The old man looked up from his Bible as his son entered.

“It’s sore sad, laddie, we can’t have the temple for your sealing-vows.”

“Prudence will not be sealed to me, father.”  He spoke dazedly, as if another like the morning’s blow had been dealt him.  “I—­I am already sealed to the Spirit for time and eternity.”

“Was it Prudence’s doings?” asked his mother, quickly.

“Yes; she has left the church with her people.”

The long-faced, narrow-browed old man raised one hand solemnly.

“Then let her be banished from Israel and not numbered in the books of the offspring of Abraham!  And let her be delivered over to the buffetings of Satan in the flesh!”

CHAPTER V.

Giles Rae Beautifies His Inheritance

By eight o’clock the next morning, out under a cloudy sky, the Raes were ready and eager for their start to the new Jerusalem.  Even the sick woman’s face wore a kind of soft and faded radiance in the excitement of going.  On her mattress, she had been tenderly installed in one of the two covered wagons that carried their household goods.  The wagon in which she lay was to be taken across the river by Seth Wright,—­for the moment no Wild Ram of the Mountains, but a soft-cooing dove of peace.  Permission had been granted him by Brockman to recross the river on some needful errands; and, having once proved the extreme sensitiveness, not to say irritability, of those in temporary command, he was now resolved to give as little eclat as possible to certain superior aspects of his own sanctity.  He spoke low and deferentially, and his mien was that of a modest, retiring man who secretly thought ill of himself.

He mounted the wagon in which the sick woman lay, sat well back under the bowed cover, clucked low to the horses, and drove off toward the ferry.  If discreet behaviour on his part could ensure it there would be no conflict provoked with superior numbers; with numbers, moreover, composed of violent-tempered and unprincipled persecutors who were already acting with but the merest shadow of legal authority.

On the seat of the second wagon, whip in hand, was perched Giles Rae, his coat buttoned warmly to the chin.  He was slight and feeble to the eye, yet he had been fired to new life by the certainty that now they were to leave the territory of the persecuting Gentiles for a land to be the Saints’ very own.  His son stood at the wheel, giving him final directions.  At the gate was Prudence Corson, gowned for travel, reticule in hand, her prettiness shadowed, under the scoop of her bonnet, the toe of one trim little boot meditatively rolling a pebble over the ground.

“Drive slowly, Daddy.  Likely I shall overtake you before you reach the ferry.  I want but a word yet with Prudence; though”—­he glanced over at the bowed head of the girl—­“no matter if I linger a little, since Brother Seth will cross first and we must wait until the boat comes back.  Some of our people will be at the ferry to look after you,—­and be careful to have no words with any of the mob—­no matter what insult they may offer.  You’re feeling strong, aren’t you?”