Part 25 (1/2)
But, a few minutes after, coming into the hall, she hears: ”Wall, bishop, did Miss Ermie arrive all right? I saw her off in good style, and I've come down here, first to look after the mine, and then to consult ye on some church business. What a beautiful lamb of Zion your darter is!”
It is the voice of Kruger, the Mormon! And Miss Travenion grows pale as marble, for she knows that the Church of Latter-Day Saints has its eye on Tranyon, its bishop, and Erma, his daughter, last season's prize-beauty in New York society, and Newport's latest summer craze; but now regarded by the Prophet Brigham and his Council of Seventy, as one of the elect of Zion, whom G.o.d has given into their hands to save, or lose--to elect, or to cut off, even unto the atonement of blood.
CHAPTER XIII.
THE LOVE OF A BISHOP.
The very telegram Erma thinks may bring Harry Lawrence to her side, curiously enough keeps him from her.
It comes about in two little episodes--one of sorrow, one of joy.
On the day Miss Travenion left Salt Lake City, at eleven o'clock, the young man calls at the Townsend House, to keep the appointment Erma has made for him with her father. He comes up to the office of that hotel, rather light-hearted, considering his desperate straits financially. He is about to see the girl he loves--she who, in wild moments, since her generosity of yesterday, he thinks may have some interest in him; for otherwise why should she take such pains to have him see her father?
He asks lightly: ”Is Miss Travenion in?”
”Miss Travenion has gone,” says the clerk, a little curtly, for the sudden departure of the Livingstons has not altogether pleased the hotel office.
”And the Livingstons--” asks Lawrence, hurriedly.
”The whole party went to California this morning at five o'clock, on the Ogden train,” answers the youth behind the counter indifferently, for Mormon hotel clerks are quite often as careless as Gentile hotel clerks.
After a moment of blank astonishment, Harry suggests: ”Any letter for Captain Lawrence?”
”Yes,” replies the clerk, and hands him an envelope, the feminine handwriting on which he knows, and it gives back to him hope,--for one moment. Stepping aside a little, he opens it; and the sun, s.h.i.+ning so brilliantly this bright October day, goes out of the heavens--for him.
For he sees a lady's visiting card which looks like this:
[Ill.u.s.tration:
(handwritten at top of card: I have seen my father, Good bye)
_Miss Erma L. Travenion_
_18 Madison Square North_]
Crus.h.i.+ng the fragile pasteboard in his hand, his moustache twitches with pain, and he mutters bitterly: ”Oliver Livingston was right! My darling has seen her father; he wishes her to still wed that washed-out aristocrat!”
A minute after he thinks: ”She wished to bid me good-bye, also! Did she do it easily?” and inspects the card he has almost thrown away, to see if the handwriting shows emotion in its lines. Doing this, a little hope comes to him, for he sees a splash such as a tear-drop might make upon the delicate tint of the cardboard.
Putting the missive away reverently in his pocketbook, he meditates, and reason tells him he has lost her. It says to him, She is not of your cla.s.s and people. Her father wishes her to wed in her station, among the exclusives of Fifth Avenue and Murray Hill, and she obeys him. What are you that you should hope for her? If your mine was sold and you had nearly five hundred thousand dollars in your pocket, you might make an effort to win this b.u.t.terfly, who has come into your mannish frontier life to make it brilliant for a day or two. You were happy before you saw her; be so without her!
To this he cries, resolution fighting against conviction and common sense: ”No more joy for me without her! I'll win her yet!” and goes on his way to see his lawyers about getting the injunction on his mine removed.
But his attorneys, Messrs. Parshall & Garter, do not give him very much hope of immediate success, and common sense is a very hard party to down in argument; consequently Harry Lawrence makes a very sombre day of it, and a more sombre night.
Two days after, however, cometh joy. He is in his lawyers' offices, trying to think if any one in this wide world will go on his bond to raise the injunction that paralyzes him financially, when Garter comes excitedly in, and slapping him on the back, cries enthusiastically: ”Here's luck for Harry Lawrence. I've just received a stipulation from Judge Smith, Zion's Co-operative Mining Co.'s attorney, agreeing to raise your injunction!”
”Impossible!”