He fell asleep at night usually with a mind full of confusion,—­infant baptism—­a slender figure in a pink dress or a blue—­the Trinity—­a firm little brown hand pointing the finger of admonition at him—­the regeneration of man—­hair, dark and lustrous, that fell often half away from what he called its “lashings”—­eternal punishment—­earnest eyes—­the Urim and Thummim,—­and a pleading, earnest voice.

He knew a few things definitely:  that Moroni, last of the Nephites, had hidden up unto the Lord the golden plates in the hill of Cumorah; and that the girl who taught him was in some mysterious way the embodiment of all the wonderful things he had ever thought he wanted, of all the strange beauties he had crudely pictured in lonely days along the trail.  Here was something he had supposed could come true only in a different world, the kind of world there was in the first book he had ever read, where there had seemed to be no one but good fairies and children that were uncommonly deserving.  Yet he had never been able to get clearly into his mind the nature and precise office of the Holy Ghost; nor had he ever become certain how he could bring this wonderful young woman in closer relationship with himself.  He felt that to put out his hand toward her—­except at certain great moments when he could help her over rough places and feel her golden weight upon his arm—­would be to startle her, and then all at once he would awaken from a dream to find her gone.  He thought he would feel very badly then, for probably he would never be able to get back into the same dream again.  So he was cautious, resolving to make the thing last until it came true of itself.

Once when they followed the stream down, in the late afternoon, he had mused himself so full of the wonder of her that he almost forgot his caution in an amiable impulse to let her share in his feelings.

“You know,” he began, “you’re like as if I had been trying to think of a word I wanted to say—­some fine, big word, a fancy one—­but I couldn’t think of it.  You know how you can’t think of the one you want sometimes, only nothing else will do in place of it, and then all at once, when you quit trying to think, it flashes over you.  You’re like that.  I never could think of you, but I just had to because I couldn’t get along without it, and then when I didn’t expect it you just happened along—­the word came along and said itself.”

Without speaking she had run ahead to pick the white and blue columbines and pink roses.  And he, alarmed at his boldness, fearing she would now be afraid of him, went forward with the deep purpose of showing her a light, careless mood, to convince her that he had meant nothing much.