"Keep cool, Hickman Holt!" rejoined the Mormon, without moving from his seat--"keep cool! I expected this; but it's all bluster. 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' damnation!" 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 passed 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 pronounced 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, passed 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 passion 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." "What duty is't you mean?" "One I owe to society; and which I have perhaps sinfully neglected--_bring a murderer to justice_!" "Hush! Josh Stebbins--for Heaven's sake, speak low! _You know it isn't true_--but, hush! the gurls are 'thout. Don't let them hear sech talk!" "Perhaps," continued Stebbins, without heeding the interruption, "perhaps that murderer fancies he might escape. He is mistaken if he do. One word from me in Swampville, and the hounds of the law would be upon him; ay, and if he could even get clear of _them_, he could not escape out of my power. I have told you I am an Apostle of the great Mormon Church; and that man would be cunning indeed who could shun the vengeance of our Destroying Angels. Now, Hickman Holt, which is it to be? _yes or no_?" The pause was ominous for poor Marian. The answer decided her doom. It was delivered in a hoarse husky voice: "_Yes--yes--she may go_!" CHAPTER EIGHT. A SPLENDID PENSION.