"Kitty is. Oh, Mr. Jan, think of her sufferings! A journey like that
before her! All the way to that dreadful place! I have heard that even
strong women die on the road of the hardships."
Jan had stood with open mouth. "Is she mad?" he questioned.
"She has not been much better than mad since--since--But I don't wish to
go into family troubles. Can you give me Dr. West's address? She might
come back for him."
Now Jan had received positive commands from that wandering physician not
to give his address to chance applicants, the inmates of Chalk Cottage
having come in for a special interdiction. Therefore Jan could only
decline.
"He is moving about from one place to another," said Jan. "To-day in
Switzerland, to-morrow in France; the next day in the moon, for what we
can tell. You can give me a letter, and I'll try and get it conveyed to
him somehow."
Mrs. Baynton shook her head.
"It would be too late. I thought if I could telegraph to him, he might
have got to Liverpool in time to stop Kitty. There's a large migration
of Mormons to take place in a day or two, and they are collecting at
Liverpool."
"Go and stop her yourself," said Jan sensibly.
"She'd not come back for me," replied Mrs. Baynton, in a depressed tone.
"What with her delicate health, and what with her wilfulness, I have
always had trouble with her. Dr. West was the only one--But I can't
refer to those matters. Flore is broken-hearted. Poor Flore! she has
never given me an hour's grief in her life. Kitty has given me little
else. And now to go off with the Mormons!"
"Who has she gone with?"
"With the rest from Deerham. They have gone off in the night. That
Brother Jarrum and a company of about five-and-twenty, they say."
Jan could scarcely keep from exploding into laughter. Part of Deerham
gone off to join the Mormons! "Is it a fact?" cried he.
"It is a fact that they are gone," replied Mrs. Baynton. "She has been
out several times in an evening to hear that Brother Jarrum, and had
become infected with the Mormon doctrine. In spite of what I or Flore
could say, she would go to listen to the man, and she grew to believe
the foolish things he uttered. And you can't give me Dr. West's
address?"
"No, I can't," replied Jan. "And I see no good that it would be to you,
if I could. He could not get to Liverpool in time, from wherever he may
be, if the flight is to take place in a day or two."
"Perhaps not," sighed Mrs. Baynton. "I was unwilling to come, but it
seemed like a forlorn hope."
She let down her old crape veil as she went out at the door; and Jan,
all curious for particulars, went abroad to pick up anything he could
learn.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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