in, but her father detained 
 her, and when the elder came up he invited him to 
 go in with them. He declined the invitation after a 
 look at Esther, but said he would like to say a few 
 words to Mr. Wainwright and suggested that they 
 walk together, since the evening was so pleasant it 
 seemed like a loss to spend it indoors. Esther 
 brought her father's hat and gave it to him with a kiss 
 and looked fondly after him as he passed down the 
 quiet street, but her heart forewarned her as he and 
 his companion walked away that this interview meant 
 something serious. Left alone, she went inside,
 
 38 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 closed the door and threw herself on the floor by a 
 south window where she laid her head on her arm so 
 that she could look at the sky. The exile always 
 finds some comfort in this. To look at a star and 
 know that it can be seen from the spot where we 
 most long to be, and by the eyes we most wish to 
 meet, brings a vague solace to us all, but it did not 
 prevent the hot tears from falling from Esther's eyes 
 nor quiet the fears which possessed her. She could 
 not be still, the air of the house seemed to stifle her; 
 she threw open the door again and went out to listen 
 for her father's return, though she knew he would 
 not come so soon. No sound came from the direc 
 tion in which he had gone, but she heard hurrying 
 steps coming the other way. She had no well-defined 
 reason for thinking they were coming to her, but her 
 father's absence and the fear she felt, together with 
 the uncertain light, made her tremble, and she stood 
 irresolute whether to go in or to run away. The 
 steps quickened and she strained her eyes to see, if 
 she could, who came. But before she could distin 
 guish anything a hand had grasped hers and a voice 
 said excitedly, "I knew you almost in the dark, Miss 
 Wainwright; do not be alarmed and do not go away; 
 I come as a friend and in great haste. Do you re 
 member me, I saw you but once, at the little school 
 house, and I have a message from your old teacher, 
 Mr. Blounce." 
 
 For answer to this hurried speech Esther burst into 
 tears, but in a moment more she choked down her 
 sobs and invited her visitor into the little parlor.
 
 ESTHER THE O EN TILE. 39 
 
 With shaking hands she lighted a lamp that stood on 
 a diminutive center table, and the stranger watched 
 eagerly to see if the face it would illumine could be 
 as beautiful and as innocent as when he first beheld 
 it. He almost held his breath while the uncertain 
 flame flickered and blinded him, but as soon as the 
 steady glow came he went to her and took her hand 
 again. It lasted but an instant, that brief time when 
 he could touch her hand and look deep into her eyes, 
 but he was not disappointed ; he saw there all he had 
 dreamed of in the months since he had first discov 
 ered her one idle summer day. 
 
 " Oh, yes, I knew you at first," she said, "you came 
 to the school house the night before the storm. Any 
 one I ever saw there would seem like an old friend 
 now; but are you living here?" she added hesitat 
 ingly. 
 
 "No, indeed, I am merely passing through; we are 
 going to do some Government work two or three 
 hundred miles beyond here and stopped off only 
 from one train to another. Our captain had business, 
 and I came to find you. You are contented here? 
 and your father, how is he ? Mr. Blounce has told 
 me about you, and whether you need it or not, I came 
 to offer you my friendship; persons sometimes do 
 need friends in a strange land. You have both been 
 well? Mr. Blounce will want to know." 
 
 " Will you see him ? " asked Esther eagerly. 
 
 "No, not soon, but I promised to write him of you 
 and your father if I found you, and to give you hi* 
 love."
 
 40 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 " He is very kind ; I wish I could see him. Tell 
 him we are both well; father is very happy too; he 
 will be in soon, he has only gone out for a little 
 walk." 
 
 Esther did not explain that he had gone with one 
 of the elders, but she betrayed her apprehension 
 concerning him by nervous glances towards the door, 
 even in the midst of questions about her old home. 
 It was little her guest could tell her; he had not been 
 near the old school house since the day he saw her 
 there. He could, however, talk to her of that day 
 and the familiar places; but not even the sense of 
 acquaintanceship, that is always the result of such 
 meetings in a foreign land, made it seem possible for 
 him to lead her from the old scenes to her present 
 life. He could only fear that she purposely avoided 
 talking of it, while she seemed wholly oblivious to 
 it. Their meeting was more natural and uncon 
 strained than it could possibly have been under any 
 other circumstances, and after two or three attempts 
 to go the visitor still lingered at the door, and finally 
 parted from Esther almost as an old friend. He had 
 told Esther that he should return to Salt Lake City 
 in six or eight weeks, he could not tell just when, 
 but whenever he did come it would be to stay some 
 time, and he would see her often then, he hoped. 
 Then he was gone. 
 
 Still her father had not come, and again she stood 
 alone under the trees listening for his footsteps. The 
 quiet streets grew quieter, the few scattering lights 
 that had been company for the lonely girl went out.
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 41 
 
 and yet she waited. The visit she had had seemed 
 like a dream as she sat and thought it over word for 
 word. A sweet dream indeed, which tempered the 
 bitterness of her vigil so that when at last she heard 
 her father coming, slowly and alone, she was able to 
 meet him calmly and to ask where he had been, as 
 though she did not suspect anything unusual. But 
 the first sound of his voice froze her, and she knew 
 it must be something even more serious than she had 
 feared that>he had to say to her. 
 
 "My daughter," he began, as soon as they were 
 inside the door, as if afraid to trust himself to put 
 off the fatal moment, " My daughter, I came here to 
 do my whole duty to the Church, God helping me, 
 and Elder Bean has made it plain to me that I must 
 change my manner of life. It is selfish in us to live 
 here alone in this quiet way. We have been very 
 happy, and I would be glad if it was right for us to 
 go on in the same way, but I must do my whole duty 
 as it is shown to me. Come here, njy girl, and sit 
 on my knee; you know I wish for nothing in the 
 world so much as your happiness, Esther? You do 
 know this, my daughter?" repeated the trembling 
 man as he put his arms about her and looked appeal- 
 ingly into her dazed face. He would have drawn 
 her head down upon his shoulder and soothed her 
 into at least apparent submission while he talked to 
 her, but Esther would not permit it; she sat upright, 
 and demanded to know what he meant and what 
 Elder Bean had said to him. 
 
 " Perhaps we had better talk of this in the morn-
 
 42 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 ing, Esther, it is late now, I will not trouble you to 
 night, my girl," said Mr. Wainwright, baffled in his 
 effort to be strong and brave. Then his head fell on 
 her shoulder, and though he did not sob nor cry out, 
 she could feel the hot tears falling on her hands. 
 Her hardness of heart lasted but a moment, then she 
 strained him to her breast, as a mother would have 
 taken a forgiven child, and said gently: 
 
 "No, no, father; do not send me away, let me 
 know what is in your thoughts, tell me Everything; 
 I have grown older in many ways since we came 
 here, and I can be wise. But this is nothing that 
 will part us, father?" almost fiercely again. 
 
 "No," he hastened to reply, "not necessarily, not 
 unless you think it best for a time." But he did not 
 look up and Esther could feel his arms tremble. 
 
 "What can you mean, father? You would not 
 consent to that? Why should we be separated? 
 What reason can there be for it? No, I will never 
 leave you, not for a single day; they shall never take 
 you from me." 
 
 "There, there, my child, do not be alarmed, it 
 shall be as you say, but Elder Bean says it is not 
 right for me to be living alone," he continued, tak 
 ing courage again. 
 
 " Living alone, father, are you alone while I am 
 with you, are. we not happiest as we are, and who 
 could we have with us?" 
 
 "You do not understand, Esther, I must take a 
 wife." 
 
 It was Esther's turn to quail now. A spasm of as-
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 43 
 
 tonishment swept over her face, and then she broke 
 down utterly, and was folded sobbing in her father's 
 arms. Her fears had caused her much suffering, but 
 they had all been vague, her apprehensions had never 
 once materialized into the personality of a wife for 
 her father, a woman in her mother's place, and in her 
 own place, too. That, she would have felt, if she 
 had thought of it at all, was sacred and safe. Six 
 months ago this frail man would have hesitated a 
 much longer time before making such an announce 
 ment to his daughter, but his newly-found faith lent 
 him a strength not his by nature, and the elders had 
 so wrought upon his confiding mind that he was in 
 actual terror of ending his existence upon earth be 
 fore he had fulfilled every commandment of the Mor 
 mon church. He had also listened that very day to 
 a powerful sermon on the duties of the elder leaders 
 and supporters of the revealed religion, and foremost 
 among these duties was the obligation of taking more 
 than one wife, and as Mr. Wainwright was guilty 
 of the great sin of being wifeless, he was a most fit 
 subject for Elder Bean's exhortations, and came 
 home overwhelmed with a sense of his own short 
 comings. It was not his fear of her reproaches that 
 made him bow his head and weep rather than utter 
 the words that had hurt Esther like a stab, he was 
 strong in his faith that he was doing right, it was his 
 great love for her that made the task so hard. And 
 when she clung to him, sobbing as if her heart would 
 break, nothing but his zeal for what he believed to 
 be exalted righteousness could have supported him.
 
 44 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 Even then, he pressed her convulsively to him, and 
 mingled his tears with hers. 
 
 "Father, father, you do not know what you are 
 saying. A Mormon wife, a Mormon woman in our 
 home, think of it! Do not let them force you to 
 this ! " she exclaimed after a little time. 
 
 But Mr. Wainwright remembered the command, 
 "Let no man be ashamed of his faith," and he said, 
 with an attempt at cheerfulness, " Why, my child, I 
 am a member of the Church myself; why should I 
 not have a wife of my faith? I could take no other. 
 You need a m " 
 
 But a shudder from the girl as she rested against 
 him checked this argument half uttered, and she 
 raised herself up, defiant again. Esther knew it was 
 but the echo of the advice he had received during 
 the evening, but she could not bear it. The sacred 
 name of "mother" had not been spoken by either of 
 them, and she could not endure that it be mentioned 
 in this odious connection. So the words died on Mr. 
 Wainwright's lips, and thereafter it was as though it 
 had never been known to either father or daughter. 
 They had been accustomed to talk often of the dear 
 heart they had left resting amid the hills, but from 
 that fateful night her name was not spoken again for 
 many a long day. 
 
 " She is a good woman, the one Elder Bean has se 
 lected for me, a woman who has been married, like 
 myself, and who has years and judgment sufficient 
 to make a suitable companion for a man of my age. 
 She has a daughter, too, Esther, a young woman
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 45 
 
 near your own age who will be company for you, if 
 you do not choose to accept Elder Bean's offer." 
 
 " Offer ! What offer, father ? " 
 
 " This woman, Elizabeth Comfrey, will be sealed 
 to me next Wednesday, and Elder Bean has proposed 
 to me that you become his wife at the same time. It 
 would be " 
 
 What it would be, in his opinion, Mr. Wainwright 
 never expressed, for Esther sprang to her feet and 
 stood erect with flashing eyes, while she cried in a 
 hard, unnatural voice, "His wife! father, are you 
 mad? His wife! has he not a wife already ?" 
 
 "I I do not know. I suppose not; why why 
 he would not " 
 
 " He would do anything ! Tell him no, a thousand 
 times no; I will stay with you. Oh, father, can you 
 not see what we are coining to? Let us go home to 
 morrow now we cannot stay here. Oh! why did 
 we ever come?" 
 
 "Quiet yourself, Esther, you frighten me; go to 
 bed now, you are excited, and I am tired, very tired. 
 It hurts me to see you so. Say good night to me; 
 Esther, Esther, do not look at me in that wild way; 
 I must do my whole duty, and I believe you will yet 
 be led in the right way." 
 
 Esther could say no more; she saw that she talked 
 to one in a dream, and realized as she looked at her 
 father that she must fight her battle alone. She went 
 to him and kissed him forgivingly, but he did not 
 take her in his arms again or notice her. She waited 
 a minute by his side, and then, with a look of unut- 
 
 4
 
 46 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 terable helplessness in her face, went out and left him 
 alone. 
 
 Esther had not for an instant premeditated the 
 concealment of the visit she had received during her 
 father's absence, but the terrible message he brought 
 had so overwhelmed her with grief and shame that 
 everything else seemed unimportant. There had 
 been no time to speak of anything else, and she felt 
 that her father could not understand, while in his 
 present state of mind, that she could have a visitor 
 whom he did not know, even if he was interested in 
 the fact. So she went sorrowfully to her room with 
 that secret in her heart, and her dreams that night, 
 when at last they came to her tired senses, were of 
 mingled fear, despair, and hope. Young as Esther 
 was, she appreciated that her father was being slowly 
 drawn into a net that sooner or later would make him 
 wretched, and she wept for him in her sleep. But in 
 bright relief against this dark sorrow stood the form 
 of her new friend, and the light that bade her hope 
 was the light of love.
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 IT seemed a hard fate that sent a timid man like 
 Mr. Wainwright forth alone to meet his bride, 
 but probably no amount of persuasion could have 
 induced his daughter to accompany him, when the 
 day came, to the Endowment House. There was not 
 much in the way of argument ever available to him; 
 he was a man of few resources, and when Esther told 
 him she could not go, and begged him not to ask her, 
 it saved him the effort of saying a great many things 
 he had thought he might say, if he discovered in her 
 a possibility of yielding to his wishes in this respect. 
 He would have been glad to have his daughter stand 
 by him while he assumed this new duty, but he did 
 not hesitate because she refused. At the appointed 
 hour he went prayerfully, with bowed head, along the 
 street as was his custom, and Esther watched him as 
 if he were going to the stake. 
 
 When he returned he led by the hand a tall gray- 
 looking woman, not quite his equal in years, but evi 
 dently much riper in experience and knowledge of 
 people, and some four inches taller than he. Her 
 daughter walked behind. One may see such a per 
 son as Elizabeth many times in a crowd and make no 
 note of her. She was thin, square shouldered, solemn 
 visaged, middle aged, and all of a grayness, a kind of 
 iron gray, that looked as if it would neither bend nor 
 
 (47)
 
 48 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 break. Her eyes one could seldom see, they were so 
 overshadowed with heavy brows, which, like the hairs 
 of her head, were half black and half white. Her 
 complexion partook of the same general color, like a 
 well-toned wintry landscape, and even her expression 
 was gray, perpetually gray. . It is a small task to put 
 a gray gown on such a woman, though she wore it 
 because it was serviceable, not because it was harmo 
 nious. Perhaps the theory of harmony had been re 
 served as a grace for Elizabeth in some future state 
 of existence; it certainly had no place in her soul in 
 this life. She had been widowed a long time, but 
 she belonged to a rare philosophical genus of woman 
 kind. She was a person who could wait, secure in 
 the belief that her mission would be made clear to 
 her some day. She possessed another attribute as 
 rare among women as it is among men, almost. She 
 could not only keep her own counsel, but she could 
 keep secrets for others, and she never gossiped; con 
 sequently she had been made a confidante by many 
 of the high dignitaries of the church and had proven 
 herself a valuable ally in many important church 
 works. It is, indeed, wonderful how much any man 
 or woman is permitted, or, rather, obliged to know, 
 when once it is learned that he or she can keep a se 
 cret. But few mortals carry their treasures with 
 greater safety and less ostentation than did Elizabeth. 
 Esther had nerved herself to meet the bridal party 
 at the door and extend to them some show of wel 
 come, but the moment Elizabeth's foot crossed the 
 threshold Elias Wainwright's daughter was relieved
 
 ESTHER THE Q EN TILE. 49 
 
 of all effort in that direction. The new wife assumed 
 her position as mistress of the household instantly; 
 not rudely, nor by any worded assertion. A deliber 
 ate but momentary survey of the little room was all 
 that was visible, then she untied her gray silk bonnet 
 and removing it from her head, walked straight to an 
 unoccupied nail in the wall on the other side of the 
 room and hung it thereon as if she had done the same 
 thing a hundred times before. Esther stood waiting 
 with empty hands, and that little but unhesitating 
 action showed her the keen perception and the self- 
 reliance of the woman who had come into her life. 
 Elizabeth did not choose to be waited upon; she 
 placed nothing from whence it must be directly re 
 moved, not even a word. She both moved and spoke 
 without studied effort or unseemly haste, and in half 
 an hour she had impressed so inexperienced an ob 
 server as Esther with the feeling that she was as au 
 tomatic, as alert, and as soulless, as a fine piece of 
 mechanism. 
 
 If there is anything in this world that can un 
 steady one's faith in the good old Quaker doctrine 
 that the "still, small voice," well heeded, will guide 
 a mortal life through channels of usefulness, and 
 make it at the same time joyful and joy-giving, it is 
 such a life as Elizabeth Wainwright's. She never 
 committed an act of which any man could say, " She 
 knows that to be evil." She never shirked a duty, 
 and yet she stood like a hard, unyielding, silent rock, 
 in the midst of lives that without her would have 
 been smooth and pleasant. Around her individual-
 
 50 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 ism the lives of three others by turns eddied, and 
 surged, and fell back calm and hopeless. Into her 
 unanswering eyes three pleading faces looked day 
 after day for something they never found. She went 
 with her husband faithfully to church, and usually 
 took her daughter along. When she was left behind 
 it was because there was work to do. The house 
 hold duties were shared equally by the three 
 women and no unfair burden was laid upon Esther, 
 indeed most of the time she felt that everything 
 would go on quite as well without her, for both Eliz 
 abeth and her daughter were expert housekeepers, 
 and the habits of all were so frugal and regular 
 there was not much to do. Elizabeth had several 
 times invited Esther to accompany them to church, 
 but when she declined, as she always did, she was not 
 urged. Her father said nothing, but she noticed 
 that when she was left alone he always looked wist 
 fully back at her, and when Elizabeth's daughter re 
 mained at home he looked pleased because she had 
 a companion. The daughters did not become ac 
 quainted rapidly, though there seemed no special 
 antagonism between them. Elizabeth's daughter had 
 been accustomed from her babyhood to submit totally 
 to her mother's direction without a thought beyond 
 it. Esther had no treasonable designs, nor hopes 
 even, for any one save her father, but one day when 
 the girls had been left to a task that kept them to 
 gether longer than usual, Esther sighed deeply and 
 looked wearily out of the window. Drusilla looked 
 up at her in mild astonishment and asked if she was
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 51 
 
 troubled. Esther, stammering and hesitr.ting, at 
 first denied it, because she was frightened at having 
 her real feelings discovered, and because she was 
 just enough to remember that this girl was in no 
 way accountable for her suffering But when she 
 saw the look of incredulity on Drusilla's face she 
 cried out in desperation, "Yes, I am in trouble, and 
 you may as well know it. Do you think it is noth 
 ing to me that my father has left his home and his 
 people to come away here to live with the Mormons? 
 You are one of them yourself, I suppose, but you 
 are not accountable for it; you were born here your 
 mother said, and you do not know that it is consid- 
 dered a disgrace all over this country, outside of 
 Utah, to be a Mormon. Poor girl, I ought to pity 
 you, but I don't, I have grown so hard hearted, i 
 hate your mother, I hate the whole race of Mor 
 mons, they have taken my father from me and they 
 are taking his money and soon he will be a poor, 
 helpless old man. I don't care for that, they can 
 have all if they will let me have him and let us go. 
 Oh mother, mother, what shall we do ?" 
 
 The cry seemed to come spontaneously to Esther's . 
 lips, and she had but just uttered it and thrown her 
 self into a chair sobbing out her long pent-up grief 
 when the door opened and Elizabeth and her father 
 walked in. No questions were asked, but Elizabeth 
 dismissed the girls with the remark that she would 
 prepare the supper and they might go to their own 
 rooms and refresh themselves after their work. Dru-
 
 52 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 silla's astonishment faded from her face and she 
 acted immediately on her mother's suggestion. 
 
 Esther slowly lifted her tear-wet face and saw her 
 father gazing at her with the old fond look in his 
 eyes ; she stretched out her hands to him, and before 
 Elizabeth could turn around they were clasped in 
 each other's arms and Esther was weeping on her 
 father's breast. It did not last long, no tender feel 
 ing could find expression under the stony and un 
 flinching gaze of Elizabeth, and Mr. Wamwright 
 put his daughter gently from him and tried to 
 speak, but his lips only quivered and no sound came 
 from them. Then Elizabeth stepped forward and 
 taking Esther by the arm said, " Come, my daughter, 
 calm yourself." 
 
 The words were hardly spoken when Esther broke 
 from her hold and turned upon her like something 
 wild. 
 
 "I am not your daughter, woman ! Do not speak 
 to me in that way again. I cannot choose my home 
 or it would not be with your people, but I can be 
 true to my mother, and I can keep my place at my 
 father's side," she said, as she put her hand on his 
 arm and looked at him. Elizabeth turned away at 
 this and left them alone. But the old look had gone 
 out of Mr. Wainwright's face, he was pale and 
 greatly agitated. Esther herself felt no sense of vic 
 tory, she even trembled as the fear came into her 
 mind that she had said too much. 
 
 Several days passed by and no reference was made 
 to this little scene, and Esther began to be less ap-
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 53 
 
 prehensive that she had made a fatal mistake, when 
 her father came to breakfast one morning looking as 
 if he had had a fit of sickness, he was so haggard 
 and white. He avoided Esther's eyes continually, 
 and ate nothing at all. The preparations for church 
 began early, and some desperate fear, inspired by 
 her father's actions and his suffering face, caused 
 Esther to resolve to accompany them. She came 
 into the room, as they were about to start, all in 
 readiness, and announced her intention to her father, 
 but what was her surprise to see the agony of his ex 
 pression increase tenfold, and a look of supreme fear 
 start into his face. He begged her for his sake not 
 to go, and Elizabeth said, "It will be better so." 
 
 She took off her hat, put aside her wraps, and saw 
 them depart alone, not because she was not brave 
 enough to go and make the effort to save her father 
 from further suffering if that was impending, but 
 because she knew she was powerless, and she had 
 seen plainly that her presence would really pain him 
 more. That he had gone to meet some great trial 
 she had no doubt, but of its nature she had no idea, 
 and after events only made it possible for her to 
 guess at it. The next time she and Drusilla were 
 alone the girl said to her: "I know you are one of 
 those terrible people who think the Saints are not 
 God's people, but I want to ask you something that 
 I can ask of no one else: Are there many such as 
 you ? Many people in the world, I mean, who think 
 it is a disgrace to believe in the revealed religion ? 
 And why do they think us so wicked? I know it is
 
 54 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 very wrong for me to ask these things but I can't 
 help it, I want to know." 
 
 " Can it be possible, child, that you do not know 
 that the Mormons are but a handful of the popula 
 tion of the United States, and that in the history of 
 the world they really have no place at all? No won 
 der polygamy thrives. That is the shameful part of 
 the Mormon doctrine, that is why everybody despises 
 them; you know what that means, I suppose, do you 
 not?" Esther asked. "Yes, I thought you would; 
 every man in the church, who has any position, has 
 more than one wife. Does it not seem terrible to 
 you? Think of it! how would you feel yourself if 
 you were married to a man who had another wife, 
 or two or three others ! " 
 
 "But the law of God commands it, and nature 
 has so ordered it; there are more women than men 
 in the world, and no woman can be acceptable in the 
 sight of God who has not borne children in the 
 Church." Esther looked at the girl beside her in 
 amazement. The hideous, practical details of the 
 Mormon government, the Mormon religion they call 
 it, had been stamped on this child's mind in all their 
 nakedness, and she knew nothing else. 
 
 "What would you think if your father were to 
 marry another woman?" proceeded Drusilla. 
 
 " Marry another woman ! " If a knife had pierced 
 Esther's flesh it could not have stung her more 
 sharply, but she rallied in an instant, and said that 
 her father had been converted to the Mormon religion 
 by designing men, but that he was a man of honor;
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 55 
 
 he did not come there to practice polygamy, but to 
 serve God as he believed, and she would not hear him 
 talked of in that way. She thought for an instant 
 that she saw a glitter and a sneer that were new to 
 her in Drusiila's eyes, but Esther was unsuspicious, 
 and the girl was young, even younger than herself, 
 she reflected, and so ignorant. 
 
 In the afternoon Elizabeth and her daughter went 
 out together, and Mr. Wainwright shut himself up 
 in his own room, he was not well, he said, but only 
 wished for quiet and to be undisturbed. Esther 
 spent the time as she had spent many long days, cry 
 ing in her heart, "How long, Oh Lord, how long?" 
 and seeking for some way of deliverance. She was 
 completely shut out from her father's confidence, but 
 she knew he was breaking down under some new 
 torture of mind, and her own suffering can only be 
 realized by loving hearts that have borne the agony 
 of suspense. The following morning Mr. Wain 
 wright, Elizabeth and her daughter all went to 
 church. Esther noticed that her father looked even 
 more haggard than on the previous morning, his 
 breakfast again was left untouched, and he still so 
 persistently avoided her and in other ways acted so 
 strangely that once the fear that he was losing his 
 mind came to her. The mother and daughter, she 
 was sure, exchanged looks that meant more than 
 their words, and Esther felt that she was bound ami 
 gasping for breath while her father was being crushed 
 before her eyes.
 
 CHAPTER 
 
 SIX months after the "Wainwright farm had been 
 sold to Col. Barbold, it was the scene of busy 
 mining operations. Heaps of blue clay and slate, 
 pools of muddy water, derricks and rough board 
 cabins disfigured the once well-kept hillside; but the 
 Colonel was pleased with his bargain, and surveyed 
 it each day with increasing satisfaction. He was now 
 on the high road to become the wealthiest man in the 
 county there was no doubt of that. His son was a 
 handsome young fellow, who would make a worthy 
 successor to the broad estate, and who would have 
 the self-confidence to maintain the family position in 
 the community that was equally certain. Indeed, 
 there was little more the Colonel could wish for, and 
 much that he should be thankful for. He realized 
 all this as he started out in his clean, glittering car 
 riage one frosty morning in early autumn. He seated 
 himself squarely in the middle of the seat, his smooth- 
 shaven face surmounted by a tall, glossy black hat, 
 his coat buttoned tightly over his rotund form, and 
 respectability and importance radiating from his shin 
 ing person. His well-gloved hands guided a thor 
 oughbred team that held a different gait from the 
 native beasts which trod the dusty valley roads and 
 climbed the rain-washed rocky hills, year in and year 
 out, eating their fill, and dying peacefully of old age 
 
 (56)
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 57 
 
 when they had honestly worked their score or more 
 of years. The silky coats of the Colonel's horses 
 shone in the sun. They sniffed the cool air with ap 
 preciative nostrils, and took long, clean strides, much 
 to their master's satisfaction. He took out his watch 
 just as he turned from the lane into the pike road, 
 with the intention of timing them to the court house 
 at the Center, and rolled off down the smooth high 
 way. All the way there, three miles and over, they 
 trotted evenly at a fine speed, and when the Colonel 
 drew them up in front of the Post-Office and stepped 
 out, all the village loungers sauntered up to shake 
 hands with him and admire his turnout, as they were 
 accustomed to do. It was one of the sights of the 
 place, and the principal event of the day, to see 
 Colonel Barbold drive in. When he had tied his 
 horses and gone in for his mail, the men all looked 
 after him, and one of them said : " The Colonel holds 
 his own remarkable." 
 
 "So he does, so he does; he is well kept, and well 
 to do," said another. 
 
 Inside the Colonel met a hearty good morning 
 from the postmaster and received a goodly package 
 of letters nearly all there were, in fact, for not 
 many of the inhabitants of that happy valley received 
 mail every week. As he looked hastily over his let 
 ters, the Colonel dropped them one by one on the 
 dingy counter between himself and the dignitary, 
 reserving in his hand only one. This one was ad 
 dressed in the writing of his son, who had been gone 
 from home a few days on a little business trip. He
 
 58 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 was old enough now to begin to take an interest in, 
 and a part in the work of conducting the business, 
 and his father was desirous of learning of his success 
 in this, one of his first ventures at bargaining alone. 
 The Colonel deftly shook the other letters into a 
 regular pack raid put them in an inner pocket. Then 
 he took a seat near the hospitable old stove and 
 opened the letter from his son. 
 
 Most of the letters that came to Pineborough Cen 
 ter were opened in the little country store that served 
 also as Post-Office, and the high official whose privi 
 lege it was to hand them out generally knew as 
 quickly as the recipient himself whether the letter 
 contained good news or ill. He had watched the 
 faces of so many letter readers during his long term 
 of office that he knew just what the rapid, excited 
 glance down the page meant, and that the drawn 
 brows, and the puzzled, anxious expression of the 
 face before him betokened trouble that the Colonel 
 could not see his way through. His usually pleasant 
 and ruddy countenance was blanching, and the lips 
 were tightening spasmodically. This school of faces 
 had also taught the official that it would be unwise 
 for him to ask any questions, but it was not long till 
 he was called upon to lend assistance. The Colonel 
 felt his own danger, and turned to the man with a 
 frightened look in his face, and asked him if he could 
 give him something hot to drink. Fortunately a dis 
 cussion of the merits of. the team had kept the loaf 
 ing population outside, and after the hot draught 
 had been swallowed the Colonel was able to brace
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 59 
 
 himself and go out. The little crowd appealed to him 
 noisily to settle several disputed points about the 
 horses, and was closing around him when the men 
 saw that something had gone wrong; the Colonel's 
 manner had changed; he seemed bowed down and 
 aged. 
 
 "He's had a spell," one man whispered; "his fa 
 ther died in one." " He's like to be took any min 
 ute," another muttered, and they all fell back and 
 let him pass. Some one nearest the horses' heads 
 untied them and partly turned them about, for which 
 the Colonel thanked him in an absent way, and then 
 drew up the lines and was gone. When his horses' 
 feet again struck the pike road their gait did not 
 seem to interest the man who drove them. They 
 tossed their proud heads and went with the wind for 
 a little time, and then slackened their speed as they 
 pleased. The same hand drew upon the bit by starts, 
 but the mind that guided them was distracted, and 
 they quickly perceived it. It was a short journey 
 from the Barbold mansion to the " Center," but in 
 that short span a lofty man, in the prime of life, had 
 been broken like a reed. As soon as the Colonel's 
 back was turned, the lounging jockeys and small 
 traders swarmed into the store and plied the post 
 master with questions, but he could only tell them 
 that a letter from young Barbold had brought bad 
 news to his father. Not one in the company could 
 conjecture what could have befallen so clever a young 
 man as Tom Barbold. Not one had a clue to any 
 thing that would lead him into desperate ventures or
 
 60 ESTHER THE Q EN TILE. 
 
 dangerous crimes. He had no habits that would 
 cause them to suspect he had forged his father's name 
 and run away with a large amount of money, for 
 everybody knew he might have all the money he 
 wanted, and was sole heir apparent to his father's 
 fortune. He had no heart-entanglements that any 
 body knew of, and consequently there was no proba 
 bility that he had eloped with some poor girl whom 
 the Barbold pride would not tolerate. But they had 
 not many days of suspense. Although the exact 
 contents of the letter received by the Colonel that 
 fair morning were never known outside of the Bar- 
 bold mansion, it was well understood throughout the 
 length and breadth of Pineborough township, long 
 before the Colonel arose from what was for many 
 weeks considered his death bed, that Tom Barbold 
 had gone to Utah and had become a Latter Day 
 Saint. One of the interested parties to whom this 
 news soon found its way was Ezekiel Blounce, and 
 the next westward-bound train from Rocky-ford car 
 ried an old man with a careworn face.
 
 CHAPTER VIEL 
 
 IT was at the close of the first chill day of autumn 
 that Tom Barbold knocked at the door of the lit 
 tle house in Salt Lake City and was met by Elias 
 Wainwright himself, now a pale and shrinking old 
 man, but who was surprised into an ecstacy of de 
 light and forgetfulness at seeing a face from the home 
 country. He took the boy in his arms and clung to 
 him with tears raining down his face uijtil Tom asked 
 if Esther was at home. "Oh, yes, to be sure you 
 want to see Esther, and she will be glad to see you; 
 I was so delighted myself, I forgot everything for a 
 moment; I will bring her, sit here; indeed we are 
 glad to see you, my boy. Esther, Esther," he called 
 as he went out, " Come quick, my child, some one 
 from Pineborough is here," and when she came, hur 
 rying, surprised at his cheery voice, he caught her 
 by the hand and led her in before Tom Barbold. 
 
 He would have greeted the girl warmly, but she 
 had hoped to see her old teacher, and young Bar- 
 bold's presence she could not understand. An em 
 barrassing blush flew to her cheek and made it 
 impossible for her to look in his face after the first 
 glance. She gave him her hand, however, and be, 
 like all men of his type, took the blush for more than 
 it really meant 
 
 "Esther is glad to see you, Tom," said Mr. Waiii- 
 6 (61)
 
 62 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 wright, " and we both want to hear all the news from 
 home, how does it look at the old place, and how are 
 all the folks? Your father, is he well?" And so 
 he went on with questions which the young man 
 answered, while he kept his eyes on Esther and 
 addressed an occasional remark to her. Mr. Wain- 
 wright seemed to have been lifted out of his sur 
 roundings, and to see through the medium of the 
 new presence all the old scenes of his far-off home, 
 but suddenly he came back to the boy himself and 
 asked where he was bound and what had brought 
 him there. 
 
 " Oh, I have come to join the Saints," young Bar- 
 bold answered fearlessly, and looked first at the father 
 and then at the daughter for approval. The revul 
 sion that came over Esther's face did not escape him, 
 and Mr. Wainwright, instead of welcoming him cor 
 dially to the fold, seemed frightened and glanced 
 quickly towards the door. 
 
 For a moment, it seemed as if the subject would 
 not be touched upon again, but Mr. Wainwright ral 
 lied a little and said it was to him the "perfect way;" 
 he wished Esther could see it so, and he looked at 
 her an instant as if a faint hope had sprung up in his 
 heart now that this young friend had come. But 
 Esther sat with compressed lips, and young Barbold 
 thought he could see tears glistening in her eyes. He 
 was sadly disappointed to find this state of affairs in 
 the Wainwright family; he had been led, not directly 
 perhaps, to suppose that by this time Esther would 
 be firm in the faith, and then well, he had indulged
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. C3 
 
 in a great many dreams as to what would naturally 
 follow his appearance at Salt Lake City. 
 
 Ever since the party of converts had left Rocky- 
 ford under the care of Elder Bean, Tom Barbold 
 had been in correspondence with him, and at last he 
 had been induced by flattery, and promises of posi 
 tion, and the hope of winning Esther Wainwright for 
 his wife, to leave his father, his home, and all his 
 bright prospects there, for the life of a Mormon Saint. 
 
 "It is just such young blood that we need," Elder 
 Bean had said when he was talking it over with Eliz 
 abeth, "and if Esther can't be brought to see her 
 duty in one way, perhaps she can in another." 
 
 "It is a wise scheme," Elizabeth had assented; 
 "one worthy of your noble mind, Elder Bean; you 
 have always the good of the Church at heart. Send 
 for him, persuade him to come, and Esther will marry 
 him, of course." 
 
 "I hate to give the girl up, you know that, Eliza 
 beth, but I have used every argument I can think of; 
 she is set against me." 
 
 And now he was here; the young man who was to 
 solve the problem of what to do with Esther, for 
 Elizabeth and Elder Bean, whose consciences would 
 not allow them to rest while the girl was outside the 
 Church. When the door of the little room opened 
 to admit Elizabeth and her daughter, all the occu 
 pants arose and the three pairs of eyes turned upon 
 them with widely different expressions. Young Bar- 
 bold's were full of wonder, for Elizabeth walked
 
 64 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 straight to her husband's side, and by her very atti 
 tude demanded recognition. 
 
 " This is my wife," said Mr. "Wainwright, and Eliz 
 abeth held out her hand stiffly to the stranger, who 
 took it, while he continued to look wonderingly from 
 from one member of the group to another. He had 
 never been apprised of Mr. Wainwright's marriage, 
 and was so much surprised that he forgot to say any 
 thing before Elizabeth turned from him and cast upon 
 her husband a look so fraught with righteous scorn 
 that the frail man seemed to quiver under it as though 
 it were a north wind. Then he stepped forward and 
 took Elizabeth's daughter by the hand and said falter- 
 ingly, " This is my wife, too." 
 
 If a thunderbolt had resounded from the little white 
 patch of plaster over his head it could not have more 
 completely stunned the mind of this young man who 
 was unaccustomed to out-of-the-beaten-way occur 
 rences, and whose mind was naturally slow to grasp 
 new situations. He raised his eyes for an instant to 
 see that the woman before him was young, a girl like 
 Esther in years, but unlike her in every other respect. 
 He dared not look at Esther, but he caught sight of 
 her flaming cheeks and he knew without seeing them 
 that her eyes were dry now, and hot and hard looking. 
 If he could have known the tears that had rained 
 from them since that fatal day when her father and 
 Elizabeth and her daughter went from the little home 
 and left her almost wild with fear and grief, he would 
 have wondered that they did not burn out and leave 
 her sightless. She had borne it as best she could,
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 65 
 
 though sometimes she wondered how she did endure 
 to see it all and feel herself powerless. Elizabeth 
 was still sternly just to her, but the girl-wife taunted 
 and upbraided her with living a useless and sinful 
 life. At times she felt too much crushed to retaliate, 
 and at others she would send the girl from her with 
 a torrent of indignation inspired by her innocence 
 and the knowledge of her right to her place at her 
 father's side. It was a terrible life for a girl, and 
 Esther could feel herself growing unforgiving. She 
 realized that a change was taking place in herself, 
 and that from a thoughtless girl she was being trans 
 formed into a care-burdened, sometimes she thought 
 a hard, woman like Elizabeth, she would say to 
 herself; and then she would resolve anew to bear her 
 lot patiently, and to be ever ready to give a word of 
 love and comfort to her father when opportunity of 
 fered, and never at any time to add to his sorrow by 
 even a reproachful look. 
 
 During all these months Esther had a secret 
 trouble of her own, which she could explain to n 
 one. She had neither seen nor heard from the young 
 surveyor since the night he had been at their house. 
 The last limit of the time he thought to be gone was 
 long past, and yet no tidings, and he came not. 
 While the long, beautiful summer lingered, Esther 
 was accustomed to sit in the low door in the evening, 
 and watch, thinking because he once came at that 
 hour he might again. But now the wind was atorm- 
 laden, and the nights were dark and cold. Esther's 
 life was confined mainly to the little house whose
 
 66 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 only semblance of a home was that it provided shel 
 ter for its inmates. Their little sitting room was 
 often cheered now by the presence of young Bar- 
 bold, and although Mr. Wainwright never again for 
 got himself in the presence of the young man, he 
 was always glad to see him, and soon showed an in 
 terest in his connection with the Church. Esther 
 herself could not be indifferent to his coming, it re 
 lieved the tedium and the embarrassment of an 
 evening alone with the family. For a time she was 
 wholly unsuspicious of the object of his frequent 
 visits. The license that is permitted old acquaint 
 ances in a new country, the real pleasure she felt in 
 seeing an old friend, and the remembrance she had 
 
 O 7 
 
 of his manner when a boy at school, were all reasons 
 for this. He had the habit of assuming privileges 
 that other boys would hesitate to take. No doubt 
 his father's position as the largest land owner and 
 the richest man in the neighborhood gave a lordli 
 ness to his youthful bearing that he would not have 
 taken on under other circumstances, but "it was in 
 the blood," the old farmers said, and it "would crop 
 out." All these considerations combined to make 
 Esther look upon Tom merely as an old schoolmate 
 and friend. His conversion to the Church had sur 
 prised and pained her, but it was of so little conse 
 quence to her compared with her father's conversion 
 that she did not dwell upon it. 
 
 After awhile it came about naturally enough that 
 the two young people were left often alone. Eliza 
 beth went away on a visit, a kind of missionary tour,
 
 ESTHER THE Q EN TILE. 67 
 
 to some of the outlying towns in the Territory, and 
 while she was gone Mr. Wainwright invariably went 
 to church in the evening, with a determination, 
 Esther thought, not to give himself an opportunity 
 to reflect upon his own harassed life, for it was evi 
 dent now that between the close scrutiny Elizabeth 
 gave his every action, and his uncertainty as to how 
 he was expected to deport himself towards his young 
 wife, the poor man was at his wits' end. Still he 
 never murmured. Elizabeth had left the command 
 she seldom uttered anything but commands that 
 her daughter should go to church daily with Mr. 
 Wainwright, and for a week this instruction was 
 carried out, apparently without a thought of waver 
 ing from it. But about this time, Drusilla, for some 
 unaccountable reason, seemed to develop a mind of 
 her own, the whole force of which new sense was ex 
 pressed in a desire to stay at home, and indoors, at 
 all hours of day and night. Bitter and hard to con 
 trol as Esther's feelings toward this girl often were, 
 she also sometimes pitied her, her life seemed such a 
 hopeless blank of submission to a hard, unnatural 
 mother, but when she took upon herself the part of 
 a spy upon Esther's deportment, then open war was 
 declared. Esther felt that she could endure no more, 
 and after Drusilla one morning came into the room, 
 while young Barbold was there, and took her seat 
 with an air that said plainly enough, " This couple 
 need watching, and I feel it to be my duty, as well 
 as my privilege, to attend to it," Esther no longer
 
 68 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 felt any doubt that it was to scrutinize her actions 
 that her father's young wife remained at home. 
 
 It was during a ride they took together that same 
 afternoon that Tom Barhold told Esther he had 
 come to Utah with the hope of winning her love and 
 making her his wife. It would be but a dull woman 
 who could be wooed by a man and not know that he 
 was trying to gain her love, and it cannot be said of 
 Esther that she remained insensible to the meaning 
 of young Barbold's attentions to her as their ac 
 quaintance progressed and he became a more and 
 more frequent visitor, but when the declaration 
 came she was surprised at its earnestness, and the 
 young man was vastly more surprised at the unquali 
 fied refusal of his suit. He had never attributed 
 Esther's avoidance of him at times to a sincere wish 
 to be less in his company, or to a desire to discour 
 age his intimacy. It was only girlish diffidence and 
 coquetry in his eyes, and added to his admiration of 
 her. He was not blessed with the quick discern 
 ment of some lovers, nor the sensitive nature that 
 troubled itself with doubts about how he was held in 
 other people's estimation. His self-appreciation was 
 enough to blind him to the opinions of others, and 
 the natural effect of the refusal of his hand by a 
 pretty girl, was anger. It seemed unwarrantable to 
 him from every point of view, and he was foolish 
 enough to advance the arguments of policy and self- 
 protection to Esther on the impulse of his wounded 
 pride. This proceeding made Esther's part compar 
 atively easy, and she told him with scorn that she
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 69 
 
 was sorry he had not learned to know her better 
 than to think she could be won by threats of what 
 would befall her if she did not consent. Resentful 
 as were the feelings which this ungallant treatment 
 caused in Esther's mind, she could not forget that 
 she had lost a friend. Her friends were so few that 
 she had looked forward with dread to the result of 
 the avowal she had heard, and which she had known 
 must come, but which she had been powerless to 
 avoid. Now that it was made, however, she discov 
 ered that through it she not only lost a friend, but 
 gained an enemy, if young Barbold gave up the 
 hope of winning her. To hold out that false hope 
 to him and thus save herself from his open enmity 
 was an idea that had no place in her thoughts, and 
 aside from its baseness, the continuance of his atten 
 tions after what had occurred between them would 
 have been more disagreeable than anything she 
 feared, and she unhesitatingly chose the result of ex 
 pressing her true feelings without reserve. 
 
 But of all kinds of lovers, the egotist who thinks 
 nothing but a passing whim could cause a woman to 
 refuse him is the last to give up, and to her dismay 
 Esther saw that when Tom Barbold discovered the 
 effect of his threats he merely laughed and said he 
 could "wait, he guessed, until she changed her mind; 
 it would not be long, perhaps. 
 
 That night Esther longed, oh, how sorrowfully, 
 none but a deserted heart knows, to go to her father 
 and tell him her troubles, but his own sad face and 
 hie strange, preoccupied manner forbade it. She
 
 70 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 went to him once with an almost bursting heart, but 
 when he had taken her mechanically in his arms she 
 only asked if she could do anything for him, and he 
 answered "Nothing, nothing," and hurried off to 
 church. A great gulf had formed between them, 
 and each carried a heart as utterly alone as if the 
 other had been numbered with the dead.
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 SALT LAKE CITY is the great head-center of 
 Mormondom and Mormonism, but there are 
 scores of towns and villages in Utah and the adja 
 cent Territories that were established by Mormon 
 elders under the direction of Brigham Young, and 
 later by President Taylor, where the Mormon law 
 is as strictly and promptly enforced as it is in Salt 
 Lake City. These outlying communities are called, 
 in Mormon parlance, " Stakes of Zion." 
 
 It was to visit some of these that Elizabeth had 
 been sent with Elder Bean, a man high in church au 
 thority, possessed of great wealth and the implicit 
 confidence of the head of the Church, but lacking, 
 somewhat, in executive power. A better combina 
 tion from which to form a good overseer could not 
 well have been made than this impulsive elder, who 
 had the legal authority and the advancement of the 
 Church interests at heart at all hazards, and Eliza 
 beth, who had the iron will and the ability to carry 
 out the decrees. They made many visits to the villa 
 ges that were unquestionably loyal, as well as to some 
 that were said to be more or less disaffected. They 
 met with no trouble in ascertaining who were the 
 contumacious parties in any of these places. Every 
 man was a spy upon his fellow men, and the least 
 sign of wavering from faith in the "New Light," or 
 
 (71)
 
 72 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 of inclination to retrograde toward the faith of their 
 fathers, was marked against both men and women, 
 and reported through the proper channels to their 
 ruler, the man of almost unlimited capabilities and 
 resources, the man almost untaught of books and un 
 learned in the history of the world and the methods 
 of other great rulers, but of more than Napoleonic 
 strategy and shrewdness, a man with an absolutely 
 pitiless heart Brigham Young. 
 
 This holy pair always managed to leave with the 
 backsliders in any village the impression that they 
 could go on in the way they had begun with impu 
 nity. Elder Bean and Sister Elizabeth did not consti 
 tute themselves a committee to visit and remonstrate 
 with the recalcitrant members of their flock on the 
 error of their ways, nor did they appoint any others 
 to perform what is considered a duty of love in other 
 churches. 
 
 They merely came, and saw, and went. 
 
 Rewarding the most faithful with promises of in 
 creased leniency and honor after they should have 
 passed from this earthly, working vineyard, but leav 
 ing the sinners who dared to doubt, indulging in the 
 renewed hope that the day had gone by when the doc 
 trine of the Latter Day Saints was all-powerful among 
 them. 
 
 The day has indeed gone by when the awful doc 
 trine of Blood Atonement can be openly and defiantly 
 carried out by the Mormon priests. But if the true 
 history of the tour of Elder Bean and Sister Eliza 
 beth were written, it would show in every hamlet
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 73 
 
 through which they passed, in every household in 
 which they tarried, an increased vigilance on the 
 part of each faithful individual to comply with all 
 the requirements of his superiors, and to spy out 
 every shortcoming of his brethren and sisters in the 
 church. More than this, it would bring to light 
 a bloody vengeance upon every suspected man or 
 woman, for Blood Atonement for the breaking of 
 endowment vows was binding in Utah in the days 
 when Brigham Young was absolute. It is not so 
 now, because the encroachment of civilization upon 
 the domain of Mormonism has made communication 
 with United States authorities so much more swift 
 and sure. If the awful decree is carried out now, 
 instead of striking a man down, and burying him 
 with a parade as a public threat to others, he must 
 be laid in wait for and assassinated in dark and secret 
 places, and his remains disposed of in the dead of 
 night, or he must be decoyed away upon a long jour 
 ney that promises him freedom, but which ends only 
 in the freedom of his soul from the body. For 
 although the criminal conviction of Mormons has 
 been rare in the United States courts, the Mormon 
 leaders are sagacious enough to know that if crimes 
 against national statutes were committed in too 
 glaring a manner, somebody would be forced to 
 testify against them. Mormons never testify against 
 each other in the Territorial courts, and in the over 
 whelmingly Mormon districts Gentile citizens would 
 not dare if they were allowed the opportunity, which 
 they never are. But the most terrible phase of the
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 doctrine of Blood Atonement is, that if the crime of 
 breaking one of the vows which endows a man with 
 a saintship in the Mormon church is not atoned for 
 by one generation, it must be by the next, even unto 
 the fifth or sixth. If it is not deemed judicious, then, 
 that the blood of a man or a woman shall be spilled 
 to wash away his or her sins against the Church, the 
 blood of their children, or their children's children 
 must atone for them. By no other means of grace 
 can the spirits of such often ders ever reach Paradise. 
 Human sacrifice alone can save them from eternal 
 damnation. 
 
 Such is one of the strongest tenets of the Church 
 of the Latter Day Saints. If Brigham Young did 
 not complete his vengeance upon any disobedient 
 family, it was simply because he did not live long 
 enough. He was an old man when he died. He 
 had taken scores of bright boys under his espionage 
 and raised them to do his bidding. Many of them, 
 when young men, worshipped him almost as a god, 
 but he goaded them on to the commission of crimes 
 so terrible, and practices so revolting to any but a 
 nature like his own, that even a life-long faith at last 
 gave way to conscience and reason, and many of 
 them openly rebelled. 
 
 As a punishment, their families suffered every in 
 dignity and every torture his fiendish revenge could 
 invent. Daughters were given in marriage to high 
 priests and elders because they had greater license to 
 treat their wives as slaves, under cover of the doc 
 trine that to be the wife of an elder on earth exalts
 
 ESTHER THE Q EN TILE. 75 
 
 a woman to places in heaven which she could never 
 otherwise reach. Sons of the hated father or mother 
 were detailed to perform acts of cruelty upon other 
 condemned families, and forced into polygamy at the 
 risk of their own lives. When it was evident the de 
 sired end could not be reached by threats and intimi 
 dation, Brigham Young could flatter and fawn, and 
 even simulate love, equal to Kichard the Lion-hearted, 
 and while waiting to scourge his victim he could lure 
 him on with smiles, and the expression of fatherly 
 advice and sympathy, and bright promises of tem 
 poral power and spiritual reward, never betraying by 
 a look nor a hasty word his real purpose. His most 
 intimate acquaintances testify that Brigham Young 
 was a marked example of the almost invariable rule, 
 that to govern others successfully, a man must be 
 able to govern himself. He was not given to great 
 bursts of passion at any time, but when he knew his 
 power, and felt it to be safe, his vindictiveness could 
 express itself in masterly and crushing scorn. On 
 the other hand, perhaps the most anomolous charac 
 teristic of this man, who held a kingdom in the 
 midst of a republic, was his innate cowardice in the 
 face of physical danger. This trait was notorious 
 among his followers, as well as among the officers 
 and soldiers of Fort Douglas, so long the only avenue 
 of escape for outlawed Mormons. 
 
 It was not long before the death of the Prophet 
 that these emissaries of the Church, Elder Bean and 
 Sister Elizabeth, were sent out, and, as if he had a 
 forewarning of his fast approaching end, and wished
 
 76 ESTHER THE Q EN TILE. 
 
 to reinforce his army for longer survival after him, 
 he had given orders that the inspection should be 
 unusually thorough. Discipline was to be enforced 
 in every instance that was the rule always; but 
 upon this occasion Elder Bean and Sister Elizabeth 
 were empowered to give " counsel " in doubtful cases, 
 without waiting to refer the facts to the Prophet. 
 That meant a great deal. Everything was done ac 
 cording to "counsel," which was in fact Brigham 
 Young's personal and irrevocable decree. The 
 power of his generalship lay largely in his personal 
 attention to details, and a case of importance was 
 rarely decided without his intimate knowledge and 
 his individual judgment. To empower others with 
 the right to give "counsel" meant to constitute them 
 witness, lawyer, jury, judge and high priest, for the 
 time being, in both temporal and spiritual affairs, for 
 church and state are inseparable in Utah. 
 
 After the pair had journeyed many days on their 
 blood-righteous errand, they stopped at a little ob 
 scure "Stake of Zion," away out in the western por 
 tion of the Prophet's domain, and were entertained 
 in the only "plank house" belonging to the village. 
 The habitations were mostly "dugouts," though 
 there were a few sod houses and one or two adobes. 
 It was time for the mid-day meal when they arrived, 
 and after they were seated around the table, the " Sis 
 ter" of the house served a plate and asked to be ex 
 cused, while she carried it into an adjoining room. 
 
 "Is some member of the household sick?" asked 
 Elizabeth of the woman's husband, as she passed out.
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 77 
 
 "Yes; a young man who escaped from the Indians 
 took refuge with us ; he was hungry and we fed him ; 
 but whether my good wife will succeed in nursing 
 him back to health, is extremely doubtful, I think; 
 he was badly cut up, and does not seem to gain 
 much." 
 
 "Is he one of the Lord's people?" asked Elder 
 Bean in his piping voice, and Elizabeth put down 
 her knife and fork while they waited a reply, as if to 
 express her conviction that it was much more im 
 portant than the gratification of her appetite. 
 
 "Well, no, he is not; but he is a poor, suffering 
 creature, unable to travel any further. In fact, it was 
 by the greatest exertion he came this far; he was al 
 most ready to faint from loss of blood when he 
 reached our door, and " 
 
 The man would have said more in extenuation of 
 an act which the scriptural injunctions he had re 
 ferred to evidently did not wholly justify in the 
 minds of his guests, but Elizabeth interrupted him 
 with : " It was well enough to give him shelter, but 
 if he cannot be brought to see and acknowledge that 
 he was saved by the interposition of Providence 
 through the Church of the Saints, he should not be 
 pampered. Elder Bean will see this person after 
 dinner, and advise you and our Sister-in-the-Lord in 
 regard to him." 
 
 The man looked in astonishment. Could it be 
 
 that he was in his own house and heard such things? 
 
 He would have replied with hot and resentful words, 
 
 but that he was so dazed he could say nothing for a 
 
 6
 
 78 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 moment, and when he remembered who these people 
 were, and that he was in their power, he swallowed 
 his wrath and said nothing; but when his wife re 
 turned to her place she quickly discovered the em 
 barrassment that had fallen upon the company 
 during her absence, and knew by her husband's face 
 that he was angry. She dared ask no questions, 
 however, and the meal was eaten almost in silence. 
 When it was finished, though the husband and wife 
 were wishing to be alone, they knew it would not be 
 wise to show any anxiety. It was late in the after 
 noon before Elizabeth went out, and Elder Bean 
 went into the sick man's room and closed the door 
 after him that he might talk with him uninterrupt 
 edly, he said significantly, concerning the salvation of 
 his soul. Then the frightened wife was clasped in 
 her husband's arms, while they talked hurriedly in 
 whispers, hardly daring to breathe for fear they 
 should be overheard and their treason suspected, for 
 in the short time since the arrival of the function 
 aries of the Church, the " Brother " with whom they 
 sojourned had decided to escape from the kingdom 
 of the Latter Day Saints at the first opportunity. It 
 was not alone the indignity that had been extended 
 to him and his household by Elder Bean and Eliza 
 beth that caused him to reach this decision ; that was 
 only one of the numerous and multiform insults he 
 had had to bear, and while it was not nearly so great 
 as some others, it was the last straw, and, he said to 
 himself, he would submit to no more. 
 
 One of the cruelest things he had been called upon
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 79 
 
 to do was to collect taxes from the poor people of 
 his neighborhood. Nearly all the families for miles 
 around about had traveled long, wearisome journeys 
 to reach the New Zion, and many of them had spent 
 their last cent long before they reached the end, but 
 a productive year and hard labor brought something, 
 and a share of whatever it was, much or little, must 
 go to the church. A tenth of a man's income was in 
 variably collected by law, but the exaction seldom 
 ended there. Special taxes were levied upon all 
 kinds of property and with all kinds of pretexts, 
 and no man dared disobey. If the tithe collector 
 chanced to be a man with a heart less hard than iron, 
 he must necessarily suffer in carrying out his mas 
 ter's will, for children must cry for bread and go 
 hungry to a cold bed rather than that the Church 
 should call for money and the call go unheeded. At 
 the same time the material interests were so wisely 
 fostered by Brigham Young that if any of his people 
 suffered for physical comforts it was for special rea 
 son, but these special reasons were not few. Heavy 
 taxes were imposed for purposes of intimidation, for 
 the punishment of various offenses against the 
 Church hierarchy, and in many instances because it 
 was believed by the egotist who ruled that it could 
 be done with impunity; that the blind faith of his 
 subjects was unalterable. 
 
 The man who now talked with bated breath be 
 hind barred doors, to his own wife in his own house, 
 had taken money from poor farmers and mechanics 
 when he knew they would rather die than go home
 
 80 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 and tell their families that their hard-earned savings 
 had all gone to the Church. But that was all over 
 now ; he was yet bodily in the toils, but his mind was 
 free, and his first words to his wife were to tell her 
 that her prayer had been answered : that he was no 
 longer a Mormon at heart. To the woman who has 
 suffered the martyrdom of apprehension that is in 
 separable from the lot of Mormon wifehood, whether 
 her husband is a polygamist or not, no words could 
 be sweeter than these, and his wife wept upon his 
 breast until he had to caution her that she would not 
 be able to meet their guests. Her tears were not of 
 grief, but of joy; the fountain of thankfulness had 
 broken in her heart and was washing away her long- 
 pent agony. She felt as though she could not meet 
 Sister Elizabeth and Elder Bean again. Their very 
 presence was hateful to her, the air seemed poisoned 
 by them ; but her husband told her that their only 
 hope lay in entire self-possession and apparent acqui 
 escence in every command. 
 
 " Walls sometimes have ears," said Elder Bean to 
 Sister Elizabeth, late in the evening, after he had 
 prayed that the family with which they sojourned 
 might long be preserved to labor in the vineyard of 
 the Lord according to the counsel of the Prophet. 
 "We will sit in the open air for a time, Elizabeth, 
 and advise with each other. I have some things to 
 say, and some news that concerns you." 
 
 "News that concerns me?" queried Elizabeth, 
 when they had carried their chairs to an open space 
 in the yard. "Everything connected with the ad-
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. gl 
 
 vancement of the revealed religion concerns me, 
 Brother Bean, but I have no friends here except 
 friends in the Lord, and news of anything outside 
 the work we have been sent to do can have little in 
 terest for me." 
 
 " Oh, we'll see. This young man, this sick per 
 son" 
 
 "I supposed it had to do with him." 
 
 " He is delirious," continued the Elder, paying no 
 heed to her interruption, "and he talks in his de 
 lirium of one Esther. Could it be Esther Wain- 
 wright, do you think?" 
 
 " Certainly not. Esther has no acquaintances, she 
 was a child when she left her old home. It is not 
 probable that such a girl would have more than one 
 youthful admirer who would care to follow her out 
 here. She has known young Brother Barbold from 
 her infancy, and she is flattered by his attentions, I 
 can see it constantly; she will marry him, of course." 
 
 As if that settled it, Elizabeth gave her head a 
 slight upward inclination, and turned toward the 
 elder as if she would have him proceed to more im 
 portant business. 
 
 "But he talks of Salt Lake City, and makes plans 
 for getting her away from her old father; he fears she 
 will not consent to leave him. He does not care for 
 the rest of the " crew," as he calls them, whoever 
 they may be. He is too sick and too crazy to put 
 things very straight, but I gather that he is on his 
 way to Salt Lake City now, or rather that he was
 
 82 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 when he was waylaid by the Indians. They came 
 near making a finish of him." 
 
 Elder Bean ceased speaking and looked thought 
 fully at the ground. But Elizabeth looked disturbed 
 and asked if that was all he knew. 
 
 " That is all I have learned from the young man 
 himself, but from this I have learned something 
 more." 
 
 And here the Elder produced from an inner pocket 
 a crumpled envelope which he handed to Elizabeth. 
 It bore this superscription : 
 
 EZEKIEL BLOUNCE, 
 
 FOR MISS ESTHER WAINWRIGHT, 
 
 SALT LAKE CITY, UTAH. 
 
 " Oh, it is empty," said he, significantly, as Eliza 
 beth scanned it and hurriedly looked inside, " but it 
 tells enough. This young man is a Gentile, a lover 
 of Esther "Wainwright's, and is going to Salt Lake 
 City for her, if he gets well enough. I think the 
 Lord has sent him to take her off your hands, Sister 
 Elizabeth; she will always be a troublesome minx in 
 the Church, make the best of her. If you are wise, 
 sister, I say you will let him go and lay no hindrances 
 in his way. Let him take her, and good riddance." 
 
 That Elder Bean had not felt quite sure of his log 
 ical footing, was evidenced by the fact that he did
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 83 
 
 not look Sister Elizabeth in the eye. He was trying 
 an experiment, and he feigned to be abstracted while 
 he gave her an opportunity to make up her mind as 
 to what course she would pursue. He knew better 
 than to argue a point of conscience-policy with her, 
 but he took care to advance what he considered would 
 be the strongest argument with her for permitting 
 Esther to go out of the way. 
 
 "It was foreordained that that young woman 
 should be brought into the fold. Elder Bean, I feel 
 this in my heart, and if I was not so unworthy to be 
 so singled out and blessed, I should believe it had 
 been revealed to me that I am to labor for her con 
 version until she is safe within the fold." 
 
 If it passed through the elder's mind that perhaps 
 Sister Elizabeth's desire to be revenged upon Esther 
 for her obstinacy, was greater than her desire to see 
 her converted, he gave no sign of it. They never 
 took off the mask of holiness before each other. 
 
 "No, Elder Bean, I cannot give up the girl; Provi 
 dence has put her in my care, and I feel it to be my 
 duty to save her. She will yet repent, you may 
 trust me for that. I will live to see her a dutiful 
 wife in a loyal household." 
 
 Elizabeth would have continued indefinitely, it 
 seemed, upon a theme which had evidently been 
 much in her thoughts, but the elder broke the cur 
 rent of her reflections by asking her what she would 
 do with the young man. 
 
 "He is very sick, you say," she answered; "per-
 
 84 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 haps it is the Lord's will that he may not recover; 
 we will wait and see." 
 
 "I must go to him; these good people are weary 
 watching him, and it is not becoming in us that a 
 stranger should suffer and receive no help from us. 
 You can retire early and rest from your journey, 
 Sister Elizabeth, and I will watch the stranger to 
 night," 
 
 "Could I not see him too? I might be able to 
 suggest something for his relief? Is there a phy 
 sician in the place ? " 
 
 " 0, yes, there is a doctor here, and you can see 
 him also. Between the two he is sure to be either 
 killed or cured," said the elder; but Elizabeth, who 
 so rarely smiled at anything, was in no mood for 
 poor jokes, and she went grimly behind the elder to 
 the door of the sick man's room. Within, they 
 found both their host and hostess, who stood watch 
 ing the sick man, bathing his burning head and lis 
 tening to his incoherent mutterings. When Elder 
 Bean announced that he would take care of their 
 patient during the night the woman protested vigor 
 ously that she was quite able to do it, and said she 
 could not think of having her guests deprived of their 
 rest. Her husband knew that after the excitement 
 of the day she needed sleep, and he knew, too, from 
 the elder's manner, that they had better comply with 
 his suggestion, but when he spoke of his wife's fa 
 tigue she looked up at him in surprise. Elder Bean 
 spoke up then and said that Sister Elizabeth would 
 retire immediately and that they should do likewise,
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILi:. 85 
 
 he would stay with the sick man. Elizabeth obeyed 
 dutifully, bidding them all a grave good night, and 
 after she was gone the wife arranged things for the 
 watcher's convenience and went too. 
 
 " I could not have left her there," she said to her 
 husband when they were alone, "she looks so cold 
 and cruel I believe she would kill him if he did not 
 say he would be a Mormon when he gets well." 
 
 "Hush! it is not safe even to whisper such thoughts; 
 you little know, dear wife, the dangerous ground we 
 are treading on. But while we are alone I must tell 
 you one thing which will help to put you on your 
 guard for to-morrow; Elder Bean and Sister Elizabeth 
 know something of this sick man. Whether they 
 learned some secret of him this afternoon, or whether 
 they have known him before, I cannot tell; but they 
 have some secret interest in him since the Elder saw 
 him, and they know something about him. Have 
 you heard him talk of anything mysterious?" 
 
 "Nothing at all, but I have not been thinking of 
 that, I knew the poor fellow was delirious and did 
 not think his ravings of any consequence. I remem 
 ber he called on some one to wait, and be patient, 
 that is all I remember that meant anything." 
 
 " Well, be careful; do not appear to watch them; 
 be as natural as possible, and, as we value our free 
 dom, let us see our guests off without arousing their 
 suspicion." 
 
 Whatever may have been Elder Bean's motive 
 and he may as well have the benefit of the supposi 
 tion that it was a good one, since we know of no
 
 86 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 other lie worked hard to save Mark Branch, the 
 young surveyor, for of course it was he whom the 
 missionaries had found, and before morning there 
 did come a little more restfulness, and a decrease of 
 the terrible fever. It was not until about the same 
 hour that Elizabeth's eyes closed in the fitful slumber 
 of an overwrought mind, and her compressed lips re 
 laxed like a weary laborer's who has laid down his 
 burden for a brief respite. But with the first sounds 
 of morning in the little village, she was awake and 
 eager for some plan of active operations. In her im 
 patience to know whether the young man was better, 
 and his recovery probable, or whether he was dan 
 gerously worse and still unconscious, her usual equa 
 nimity failed her; and she pushed her breakfast from 
 her, plainly unable to touch it, when Elder Bean said, 
 in answer to her questions, that it was impossible that 
 there should be much change in so sick a man in one 
 short night, but that what change there was, was gain. 
 
 "It may not be permanent," he said, when the brief 
 meal was ended and he and Elizabeth had gone out 
 for an interview, "but since we have checked the 
 fever, I should not be surprised if he'd out-last it and 
 live to make you a son-in-law yet. 
 
 The day passed in anxious watch of the Gentile, 
 and as hour after hour went by Elizabeth showed 
 more and more her unusual perturbation of spirit. 
 She would announce suddenly, with great earnest 
 ness, that she must go home immediately; she knew 
 she was needed there, and she felt it be her duty to 
 go. Elder Bean would advise her to start forthwith,
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 87 
 
 and leave him to finish the tour alone. Then she 
 would say that the Lord had appointed her to fulfill 
 this mission, and she would not abandon it. So long 
 as their patient was in such a precarious condition the 
 elder felt sure that Elizabeth would not desert him; 
 but the exhibition of such variable moods and such 
 sudden changes of the mind were so rare, indeed so 
 unheard of, in Elizabeth's history, that even Elder 
 Bean could not wholly comprehend them. It seemed 
 to excite her to uncontrollable nervousness to talk of 
 the young man, yet she was constantly inquiring as 
 to his condition, and insisted upon seeing him fre 
 quently. He gained steadily all day, and at night 
 fall sank into a deep, quiet sleep. Elder Bean sat a 
 long time by his side watching him patiently, and 
 was just about to lie down and take a little rest him 
 self, trusting that his charge would sleep on, when 
 the door opened and Elizabeth stepped noiselessly 
 into the room. She had evidently tried in vain to 
 sleep, and had sought the sick room because she 
 could not remain longer alone with her own thoughts. 
 She moved toward the bed, and the elder said to her 
 in a low tone, "You see he sleeps quite naturally; 
 he will soon be all right." Faint as the sound was 
 it reached the sleeper, and he slowly opened his eyes 
 on Elizabeth. They gazed at each other an instant 
 and then the sick man cast his eyes downward to 
 wards her feet as if taking in her whole personality. 
 He did not move or speak, but Elizabeth felt that 
 he had seen her with his true vision. He closed his 
 eyes again and made no further sign, and Elder Bean,
 
 88 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 who had chanced to turn away, did not see even this. 
 Elizabeth lingered but a moment and passed out as 
 noiselessly as she came. In the morning the patient 
 was pronounced much better by all the household 
 except Elizabeth; she did not seem anxious to see 
 him, but said with the others that she was glad he 
 was out of danger. 
 
 There are men, particularly young men, who have 
 lived an active out-door life, who have the power to 
 rally from an acute attack of sickness in an incredibly 
 short space of time, and toward the evening of the 
 next day, when Mark Branch insisted upon getting 
 up, everybody was amazed, but he said he had not 
 really been sick; he was merely exhausted by fatigue 
 and loss of blood, and now that he was rested and 
 refreshed by their care, he was all right again. See 
 ing his determination, his host and the elder shared 
 their not too plenteous wardrobes with him, and be 
 tween them made him presentable. Not to Elizabeth, 
 however ; she kept her room with a nervous headache, 
 and the little party took supper without ner. The con 
 gratulations that were extended to Mark so heartily by 
 all, made the event quite a pleasant one. The little 
 woman who had for the last two or three days trem 
 bled between hope and fear for her husband's safety, 
 almost forgot her anxiety, and even her suspicion of 
 Elder Bean, in her gratitude to him. 
 
 The stranger's thanks were as genuine as their 
 hospitality, and when they bade him good-night, the 
 entire household looked upon him as an old friend. 
 The elder even suggested that perhaps they might
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 89 
 
 make some arrangements for journeying together, if 
 he were going towards the States. 
 
 "Shouldn't wonder if we might," answered Mark 
 brightly, as if it were a happy thought. 
 
 In the morning, the host, who tapped early at his 
 door, received no answer. He hesitated a moment, 
 thinking the convalescent yet asleep, and was about 
 to turn away and leave him undisturbed, when Eliza 
 beth appeared. 
 
 " The fever ! it may have returned ! " she said ex 
 citedly ; and at this suggestion they hurriedly opened 
 the door. 
 
 The room was empty. The bed had not been oc 
 cupied. Their patient was gone.
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 MR. WAINWRIGHT failed in strength per 
 ceptibly as the autumn passed away. When 
 winter set in, the cold of even the mild climate of 
 Salt Lake seemed to chill him through. He lingered 
 long about the little fire at home, and went out into 
 the crisp frosty air as if it were a biting and bitter 
 wind. Esther often stood and looked after him, and 
 sometimes followed him, to assure herself that he 
 would reach the church safely; he seemed so frail 
 and feeble, she feared he might fall by the way. But 
 day after day he came and went, almost as if he 
 neither saw nor heard. It was a silent agony, that 
 reacted upon Esther's sensitive nature. cruelly; she 
 was wasting under it, too. And, besides this great 
 sorrow, she had to bear the annoyance of young Bar- 
 hold's attentions. His visits were quite as frequent, 
 and his manner quite as assured, as before her refusal 
 to marry him. There seemed to be no way by which 
 she could evade or repel him, and she could only 
 bear his presence and suffer in silence. She had no 
 protector, and no friend to advise her how to protect 
 herself, but her womanly instincts had been devel 
 oped so rapidly during her life among the Latter Day 
 Saints that she did not often feel afraid for herself. 
 She felt sure she had strength enough to resist any 
 power that would try to force her into a marriage 
 
 (90)
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 91 
 
 with Barbold, and she was happily ignorant of the 
 other methods of punishment for disobedient daugh 
 ters under the counsel of the Prophet; but she 
 dreaded constantly the conflict she knew must come 
 when Elizabeth returned. Young Barbold had as 
 much as told her that Elizabeth had not only ap 
 proved the marriage, but she had said it was greatly 
 to be desired, and must be consummated for Esther's 
 good. Many a time Esther planned her methods for 
 defense and resistance, but she always discovered a 
 weak point, and ended by trying to shut out of her 
 mind all that was before her. 
 
 One day when she was more than usually troubled 
 about her father's feebleness, Tom Barbold walked 
 in and seated himself familiarly by her side. Eliza 
 beth's daughter was with her, seated on the opposite 
 side of the room, and just as the young gentleman 
 sat down, Esther looked up at Drusilla. The con 
 stant watch she had recently exercised over these 
 young people had added another embarrassment to 
 Tom Barbold's visits, and Esther glanced at her in 
 voluntarily, as she had done many times before, while 
 her fair face flushed with shame; but she saw some 
 thing this time she had never seen before, or, having 
 seen, she had never understood. Drusilla's cheeks 
 were aflame, and the expression of her face as she 
 looked at Esther told as plainly as words could that 
 she was jealous. The revelation came to Esther in 
 stantly when she saw those flashing eyes. Her first' 
 impulse was to speak. Her father's wife jealous of 
 another man's attention to her, his daughter! It
 
 92 'ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 seemed monstrous ! But some better impulse checked 
 her, and instead of breaking out in a tirade of hot 
 words, as she was tempted to, she rushed from the 
 room and left Drusilla and Barbold alone. When 
 she reached her own room she could not be thankful 
 enough that she had held her peace. She had no 
 respect for the mock-marriage between her father 
 and Drusilla; why should she expect any one else to 
 have, she queried, even Drusilla, the plural wife; 
 she was as young and ignorant as herself, and had 
 always been under the complete control of Elizabeth. 
 
 When Esther was gone, Barbold looked after her 
 a moment in astonishment and then said: "Well, 
 what does the girl mean ? " 
 
 "0, she is so queer, you never know what she will 
 do next," said Drusilla, quickly. And then Barbold 
 looked at her, and, seeing her bright cheeks, was 
 tempted to ask a question that had been in his mind 
 many times, though he had never taken much notice 
 of Drusilla. " She belongs to the old man," he would 
 always think when he saw her, and then forget her 
 again. This time she looked unusually pretty, and 
 he would ask her while Esther was gone; he would 
 not have thought of doing it while in her presence. 
 
 "How did you happen to marry the old man, any 
 how?" he said then, looking at her admiringly to 
 palliate his offense. 
 
 The only sign she gave of having heard was to 
 'grow redder in the face, and seeing her hesitate, he 
 added: "Does the Church fix such affairs to suit it 
 self? it was not from choice wholly, I suppose?"
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 93 
 
 "I never thought anything about it," said the girl, 
 with her head still bowed down. 
 
 A confused sense of his new professions prevented 
 Barbold from continuing this conversation, but he 
 saw Drusilla as he had never seen her before, and 
 perhaps had a suspicion of the same thing that Esther 
 had discovered, for such a specimen of mankind is" 
 never slow to conclude that a woman loves him. He 
 watched Drusilla a moment longer, while a compla 
 cent smile spread over his face, and then he remem 
 bered Esther, and wished she were a little more like 
 this obedient daughter, and yet he coveted her the 
 more for her willfulness. He went away half vexed 
 and half troubled because she did not return after 
 her sudden departure from the room. 
 
 Esther was the first real obstacle to his plans he 
 had ever encountered, and even his dull vision was 
 beginning to see that to win her for his wife was not 
 merely a matter of words. Each day he became more 
 impatient for the return of his ally, Elizabeth, for he 
 could see that he was losing ground. And day by 
 day he found himself oftener with Drusilla. There 
 seemed to be no prearrangement to bring these meet 
 ings about, and yet he knew there must be. He never 
 accused Esther of it, however, and to the greatest 
 dullard her sweet tell-tale face showed the struggle be 
 tween respect to her father and the temptation to free 
 herself from Barbold's attentions by aiding another 
 woman to win what poor love he had to give. That 
 he was flattered by Drusilla's increasing admiration 
 no one could fail to see, and Esther realized it even 
 
 7
 
 94 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 more than he did himself. The subject was never 
 referred to between the two young women, but they 
 understood each other. 
 
 Every night Esther prayed again, " How long, 
 Lord, how long?" and every day Drusilla's cheeks 
 grew redder and her eyes brighter. She was drink 
 ing her first draught of nature. This young man 
 had crossed her barren pathway like a magnificent 
 vision; she looked, and was charmed. Mr. Wain- 
 wright was nothing to her, and had never been a fac 
 tor in her life; she had not only not been taught, but 
 she had never been permitted to cultivate an individ 
 ual conscience, and up to this time had merely been 
 a weak instrument. Now the conquering hero had 
 come, and the one pure fountain in a woman's heart 
 that ever gives her full strength had been touched, 
 and under its influence she would yet become either 
 angel or fiend.
 
 CHAPTER XL 
 
 LIZABETH reached home at the close of a 
 bleak winter day. Brasilia met her at the door, 
 but although she was the only member of the house 
 hold who was of her own flesh and blood, she was 
 not the member whom Elizabeth was most impatient 
 to see. She had made the long, tiresome, hurried 
 journey from the remote frontier Mormon settlements 
 back to Salt Lake City, with one burning desire in 
 her heart, to reach Esther before Mark did, and to 
 conquer her. She could but greet her daughter, how 
 ever, and having eyes, she could not fail to see that 
 Drusilla was changed. She had left her a plain, un- 
 noticeable girl, she found her almost a beautiful 
 young woman. Some throb of human feeling had 
 set a light in her face that Elizabeth had never seen 
 there before. She could not analyze it at the instant, 
 but she had seen a great many faces, it had been a 
 part of her business to learn to take them at the su 
 preme moment of triumph or weakness, as best 
 suited her purpose. So she knew it was not the de 
 velopment of mere physical beauty she saw, and she 
 realized that before her, in her own child, stood a 
 new force, either with her or against her. Elizabeth's 
 own thin face was blue with cold, and she shivered 
 her way into the little sitting room, a painful contrast 
 to the rosy and healthful creature at her side. Some- 
 OS)
 
 96 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 thing of her old fire and energy were gone, but she 
 took her place at the head of affairs and people, and 
 struggled bravely not to let it be known that she had 
 any new care. The especially hard thing she had to 
 do was not to let it be known that she was looking 
 for any one. Every day she expected Mark to ap 
 pear, and her mind was so fastened upon consummat 
 ing the marriage of Esther to young Barbold before 
 he came, that she was slow to perceive the situation 
 she had to deal with. She held a consultation with 
 Barbold, and promised to assist him in his suit; the 
 girl's real wishes troubled neither of them ; to win 
 her was the object they plotted for, not to woo her. 
 The subject could not be hinted at and gain any head 
 way with Esther; it was so hateful to her, and she 
 held herself so much aloof from all the family, that 
 it was only by a bold statement of exactly what she 
 meant that Elizabeth was able to approach her. 
 
 "And you expect me to do your bidding!" Esther 
 had risen and said. "Me, whose father's life you 
 ha.'e blighted, almost destroyed! You expect me to 
 marry as your daughter has done, because you say I 
 must, and repent as she has done, when it is too late ! 
 I have borne almost all I can, but your cruelest 
 threats cannot drive me to this. Even to marry a 
 man I could love would not tempt me from my 
 father; where he stays, I will stay; he has no one 
 left but me, and I have none but him ; nothing shall 
 part us." 
 
 Esther spoke with a vehemence which showed that 
 she believed she had divined the reason why Eliza-
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 97 
 
 beth wished to see her married to Barbold; she did not 
 suspect the woman of a thirst to be revenged for the 
 sake of the Church. When she had dropped into a 
 chair, white and trembling, Elizabeth turned upon 
 her with the announcement that the duty of the 
 Church toward the children of its members must be 
 done, and that as Esther knew little of its laws, it 
 would be wise for her to beware what statements she 
 made, and to listen to her proper advisers. 
 
 " The only proper adviser I have has been turned 
 against me by you, and now, though I am alone and 
 helpless, I will not be driven into the toils of the 
 Mormon church; I can die of grief and fright, but 
 I will not give myself to that man, nor to a Mormon 
 elder. I am not the child I was when my father 
 brought me here ; I have been forced to see and to 
 understand that there is nothing sacred where the 
 Mormon religion reigns. From this time on the 
 proposition of my marriage to a Mormon, whoever 
 he may be, need not be repeated, I will not listen to 
 it." And then in her excitement she hurried from 
 the room. As soon as she was alone she found she 
 was shaking with excitement, and could not quiet 
 herself. Tears rained from her eyes one minute, and 
 the next the necessity for some plan of action would 
 force them back, and she would stare into vacancy 
 with a wild determination to discover some way of 
 escape, but in every direction only an impregnable 
 wall surrounded her. She could refuse to be " sealed " 
 to a Mormon, but that was all she could do. Even 
 if she would consent to leave her father, there was
 
 98 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 no place she could go. Fort Douglas was difficult to 
 reach, even by fugitives who had strong, determined 
 men to guide them. What could one frightened girl 
 do, alone among enemies ? 
 
 The afternoon wore away, the hour for their frugal 
 supper passed, and still Esther struggled alone. She 
 could hear Elizabeth and Drusilla moving quietly 
 about the house at times, but she did not hear her fa 
 ther come home as usual, and Tom Barbold did not 
 come as he was accustomed to. She heard no conver 
 sation between the women, and at last all was perfectly 
 quiet in the little house, not a sound but her own spas 
 modic sobs could be heard, until at bed time Mr. 
 Wainwright came softly through the front door. 
 Esther had begun to fear that he would not come at 
 all, and horrible imaginings made her tremble with 
 a fear greater than had ever possessed her. She 
 knew that her father was as powerless as herself, and 
 failing to drive her from him, she suspected they 
 might take him from her. In her joy at hearing his 
 footstep, she opened her door to run to him, when 
 his hoarse voice startled her, saying, "Is it over? 
 Has she gone?" in a half whisper. 
 
 " No," said Elizabeth. 
 
 "Is she here?" eagerly, under his breath. 
 
 "Yes, and it is time we were all abed," added his 
 wife in a louder tone. Esther's hurried step was 
 stayed, she waited, breathless, with her hand on the 
 door, afraid to go on. She could not trust herself 
 even to stand, and carefully letting go her hold, she 
 crouched down on the floor and waited. An awful
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 99 
 
 fear that Elizabeth would appear noiselessly in the 
 doorway, like an apparition, and accuse her of listen 
 ing, made her cold, but still she dared not stir to 
 creep back to bed. After a long time, it seemed to 
 her, the sound of the quick breath of two uneasy 
 sleepers reached her, and then she said to herself she 
 must think, and think fast. The summer night was 
 short, but it was the only time left her in which to 
 try and save herself. All the horrible stories of kid 
 napping, imprisonment, and punishment, that Dru- 
 silla had told her, came swarming into her hot brain, 
 and she knew that she must fly. Only a few hours 
 since, she had said defiantly that nothing could drive 
 her from her father; now, she knew that she must 
 go, alone, in the night, a fugitive, even from him. 
 She knew that her father's questions meant that be 
 fore another night she would be taken out of his 
 reach, and that immediate flight was her only hope 
 of freedom from Elizabeth and the Mormons. To 
 fly from that treacherous refuge into the dark 
 streets of the enemy, was a hazardous venture, but 
 it must be made, and with a prayer for the dear old 
 father she left behind, Esther slipped from the little 
 low window of her room and ran across the small 
 door yard into the street. 
 
 If it had been into the mountain fastnesses where 
 wild beasts hid, or out on the desert plains, where 
 immigrant Mormons starved and died, she could 
 have been brave, but here, where every shadow seemed 
 a lurking human fiend for her destruction, she could 
 not decide which way to go. For a block she ran
 
 100 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 along under the trees where she could not be seen, 
 nor her foot-falls be heard, but when she came to the 
 open street she could not summon courage to cross 
 it, and was just sinking to the ground with the in 
 stinctive feeling that she was less liable to be seen, 
 while she looked about her, when a night patrol of 
 half a dozen men appeared in the moonlight a little 
 distance down the street to her left. Tramp, tramp, 
 they came up the deserted street directly towards her; 
 if they came straight on they must pass almost over 
 her, for she was crouched at the very edge of the 
 footpath. Her heart beat louder than the approaching 
 steps. It drowned them completely, her brain whirled 
 round and round, and her head sank to the ground. 
 The face that turned its sightless eyes toward 
 heaven might have been dead, for aught of sound or 
 motion that betrayed its life.
 
 CHAPTER XH. 
 
 IT suited Elizabeth's purpose to permit her husband 
 to think that she had been instrumental in Es 
 ther's disappearance, and although she had secret 
 agents out searching in every quarter of the city, she 
 preserved a calm demeanor in the presence of her 
 family, and even talked about the necessity of disci 
 pline for youthful and rebellious minds. 
 
 It required but a short time for Elizabeth to assure 
 herself with comparative certainty that her lost charge 
 was not at the Fort. The emissaries of the Church 
 watched all the avenues of approach to that refuge 
 so closely that it was almost impossible for a fugitive 
 to reach it undiscovered, and if one did, there was 
 always some one there who would, for a considera 
 tion, betray the presence of a renegade Mormon. 
 Not finding Esther there, the search was confined to 
 the city. She knew no one could leave its limits and 
 go long undetected. A young, unprotected girl 
 would be arrested by the first farmer of whom she 
 asked food or shelter, and sent back for the Proph 
 et's counsel concerning what should be done with 
 her. Elizabeth knew this and waited through the 
 first day, secure in her belief that Esther had fled to 
 the open country, and that she would soon be brought 
 back to her lawful protectors. 
 
 Every Mormon is two things, whatever else he may, 
 (101)
 
 102 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 or may not, be; he is a private detective for the head 
 of the Church, and a public immigration agent for 
 the Territory. By some of the many eyes always on 
 the alert to do Brigham Young's bidding, Esther 
 would be seen and brought back to him, and thence 
 to Elizabeth. She did not doubt. It did not depend 
 upon the feelings, or the pleasure, of any one Esther 
 might appeal to; no one would dare to aid her. But 
 the second day dawned and passed, slowly, for no 
 tidings came. Towards night Elizabeth became ner 
 vous and watchful, and her daughter asked her, 
 abruptly, if she was sorry for the girl. The ques 
 tion caused such a look of surprise that it brought a 
 revelation to Drusilla, and she exclaimed, "Oh! she 
 has run away, has she ! " 
 
 "Hush, don't speak of it; she will be back during 
 the day," said Elizabeth. 
 
 "The day is almost gone now," rejoined the young 
 woman, " and if Esther has gone to the Fort she'll 
 not be back at all, you may depend upon that. Let 
 her go, I say, she is a good riddance." 
 
 " She is not at the Fort, and wherever she is she 
 will be found. It is my duty to take care of her, and 
 I intend to do it." 
 
 "But, mother! mother! if you do find her, you 
 will not insist upon having her married to Mr. Bar- 
 bold, will you? Because because " 
 
 " Because what, my child ? " said Elizabeth in sur 
 prise at this abrupt speech. 
 
 "Because, sometime, may be " 
 
 But Brasilia's stammering tongue could not frame
 
 ESTHER THE O ENTILE. 1Q3 
 
 for her mother the thought that had so long been in 
 her own mind. Perhaps 'her burning face revealed 
 enough, for an angry cloud overspread Elizabeth's 
 gray face, and turned it black. Then Drusilla buried 
 her face in her hands and a silence fell between 
 the mother and daughter. It seemed a long time to 
 the daughter, during which she was sinking lower 
 and lower in despair, until the mother broke the 
 hardening air with, "What is the meaning of this, 
 Drusilla?" 
 
 Even the sound of her harsh voice, despite the 
 portentous words, gave the girl courage and she 
 looked up quickly. 
 
 "I don't know, mother; I didn't mean anything; 
 I don't know when it happened, but Mr. Barbold 
 thinks more of me than he does of Esther; he is 
 glad she is gone. Oh! let her go, mother; don't try 
 to find her, Mr. Barbold will not care," and an ap 
 pealing voice came with Drusilla's words that Eliza 
 beth had never heard before. 
 
 A practiced and un-anxious eye might have seen 
 the signs of relenting even under Elizabeth's hard 
 mask. If she could forgive her daughter for having 
 conceived an idea, she could doubtless forgive the 
 substance of that idea. Perhaps it impressed her as 
 good, and she fell to wondering why it had not been 
 born in her own fertile brain. "Whatever she thought, 
 she kept her thoughts to herself for a long time, and 
 then said with a manner of forced calmness and de- 
 liberateness, "And you, Drusilla, have you commit 
 ted the indiscretion of being drawn towards Brother
 
 104 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 Barbold? You who are already sealed to another 
 man? To be sure you were not married to Mr. 
 Wainwright for eternity you were so young. But 
 this is all unexpected to me, and so sudden." The 
 gray woman again ceased to speak, and turned her 
 eyes away from her daughter. That she was revolv 
 ing the new idea in her rnind was now plain to Dru- 
 silla, and her heart hounded with hope because her 
 mother expressed no decided opposition. For sev 
 eral minutes they sat silent, the eager eyes of the 
 daughter watching Elizabeth's hard face for the first 
 time in her life to see some sign of softening. Pres 
 ently Elizabeth began to speak, more as if she were 
 thinking aloud, than addressing Brasilia: 
 
 "If he fails to rise in the Church according to his 
 opportunities, it may be better, sometime, to select a 
 worthier member to share your future. I will con 
 sider it, but for the present you know your duty, and 
 I am the best judge of your welfare." 
 
 "Yes, yes, mother, I know, but is there no help 
 for it now ? " 
 
 "No help for what, child?" 
 
 "I don't love Mr. Wainwright, and he doesn't care 
 anything for me, and I don't want him to, and 
 dear! I don't know what to do." 
 
 The sentence ended in sobs, but Elizabeth com 
 manded quiet. She was not thinking of love, she 
 said. "When Drusilla was sealed to Mr. "Wain 
 wright, there were other considerations which a 
 mother might have for a daughter that were of far 
 greater importance.
 
 ESTHER THE O EN TILE. 105 
 
 What they might be Drusilla could not then imag 
 ine, and she soon ceased to wonder when her mother 
 repeated in a solemn, but, on this occasion, to Dru 
 silla a very comforting tone, that she would consider 
 the matter seriously, and take counsel on the sub 
 ject, and if it was found that her child's spiritual 
 exaltation, and the advancement of the Church de 
 manded it, perhaps they could make a different 
 arrangement. "But Mr. Barbold," she remembered 
 to ask, "has he expressed himself at all in this mat 
 ter?" 
 
 " 0, yes, he is willing; he is indeed glad that Esther 
 has gone, and he never wants to see her again." 
 
 Drusilla would have been willing to confide more 
 of her own thoughts to her mother, now that the way 
 seemed open, and would have said much more con 
 cerning young Barbold, but she was dismissed by a 
 decided motion of the already preoccupied woman's 
 arm. As soon as the door closed upon her daugh 
 ter, Elizabeth rose to her feet and began to pace the 
 little room. Its confines seemed much too small for 
 her expanding mind. She bent her head against her 
 hard breast as she walked, and locked her angular 
 hands together in a hard knot. 
 
 "Yes," she seemed to be saying to herself, "Es 
 ther has doubtless met with some merited punish 
 ment for her obstinacy; why should I concern myself 
 further with her? Would it not be a wise thing to 
 make some other use of Brother Barbold?" 
 
 Elizabeth's soliloquy was a long one, but before it 
 was broken she must have convinced herself, not
 
 106 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 only that it was wise, but that it was her duty, to 
 make some other provision for young Barbold's ad 
 vancement than marrying him to Esther Wainwright, 
 for within a few days thereafter she made a pro 
 tracted visit to the Prophet, and returned with the 
 advice that her daughter should immediately apply 
 for a divorce from Mr. Wainwright. This was equiv 
 alent to a release from her matrimonial relation, and 
 made Drusilla inexpressibly happy. 
 
 It has been thought by many people that divorce 
 was not granted in the Mormon church under any 
 circumstances, but the idea was doubtless founded 
 upon the supposition that, if divorce were obtaina 
 ble, more Mormon wives would avail themselves of 
 that means of release from their wretched bondage. 
 It certainly has no foundation in fact. A divorce at 
 that time could be obtained only upon the applica 
 tion of the wife. A Mormon husband could not 
 even ask for a divorce. Now, he has only to ask, 
 and pay the small fee, the divorce laws being no 
 toriously lax. 
 
 In the decade beginning with the year 1850, there 
 was a period which cannot be exactly measured, but 
 which reached its culmination about 1856 and '57, 
 that is known among the Mormons as the refor 
 mation. It was begun, probably^ as a determined 
 resistance to the encroachments of the mining popu 
 lation, the California emigration movement, and the 
 progress of the transcontinental railways. Brigham 
 Young hoped that his efforts to prevent the settle 
 ment of Gentiles among his people, and the vigorous
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 107 
 
 prosecution of his foreign missionary policy, would se 
 cure the admission of Utah as the State of Deseret at 
 no distant day, and every device of his unscrupulous 
 mind was used to further that end. Foremost among 
 these means was the encouragement of polygamy. 
 Men were taught from the pulpit, by the Prophet 
 himself, that with God they would reign in heaven, 
 but that their celestial kingdoms must be "built up" 
 by themselves while upon earth, and they were coun 
 seled to plural marriage in such a way that no man 
 dared neglect to heed. Old, young and middle-aged, 
 rich and poor, strong and weak, were alike compelled 
 to cast about and find themselves new mates. 
 
 During this reign of terror, marrying was one of 
 the chief employments of the populace. Some men 
 almost abandoned their business, and traveled miles 
 in search of a wife, fearing they might not find one 
 soon enough to escape the anger of the head of the 
 Church. Girls as young as fourteen were compelled 
 to marry men old enough to be their grandfathers, 
 and during this period plural marriage among the 
 Mormons was enforced as it never was before and 
 never has been since. 
 
 As a result of these hurried and indiscriminate 
 marriages, so much dissatisfaction arose that the 
 Church was obliged to provide some remedy, and it 
 occurred to the Prophet, who at that time constituted 
 the church government, that he might materially in 
 crease his revenues by granting divorce for a sum that 
 would come within the limited means of many of his 
 people. So it was " revealed " that for the sum of ten
 
 108 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 dollars Brigham Young would have the power to 
 " unseal " all marriages for time. The bill of divorce 
 would be worthless for eternity, he said, as the vows 
 that had been taken in the Endowment House would 
 last forever, and no power, not even his, could undo 
 them. All the Mormon women who applied for di 
 vorce were no doubt glad to accept freedom for the 
 remainder of their miserable lives upon earth, and 
 trust to chance for eternity. But there are many 
 causes that prevent a woman from asking for a di 
 vorce in Utah, as well as many causes why she should 
 desire one, that do not obtain in other places. We 
 have now to deal largely with a generation of Mor 
 mons who have been born and bred in the Church, 
 and they have been taught from infancy that a rebel 
 lious woman will be damned. Having no part in 
 happiness in this life, Mormon women are educated 
 to believe that their reward will be found in the here 
 after, and that it will be measured according to their 
 submission to their husbands, and the number of chil 
 dren they bear. A Mormon wife is expected to ask 
 no questions, and tell no tales. It is not strange, then, 
 that women whose part here is to suffer and be still, 
 should hesitate to relinquish all claims to joy in the 
 world to come. 
 
 While the Mormon wife has had the privilege for 
 twenty-five years of asking for a divorce, she knows 
 that the granting of her petition depends wholly up 
 on the will of the high priest, and she must be rea 
 sonably sure of his willingness to grant it, before she 
 will subject herself to the danger of a reprimand
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 109 
 
 from that authority, and to the certainty of being 
 counseled to return to her home, and in the future 
 to be more obedient and humble in spirit. 
 
 A large proportion of Mormon women among the 
 poorer classes, who would be glad to avail themselves 
 of divorce, and who might count with comparative 
 certainty upon obtaining it on the plea of poverty, 
 could not get together ten dollars in money without 
 seeing their children suffer for bread. Greatest of 
 all reasons why a Mormon woman would not, a few 
 years ago, apply for divorce, is that after having se 
 cured her release, she had no place to go. She was 
 then a " vile apostate," with no shelter, and no means 
 of sustenance for either herself or her children. She 
 was shunned by the Mormons and suspected by the 
 Gentiles, or if any pitied her, they were afraid to be 
 friend her for fear of the "Avenging Angels;" in 
 other words, of the vengeance of the secret police of 
 the Church. So she lived on, and suffered and died 
 a "plural wife," in most instances. But the estab 
 lishment of divorce did, of course, open an avenue of 
 escape for some, and a convenient subterfuge for 
 others. 
 
 It was developed ultimately that Elizabeth had 
 herself taken advantage of her knowledge of the di 
 vorce laws of the Saints, to unite her daughter to Mr. 
 "VVainwright " for time," in order to prevent another 
 elderly brother from having her sealed to himself. 
 She learned that Brigham Young would probably 
 counsel the marriage, and took that means to fore 
 stall the decree. As it was not a personal matter 
 
 8
 
 HO ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 with the Prophet himself, she trusted to her own in 
 fluence to have the marriage with Mr. "Wainwright 
 annulled when it suited her ambition to see Brasilia 
 united with some more favored elder or high priest. 
 Young Brother Barbold she considered to be a rising 
 Saint, and if Drusilla loved him, it is but reasonable 
 to suppose that even her stern heart contained enough 
 of mother-love to cause her to wish to see them 
 united, after the idea took root in her mind. 
 
 Of course the decree was granted which formally 
 released Mr. "Wainwright's young, plural wife, and 
 Drusilla was at liberty to receive openly the atten 
 tions she had long been secretly encouraging from 
 Mr. Barbold. 
 
 For a nature as superficial as Tom Barbold's, the 
 transfer of his affections from Esther to Drusilla was 
 a process of speedy accomplishment. Especially as 
 Esther was out of sight, and Drusilla was always at 
 home when he was present, and ever ready to acqui 
 esce in his wishes. She was growing prettier, too, 
 each day, and Barbold wondered more and more that 
 he had not discovered her beauty sooner. He did 
 not know that love of him had developed it, and that 
 each time he appeared to her, her eye sent out a new 
 beam of the beauty born of happiness. It is but 
 justice to him to say that he soon really loved her 
 much more than he had ever loved Esther; Drusilla 
 was much more nearly suited to his taste, as well as 
 to his understanding, and they soon rejoiced mutually 
 in Esther's disappearance. 
 
 Elizabeth, too, seemed to improve in spirit under
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. HI 
 
 the new arrangement in her household affairs. The 
 marriage of Barbold and her daughter she looked 
 upon as an event that would bring her increased 
 honor and power in the Church, and her daughter a 
 loving husband. When she had contemplated his 
 union with Esther, she had expected, besides " the 
 performance of her duty," merely power over one 
 helpless girl. The effect upon her mind of this 
 change in its policy was most salutary, and, if that 
 had been possible, would no doubt have softened the 
 hard lines of her face. Of the household only Mr. 
 Wainwright now remained wholly sad and cheerless. 
 His daughter had been little comfort to him while she 
 remained near him, but now that she was gone his 
 feeble mind was torn with terrible fears. He asked 
 but few questions; he had enough understanding left 
 to know that inquiries would be useless, though it is 
 in the Mormon tenets that the wife shall make none. 
 Elizabeth was an exception to this rule by virtue of 
 her extreme loyalty to the Church, and the well- 
 known fact that she had contracted her marriage 
 with Mr. Wainwright as a part of her mission. 
 
 That poor man tottered back and forth to the Tab 
 ernacle as regularly as ever, but sometimes he would 
 forget to start until reminded by Elizabeth. He 
 would sit with his head down, dozing in his easy 
 chair, apparently oblivious of everything, until his 
 watchful wife would tell him it was time to go. He 
 had softening of the brain, they said, but he must 
 not be permitted to neglect his spiritual duties. The 
 preparations for the wedding of Drusilla and Barbold
 
 112 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 went swiftly forward, and amidst them this broken 
 old man seemed to be the only disinterested one. 
 Barbold came often and stayed long, and was help 
 ful in all the plans. The courtship between himself 
 and Brasilia became the talk of the neighborhood, 
 as a first marriage always is among the Mormon 
 women; it has a tinge of human romance even 
 among the polygamists, where there is almost 
 nothing sacred in connection with marriage. This 
 seemed so truly a love affair, that as it progressed, 
 every woman looked after the happy pair admiringly, 
 and saw in them a realization of her own dreams or 
 her lost hopes. 
 
 It was in the midst of this glad time, when the 
 lovers were sitting in the little parlor one afternoon, 
 that a hurried knocking sounded on the street door. 
 Elizabeth heard it from the back part of the house, 
 and by the time her daughter had opened the door 
 she was at her side. Before her stood the young 
 man whom she had last seen at the outlying "Stake 
 of Zion," bruised and weak from his encounter with 
 the Indians, now strong and defiant. She saw it all 
 in a glance. He stood a moment with expectant 
 face, looking into hers, and then demanded, "Where 
 is Esther Wainwright?" 
 
 "Why! do you not know?" answered Elizabeth. 
 
 "And so there is another man in the case," said 
 Barbold coldly; "Oh ho, I see, that makes it more 
 interesting." 
 
 This coarse speech stung the girl at his side, and 
 she turned away to hide her rising color.
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 113 
 
 The young stranger kept his eyes steadfastly on 
 Elizabeth, but listened in a kind of daze to Barbold's 
 words, until it was borne in upon his mind that no 
 one of the persons before him knew any more of 
 Esther than he did himself. 
 
 "And you do not know where she is?" he said to 
 Elizabeth in a tone that meant much more than his 
 words. 
 
 It was in the woman's face, by this time, to equiv 
 ocate; she would not have acknowledged her igno 
 rance of Esther's whereabouts if she had had warn 
 ing, but she answered with his eyes still upon her, 
 "I do not, I know nothing of her. I supposed you 
 knew." 
 
 "How long has she been gone?" 
 
 "Two or three months." 
 
 "Three months to-night," answered Drusilla. 
 
 It was not necessary to ask any proof that Eliza 
 beth was telling the truth; the whole story, so far as 
 she knew it, was visible in her surprised face and at 
 titude. 
 
 Esther was lost to him, and to them. That she 
 had fled from persecution, he knew without the tell 
 ing; perhaps she had gone to save her life. He 
 learned that she had never become a Mormon, and 
 knew that the young man with whom he stood 
 face to face was the same with whom he had once so 
 suddenly resolved to make a desperate race. Now, 
 so far as gaining the consent of the maid was con 
 cerned, he had no doubt that, given a fair field, he 
 could win, but she seemed lost to both of them, and
 
 114 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 he turned from the door with a feeling that in almost 
 any other place the search would be more hopeful. 
 The one encouraging fact in the case was, that she 
 was not in Elizabeth's toils, and therefore almost cer 
 tainly not in the hands of the Mormons. If she had 
 tried to fly beyond the limits of the city, what might 
 not have befallen her? If he was not spurred to his 
 chosen task of finding her, dead or alive, by the 
 rivalry of Barbold, he was made deeply conscious 
 by his visit to Elizabeth that he must save her if she 
 were to be saved at all. It was evident that all search 
 for her had been abandoned by Elizabeth's family, 
 and even the lover whom he had feared was diverted 
 by a new face, and had no thought of trying to res 
 cue Esther. He alone seemed left to look for her and 
 protect her. His heart throbbed with the thought of 
 how gladly he would shield her with his life, if nec 
 essary, but what could he do? 
 
 It seemed impossible that this was the end of the 
 vision that had urged him forward during the toil- , 
 some and hazardous journey he had just accomplished, 
 and sustained him during the weeks when he was 
 again prostrated with fever the inevitable conse 
 quence of his hurried flight, and his determination to 
 reach Salt Lake City and rescue Esther before Eliza 
 beth's return. 
 
 Naturally his thoughts turned first to her father, 
 and having been informed that he was at the Taber 
 nacle, he waited to see him pass on a quiet street; 
 but when he recognized, with difficulty, the tottering
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. H5 
 
 old man, whom he had seen but once or twice before, 
 he turned aside and let him pass undisturbed. 
 
 The happy, trustful look had all faded from his 
 eyes, they were vacant and uncertain, and his face 
 was full of the lines worn by the constant fear of evil. 
 No help could be expected of him; it was better to 
 let him go. His next step was to write to the school 
 teacher, Ezekiel Blounce, at his old home for if 
 he had come to Salt Lake City, Mark did not know 
 where to find him. 
 
 Then he walked the streets, searching day and 
 night in places where he thought she might be, and 
 in others where he was sure she was not. He learned 
 that she had not been seen at Camp Douglas, and he 
 inquired from door to door in the Gentile quarters 
 of the city. He went into every store and shop on 
 some pretext or other, but the weeks passed by and 
 he found no trace of her. 
 
 Once, when he was standing near the entrance to 
 the Endowment House watching the people as they 
 passed by, in the vain hope that he might see the 
 longed-for face, he saw a wedding procession ap 
 proach, and as it came nearer he recognized Barbold 
 and Drusilla, followed by Mr. Wainwright and Eliza 
 beth. Drusilla was brilliant in her beauty, and Bar- 
 bold, too, looked proud and handsome. There was 
 no salutation exchanged between them, but Eliza 
 beth's eagle eye saw him, and she knew that he had 
 not yet found the object of his search. Perhaps she 
 exulted just a little, now that her daughter was to be
 
 116 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 "sealed" to Brother Barbold before there was a pos 
 sibility of Esther's coming between them. Mark 
 looked on with bitterness and fear and sorrow in his 
 soul, and when they had disappeared within those 
 walls, which, could they speak, could tell of more 
 human woe than any others ever erected on the 
 western continent, he turned and went again upon 
 his search.
 
 CHAPTER XHI. 
 
 5 HERE had been a great religious festival, and the 
 streets of the City of Zion were thronged with 
 people going home from the Tabernacle late in a 
 windy night. For a few blocks they nearly all went 
 in one direction, then they scattered gradually in 
 their various ways. While this slowly moving mass 
 was concentrated within a short space, it might have 
 seen, with more or less of its many eyes, two men 
 peering into the passing faces. They stood on the 
 inner side of the walk, unnoticed by each other, both 
 holding to their wind-blown garments and bracing 
 themselves against the gusts that came down the 
 street with constantly increasing force. There were 
 lamps here and there at the street crossings, that flick 
 ered and flared up and almost went out so often that 
 the darkness seemed intensified, and it would have 
 been impossible to recognize any one except in a rare 
 lull of the wind while it took breath for a new on 
 slaught. The two men were stationed on opposite 
 sides of one of these flaming beacons, and were as 
 oblivious of each other as most of the people they 
 watched were of them. Suddenly the swirling wind 
 took the elderly gentleman's hat from his head and 
 swiftly and directly laid it at the feet of the younger 
 one, as if fate had decreed that a mysterious messen- 
 
 (117)
 
 118 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 ger should arise in the southland and fly thither for 
 that purpose. 
 
 Mark Branch stooped to pick up the thing that 
 fluttered at his feet as if it would claim attention, 
 and when he raised his head again Mr. Blounce stood 
 before him. The recognition was mutual and instan 
 taneous. They clasped each other's hands and forgot 
 the throng about them, and all else save the girl 
 whose retinue of friends counted two themselves. 
 
 Mr. Blounce guided his companion out of the 
 throng, and, in utter silence, through the streets 
 towards the least frequented part of the city, as fast 
 as his feeble old limbs could carry him. 
 
 " She is safe with me," he whispered at last, in an 
 swer to Mark's eager questioning. 
 
 "Are we on the way to her now ? " 
 
 "Yes; turn to the right here." 
 
 " Then tell me about her. Where did you find 
 her, and how long has she been with you ? " 
 
 " She has been with me since she left her father's 
 house." 
 
 " Thank God for that." 
 
 " I came here, as I told you I would, directly after 
 you, and managed to watch her unseen, almost con 
 stantly, until she left her home in the night. I knew 
 it would come to that, and every night for weeks I 
 hid in the shrubbery of the little yard and waited. 
 At last she fled, and when I picked her up she was 
 dumb and cold with fright. She had escaped dis 
 covery by the merest chance, and I half carried her 
 through the streets, fearing to be stopped at every
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. H9 
 
 step. It was a journey of which I shall never for 
 get the slightest incident, and my blood runs cold 
 when I recall it. My feeble old arms could have ta 
 ken her up and carried her, easily, but I knew that 
 would attract attention, so I had to sustain her as 
 she walked, and talk to her constantly to reassure 
 her that we were not followed, and yet it was not 
 safe for us even to speak a word. Her nervous feet 
 tripped on every obstruction, and once or twice when 
 we heard steps behind us she gasped for breath. 
 Still she was silent. I whispered that if she failed we 
 were lost. Then her step grew firmer and we hur 
 ried on, the sounds died away and her breath came 
 again. It seemed a long time before we reached my 
 little lonely house on the opposite side of the city 
 and I could tell Esther she was safe. I told her I 
 would guard her with my life, and whatever hap 
 pened she must be still and trust me. She has trusted 
 me ever since, bless her heart, as a child would a 
 father. But see," he said holding up his wrinkled 
 hand in the wan light, "I am old, and failing fast; 
 it must soon be a trustier arm than mine that pro 
 tects her." 
 
 "Here's the hand for it, with a heart in it, Mr. 
 Blounce, if that is what you want to know," and 
 Mark grasped the shriveled fingers warmly, and took 
 hold of the old man's arm to help him along. They 
 had reached, by this time, a dark, unfrequented 
 street, and Mr. Blounce forbade any further conver 
 sation. 
 
 " I have learned to be enough of a Mormon never
 
 120 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 to talk in the dark," he said, and he noiselessly guided 
 the steps of the young man over the same way by 
 which he had taken Esther on that fearful night. 
 When they reached open ground again Mr. Blounce 
 resumed his story. "I knew the time would come 
 when Esther's greatest need would be a place to hide 
 in; and I knew, too, that it would be useless to ask 
 her to leave her father. Every night for months I 
 waited near until I was satisfied she was in her bed, 
 and every night after Elizabeth's return I watched 
 for her to fly, for I knew some things of which she 
 was spared all knowledge. How I found them out, 
 it would take a long time to tell; in many ways. At 
 last I learned that if Esther positively refused to 
 marry young Barbold, she would be forcibly "sealed " 
 to Elder Bean. I hoped that in some way she, too, 
 would find this out, but I did not intend to trust en 
 tirely to that. The night she fled, the sound of her 
 sobs warned me that matters had come to an issue 
 between herself and Elizabeth, and the late return of 
 her father made me suspect that he had been conveni 
 ently put out of the way while some plot was carried 
 out. Then she came out into the night alone, and I 
 followed her up the dark street, not daring to speak 
 lest I should alarm her, and she should make some 
 noise that would betray us. But we escaped and 
 reached a safe hiding place; then, for many days, her 
 remorse for having deserted her father so preyed upon 
 her mind that I sometimes feared she would escape 
 me and return to Elizabeth's house." 
 
 "It might not have been." she would say to herself,
 
 'ESTHER THE GENTILE. 121 
 
 Elizabeth might have repented; and she might at 
 least have remained where she could watch her poor 
 father, if she could not help him, she thought. " But 
 I assured her that if she had not left her father in 
 that way she would soon have been forcibly separated 
 from him, and he would have grieved for her much 
 more than if he knew the truth. That, I am sure, 
 would have been a great consolation to him; but he 
 probably believes that Elizabeth was instrumental in 
 her disappearance; they would never tell him the 
 truth, I fear. It is an anxious life we two have led 
 in the outskirts of this beautiful city, but I have been 
 able to keep her, to save her from them, and now 
 you have come." 
 
 They clasped each other's hands again, but neither 
 tried to speak, until Mr. Blounce lifted the latch of a 
 little wicket gate, and asked his companion to come 
 in. 
 
 " This is where we have waited and watched since 
 that awful night," he said, and then tapped lightly 
 on the door of the little cottage before them. It was 
 opened immediately, and Esther's voice said, "Oh, 
 you have come at last; I was so frightened; I cannot 
 help being afraid when you stay so long away." 
 
 "Yes, I have come, and not alone; see, I have 
 brought a friend," and Mr. Blounce led Mark to 
 Esther's side and turned away from the silent greet 
 ing. She had known him again at first sight, but 
 because her heart beat fast she shrank the more. 
 Mark took her hand and once more looked into her 
 pure eyes, this time \\ith more confidence that their
 
 122 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 answer would be plain; that he could see what he 
 wished for, their kindly remembrance of him. There 
 was no time there for the delays of conventional 
 peace, the exigencies of war make all things fair in 
 love; and if Mark took his place beside the girl he 
 had lived to save as though he were an accepted 
 suitor, it was not because he felt that she must of 
 necessity choose him, nor that he believed himself to 
 be irresistible in her eyes. To be " taken by storm " 
 pleases all women, but the general of such a master 
 stroke must not be an egotist. Mark looked upon 
 Esther as Dante upon his Beatrice, a being high 
 above and purer than he. Yet he alone could save 
 her, and the subtle communicant, whether it be spirit 
 or substance, that flies from a heart to its mate, told 
 him she would choose to be saved by him rather than 
 by any other. 
 
 Then it was told and retold how they had fled to 
 gether that dreadful night, Esther and her protector, 
 the old teacher. There seemed to be no end to what 
 must be recounted of the suffering each had endured 
 in the past, nor to the plans they must make for the 
 future. 
 
 When they talked of the Latter Day Saints, and 
 the fears they had felt of the vengeance that might 
 be meted out to Esther if ever she fell into their 
 clutches, the old teacher's face wore a look like some 
 great beast at bay, it was so determined; but when 
 he bent his eyes upon the fawn at his side, it was all 
 gentleness. 
 
 Esther would have been more than woman, and
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 123 
 
 less than maiden, had she not almost forgotten, for a 
 time, the difficulties which surrounded her. In the 
 sweet realization that she is first and dearest in the 
 care of a strong arm and a brave heart, a woman feels 
 so secure that all danger is dwarfed, and in the first 
 happy hours of this security Esther felt safe. The 
 narrow walls that held her were dissolved, and she 
 was free in spirit, and content merely to wait for the 
 time, which must be near at hand, it seemed to her, 
 when her father and Mr. Blounce, her new friend and 
 herself, should all go back to the old hills, or at least 
 away from Salt Lake City, out of the sight and knowl 
 edge of the things that had made her old in sorrow 
 while yet a child in years. 
 
 Mark Branch came every night to the little house 
 as soon as darkness shielded him, for it was known 
 to the neighborhood only that an old man lived there 
 alone, and by invisible degrees he and Esther were 
 drawn nearer and nearer to each other. 
 
 He talked constantly to Mr. Blounce, when they 
 met, according to a plan of the previous evening, 
 sometimes in one place and sometimes in another, of 
 taking Esther away, anywhere out of the danger that 
 constantly surrounded her there. Each time he was 
 answered by a solemn shake of the old man's head, 
 and the assurance that Esther would never leave Utah 
 without her father, not even as Mark's wife. This 
 seemed so unreasonable to Mark, since she could not 
 even see her father, and while it was unsafe for her 
 to go upon the streets or even be seen by any save 
 themselves, that he could not be convinced of it easily.
 
 124 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 " I will ask her," lie said, after a week had gone 
 by and he had begun to chafe at her imprisonment. 
 But the old man begged him not to mention it to her. 
 He seemed frightened at the idea, and exacted a 
 promise from Mark that he would at least delay. 
 Almost every day the young man had some new plan 
 to explain to Mr. Blounce, with the utmost faith that 
 he, too, must believe in it, and would help put it into 
 effect. The old man always listened, but listened in 
 silence, and sometimes a look so sad and weary would 
 come over his face that Mark was perplexed almost 
 beyond endurance. With him, to plan meant to do; 
 he had not learned that it sometimes means to wait. 
 
 "Why is it that you oppose me so determinedly in 
 this? Have you ever asked Esther to go away? Do 
 you know that she would not consent?" Mark asked 
 at last, decided in his own mind that unless Mr. 
 Blounce gave him some good reason, or explained 
 something that he did not understand, he would that 
 night propose to Esther that they leave her father, 
 since they could not take him with them, and go out 
 of the Territory. 
 
 "No, I have never asked her; I know she would 
 not go." 
 
 A heavy sigh, almost like a sob, shook the old man, 
 and then he straightened himself up and looked Mark 
 in the eye quickly and piercingly as was his habit, as 
 if a fear had suddenly come to him. The look always 
 eeemed to allay his suspicion, however, and it was put 
 aside. "No, I have never asked her," he repeated, 
 "and it is not safe that I should longer delay telling
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 125 
 
 you why I would not have you ask her. It seems a 
 crime to calculate the love of an innocent heart like 
 that child's, but she has nobody but you and me. You 
 are her friend, too, no one could deceive me in this; 
 and I would have her trust you so wholly that no 
 shadow of a fear could enter her heart. I cannot 
 stay by her long; old age creeps on with rapid pace, 
 because I fear it so, I think, not for myself, but for 
 her. The knowledge that she would be left alone, here, 
 would stop the beating of this old heart with terror 
 for her. I should have been mad with fear before 
 now if I had not found you, or you had not found us. 
 To your keeping I must some day lay down my trust; 
 no one else wants it but to curse and torture. You 
 comprehend me? Look into her eyes to-night; re 
 member what she has borne; read, if you can, the 
 purity of her soul, and be worthy of the love you see 
 dawning in it. Give her no cause to doubt that you 
 will stay by her." 
 
 From that hour Mark Branch understood that to 
 suggest to Esther the idea of leaving Salt Lake City 
 without her father, would be to create in her mind a 
 fear that if she refused, he, her friend, might go alone. 
 Her friend; yes, that was the only title Esther's 
 thoughts had ever bestowed upon him; but the 
 promptings of his own heart, his conversation with 
 Mr. Blounce, and the extremity of Esther's position, 
 had made him aware in this short time that he 
 was more than friend, and that he longed to be 
 more than lover. It is not a pleasant thing to leave 
 out of the lives of two people BO well adapted to 
 8
 
 126 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 love each other as Mark Branch and Esther Wain- 
 wright the amenities of a courtship, but there are 
 instances when neither time nor circumstance will 
 permit this sweet dalliance, and this was such a one. 
 On the night after Mr. Blounce appealed to Mark 
 to spare Esther the pain he was sure a proposition to 
 abandon Salt Lake City would give her, a stranger 
 accompanied the young man along the shaded streets 
 to the quiet part of the city where Esther was in 
 hiding. The little cottage was not lighted as if for 
 a wedding, but its humble walls sheltered a bride as 
 brave as ever man won with longer wooing, and no 
 more solemn vows were ever uttered than the simple 
 ones which made the young surveyor and Esther 
 Wainwright husband and wife. They stood beside 
 each other with no witnesses but Ezekiel Blounce 
 and the minister, who saw them for the first time as 
 he pronounced the bond. It was a simple ceremony, 
 but it meant much to the three principal actors. 
 Never since he had first recognized her as the flower 
 of his heart, that summer morning when he was bot- 
 anizing, had Mark questioned the feeling which 
 prompted him to seek her, and to defend and protect 
 her; and in the weary months when he had sought 
 her, morning, noon and night, up and down the 
 streets of that sorrow-haunted city, he had learned 
 that his life was inseparable from hers. 
 
 And Esther's? Ah, a maiden's heart is more easily 
 taught than a man's, and sufiering had given her's a 
 woman's strength and cleverness. 
 
 Mr. Blounce, the god-father of both, blessed them
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 127 
 
 with a faltering voice. No hand could snatch Esther 
 from his sight now, not even the emissaries of the 
 Presidency of the Saints could take the lawful wife 
 of a Gentile from her home. It was no longer nec 
 essary that she should hide from her enemies, and 
 Mark's devotion soon inspired Esther with a sense of 
 peace and security which nothing but the support of 
 a helpmeet of the heart ever gives. 
 
 The day after their marriage they watched on an 
 unfrequented street for Esther's father, and it chanced 
 that he went alone to the Tahernacle. When he saw 
 Esther standing before him he looked dazed for a 
 moment, and then after an anxious glance about him, 
 fell into her open arms. But he started from her in 
 the midst of his mingled joy and grief, and looked 
 nervously at her companion who had approached to 
 support him, and although Mark spoke to him in 
 gentle tones, and tried to assure him that he would 
 be a friend to him as well as to Esther, a look of fear 
 came into his face, and when they asked him to go 
 with them he passed his hand wearily over his fore 
 head as if trying to comprehend it all, but sadly 
 shook his head as though pained that they should re 
 mind him of anything besides Esther's presence. 
 And when they uged him, though a look of indecis 
 ion wavered for an instant in his eyes, he soon began 
 to repeat that " he must do his duty," and in a mo 
 ment more bade them good bye, and tottered on his 
 way, leaving to Mark the care of the tender heart, 
 which, had not love for him tilled it, would soon 
 have burst with grief.
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 IF there had been a time in the remote past when 
 Elizabeth labored for love, it must have been 
 brought vividly to her remembrance when she saw 
 Drusilla and Barbold together. They were so fond, 
 and so absorbed in their fondness. Drusilla's face 
 beamed constantly, and her husband looked on her 
 dotingly. If it had been possible, with his sur 
 roundings, he would have forgotten half the services 
 at the Tabernacle. Elizabeth did not permit that, 
 but she looked on with approving eyes while they 
 sauntered together, oblivious of all the world. If the 
 depths of her bosom yet held a mother's heart, she 
 must have secretly wished that they might fly from 
 all that had made her what she was. She would sit 
 and watch them by the hour, and discourse upon 
 their devotion to the eager Mormon women whose 
 hearts, one might suppose, had long since been 
 drained of feeling. That, however, was the one idea 
 that aroused them. 
 
 After all the years of oppression and deceit, their 
 woman's nature asserted itself whenever the tender 
 sentiment was broached; they hungered even for a 
 sight of love-making, and when a daughter became 
 a first-wife it was a matter of boasting and congratu 
 lation. Not that it was expected her position as an 
 only wife would last, but it was her one short oppor- 
 
 (128)
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 129 
 
 tunity to taste the sweet romance which belongs bj 
 right to every woman, and which but few are privi 
 leged to know in that empire of legalized heart 
 breaking. 
 
 Brasilia accepted her happiness in good faith, it 
 filled her so completely. It was natural, too, that 
 she should know no grave suspicions of the institu 
 tion in which she had been reared. Familiar as she 
 was with the plural marriage system, she had never 
 put herself in the place of a plural wife since it had 
 become a matter of interest to her whether she 
 should ever be one or not. She believed that she 
 was all in all to her husband, and in trusting him 
 she proved herself but human, and woman, not Mor 
 mon. Their lives together were like those of care 
 less children, too thoughtless to be long secure in 
 their own strength, even in an atmosphere where 
 laws and customs would have helped to sustain them. 
 
 The superficial happiness was sure to be disturbed 
 by the first temptation that crossed Barbold's path; 
 even Elizabeth must have acknowledged that to her 
 self, and the promptings of her motherhood caused 
 her to shield them as well as she could from all dis 
 tractions. She neither insisted that they should go 
 to merry-makings, nor that Barbold should be more 
 active in church work than was required to maintain 
 the standing he had already gained. Her aggressive 
 impatience for his advancement was all laid aside, 
 and one who did not know her well could not have 
 believed that she was only biding the time when her 
 daughter's happy dream should be over; that she
 
 130 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 conld calmly sit and wait, without an effort to save 
 them from the fate she saw so surely impending, for 
 the time when her greatest interest in life would be 
 to secure the preferment of her son-in-law, and 
 through him add to her own power in the Church. 
 She must have felt a twinge, now and then, that 
 brought to mind her long lost conscience, but if she 
 did she mistook her zeal for the Church of Zion for 
 its better part, and suffered the pang in silence. 
 During this delightful season, while the little play of 
 love and marriage was going on between Barbold 
 and Brasilia, poor old Mr. "Wainwright was made to 
 do double duty as a figure-head for the family at the 
 Tabernacle. Every day he dragged his weary steps 
 back and forth over the hot pavements, and sat with 
 his vacant stare fixed on the priest who propounded 
 his damnation. Sometimes he would remain in his 
 seat after the others had gone, dozing and dreaming, 
 smiling like a babe at his fancies one day, and weep 
 ing bitter tears that would not be suppressed another. 
 He took no notice of the young pair in Elizabeth's 
 house, nor showed any sign that he missed his 
 daughter, except rarely when a door opened hur 
 riedly or there was some unusual commotion; then 
 he would look up quickly with a gleam of glad ex 
 pectancy in his face, but when she did not appear 
 he would immediately forget her again, and relapse 
 into his brooding quiet. 
 
 This household, with its divers minds, was only a 
 sample among thousands in that cruel city where 
 women's hearts seemed the prey that all the brother-
 
 ESTHER THE Q EN TILE. 131 
 
 hood of Latter Day Saints had combined to torture. 
 Here, for a little time, a ray of the sunshine of love 
 lighted the hearthstone for all but the lonely old man, 
 and made a bright scene in the bigoted and scheming 
 rule that Elizabeth had long held over it. Prayers 
 that it might last, that Elizabeth's heart might be 
 softened, that Barbold's shallow nature might be 
 changed and that he might remain true to the inspi 
 ration which bound him for a time to Drusilla, would 
 not avail; a life in that atmosphere makes one doubt 
 that the tearful petitions which have so often been 
 breathed in fear from trembling lips, and borne aloft 
 on the sighs of a bleeding heart, can penetrate the 
 hideousness. The pall is so black with blood that 
 has been drained, drop by drop, from hoping, trust 
 ing, fearing, dying women's hearts; it is so weighted 
 down with misery and ignorance and blasphemy, that 
 only some great convulsion can rend it and let the 
 light of Heaven come through, and the supplications 
 ascend. 
 
 While there are women in America who have 
 homes, husbands, children, love, which they call their 
 own, can they indifferently look upon the spectacle 
 presented in Utah? No, it is impossible. It is not 
 in woman's heart to know that in a portion of her 
 own fair land there is a sect, calling its doctrines a 
 religion, which takes from a wife the husband who 
 has sworn to protect and cherish her, the father who 
 has set himself for an example to her children, and 
 not only permits him to espouse another who must 
 bear children to look with envious eyes on all that
 
 132 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 goes to their unnatural half-brothers and sisters, but 
 declares that God commands this sacrilege of his holy 
 laws, this sacrifice of the most ennobling sentiment 
 He saw fit in the beginning to implant in the soul, 
 and be unmoved. 
 
 Call it selfish, if you like; love is the passion that, 
 in its highest type, for a pure object, will achieve 
 more than all others. 
 
 Fame, the reward for which ambition strives, fades 
 into nothingness in contrast with the peace that rules 
 over the realm of two hearts. 
 
 Genius is bungling beside it. 
 
 Avarice is palsied by the dross that clings like a 
 magnet to its lean hands for a day, and then takes wings. 
 
 Call it unselfish, rather, this transport of the soul 
 that will not die even under scorn, contumely, rob 
 bery, scourging, and desertion, but will live, bearing 
 all these, to toil for the child of the father who has 
 caused its sorrow, and wait with bursting heart and 
 straining arms for his repentance. Call it divine, 
 this attribute of the heart that has made Mormon 
 women suffer as the slave women of the South never 
 did. They were torn from their homes by masters, 
 while their husbands mourned; the Mormon women 
 are slaves to their husbands, concubines to their re 
 ligion, martyrs to a despotism as immoral as cursed 
 Sodom of old. A Mormon wife is set aside by the 
 very hand that should clasp hers while all the world 
 goes by, degraded into hopeless shame and woe, while 
 her husband makes new vows and bestows upon an 
 other her name, the fond, proud title of wife.
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 YOU will remember, dear reader, it was the leafj 
 summer time when Mark and Esther were wed 
 ded. Little by little he enticed her to make short 
 excursions into the mountains, to leave the hateful 
 city for a day or a few hours, that she might breathe 
 the unpolluted air and walk in the sunlight that had 
 so long been denied her. Here, along the mountain 
 streams, with such friendly witnesses as trees and 
 rocks and waving grasses, the riper acquaintance of 
 this young husband and wife was made, and all un 
 aware to herself the bloom of youth youth's 
 beauty came back to her face as the love-light in 
 creased in her eyes. 
 
 The thought of her father was always with Esther, 
 but she could do something to alleviate the suffering 
 this thought caused her, by ministering to Mr. 
 Blounce, and she could not but grow happier witk 
 Mark. He and the old teacher together had man 
 aged to see Mr. Wainwright often enough to impres 
 upon his feeble mind the location of Esther's home, 
 on a quiet, pretty street where Mark had taken her, 
 so that if ever the time came when he could turn to 
 her he would know where to find her. Esther rarely 
 ventured to intercept him, because she knew so well 
 that if ever they were seen together any subsequent 
 meetings would be prevented, but her mind followed 
 
 (133)
 
 134 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 him with loving compassion every day, as he moved 
 like a spirit along the streets and was absorbed in the 
 throng that passed into the Juggernaut of the Nine 
 teenth Century, the Mormon Tabernacle. And every 
 day she and Mark watched with almost equal solici 
 tude the waning of the life of their old friend, Eze- 
 kiel Blounce. The passion of hate and the corro 
 sions of fear had been chiseled away from his face 
 since Esther's marriage, and a great peace had settled 
 in their stead. The strong spirit shone unveiled by 
 human desires; his one great wish having been grati 
 fied completely as time went on, and he saw Mark 
 and Esther content together. 
 
 With the coming of the chill winds of autumn, a 
 weakness overtook the old man, from which it was 
 evident he could not rally, indeed, he had no wish to 
 throw it off; and his two young friends could not fail 
 to see that it was rest that was coming to him, and to 
 realize that it would be cruel to wish him to take up 
 again the burden of life. He had carried it so long, 
 BO heroically, alone all these many years, and if he 
 lived longer, trouble, instead of joy, might enshroud 
 him at the last. Now he could "lie down to pleas 
 ant dreams." 
 
 One evening when the three sat together in the 
 twilight of one of the last warm evenings of Septem 
 ber, the old man looked tenderly upon Esther for a 
 long time, and then turned to her husband and said : 
 "Perhaps you would like to know, Mark, why I 
 have loved this little woman so long, even before I 
 learned to love her for her own sweet sake, though
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 135 
 
 that was long ago. I have often thought to tell you, 
 and her. I'll do it now, I may never have the 
 strength again. I am exhaling it with every breath. 
 You know how I taught her when she was a wee 
 thing, how I have seen her grow from a shy and 
 modest maiden to a noble woman ; she has told you 
 that I was her mother's friend, but she has not told 
 you, for she never knew, that I loved her grand 
 mother, whose counterpart in face and form and 
 character she is. I never called her wife, she mar 
 ried another, but that did not interrupt my love for 
 her, and, God help her, I always feared it did not 
 change her's for me. It does not concern you to 
 know how this occurred; it did, and changed the 
 current of my life from gladness to weary waiting. 
 Her daughter, Esther's mother, was not like the 
 woman I loved, but her granddaughter, this child, has 
 her image, and, I verily believe, her spirit. Do you 
 wonder that Hove her, that I want to see her loved? 
 So many years I bore the sorrows of another in my 
 heart; I did not care for my own, but 0, the agony 
 of knowing that the one who was to me before and 
 above all suffered, and I dare not put out my hand 
 to help, much less to save ! It killed her at last, and 
 I wondered for years why it did not kill me, it would 
 have been a mercy; but now I know, and I am satis 
 fied. I shall go soon to seek her, perhaps to find 
 her; who knows? At any rate, I am glad to start 
 upon the quest; everything else makes me weary, so 
 weary, now." 
 
 The old man's head bent forward and rested on
 
 136 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 his wrinkled hands that were supported by his staff, 
 just as Mark had seen him that awful night in the 
 hills, where he first made his acquaintance. "It has 
 been my privilege," he resumed, " to take the place 
 of a grandfather to Esther, her grandchild. I have 
 not lived so long in vain. When I am gone you will 
 find in my chest a small, worn book of poems, trans 
 lated from the German; it was left with her by a 
 traveler who discovered in her a poetic nature, one 
 with which Esther's rhymes exactly. The book was a 
 rare possession in those days, and it was read many 
 times, both by the happy maiden, and later by the 
 sorrow-burdened woman. When she closed her eyes 
 and laid down to rest she sent the little volume, 
 wrapped in a square of white linen, which her hands 
 spun and wove, to me. They are the only visible 
 mementoes of her I ever had, and when I am gone 
 Esther will keep them. The image in my heart was 
 always visible to me, and before me there was a great 
 dial, with a long hand pointing to 'what should have 
 been.' Do what I might, it was always turning, and 
 if I sometimes looked away it was always there when 
 I looked back, pointing to my lost life. It was the 
 unrelenting hand of fate, and I its helpless victim." 
 
 "But you do not comprehend me, my children," 
 said the old man, as he raised his massive head and 
 saw them gazing at him, wondering at the strange 
 tale. " God grant you never may." 
 
 Not many days after he had told this brief story 
 of his life to Mark and Esther, Ezekiel Blounce 
 started upon the search for his love. He entered
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 137 
 
 upon the road so often traveled, but which must yet 
 be explored anew by every man, fearlessly and 
 gladly. 
 
 The last returning ray to his great calm eyes car 
 ried the picture of Mark and Esther standing with 
 clasped hands by his side, and the last conviction of 
 his mind was that their hearts were inseparable for 
 ever. 
 
 A dull leaden pall hung in the sky and covered all 
 the earth the day they carried him to his first home 
 the grave; and Esther said it was typical of his 
 life, forever shadowed by a great grief, with not a ray 
 of the sunshine of hope to illumine the long, weary 
 way. 
 
 But Mark gently reminded her that one ray had 
 come to him at last, the same bright ray that made 
 the full day of his life, and would unto the end.
 
 CHAPTER XVI 
 
 AA ARK and Esther lived frugally. Mark found 
 * L some local and temporary employment, and he 
 had frequent opportunities to go out with surveying 
 parties into the mountains, but both he and Esther 
 knew too well the terrible hazards of such expedi 
 tions. There were not only mountain dangers to 
 fear, there were sleuth hounds yet remaining of the 
 Danites. 
 
 A Gentile who had enticed a Mormon from almost 
 within the fold was never safe alone with Mormons; 
 on such occasions they might all be Danites no one 
 could tell. So, on the whole, though their life was 
 quiet and confined within a narrow space, it was full 
 of apprehension. Mark told Esther of many things 
 that were new to her, and made plans for future 
 journeyings out into the world, with herself as the 
 admiring queen who would ride in an enchanted 
 chariot, and himself as guide and protector. 
 
 The winter came on, and a fireside was established, 
 that magnet around which the home-idea concentrates 
 closer than round any other. Mark and Esther sat 
 before the fire one evening, a little more alert than 
 usual to the noises of the street, because Mark had 
 that day passed the house where Elizabeth and Mr. 
 "Wainwright lived, and had seen the old man sup 
 ported by pillows in an arm chair near a window. 
 
 (138)
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 139 
 
 He seemed feebler and paler than ever, and Mark 
 knew that the time would soon come when Esther 
 must hear the tidings of his death. 
 
 She had longed so much to go to him, but Mark 
 had always assured her that it was folly to try to 
 gain admission to Elizabeth's house, and the old man 
 had grown too weak both in body and mind to ven 
 ture alone to the Tabernacle; hence she never saw 
 him now. 
 
 They could do nothing more for him in life, but 
 Esther had set her heart upon taking his body to the 
 old home when the spirit left it, and though she had 
 little hope that Elizabeth would comply with her re 
 quest to summon her to receive the precious remains, 
 she could not help expecting it hourly. They were 
 not surprised, therefore, though it startled them both, 
 to hear a knock at the door late that evening. It did 
 seem a little strange to them that the person who thus 
 asked for admission should come to the back door, 
 since it opened into a small enclosed yard, almost in 
 accessible to strangers from the street. 
 
 Esther followed her husband closely, as he carried 
 a light to the door at the back part of the house, and 
 as he began to unfasten it she put her hand upon his 
 arm and suddenly demanded to know who was there. 
 
 "Oh, Esther! let me in, quick, quick," answered 
 a voice that Esther knew well, despite the pain and 
 alarm that vibrated in it. Mark hastily opened the 
 door and Drusilla staggered against it, white and 
 wild. 
 
 "Will you come with me, Esther?" she cried,
 
 140 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 "I have come for you; O, Esther, don't say you 
 can't come, there was no one else I could ask. You 
 will save me, will you not? They are going to make 
 me see her to-morrow in my own house; you will not 
 let them, Esther, I cannot bear it," and the exhausted 
 woman sank on the floor at Esther's feet. Her black 
 hair hung in long locks around her face; her cheeks, 
 that only half a year ago were round and blooming 
 with the roses of happiness, were colorless and hol 
 low, and her black eyes shone with the frenzy of de 
 spair. She would have moved to pity any woman's 
 heart, and Esther, quickly divining the cause of her 
 grief, stooped beside her and took the wild face in 
 her gentle hands. 
 
 "I will do anything I can for you, Brasilia; what 
 is it? Of whom do you speak? How did you find 
 us?" 
 
 "I have known where you lived for a long time," 
 Baid the woman, answering Esther's last question 
 first, " and for weeks I have been trying to come to 
 you to ask you to help me, to see if there is not some 
 way to keep him from it. But at first I was ashamed, 
 and then I was afraid, and now I fear it is too late. 
 My husband has forced mother to help him bring us 
 together, this other girl and me," she added, remem 
 bering how incoherent had been her story. I know 
 she would have saved me from this, at least for a 
 time; I heard her pleading with him to wait a little 
 longer. She said the Church would not expect it of 
 him yet, he was so young, and had been such a zeal 
 ous worker. But he laughed and scorned her, and
 
 ESTHER THE Q EN TILE. 141 
 
 taunted her with her own words. It is all her fault. 
 Oh! Esther, my eyes are opened now, I wish they 
 had been torn from their sockets first. I could never 
 tell you what I have suffered. It has all ended, 
 Esther, my beautiful dream. I did not think of my 
 self as a Mormon for months, though in fact I sup 
 pose I never did. Plural marriage was as familiar 
 to me as the air I breathed; I never heard any one 
 but you talk of anything else. And then when he 
 came it all seemed different, I forgot everything else. 
 I thought we were all in all to each other, like you," 
 she said, looking at Mark and Esther. 
 
 "I did not know enough to be afraid of Mormon- 
 ism until one day when I was walking on the street 
 I met my husband with a young woman. He was 
 so absorbed in talking to her that he did not notice 
 me until I was just beside them. Then he seemed 
 embarrassed, and if I had not stopped I think he 
 would have gone by without speaking to me. I 
 went up to him without hesitating, innocently sup 
 posing he would wish to join me and to introduce 
 his companion. But something in his manner 
 seemed strange and unnatural, arid suddenly, at a 
 look from the girl, he excused himself to me and I 
 was left alone. A pang shot through my heart that 
 no words can describe, a jealous hate filled my mind, 
 and I turned towards home. As I walked along a 
 numb sense of suffocation came over me, and I real 
 ized for the first time what it was to be a Mormon 
 woman. It meant that my husband might marry 
 another. Nothing more, nothing less, to me. Oh, 
 10
 
 142 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 help me Esther? Mother, mother, that you should 
 have brought me to this ! How can any one be so 
 cruel? What can I do!" 
 
 By this time Mark and Esther had taken Drusilla 
 to a couch and were trying by soothing words to quiet 
 her, but it was of no avail. Her bursting heart had 
 overflowed at last, she had stifled it as long as she 
 could; and now that she had found Esther, the only 
 friend she knew, she could no longer control her 
 grief. 
 
 "I had not intended to distress you so," she said, 
 after a spasm of sobs and blinding tears; "I only 
 meant to come to you quietly and ask you to do 
 something if you could anything, anything, to pre 
 vent this woman from coming between my husband 
 and me. He is my husband, Esther; does not your 
 husband think so? He cannot be hers. You once 
 spoke of laws, Esther; are they of no avail here, can 
 not something be done?" 
 
 " Drusilla," said Esther, sadly, still holding the dis 
 tracted woman by the hand, " there is one way, and 
 only one, by which you can escape the life that is 
 before you, with another sharing your place as wife, 
 and that is to leave your husband and your home all 
 to her. It is dreadful to say this to you, but I do it 
 because this may be my only opportunity to say any 
 thing to you. No words of mine can wound you as 
 you have already been wounded. It would be neither 
 kind nor truthful to bid you hope; there is no hope. 
 You come to us for help we can but tell you the 
 one way of escape. That would have been impossi-
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 143 
 
 ble once, but there are so many Gentiles in Salt Lake 
 now that Mark says a plural wife can escape from her 
 home if she wants to. You know I do not consider 
 this a moral desertion of your husband, Drusilla, or 
 I would not advise you to it. If he outrages your 
 love and desecrates his home by a plural marriage, he 
 has dissolved the bond that you believed to be holy 
 and indissoluble between you. Is it not true? Mark, 
 would she not be justified by all the laws we know, 
 human and divine, in leaving her home under such 
 circumstances?" 
 
 " Indeed she would, dear; and if it has come to that, 
 if Drusilla is sure that Barbold will marry again, and 
 she does not want to go back, she is welcome to stay 
 here, and I will be glad to do all I can to defend and 
 protect her. Curse the Mormon elders! I would 
 enjoy it." 
 
 " We know you love your husband, Drusilla, devot 
 edly, with all your passionate heart; but by this act 
 he wrongs you past all redress; it would be a crime 
 to stay with him," continued Esther, bending over 
 the poor woman whose convulsions of grief had so 
 exhausted her she could scarcely speak, and whose 
 silence her friends construed into partial acquiescence 
 with the only plan they had to suggest. She closed 
 her eyes for a moment and inhaled a few deep-drawn 
 breaths, then slowly rose to her feet. 
 
 "You will stay with us, Drusilla?" cried Esther, 
 putting her arms about the woman that she might 
 not fall. 
 
 "No! No! I will be revenged," Drusilla said in a
 
 144 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 deep, husky voice, changed, with the drying up of 
 her tears, from the desperate gasp of grief to the de 
 termined tone of despair. 
 
 "JSTo," she repeated, "I will be revenged on her; 
 she is not like me; he said I would have an excellent 
 opportunity to show my saintly qualities by dividing 
 my strength with her," and Drusilla ground her 
 teeth together as she repeated the bitter sarcasm. 
 " She is frail and delicate, her hair is like gold, and 
 her eyes glitter with a red glow, like a serpent's, in 
 her fair face. Yes, she needs my help; she shall 
 have it. Farewell, Esther, Mr. Branch, my only 
 friends; you would help me if you could, I know it, 
 I see it in your faces, but there is no hope; you can 
 not save me, even from myself." 
 
 Esther strained the now tearless woman to her 
 heart, but could not speak a word ; there was noth 
 ing more to say. Mark's eyes were dim, too, as he 
 took her quietly by the hand. 
 
 "Put out the light," she said huskily, "let me go 
 out where I came in. Do not come to the door, and 
 do not follow me; I may have to suffer much for this 
 visit, but that is nothing, it will be a comfort to me 
 many times in the dark future. God bless you both; 
 go away from this wicked place, it is not fit for such 
 as you, the curse of the Latter Day Saints is over it." 
 
 When she had disappeared into the night, Esther 
 and Mark stood with bated breath until they were 
 sure she must be far on her way, and would not re 
 turn. Then the door was locked again, and Esther 
 burst into tears. Tears of anguish for Drusilla, and
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 145 
 
 of joy and thankfulness for herself. The peace of 
 that humble home, that had never known the blight 
 of Mormonism, made all the mockery about them 
 seem doubly hideous. When the morning came 
 again, after a restless night filled with troubled 
 dreams, Brasilia's visit seemed to Esther the most 
 horrible dream of all, and it was many days before 
 she could shut out from her mind the vision of that 
 frenzied face. She thought of that wronged wife as 
 a hunted tigress, beating her life out in a vain search 
 for help, and then settling down to the calm revenge 
 of despair.
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 SOME of the most touching incidents of suffering 
 for faith's sake that have ever heen told of the 
 Mormons have pictured the plural marriage of a man 
 who truly and devotedly loved his first and only law 
 ful wife. That such instances are real there can be no 
 doubt. Members of the Church of the Latter Day 
 Saints who were not polygamists, and who openly op 
 posed the doctrine of polygamy as one of the tenets of 
 the Church, have been trapped with financial difficulty, 
 and a plural marriage with the daughter of some 
 prominent elder offered as the only possible escape from 
 ruin. Married men have been enticed by others who 
 were "pillars of the Church" into compromising rela 
 tions with women, and have then been blackmailed by 
 the Church itself until plural marriage was the inevi 
 table end the only honorable end, according to Mor 
 mon teaching. These things have been in Utah. It is 
 true that a loving husband and father has brought 
 to his home a plural wife to crush the heart of the 
 mother of his children, because, forsooth, the Church 
 and to him the Church meant God had so com 
 manded him to do. But, from a point of view which 
 commands the history of the Christian world, is it 
 not plain that genuine instances of this kind must 
 have been rare? Is there not in the heart of every 
 human being born in the effulgent light of the nine- 
 
 (146)
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 147 
 
 teenth century, on American soil, a revelation which 
 tells him that God never commanded absolute wrong 
 to his fellow human beings? 
 
 There have been gentle, pitiable, aye, even lovable, 
 imbeciles, who have thus been led by designing men, 
 under the guise of religion, to commit this most 
 heinous crime against the sanctity of wedlock and 
 fatherhood, and hundreds of dull-minded peasantry 
 from European countries have become polygamists 
 through the same teachings; but American proselytes 
 to the religion of the Latter Day Saints who have 
 desecrated their homes by plural marriage have done 
 so with the fear of God and man and their own con 
 sciences staring them in the face. They have hedged 
 themselves about with a creed, and have sometimes, 
 no doubt, hoped to shut out the inner consciousness 
 of right and wrong with which all normal human be 
 ings are endowed as the first proof of development 
 above bestial savagery, but they have miserably 
 failed. The result, with men of an appreciable de 
 gree of intelligence, has always been, either total es 
 trangement from the first wife or an awakened and 
 relenting conscience. Sad as are these instances of 
 plural marriage among the Mormons, still more sad, 
 as well as more revolting, are the immeasurably 
 greater number that occur simply because a species 
 of wickedness, known to the Christian world as adul 
 tery, is sanctioned, advised and enjoined by the Mor 
 mon church. To be sure, the doctrine was revealed 
 to the Prophet, Joseph Smith, to cover up his own 
 wickedness more than to license polygamy in the
 
 148 ESTHER THE GENTILE, 
 
 future, but the revelation answered both purposes. 
 He legitimized his children for places of power which 
 he foresaw were to be in the kingdom he had created 
 in the credulity, the self-preserving instinct and the 
 inherited superstition of ignorant men. He thus 
 made it possible not only to wed, but to give in mar 
 riage, helpless women, as suited the whims and pas 
 sions of a man of coarse mould. Joseph Smith was 
 a man possessed of both an accidental and a design 
 ing ambition. His discovery of the Mormon idea 
 was purely accidental, and his invention of the po- 
 lygamic idea was mothered both by his individual 
 necessities and the discovery made by his intercourse 
 with other common men of their desires. But his 
 naturally designing mind barely kept pace with the 
 growth of the gigantic imposition he had foisted 
 upon his fellows. More than once it had almost 
 toppled to its fall, and it was not Joseph Smith, it 
 was the horde of ignorant, stubborn men and en 
 slaved women, that saved the throne of Zion from 
 extinction, and drew it, with bleeding feet, across the 
 great wilderness from the Mississippi river to Salt 
 Lake. 
 
 The Mormon always protests against the charge 
 that he is marrying a second wife from inclination, 
 he always does it to please the Church. The fact 
 that he is always prompted, either by truth or in 
 stinctive shame and a natural sense of justice, to 
 defend himself to himself, and to hide behind the com 
 mands of the priesthood, should be proof to him that 
 he is committing a sin by plural marriage. It often is
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 149 
 
 proof to him ; but when he contemplates the fact that 
 penal laws are made for all, high and low, Christian and 
 unbeliever alike, and that crime often skulks away 
 and hides its hideousness from sight in all walks of 
 life, simply because of the attached penalties, it is 
 not strange that there are men, who, defended by the 
 most impregnable of all armors a recognized re 
 ligion adopt polygamy and pretend to believe. It 
 is putting no new thing into any one's mind to say, 
 that there are men in all Christian churches who 
 merely pretend to believe their respective creeds, 
 and who commit many wrongs under the cloak of 
 their pretended piety. But there is both a moral 
 and a legal penalty when their misdeeds are found 
 out. The monstrosity of the Mormon problem is, 
 that no penalty has been levied upon polygamy that 
 our Government seems able to enforce. The restless, 
 ever progressive, ever encroaching, native born and 
 rightfully dominant American citizen, is the power 
 that is slowly and surely crushing polygamy. He 
 has carried the home, the newspaper, the schools, 
 the arts and the traffic of the United States into 
 the heart of the Land of the Honey Bee, and noth 
 ing can stay their influence. Even a government 
 that is held in leash by a lobby of Mormon elders 
 who haunt Washington City like ghouls, and draw 
 unlimited amounts of gold from the toilers of Dese- 
 ret, is powerless to retard the work it should long 
 ago have fostered and prosecuted in its own name, 
 but which it has just begun. American women will 
 fail to grasp a great opportunity, and will be soul-
 
 150 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 lessly unrequiting for the homes over which they 
 reign secure and supreme, if they fail to assist in 
 bringing about the day when a man, born of woman, 
 will not dare to go to Washington aB a counselor of 
 the Nation and hesitate to make a record on the Mor 
 mon question. 
 
 Brother Barbold was one of the Saints who told 
 his wife, when he condescended to mention the mat 
 ter after meeting her on the street in company with 
 his intended plural wife, that the Church demanded 
 of him a plural marriage as proof of his loyalty. 
 
 It was expected, or at least it was required, that 
 the wife should make a show of rejoicing over this 
 event in her husband's career, which the husband 
 himself called a sacrifice, albeit was a sacrifice he 
 seemed usually ready to make when his superiors in 
 timated that it was time, and, indeed, for whose sug 
 gestion as to time he did not always wait. With the 
 contradictoriness born of a woman's pride, when the 
 announcement was made to Drusilla, in cold blood, 
 that her husband would take a plural wife, she raised 
 her head, and with a semblance of her former beauty 
 shining in her face, cast upon him a disdainful look. 
 Her eyes were fierce and bright, her lips so close 
 compressed that Barbold's careless look did not dis 
 cover they were blanched the ruby color he had 
 once admired all banished to the heart he had 
 wronged. 
 
 And when the day came that was to see the new 
 wife "sealed" to him, Drusilla walked with them to 
 the Endowment House in her best attire. It chanced
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 151 
 
 that Mark and Esther met them on the way, a pain 
 ful incident, no doubt, to the gay wedding party. 
 Barbold and the bride elect came together, and be 
 hind them walked Drusilla, the wife, and her mother, 
 Elizabeth. It is enough to tear a mother's heart 
 strings to imagine just what that mother's feelings 
 must have been. Hardened, bigoted, selfish though 
 she was, unless her very soul had left the body, her 
 retribution must have been great. It would have 
 broken any but an iron will. 
 
 Esther could only look at Drusilla iu passing and 
 try to express to her an atom of the womanly sym 
 pathy she felt. But Mark said Elizabeth's lips 
 moved convulsively, notwithstanding her effort to 
 hold them unflinchingly firm, and her rigid and un 
 compromising refusal to look either to the right or 
 to the left. Barbold's face flushed red for an instant 
 with honest shame, and the poor, thoughtless crea 
 ture at his side looked around with a gay toss of the 
 head already doomed to be so weary. 
 
 As soon as they had passed by Esther insisted 
 upon going to Elizabeth's house with the hope of 
 seeing her father, and as speedily as possible they 
 went to that part of the city. They knocked softly 
 that they might not too roughly disturb the invalid, 
 aud then loud and long, but no response greeted 
 them. Though they waited, and returned again, 
 the door remained closed and all was silent as the 
 grave. 
 
 " Could it be," said Esther, " that my poor father 
 would die, and I not know it? Would they be so
 
 152 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 cruel as to put him away and never tell me?" Mark 
 comforted her as he could, and resolved to come 
 again that evening after the wedding party had re 
 turned and learn the truth concerning Mr. Wain- 
 wright. 
 
 In the meantime young Barbold had led another 
 woman up the steps and into the door where, not 
 many months before, Elizabeth had proudly led the 
 way while he and Drusilla followed. It cannot be 
 truthfully said that he gloated over the misery he 
 knew he had brought upon his wife, but the not 
 unnatural satisfaction he felt in Elizabeth's discom 
 posure almost blotted out any thought his selfish 
 heart might have held for Drusilla. He had heard 
 Elizabeth plot and plan for her own preferment in 
 the councils of the Church through his elevation, 
 until he had acquired an appetite for some kind of 
 retaliation. Somewhat to his surprise he discovered 
 that he had found it when he told this zealous advo 
 cate of plural marriage that he was going to enter 
 into polygamy; that to her daughter he would bring 
 a helpmeet and friend to share her place as wife. 
 Not for worlds would Elizabeth have shown a quiv 
 ering lip and a dimmed eye to this brazen man, 
 whose few and coarse conditions of mind permitted 
 him only to rejoice in his own triumph and her 
 chagrin. Of her real suffering he had no concep 
 tion. Like a frame of iron Elizabeth moved through 
 the fatal door when they reached it, and as they 
 passed the portal she clutched Drusilla by the arm, 
 else she would have fallen. No one noticed it but
 
 ESTHER THE OENTILE. 153 
 
 the mother, and as they walked arm in arm through 
 the desolate passages and into the cursed apartment 
 where women are chained in the most degrading 
 slavery ever tolerated in an enlightened land, it was 
 supposed that filial and maternal affection drew to 
 gether in this hour of solemn duty this mother and 
 daughter in the Church of Zion. 
 
 On one side of the altar over which so many blas 
 phemous vows have been made, knelt Barbold; on 
 the other, Drusilla with her white face, her black 
 hair and her dry, shining eyes; beside her the woman 
 with the fair hair and the painted face, and eyes 
 which bespoke a soul that had as yet sounded only 
 the depths of a shallow vanity, a soul that happily 
 slept undreaming of the foundations and realities of 
 a woman's life. 
 
 Brigham Young performed the sacrificial cere 
 mony. 
 
 Addressing Drusilla, he said: 
 
 "Are you willing to give this woman to your hus 
 band to be his lawful wife for time and for all eter 
 nity? If you are, you will signify it by placing her 
 right hand in the right hand of your husband." 
 
 Drusilla lifted the waiting hand beside her own 
 and laid it in her husband's outstretched palm. A 
 noise like a death rattle sounded in her throat, but 
 no one heeded. All unmoved sat the priests and 
 elders whose presence gave sanction to this holocaust. 
 Why should they flinch at a woman's stifling gasp? 
 They had seen the part of the doomed Drusilla 
 played so often that their hearts were steeled. No
 
 154 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 woman's wail could ever again awaken in them a 
 man's response. 
 
 Again Elizabeth's supporting arm guided her 
 daughter, and, almost unnoticed, now that she had 
 bestowed the bride upon her husband according to 
 the rules of the Church, Drusilla was permitted to 
 escape ere she fainted on the floor. Then, like the 
 victims in the long procession that had preceded 
 her, she wended her way home, with only the arm 
 of a mother, against whom there raged a fierce fire 
 in her bosom, to lean upon. Had she been able to 
 walk alone she would have spurned even that sup 
 port, but her pride had burned out, and she could 
 not go alone.
 
 CHAPTER xvm. 
 
 eSTHER was so overcome with apprehension and 
 grief concerning her father that her husband 
 felt anxious for her life. He hurried home with her 
 and tried to calm her mind and allay her fears, so 
 that he could leave her while he returned to Eliza 
 beth's house to find out what had become of Mr. 
 Wainwright. Esther was at first quite determined 
 to go with him; she felt that she must know the 
 truth at once, and she feared to stay alone, but Mark 
 said he would not risk having her witness a possible 
 stormy interview between himself and Elizabeth, and 
 he would go alone. An old woman, once a Mormon* 
 but now a deserted wife, who supported herself by 
 doing odds and ends of work, and who had found a 
 good friend in Esther, lived near them, and Mark 
 brought her to keep his wife company and be to her 
 some slight protection until his return. Not that he 
 thought of any real danger to Esther, but he had al 
 ways a mysterious dread of leaving her even for an 
 hour, the place was so full of mysteries, as well as of 
 horrible realities. As soon as Esther was fully satis 
 fied that she could not accompany her husband she 
 was impatient for him to be off without her. Her 
 mind was filled with remorse for the things she imag 
 ined she might have done for her father, and any fur- 
 
 (155)
 
 156 ESTHER THE Q EN TILE. 
 
 ther delay in learning his real fate seemed intolerable 
 to her. So, with many fond farewells, Mark left her. 
 It was then about five o'clock in the afternoon, and 
 he said he would be back before it was dark, for the 
 night time had never lost its terrors for Esther, nor 
 indeed for any in that city who were familiar with 
 the far-reaching and stealthy arms of that monster, 
 Blood Atonement. It was like the slimy octopus, 
 deadly and hideous in its native element, though 
 powerless and intangible in the searching sunlight. 
 Esther well knew that its requirements could reach 
 her husband, though it was ostensibly for deserters 
 of the faith, and he was no sooner gone than she for 
 got all fears for herself and remembered the times 
 without number when she had begged him not to go 
 upon the streets after nightfall. To make the time 
 seem as short as possible, she drew a cup of tea and 
 set a dainty bit for her old companion, but this atten 
 tion had the effect of loosening a garrulous tongue 
 that rarely knew a kind listener, and the stories of 
 her former sufferings, and the scenes she had wit 
 nessed when she was "young and bonnie and not 
 long o'er fra auld Scotland," but doubled Esther's 
 fears, and she went often to the door to look for the 
 coming of her husband. By and by the light grew 
 dim and she strained her eyes through the gloom to 
 imagine she saw him beside every tree and at every 
 corner, only to be disappointed and go shivering back 
 to her fireside. Then even the mountains faded from 
 view, and slowly a thin gray cloud crept over the city 
 from their tops, the stars failed to pierce it, and be-
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 157 
 
 fore an hour of darkness had passed a quiet, weeping 
 rain began to fall. But for the old dame's restraining 
 hand Esther would have gone through the night to 
 seek her husband; she held her back and so fright 
 ened her at last with tales of horror that she dared 
 not even look out. Mark had made the woman 
 promise that whatever might betide him, she would 
 keep Esther at home and protect her with her life 
 until his return. One who did not know her history 
 might think her but poor protection for a young and 
 defenseless woman, but Mark knew and trusted her 
 not without cause. It was not merely her imagina 
 tion that enabled her to paint a lurking member of 
 the vigilance force at every door and gateway and 
 street corner, and to Esther's excited mind they 
 seemed a cordon of bloody giants whose ranks she 
 could no more pierce than she could escape them by 
 going either above or below the earth. She was 
 chained with terror when she would have gone 
 through any degree of rage of the elements to save 
 the man she loved. The hours wore away, as they 
 will even when human flesh and human hearts seem 
 unable to bear one moment more of suspense. Not 
 even the wind blew to break the awful stillness; 
 everything seemed black and dead. After nine 
 o'clock not a footfall was heard, the streets were 
 deserted of man and beast, and it seemed to Esther 
 that everybody, like herself, must be hiding from 
 the terrors of the darkness. 
 
 Pages could not tell the story of that night. It 
 were as well to say it all passed by. The expectant 
 11
 
 158 ESTIIER THE GENTILE. 
 
 hours of early evening; the midnight milestone, be 
 yond which it seemed to Esther she saw the black 
 ness of despair; the long hours between that turning 
 point and the darkest hour of all, just when the creep 
 ing light of day puts out the light of night all these 
 awful hours passed by in slow and solemn procession, 
 and yet he came not. 
 
 But with the first tinge of color in the eastern sky 
 came courage and hope to Esther's heart, and, casting 
 from her the restraining arm of her old friend, she 
 burst into the street and fled with winged feet toward 
 Elizabeth's house. A heavy shawl which the old 
 dame had wrapped about her in the night was drawn 
 over her head, and she looked like a gray ghost flee 
 ing from the betokened day. Faster and faster her 
 feverish strength carried her, until she reached the 
 door beyond which she was to learn the fate of both 
 husband and father. It was like opening the gates 
 of the valley of the shadow, and for an instant all 
 grew black before her straining eyes; but that was 
 no time to fail, the heart that had borne so much 
 whispered courage, and Esther grasped the old fa 
 miliar latch with a firm hand. It yielded quickly 
 indeed, it stood ajar as if for her to enter, or as if it, 
 too, had been opened often in the night by some one 
 who looked forth expectantly, or as if it had been 
 hurriedly left by some one who had escaped its fast 
 enings. Which was it? All these things flashed 
 through her mind as she crossed the threshold, and, 
 without pausing, hastened to her father's room. 
 
 There, also, the door stood unlatched for her en-
 
 ESTHER THE Q EN TILE. 159 
 
 trance, and when she pushed it noiselessly open two 
 pairs of eyes absorbed her as a vision from heaven, 
 two pairs of arms were stretched to embrace her; 
 but Mark motioned her to the saintly face upon the 
 pillow, from which beamed the effulgence of life even 
 through the pallor of death, the newly-awakened life 
 of the mind kindled by the expiring spark, and fanned 
 into radiance by the sound of the light step that had 
 just entered. 
 
 They were alone in the room, Mr. Wainwright and 
 Mark, the one on the pillow looking younger by a 
 score of years, and the other older by a decade, than 
 when Esther had beheld their faces last. 
 
 The feeble arms into which she sank closed round 
 her with the gentle pressure which alone their fast 
 departing strength could give, but in it she felt the 
 transport of a father's love and the benison of a pure 
 soul. 
 
 It was her husband who unclasped the tired arms 
 that lingered lovingly, even in death, around the 
 form of this sweet daughter, and laid them gently 
 upon the couch, from which they never more need 
 reach with hungry longing, for Esther had come. 
 They stood a moment, hand in hand, and gazed upon 
 the old man's peaceful countenance; then Mark said : 
 "It was of such a face that Jean Paul said, 'It is a 
 benediction for all mankind." 3 
 
 They covered it, and left him lying in that restful 
 sleep, while Mark took Esther to his heart, and tears 
 of joy rained from her burning eyes joy that she 
 had found him safe, and that she had met her father,
 
 160 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 the same loving father as of old, on the border land 
 of the great heyond, the region of hope and faith to 
 which he was so glad to go, and from which she 
 could not wish him back. 
 
 And then the story of the night was told, and 
 none disturbed their vigil, nor came to pay the trib 
 ute of a look to the old man. Mark had knocked at 
 the street door in the early evening, but no one an 
 swered him. Hearing loud noises within, he entered, 
 and appeared unannounced in Mr. Wainwright's 
 room, where Elizabeth and Barbold and an elder of 
 the Church were hovering around the bed on which 
 the victim lay, like vultures 'round their hopeless 
 prey. Barbold was trying to stiffen the lax fingers 
 to hold a pen, the elder stretched a legal paper 
 near, waiting to receive a signature which even they 
 could not ignore, while Elizabeth poured into the 
 patient but fast deafening ear a plea for the Church. 
 One little word, his name, she said, would give the 
 New Zion more than all his former gifts combined. 
 They had found more land, a neglected corner not 
 included in the deed by which his possessions had 
 been transferred to the Church. Surely he must re 
 member it; it lay across the highway from the old 
 homestead, and was rocky and barren; Barbold was 
 sure it belonged to Mr. "Wainwright; it had come to 
 him through his wife's family, this astute gentleman 
 presumed. 
 
 "Why it had not been thought of and claimed long 
 ago he could not now conceive, but he could tell very 
 well that it was coveted now because discoveries had
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 161 
 
 been made which gave assurance that its hidden 
 treasures were of great value, even richer than those 
 found on the old homestead, and confiscated by the 
 Mormon elders. 
 
 Whether the attempt to secure the transfer of this 
 newly-discovered prize from the dying man to the 
 Church was made because they thought he was past 
 finding out their real intentions and would yield un 
 resistingly to their directions, or whether they saw 
 in him a gleam of intelligence, and hoped to secure 
 the land beyond all question by persuading him to 
 will it to them in his right mind, Mark could not 
 tell, but he had not been in the room long when he 
 thought he detected a look of comprehension in the 
 old man's face, though he could see also the unmis 
 takable approach of the end. 
 
 The men and Elizabeth were all so intent upon se 
 curing Mr. Wainwright's signature that they had no 
 time to resent Mark's intrusion, and after a black 
 glance from the elder, and a dogged one from Bar- 
 bold, he had time to note that Elizabeth did not 
 pierce him with her gray eye as she had done at 
 their former meetings, and to discover also that 
 whenever she relaxed her efforts to make Mr. "Wain- 
 wright understand what was required of him a blow 
 from Barbold's gleaming eyes would have the effect 
 of redoubling her endeavors. 
 
 The elder finally asked him to leave the room and 
 wait in the outer chamber, and Barbold informed him 
 that they were in trouble, and that was no place for 
 a stranger; but Mark had come with a determined
 
 162 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 purpose this time, and he remained, watching the 
 face on the pillow for another gleam of light. It 
 came after a while, and Elizabeth plead more ear 
 nestly than before for the signature which would give 
 so much to Zion and its people. 
 
 Mark then stepped to the old man's side, took the 
 hand which Barbold dropped, as a man of his mould 
 would let go even the thing he most longed for on 
 earth at the approach of a brave spirit, and de 
 manded to know what they wanted, and why they 
 were persecuting, at death's door, the man they had 
 driven there before his time? Slowly the old man's 
 head turned on its pillow, and his white brows drew 
 together to concentrate his gaze upon the stranger. 
 The trio drew back a pace and gazed also. Slowly 
 he seemed to know, and a light shone through the 
 dimmed windows of his soul. He put forth his other 
 hand and clasped Mark's as a long lost child would 
 clasp a father's. After a little time he looked un 
 easily towards the waiting group, and said appeal- 
 ingly, " Tell them it is not mine, they will not believe 
 me. I have nothing more to give; they have it all, 
 and I am done with it/' 
 
 "What is it you want?" Mark demanded again. 
 
 "With a last hope of somehow securing his help, 
 Barbold came forward with the document he still 
 held in his hand, and which purported to bequeath 
 the stony field, and all other possible effects belong 
 ing to Mr. "Wainwright, to the Church of the Latter 
 Day Saints. 
 
 After looking at it a moment, Mark said: "Gen-
 
 ESTHER THE O EN TILE. 163 
 
 tlemen, you need trouble yourselves no more con 
 cerning this piece of laud; it does not belong to Mr. 
 Waiuwright, and never did, though it belongs now to 
 his daughter. It was bequeathed to her by Mr. 
 Blounce. It may interest you, Mr. Barbold, to know 
 that Ezekiel Blounce discovered the value of that 
 piece of land many years ago, and during one sum 
 mer vacation he made a journey to the West, where 
 the owner of it had gone, and purchased it. The 
 will he left when he died bequeathed it to my wife. 
 
 The baffled company of Mormons hesitated but a 
 moment upon the order of their going, and then left 
 Mark alone with the life flickering in its almost worn 
 out socket. It was not until the door had closed be 
 hind them, and the sound of their footsteps had died 
 away, that the old man whispered, "Esther," and 
 almost started up from his bed in his eagerness to 
 hear. " Safe and well," responded Mark. "I would 
 give a world if she were here. Can I go for her? 
 Can you wait? She will come instantly." 
 
 A look of horror spread over the old man's face 
 almost before the words were uttered. 
 
 "Don't leave me, don't leave me," he begged, and 
 turned a frightened look towards the door; "they 
 would never let you come near me again, nor Esther 
 either; I would die here alone with them." 
 
 "She will come, will she not?" he resumed pit- 
 eously after a moment; "oh, yes, surely she will come 
 now; stay with me and wait for her." The beseech 
 ing look upon his face, as much as the words he 
 spoke, urged Mark to consent to stay.
 
 164 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 Though he knew how much Esther would suffer 
 in his absence, he knew, too, that she would have 
 him stay by her father. It was doubtless true, that if 
 he left Mr. "Wainwright to fetch Esther, neither of 
 them would be admitted again, and the old man 
 would die friendless. It could not be long now, but 
 as Mark looked into the weary eyes of the old man 
 he determined to keep the spark in the body until 
 Esther would come, if that were possible. 
 
 He trusted her guardian to keep her through the 
 night, but he knew she would come with the morn 
 ing, and, though he suffered with her, and for her, 
 throughout the long watch, and would have gone to 
 her through almost insuperable dangers to himself, 
 for her sake, and her father's, he staid, cheering, 
 encouraging, promising the rich reward, the long 
 night through. And then she came, just in time to 
 hear the last fond farewell.
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 Y^LIAS WAIN WRIGHT was laid to rest in the old 
 ^>^ country churchyard in Pineborough township, 
 beside Esther's mother. His children's hands bore 
 him lovingly thither, far away from the scene of his 
 suffering, and of the slow fading out of the faculties 
 of suffering. No objection was made by any of his 
 persecutors to the removal of the empty clay, it was 
 worthless to them. They had taken all he had to 
 give, his money and his life; what could they want 
 more? 
 
 Much as she had borne for his sake, and great as 
 had been the cost of his delusion to her, Esther had 
 no resentful thoughts. She knew when she followed 
 the silent form to the old home, that it was the spirit 
 of a martyr that had gone before; and when she stood 
 beneath the trees that had sheltered them both in the 
 peaceful days of her childhood she knew that upon 
 that place, if upon any mundane spot, his spirit 
 looked down and cast a blessing. 
 
 Elizabeth's zeal long ago stung her to death. 
 
 Elder Bean, as a last means of grace, is generously 
 contributing to the Mormon lobby fund at Washing 
 ton. 
 
 Barbold is a shining light in the Church of the 
 Latter Day Saints. His father disinherited him, but 
 he has reaped rich harvests from the fields of the 
 
 (165)
 
 166 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 
 
 Land of the Honey Bee. Each of his several wives, 
 except the frail butterfly which his cruel breath soon 
 withered, has a mansion of her own, goodly and fair 
 to see externally, but black within as the ancient feu 
 dal dungeons whose prisoners were lowered into 
 them through narrow wells hundreds of feet deep, 
 and whose walls were solid rock, echoless, relentless. 
 Like those victims of old, nothing but death can free 
 them. The racks of torture, the binding corselet of 
 steel, the scourging and starvation of the body, were 
 slight punishments, as administered in those deep, 
 dark strongholds, compared with the anguish of soul 
 that is suffered by Mormon wives in the light of the 
 nineteenth century on free American soil. 
 
 Esther is the queen of a home that has never known 
 the blighting breath of doubt and fear. You will 
 not forget her, dear reader, for she is happy, and all 
 delight to know a happ}^ woman; but oh, ye men 
 and ye women, ye husbands and ye wives, ye fathers 
 and ye mothers, forget not the woman for whom she 
 prays the unhappy Drusilla, who yet wanders in 
 the streets of Salt Lake City, the Sodom of the Occi 
 dent, where the licentiousness that destroyed the 
 ancient city is practiced, not in defiance of the ac 
 knowledged laws of righteousness, but under the 
 cloak of Christianity and the protection of both 
 Government and priesthood. Outcast and yet en 
 slaved, hopeless, helpless, this first wife is alone in a 
 multitude of victims. The beauty that was born of 
 love long ago departed from her face; she is gaunt- 
 eyed and pale; and at her side totters a boy, a little
 
 ESTHER THE GENTILE. 167 
 
 child whose soul was fashioned by the infamy of the 
 Church of Latter Day Saints, and the cowardice of a 
 Government that failed to govern; a child in the tiny 
 chambers of whose heart contended revenge and hate 
 and outraged love ere yet he breathed the breath of 
 life. He looks up at his mother's disheveled locks 
 flying in the western wind and wonders whither she 
 is leading him. 
 
 Whither, indeed? 
 
 Is he being reared to curse another woman's life? 
 
 Where shall they find friends, this woman and this 
 child, if not in you, the guardians of the happy homes 
 of these brave United States?
 
 M 
 
 ^'wget.yai 
 
 W9R 
 
 i wm 
 
 University of California 
 
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