Part 32 (1/2)

Leaving word that she would receive the money on her return or else call at Smith's office for it when she was ready, she went down into the cheerful noise of the street and bargained with a man who had horses and vehicles for hire. Having arranged that he should come for her at noon, she went about to make the few farewells she felt to be desirable.

Darling was now postmaster of Nauvoo and one of the first presidency. To him she went first. She shrank from him because of his coa.r.s.eness and the jocular admiration which he sometimes had the audacity to express for her, but she could not forget how a.s.siduous his kindness had been in the days of Elvira's illness. She found him sitting, his heels on the upper part of a chimney-piece with a fireless grate, reading the Millenial Star. The hot April sun, streaming through the windows of his office, had caused him to take off his coat, which was no longer thread-bare. His s.h.i.+rt sleeves were fine enough and white; the high hat that was pushed far on the back of his head was highly polished.

Opulence, self-indulgence, good-nature, and a certain element of fanatical fire mingled in the atmosphere of the postmaster's office, and made it somewhat turgid.

When Darling heard Susannah's errand he became serious enough. An apoplectic sort of breathlessness came over him, expressing a degree of interest which she could not understand. He settled his hat more firmly upon his head. ”Does the prophet know?”

”He knows. I have said good-bye to him and to Mrs. Smith. It is sad to part with friends that I have known for so many years.”

”And the prophet's going to let you go, is he?”

Darling, clumsy at all times, in this speech conveyed to Susannah the first faint suspicion that Smith might dream of detaining her by force.

Darling's youngest daughter, who had been an affectionate pupil to Susannah at Quincy, waylaid her as she came out, and clasped her about the waist with the ardour of an indulged child. She was a blithesome girl of about fourteen.

”I heard you tell father that you are going away. Is it true?” she asked impetuously.

Susannah tried to release herself from the embrace. ”Yes, it is true.

Never mind, you like your new teacher, you know, just as well as you used to like me.”

”I just guess I don't,” cried the child defiantly. ”But anyhow, if you are going away, I'm going to tell you something.”

Whether the childish love of telling a secret, the girlish love of mischief, or a dawning sense of womanly responsibility was uppermost, it would be hard to tell. There, in the open square, while worthy Saints hurried to and fro on the pavement beside them, while horses jangled their harness and drivers shouted and exchanged their morning greetings, Darling's youngest daughter drew Susannah's head downward and hastily whispered to her the fate of her letters to Ephraim Croom.

”I know, for one day since we came here I heard father talking to the prophet. He said you'd written lately while you were at Quincy, and all your letters had been burned. Now that's the truth; and I said to myself 'twas a sin and a shame, and that you ought to know. Now don't go and tell tales of me, or father will be mad--at least, as mad as he ever can be with _me_.” A toss of the pretty head accompanied these words, a flash of conscious power in the bright eyes, the spoilt child knowing that her father was in her toils now, as truly as any future lover would ever be. The school bell was ringing. The girl, her bag of books hanging from her arm, ran with the crowd of belated children.

Susannah walked on, almost stunned at first by the throb of intense anger that came with this surprise. Then the anger was suddenly superseded, hidden and crushed down by a rush of joy. Ephraim had not neglected her; Ephraim had given her up for dead; but she had no reason to suppose that he was dead, no reason to doubt his faithfulness.

Susannah trod the common street in love with motion as some happy woodland creature treads the dells in the hour of dawn and spring.

When Elvira looked up to see Susannah enter her gate she saw her friend transfigured in a glow of returning youth and hope. Elvira looked at her timidly; this Susannah she had never seen before. Elvira's husband was not present. The interior of the house was fantastic almost as its mistress, but sultry with luxury.

”Well now, you think you are going,” said Elvira. ”Who'd have thought it? And only last week General Bennet said to the prophet that if he'd marry you to him he'd send to New York for diamonds both for you and Emma Smith. He said he'd get a thousand dollars' worth of diamonds apiece for each of you; but Mr. Darling said that you ought to be married to Mr. Heber, who has just been elected an apostle, because--”

She stopped suddenly, nodding her head. ”You know why--blood is blood, and we have seen it run in rivers, but we don't mention it here in Nauvoo.”

Elvira set the French heel of her slipper in the centre of a rose upon her carpet and spun round upon it till her flounces stood out.

”We don't mention it here in Nauvoo.”

She sang as if it were the refrain to a song.

Susannah felt from within her s.h.i.+eld of new delight an immense pity.

Here again was a revelation of the coa.r.s.e and frivolous talk that went on at the church meetings, and Elvira was privy to it through that old fool, her husband. How could she endure him!

”O Elvira, in the last few days I have realised as I did not before that riches are making fools of these men. How glad I am that my husband died before he knew that this was to be the reward of his lifework and his prayers!”

Elvira stopped dancing. The mystical side of her character now, as ever, came forward suddenly in the midst of her other interests. The suns.h.i.+ne was bright in the gaudy room. A tiny spaniel, which Elvira's senile slave had procured for her, lay on a red cus.h.i.+on in its full beam, looking more like a toy than a living thing. When Elvira stopped dancing her flounces settled themselves with an audible rustle, and her thin delicately-cut face looked at Susannah from out its frame of curled hair and gold ornaments like the face of a spirit imprisoned in some unseemly place.

”Heaven help us, Susannah,” she cried shrilly, ”if you call Nauvoo the reward of Angel's prayers. Look!” she cried, pointing out of the window, ”see how the new temple rises; how its white walls s.h.i.+ne in the sun! We are putting thousands upon thousands of dollars into it. It will be the grandest building this side of the Alleghany mountains.” She let her small jewelled hand, with its pointing finger, fall suddenly, ”and there shall not be left one stone of it upon another, for the House of G.o.d is not made with hands.”

”I see little signs of its foundations here.” Susannah spoke with fire.