What if she should come by another path while he was gone?  He waited nervously in the edge of the forest, watching, and listening for footsteps.  Each minute seemed like an hour marked into seconds by the solemn steady tolling of the bell, and after a little he found himself unconsciously measuring time by counting the strokes.  Then he went out into the path.  He followed it, step by step, until he could no longer see the light in the cabin; his pulse beat a little faster; he stared ahead into the deep gloom between the walls of forest—­and quickened his pace.  If Marion was coming to him he would meet her.  If she was not coming—­

In his old fearless way he promptly made up his mind.  He would go boldly to the cabin and tell her that Neil was waiting.  He felt sure that the alarm sounding from St. James had drawn away the guards and that there would be nothing to interfere with his plan.  If she had already left the cabin he would return quickly to Obadiah’s.  In his eagerness he began to run.  Once a sound stopped him—­the distant beating of galloping hoofs.  He heard the shout of a man, a reply farther away, the quick, excited yelping of a dog.  His blood danced as he thought of the gathering of the Mormon fighters, the men and boys racing down the black trails from the inland forests, the excitement in St. James.  As he ran on again he thought of Arbor Croche mustering the panting, vengeful defenders; of Strang, his great voice booming encouragement and promise, above the brazen thunder of the bell; he saw in fancy the frightened huddling groups of women and children and beyond and above all the coming of the “vengeance of God”—­a hundred beats, a thousand men—­and there went out from his soul if not from his lips a great cry of joy.  At the edge of the forest he stopped for a moment.  Over beyond the clearing a light burned dimly through the lilacs.  The sweet odor of the flowers came to him gently, persuasively, and nerved him into the open.  He passed across the open space swiftly and plunged into a tangle of bushes close to the lighted window.

He heard a man’s voice within, and then a woman’s.  Was it Marion?  Cautiously Nathaniel crept close to the log wall of the cabin.  He reached out, and hesitated.  Should he look—­as he had done at the king’s window?  The man’s voice came to him again, harsh and angry, and this time it was not a woman’s words that he heard but a woman’s sobbing cry.  He parted the bushes and a glare of light fell on his face.  The lamp was on a table and beside the table there sat a woman, her white head turned from him, her face buried in her hands.  She was an old woman and he knew that it was Marion’s mother.  He could not see the man.

Where was Marion?  He wormed himself back out of the bushes and walked quickly around the house.  There was no other light, no other sign of life except in that one room.  With sudden resolution he stepped to the door and knocked loudly.