Now, having a little subdued the tossing storm-cloud of hair, she stood with one hand upon her hip and the other shading her eyes, looking intently into the streets of the new settlement.  And again there was bantering jest from the men about, and the ready, careless response from her, with gestures of an impishly reckless unconcern, of a full readiness to give and take in easy good-fellowship.  But then, in the very midst of a light response to one of the bantering men, her gray eyes met for the first time the very living look of the young Elder standing near.  She was at once confused, breaking off her speech with an awkward laugh, and looking down.  But, his eyes keeping steadily upon her, she, as if defiantly, returned his look for a fluttering second, trying to make her eyes survey him slowly from head to foot with her late cool carelessness; but she had to let them fall again, and he saw the colour come under the clear skin.

He knew by these tokens that he possessed a power over this splendid woman that none of the other men could wield,—­she had lowered her eyes to no other but him—­and all the man in him sang exultantly under the knowledge.  He greeted her father, the little Seumas Cavan of indomitable spirit, fresh, for all his march of a thousand miles, and he welcomed them both to Zion.  Again and again while he talked to them he caught quick glances from the wonderful eyes;—­glances of interest, of inquiry,—­now of half-hearted defiance, now of wondering submission.

The succeeding months had been a time of struggle with him—­a struggle to maintain his character of Elder after the Order of Melchisedek in the full gaze of those velvety gray eyes, and in the light of her reckless, full-lipped smile; to present to the temptress a shield of austere piety which her softest glances should not avail to melt.  For something in her manner told him that she divined all his weakness; that, if she acknowledged his power over her, she recognised her own power over him, a power equal to and justly balancing the other.  Even when he discoursed from the pulpit, his glance would fasten upon hers, as if there were but the one face before him instead of a thousand, and he knew that she mocked him in her heart; knew she divined there was that within him which strongly would have had her and himself far away—­alone.

Nor was the girl’s own mind all of a piece.  For, if she flaunted herself before him, as if with an impish resolve to be his undoing, there were still times when he awed her by his words of fire, and by his high, determined stand in some circle to which she knew she could never mount.  That night when he walked with her in the moonlight, she knew he had trembled on the edge of the gulf fixed so mysteriously between them.  She had even felt herself leaning over to draw him down with her own warm arms; and then all at once he had strangely moved away, widening this mysterious gulf that always separated them, leaving her solitary, hurt, and wondering.  She could not understand it.  Life called through them so strongly.  How could he breast the mighty rush?  And why, why must it be so?