Part 4 (2/2)
”Ay, yours; and I must have it. Look here, Hickman Holt! Listen to me!
We're making too long a talk about this business; and I have no time to waste in words. I have made everything ready; and shall leave for the Salt Lake before three more days have pa.s.sed over my head. The caravan I'm going with is to start from Fort Smith on the Arkansas; and it'll be prepared by the time I get there, to move over the plains. I've bought me a team and a waggon. It's already loaded and packed; and there's a corner in it left expressly for your daughter: therefore, she must go.”
The tone of the speaker had suddenly changed, from that of saintly insinuation, to bold open menace. The squatter, notwithstanding his fierce and formidable aspect, did not dare to reply in the same strain.
He was evidently cowed, and suffering under some fearful apprehension.
”_Must_ go!” he muttered, half involuntarily, as if echoing the other's words. ”Yes, _must_ and _shall_!”
”I tell ye, Josh Stebbins, she'll niver consent.”
”And I tell you, Hickman Holt, I don't want her consent. That I leave _you_ to obtain; and if you can't get it otherwise, you must _force_ it.
Bah! what is it for? A good husband--a good home--plenty of meat, drink, and dress: for don't you get it into your fancy that the Latter-Day Saints resemble your canting hypocrites of other creeds, who think they please G.o.d by their miserable penances. Quite the reverse, I can a.s.sure you. We mean to live as G.o.d intended men should live--eat, drink, and be merry. Look there!” The speaker exhibited a handful of s.h.i.+ning gold pieces. ”That's the way our church provides for its apostles. Your daughter will be a thousand times better off there, than in this wretched hovel. Perhaps _she_ will not mind the change so much as _you_ appear to think. I know many a first-rate girl that would be glad of the chance.”
”I know _she_ won't give in--far less to be made a Mormon o'. I've heern her speak agin 'em.”
”I say again, she must give in. After all, you needn't tell her I'm a Mormon: she needn't know anything about _that_. Let her think I'm only moving out west--to Oregon--where there are plenty of respectable emigrants now going. She'll not suspect anything in that. Once out at Salt Lake City, she'll soon get reconciled to Mormon life, I guess.”
The squatter remained silent for some moments--his head hanging forward over his broad breast--his eyes turned inward, as if searching within his bosom for some thought to guide and direct him. In there, no doubt, a terrible struggle was going on--a tumult of mixed emotions. He loved his daughter, and would leave her to her own will; but he feared this saintly suitor, and dared not gainsay him. It must have been some dread secret, or fiendish scheme, that enabled this small insignificant man to sway the will of such a giant!
A considerable time pa.s.sed, and still the squatter vouchsafed no answer.
He was evidently wavering, as to the nature of the response he should make.
Twice or thrice he raised his head, stealthily directing his glance to the countenance of his visitor; but only to read, in the looks of the latter, a fixed and implacable purpose. There was no mercy there.
All at once, a change came over the colossus. A resolution of resistance had arisen within him--as was evinced by his altered att.i.tude and the darkening shadow upon his countenance. The triumphant glances of the pseudo-saint appeared to have provoked him, more than the matter in dispute. Like the buffalo of the plains stung with Indian arrows, or the great _mysticetus_ of the deep goaded by the harpoon of the whaler, all the angry energies of his nature appeared suddenly aroused from their lethargy; and he sprang to his feet, towering erect in the presence of his tormentor. ”d.a.m.nation!” cried he, striking the floor with his heavy heel, ”she won't do it--she won't, and she _shan't_!”
”Keep cool, Hickman Holt!” rejoined the Mormon, without moving from his seat--”keep cool! I expected this; but it's all bl.u.s.ter. I tell you she will, and she _shall_!”
”Hev a care, Josh Stebbins! Hev a care what yur about! Ye don't know what you may drive me to--”
”But I know what I may _lead_ you to,” interrupted the other with a sneering smile.
”What?” involuntarily inquired Holt.
”The gallows,” laconically answered Stebbins.
”Devils an' d.a.m.nation!” This emphatic rejoinder was accompanied with a furious grinding of teeth, but with a certain recoiling--as if the angry spirit of the giant could still be stayed by such a menace.
”It's no use swearing about it, Holt,” continued the Mormon, after a certain time had pa.s.sed in silence. ”_My_ mind's made up--the girl must go with me. Say _yes_ or _no_. If yes, then all's well--well for your daughter, and well for you too. I shall be out of your way--Salt Lake's a long distance off--and it's _not likely you'll ever set eyes on me again_. You understand me?”
The saint p.r.o.nounced these last words with a significant emphasis; and then paused, as if to let them have their full weight. They appeared to produce an effect. On hearing them, a gleam, like a sudden flash of sunlight, pa.s.sed over the countenance of the squatter. It appeared the outward index of some consolatory thought freshly conceived; and its continuance proved that it was influencing him to take a different view of the Mormon's proposal. He spoke at length; but no longer in the tone of rage--for his pa.s.sion seemed to have subsided, as speedily as it had sprung up.
”An' s'pose I say _no_?”
”Why, in that case, I shall not start so soon as I had intended. I shall stay in the settlements till I have performed a duty that, for a long time, I have left undone.”
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