“Hush!” said Jerry softly and bursting into tears. “She is dying.”
“And the girl?”
“Has fled.”
Hagar, after leaving Castle Adamant, wandered about the streets for a time entirely bewildered and oppressed by the wildest apprehensions. That quarter of the city was pervaded by the silence of Sunday. The air was cold, and the streets were comparatively deserted. She was alarmed by the fact that several men who passed her stopped and eyed her strangely, and hastened her pace with a vague idea of getting as far as possible from the ill-omened house where Ida had said all the inmates were “Hagars.” The name now had in it some fearful meaning, and the thought that they might pursue and capture her thrilled her with terror. She rushed along, not daring to look back lest she should see them coming.
Her first impulse was to go to Mrs. Green’s house, on Vine Street, to which Lamont had taken her when they arrived at Cincinnati. But suppose the people of the Castle should come there in search of her? No, the risk was too great. She must go there to get her effects but she would wait until to-morrow, and then, perhaps, she might take the train to Cleveland and seek forgiveness from Dr. Taine and the mistress of Chestnut Grove.
Lamont had kept her in ignorance of Dr. Taine’s death. She had written to him several times—once after she came to Cincinnati; but it suited her betrayer’s purpose not to send the letters, and he had destroyed them.
At length, dazed by her strange surroundings and well-nigh distracted by a sense of her desperate predicament, the words of the officer who arrested Lamont occurred to her:—“You may hear something to your advantage at the City Hall.”
By dint of persistently enquiring her way she finally found the City Hall. The place was silent and deserted, but she went slowly up the stone steps and was about to knock when the janitor opened the door.
In answer to her question he told her to call at ten o’clock next day, and she turned away more downcast than ever. Aimlessly she continued her wanderings, ignorant and indifferent as to where she was or whither her steps might lead. Her mental state was fast approaching that phase of melancholy which immediately precedes self-murder.
Towards evening she found herself in a quarter of the metropolis which, by its squalid and unwholesome aspect spoke of the pinching poverty and degradation of its inhabitants, and told by signs of awful significance, that even the most civilized part of the community was but one step removed from barbarism. Hagar instinctively felt that here she would be safe, as the denizens of the villa district would never think to seek her among the wretched and obscure. Her meditations now began to take a practical turn: Here she would find only people who worked hard for their daily bread. Her purse was almost empty. By her own act she had lost the friends who had loved her, and with whom she might always have had a home. What was to prevent her from earning a living by the work of her hands? Now and then, as she went along she heard the voice of some humble housewife singing merrily, and a bevy of factory girls who passed her were a picture of mirth and contentment.
Yes, she would exchange the clothes she had for some like those they wore, and, finding a lodging in their midst would hide herself and her sorrow in one of the neighboring factories.
A little further on she saw a group of women talking and laughing at the gate of a large manufactory. She accosted them on the pretense of inquiring her way, and when she said something about looking for work, some of them giggled, eyed her from head to foot, and made a sneering remark about “hunting work on Sunday.” One of the forewomen seeing her embarrassment and the tearful evidence of her distress, stepped forward, rebuked the girls, and said kindly:—
“You have met with misfortune? Come in, and I will help you if I can.”
Hagar was led into a neat little room which served as the forewoman’s parlor and bedroom. The latter introduced herself as “Miss Dayton” and explained that most of the regular hands were boarded and lodged at the factory by their employers.
“Davis and Jones,” said Miss Dayton, “are contractors for army clothing and are very kind to the employees who are earning a fortune for them: If you know how to run a sewing machine, or could learn quickly, you can make good wages here, and I can get lodgings for you with my married sister, Mrs. Johnson, who lives near by.”
She asked no impertinent questions, and Hagar gave the brief explanation that she had lately lost her husband, and should be in absolute want unless she heard from her people. She said her name was “Mrs. Smiles,” but Miss Dayton who was a little hard of hearing, thought she said “Miles.” Hagar offered no correction, and was so introduced to Mrs. Johnson, whose lodger she became.
Her first night’s experience in the realm of squalor was far from encouraging. Mrs. Johnson, in the kindness of her heart, got out her whitest sheets and pillow-slips and did her best to make the stranger comfortable. But just as Hagar was falling into a doze at midnight, Mr. Johnson came home from his regular Sunday pleasures, and made the rest of the night hideous by boisterous songs and a quarrel with his wife. The partitions of the old frame house were thin, and when the inebriate’s wife begged him to be quiet on account of a young lady lodger in the spare room, Hagar heard him say:
“Well, well, got a lodger, eh? And a lady lodger at that? Well, I’ll just go up and see what she’s like”....
Mrs. Johnson prevented him only with great difficulty, and poor Hagar lay trembling with terror until near daybreak, when the drunken wretch became quiet. Then she fell asleep from sheer exhaustion and was not awakened until ten o’clock when Mrs. Johnson came to her with some tea and toast and many tearful apologies.
Hagar went to the City Hall directly after breakfast. She did not see Mr. Johnson. His wife assured her, however, that he would not be intoxicated again before Sunday.
The Mayor was not in, but his clerk handed her a letter that had come in His Honor’s care. She recognized the hand-writing as Josephine’s, and took a cab that she might read it on her way to Vine Street. From it she received the news of Doctor Taine’s death. She gave way to an ecstacy of grief, but was spared the knowledge that his death was directly due to her conduct. Josephine referred to it as if supposing that Hagar already knew the details, and in the same connection informed her that Mrs. Taine had gone to Boston for her health leaving Chestnut Grove in charge of the servants, and had given out that she would spend the summer abroad. Josephine expressed the warmest friendship and keenest sympathy for Hagar, and, in conclusion said: “I am coming to Cincinnati as soon as I can make my preparations, to help with nursing the sick and wounded soldiers in the hospital there. If you will communicate with me, my dear Hagar, and let me know where to find you, we might live and work together and comfort each other in these awful times. When this strife is ended we may be alone indeed. The last accounts I saw of our friends at the front were sad enough: My dear husband had been wounded in the arm, James Taine was hurt by the fall of a horse that was shot under him, and poor Mark Kilbourne, a noble and gallant fellow, was among the dead. He fell at Philip’s side while doing his duty like the brave man he was.” Urging her to write soon and not to be cast down by the cruel wrong that had been done her, the letter closed with the hope that the friends might soon meet in Cincinnati.
“Yes,” she said, communing with herself, “Josephine is sincere; I can trust her. And yet, since I have brought this sorrow upon myself why should I look to my former friends for comfort? Why do I not rely on myself now as I did when I took the fatal step that hurled me into this abyss of wretchedness? No, no; I will not let them see me; I will not tell them where I am or what I am, but hide myself with the anguish I have purchased by my folly.”
She was in the midst of this dreary train of thought when the carriage stopped, and the driver opened the door.
“This is the house, mum; see that brass plate beside the door: Mrs. Green, Board and Lodging.”
Hagar recognized the entrance, but if she had felt any doubt it would have been removed by the apparition of the Irish chamber-maid who was outside sweeping the steps.
She alighted, paid the fare, and then accosted Biddy.
“Your mistress has heard what happened and prevented our return, has she not?”
“Yis, honey,” replied Biddy, looking with a mild stare into the young girl’s face. “But shure,” she continued in a whisper, detaining Hagar at the door, “the divils afther us all! what’s comin’ now, I declare!”
Thinking that she referred to the arrest of Mr. Smiles, Hagar merely said in an evasive tone; “Nothing must astonish us, Biddy. The enemy may be right here in this city soon, for aught we know.”
“Indade, honey, she’s here already, she’s come wid ’er childer, honey dear, an’ she’s not an hour in the house.”
But Hagar went in quickly without waiting to hear Biddy’s remark. Meeting nobody in the hall, she hurried up stairs, and, on entering the apartment that had been her own, found herself confronted by a bright, golden haired little girl who ran away calling:
“Ma’ma, ma’ma, here’s a lady.”
Hagar was stunned and confused. Could this be the rich and handsome wife of Lamont, and her children, of whom Ida had spoken? She had but a moment for conjecture, for quickly answering the child’s alarm, Mrs. Lamont came in from the adjoining room.
“I did not hear you knock,” she said, eyeing Hagar suspiciously.
“No,” the latter replied, with a marked tremor in her voice, “this was my apartment, and I was not aware it had been let to another. I beg your pardon—” Hagar had become deadly pale and was now greatly abashed and agitated in the presence of the woman she felt to be her enemy. She was unable to speak another word, and was retreating slowly towards the door.
“Are you the woman, then, who came here with Charles Lamont,—with my husband?” demanded Mrs. Lamont fiercely—“Speak, I say! are you the she-devil who has robbed me of my husband?”
A little boy, younger than the girl, had come from the bed-room with his mother, and both began to cry piteously. Dismayed by this strange and unexpected encounter, Hagar could scarcely find voice to speak, but her alarm at the menacing aspect of her antagonist enabled her to say faintly:
“No—you are mistaken, madam; I came with my husband, and that was not his name.”’
A negro woman, Mrs. Lamont’s servant, came in.
“Take the children into the bed-room, Dinah, and shut the door,” said her mistress.
Dinah glanced at the visitor, and obeyed. Hagar would have made her escape, but the sense of danger which had at first transfixed her, was now giving place to a different feeling:—she was prepared, if need be, to set her betrayer’s wife at defiance.
“Do not think to deceive me, wretch, cried the Southern lady, fiercely; if it were not for my children, I’d kill you.”
She rushed towards Hagar furiously as if to strike her, but the latter stood her ground without moving a muscle, and gazed at her scornfully.
“That would be a smaller wrong,” said Hagar calmly, “than your husband has done me. Do not blame me, madam, nor seek to avenge yourself by hurting me; but go for satisfaction to the villain who has cruelly injured you, and ruined me!”
“Begone, woman, or I shall do you harm!” shrieked Mrs. Lamont, “ Begone, begone, I say! I’ll kill you!”
Dinah having heard the excited voice of her mistress, came into the room again just in time to prevent a tragedy. She seized Mrs. Lamont and held her, saying quickly to Hagar:
“For de Lord’s sake, go, young lady, go afore it’s too late!”
Hagar turned abstractedly, and left the room. Mrs. Lamont sank into a chair sobbing hysterically.
It had been a terrible morning for Hagar, and she felt grateful as she waited in Mrs. Green’s parlor down stairs, that she had escaped unhurt. She had a few minutes to compose herself before the landlady came in, and spent them thinking of the sad case of Mrs. Lamont. For the moment, the wrong done herself by the same man who had deceived and outraged his wife and children, seemed as nothing by comparison. What was her life now, or that of her pretty children, but a miserable existence of doubt and apprehension? The innocent babes already began to partake of their mother’s despair.
When the landlady appeared Hagar rallied her energies and asked for the small portmanteau and hand-bag she had brought from Chestnut Grove. They contained only articles that were her own before she left home. She did not ask for a large trunk of wearing apparel that Lamont had bought for her with Mrs. Taine’s money, in Canada. Mrs. Green was not over-civil, but said she would try to obtain the articles named by the next day, when Hagar might send for them if she liked.
“There’s a letter here for you that was left with Biddy the night you went away,” said Mrs. Green, fishing the letter out of a tall vase of common china on the mantle-piece.
Hagar saw at once that it was in Lamont’s handwriting, and her heart leaped, she scarcely knew whether with hope or dread. She quickly tore it open, and with a sudden “excuse me” to the landlady, read the missive.
“Dearest Kitty,” it ran, “the game’s up, and you are entirely free, so far as I am concerned, to follow the bent of your own genius. You are doubtless aware that your marriage with me at Hamilton was simply a farce? I needed diversion while laboring in Ohio, and you must confess that it was hardly my fault that you left your home clandestinely at three o’clock on a bitter winter’s morning. You remember, I warned you. Girls are sweet but foolish little things! Or, is it rather their wisdom that makes them seek such adventures? The presentation this evening to Lady Clare Adamant, will give you the entree to the world of fashion. As dear Mrs. Taine said in one of her last letters to me, you were certainly very lucky to have fallen into such good hands. Au revoir, Sweet Kitty! I must be off at once to the Sunny South, where my wife and children are awaiting me.
Your devoted,
BENJ. T.”
So intense was her anguish that it was only by a determined effort that she stifled the cry of agony that rose to her lips.
“Bad news?” Asked Mrs. Green, with a malicious twinkle in her eyes.
“Yes,” replied Hagar, “very bad. My father is dead!” With this she gave way to the paroxysm she could no longer suppress, and tearing the letter in pieces cast it from her.
After she had gone, Mrs. Green gathered up the pieces and put them together for the diversion of her lodgers, and among the first to whom it was shown, was Mrs. Lamont.
Late that night a negro was admitted to Mrs. Green’s house, who was met in the hall by Dinah, and shown to Mrs. Lamont’s apartment.
She had been awaiting his arrival for some time, and sat, as pale as a statue, before the dying embers on the hearth.
The man who was tall and well dressed, approached her with marked deference.
“Well, Colt?” said she, interrogatively, her voice sounding faint and husky.
“I saw the Colonel, Madam, and he sent this letter, which, he requested that you would please read before asking me any questions.”
She took the note, opened and read it, and threw it upon the embers, where it slowly smouldered until it was reduced to carbon flakes.
“They are not going to hang him, then,” she said, sighing heavily, and leaning forward with her face between her hands.
“No, madam; he has been exchanged in accordance with the terms of the new convention just signed by the Governments of Richmond and Washington, and will start for Memphis in the morning by steamer. The exchange will actually take place at Vicksburg, so that he will be in the hands of the Union authorities for some little time yet.”
“Very well, Colt; that will do. But stay; did you ask Colonel Lamont if he thought our troops were likely to capture this city?”
“I did, madam, and he said it was not at all unlikely. The tables are to be turned on the North by a concerted invasion by all the confederate armies, and Cincinnati will probably be one of the first cities taken.”
“Then we may as well remain here. I shall never return to New Orleans while that cochon Butler is there, unless it be to see him hanged, the robber! You may go now, Colt; I will decide on something in a few days.”
The negro withdrew, and Dinah was shortly after dismissed for the night.
Mrs. Lamont sat musing for a while. “Yes, it is true that the reports I have seen were in Northern papers, as he says:—and they may have falsified the facts, or this woman may have been a Yankee emissary especially deputed to ruin him in my opinion and in that of the South. He loves me and is the soul of honor; I know it! But what of all these appearances? What of this woman’s coming here to-day, the elopement from Cleveland, the sudden death of the old father? It may have been another man!—yes another man commits the crime and he is charged with it to shield the Yankee! But his arrest in company with the woman in a house like that! Conclusive, if true, but easily to be conceived as a telling chapter in the invention. But worst of all the sore misgiving in my heart!”
“Oh, God,” she cried, falling on her knees, and clasping her hands wildly, “help me to endure these torturing suspicions, or in Thy mercy, show me they are baseless!” She wept aloud for several minutes, but was startled by the approach of a small figure in a white night gown which clasped its arms around her neck and said:
“Oh Ma’ma, dear, please don’t cry any more! Come to bed; papa will soon come. It frightens Charlie and me to hear you cry so. Come Ma’ma, come.”
Spencer had given up all hope of seeing Hagar again since his plans for her rescue were knocked in the head by the sudden death of Madame Adamanti and the breaking up of her house. The fact that Dr. Bruce became Hope Vincent’s executor had been made public through the press, but every other detail was rigidly concealed by the doctor, to shield the young girl he was endeavoring to save and benefit. Spencer had therefore very naturally concluded that Hagar had either gone back to her home at Cleveland, or followed the fortunes of the denizens of Castle Adamant. In either case she had passed out of his life, as he supposed, and only recurred to him now as a sad memory.
What was his astonishment one Sunday, after a meeting at the factory, on going with Miss Dayton to call on her sister, to meet Hagar face to face on the threshold of Mrs. Johnson’s house! She was going out for a walk, and would doubtless have passed on without noticing him had he not raised his hat, and exclaimed in a tone of wonder:
“Miss Taine!”
Hagar bowed her head and hesitated, uncertain what to do or say.
“Mrs. Miles, Mr. Spencer,” said Miss Dayton, promptly introducing them. She had not understood his exclamation, and he accepted the introduction with as good grace as he could, to save Hagar from embarrassment. The latter continued on her way after a few words with Miss Dayton, and, as soon as she was in the street, Spencer said hastily to his companion:—
“I have met that young lady before, Miss Dayton, and must speak with her now before I lose sight of her.”
“She lives here with my sister. She’s a hand at the factory, and you can see her whenever you like,” interrupted Miss Dayton. She was about to tell him there was a mystery in connection with the stranger, but Spencer, saying he had something of great importance to communicate, begged her to excuse him for a moment, and rushed out to overtake Hagar. The impulse was irresistible, for he felt that if he lost track of her then, she would somehow vanish from his sight forever.
“I humbly beg your pardon, Miss Taine,” he said as he approached her, “I must venture to speak to you even though you refuse to answer.”
Hagar stopped and turning her pale and grief-marked face towards him, said sadly:
“Why have you hunted me out, Mr. Spencer? Can I not be left alone with my sorrow?”
“Won’t you shake hands, and let me talk to you like a friend; am I such a stranger?”
“You would remind me that you saved my life. Yes! but I had been happier dead,” she said, with a bitter smile and a quiver of her lips. “But there’s my hand, Mr. Spencer: it was not pride but shame that prevented me from extending it before.” Tears came as she said this, and even the Elder was obliged to bring his handkerchief into requisition to prevent the beady drops that started from his eyes, from trickling down over his manly beard. They walked on together.
“I thought you had returned home,” said Spencer, after a pause and with a touch of emotion he was struggling to conceal.
“I have no home,” replied Hagar. “But, no matter,” she continued in a tone of assumed courage, “I can work on here and earn my living. All I ask is to be let alone by the people I have met in this city. You were there, at the house they called the Castle. Were those people maniacs?”
“Yes, I fear they were;” said Spencer, noting that she mentioned them with alarm—“but you need not dread them now. Madame Adamanti is dead, and I think the others must have left Cincinnati, for I have not seen one of them since.”
“Oh! I do not fear them,” she replied. After some hesitation she continued: “You seem to be acquainted with Miss Dayton, and I hear that she has become a convert to your religion?”
“Yes, Miss Taine; she is the niece of one of our Bishops, and the Lord has mercifully brought her to the knowledge of the truth,” he replied, reverently.
“I must ask a favor of you, Mr. Spencer.”
“I should be happy to serve you,” he replied.
“It is only that you will call me when speaking either of or to me, Mrs. ‘Miles,’ and not Miss ‘Taine;’ you forget that I am a married woman,” said Hagar, with evident embarrassment.
“Mrs. Miles?” he asked, as if speaking to himself.
“I do not wonder that you are surprised—but I came by this name by accident, and adopted it the better to conceal myself—”
“By accident?” said the Elder, still perplexed.
“Yes. I gave my name as ‘Mrs. Smiles,’ but Miss Dayton thought I said Miles—I don’t know if I did wrong in letting it pass; but I do not wish to create curiosity and suspicion by correcting it now, and must ask you to help me. Heaven only knows what I shall do!” She had spoken quite naturally until her final exclamation, which was uttered with poignant apprehension and concern. Spencer was about to venture some words of encouragement, when she suddenly stopped and said with coldness that sent a chill through him:
“Please leave me, Mr. Spencer—I want to be alone.”
“As you wish,” he said, raising his hat. “But will you not let me be a friend? May I not have the privilege of seeing you sometimes?” he paused, but, as she made no reply, went on. “Your request concerning your name, I shall comply with faithfully. I do not think you did wrong in permitting the misunderstanding, for the right name being only a fictitious one could never be of any use to you—”
“You ask me to let you be my friend—but you know you cannot be a friend to anybody who is not one with you in religious belief. So you told my brother James,” said Hagar, as if she had been reflecting on this point and had not noticed what he was saying.
“I submit that you misquote me, but whatever I said then has nothing to do with my proffer to you.”
“Then leave me,” she replied, with her former coldness, “and if you are in earnest, let me have a few words with you at Mrs. Johnson’s this evening.” With a slight inclination of her head she walked on. The elder turned back.
It was a fine bracing afternoon, and the street Hagar had taken led to a suburban quarter where the sweet breath of returning spring fanned her cheeks, and the silence seemed propitious to her musings. But few persons passed her during her walk. The pretty cottages on either side of the street, surrounded by trees and shrubs that were beginning to put forth their leaves, and garden plots in which the gardener had begun his work, looked so homelike that she sighed involuntarily when she contrasted the lot of their happy inmates with her own. Presently she was startled from her reverie by the measured beat of muffled drums, and on reaching the next corner, saw it was a funeral cortege on its way to the cemetery. It was evidently a soldier who was going to his last rest, for officers in uniform occupied the carriages, troops were marching with reversed muskets beside the hearse, a squadron of cavalry closed up behind it as a funeral guard, and a military band was in attendance. It was one of Ohio’s gallant sons who had fallen in a recent battle. Hagar thought of James Taine, of Will Sanders, of Mark Kilbourne.... Obliged to wait for the cortege to pass before she could proceed, she turned towards her lodgings and walked gloomily along, the only wish in her heart being that she might also die. She would do nothing wilfully to bring her to that solemn goal, but if God would somehow relieve her of the burden of what seemed her most hopeless life, she would think it the kindest blessing He could give.
On her return home she found the Elder awaiting her. They conversed for some time in Mrs. Johnson’s parlor, and Spencer felt a re-awakening of his old interest, while Hagar seemed not averse to his confidence in her misfortune. He told her the published facts about Lamont, and she gave him an outline of her experience. Though much cast down in spirits, she had never looked so beautiful. With her head bowed in abject humility, and wringing her dainty hands in cruel self-torture, she said at the close of her story:
“And thus I sank deeper and deeper into the abyss he had made for me, and into which I plunged the night I madly left my home!”
All was now plain to the Elder, and as Hagar wept, he sat pitying her, and wondering what he could say that would be most likely to win her to his faith; for it was evident, he thought, that she had been contemplating his Zion as a possible retreat, and it only remained for him to paint the scene in attractive colors, and he might have the pleasure of guiding her thither himself.
Other fancies accompanied these in the young missionary’s mind. He felt a genuine compassion towards the unfortunate creature, but perhaps that was not a sufficient motive for all the trouble he subsequently took to serve her. When in reply to his queries she gave him to understand that she would not under any circumstance make her whereabouts known to her former friends, or to the members of Doctor Taine’s congregation, he told her frankly that he could assure her a kind reception among “the saints” and invited her to prayerfully reconsider the opinion she had expressed of them on a former occasion.
“There is no reason,” said Spencer, in his most gracious tone, “why your misfortune should be known, for many young widows have been converted to the gospel; but if it were, our people would receive you with the deepest sympathy as a victim of the systems we oppose and denounce.”
When the interview had reached a very interesting stage, and the Elder was satisfied he had sown seed that would be likely to yield a fair return, he was reminded by the striking of the clock that it was nearly time for him to repair to the hall at the factory for his evening meeting. After tea Hagar consented to attend with Miss Dayton, and was for the first time introduced to other converts who were going in the Elder’s company to Utah.
Dazzled by the sublime picture the Elder had drawn of the Mormon Zion, most of his converts were eager to set out for that new “Land of Promise.” It was arranged that the faithful should go by rail to Council Bluffs in time to join the regular autumn Emigrant train of the church. From that point they would require from two to three months, with the creeping ox-teams, to make the journey of more than a thousand miles across plains, mountains and deserts that lay between the Missouri River and the Mormon Capital.
Up to the moment when Miss Dayton, and several other persons with whom Hagar had become acquainted at the factory, were starting for Council Bluffs with Spencer and his lieutenants, Hagar labored on at the factory without deciding to join the Mormons. In spite of the friendly sentiments and enthusiasm of those about her, and a restless desire to seek some distant refuge, she could not overcome her earlier impressions, caused by the frightful details of the Mountain Meadow Massacre, and other crimes she had heard imputed to the Mormons. But an event occurred at this time which quickly determined her to at least quit Cincinnati with them.
One day news was brought that the Union armies in Kentucky had been overthrown by the Rebels, and that the Rebel General Heth, was marching on Covington with an enormous force of hungry and victorious troops. Covington, the report said, would surely fall into the hands of the Rebels next day, and Cincinnati would then be given the alternative of unconditional surrender or immediate bombardment. The entire city was thrown into a panic by this startling report, and at every hour fresh details were circulated which made the alarm still greater. The Governor of Ohio had sent for General Lew Wallace, a gallant officer, who had been displaced in the field by a blunder on the part of his superiors, to organize the Militia of Ohio to assist in repelling the threatened invasion. With 40,000 raw recruits he had thrown up fortifications around Covington, which were sufficient, added to the rapid approach of Buell’s army, to convince the audacious Heth that the game could not be bagged so easily as he anticipated. But the “Peace Democrats” declared that the resistance of the militia would be useless; and Spencer, in speaking of the prospects among his Mormon friends, ridiculed the idea of their confronting the Rebel army, and predicted that the city merchants, dry-goods clerks, and laborers who composed Wallace’s force would run away like a flock of sheep before a band of wolves, the moment they saw the grim veterans of Shiloh and Donelson coming down upon them like an avalanche of fire.
Hagar, though more indifferent to the approaching danger than any of the others, was not proof against the alarm which was visible in every direction. Armed men were hurrying through the streets; in the squares squads of volunteers of as motley appearance as old Falstaff’s army were being put through the drill by loud-mouthed Sergeants, some of whom assumed the swagger they thought indicative of military prowess, while ignorant as cattle of all but the merest rudiments. Several regiments in new uniforms with their bright accoutrements flashing in the sunlight, their star-decked banners floating gayly, and their bands playing the merriest tunes, arrived by rail and marched past the window of Hagar’s lodging. All day long she could hear the sound of martial music, the loud huzzas of young recruits, the roar of distant cannon, and the nearer rattle of musketry at the drill-grounds, until she thought that the vague cant of Spencer to the effect that “The prophets were now to be fulfilled,” really had a tangible significance. In this state of mind Miss Dayton found her a few days before the company were to set out for the Missouri, and it required but little persuasion to determine Hagar to cast her lot with them. Before it became generally known that Heth had been obliged to beat a hasty retreat, and that Cincinnati was safe, for the present, from sack and pillage, the little band of “Saints” were on their way, Hagar appearing like the only penitent among them. The others were gay and boisterous as if engaged in a picnic; she was sad and quiet as if going to her doom.
It was a strange, if not an imposing sight; that greeted them on their arrival at the Mormon rendezvous: A picture of human experience which has, apparently, passed away to be seen no more forever. Assembled on the plain near the outskirts of a small rambling village was a motley crowd of between 500 and 600 men, women and children, with their meagre effects, and with the wagons, oxen, horses and mules which their co-religionists had sent a thousand miles for them, all ready to plunge into the wilderness.
By the arrival of Elder Spencer’s party the last cause of delay was removed and the order was issued for a start at break of day on the morrow.
The emigrants were a polyglot and heterogeneous assemblage, consisting of a few Swiss, and a good many English, Welsh, and Scandinavian peasants, besides a sprinkling of American and partially Americanized converts, similar to those brought on by Elder Spencer.
The English “saints” spoke a diversity of dialects almost as irreconcilable as the language of the Swiss and the Welshmen, and Hagar could not believe at first that they all hailed from “Merry England.” The sexes were about equally divided, and she did not hear a word among them about polygamy. They were all anxious to be en route towards the Zion they had come so far to find, but a healthy state of discipline was maintained by the Elders in charge, and their movements were characterized by almost military order.
Spencer showed Hagar and Miss Dayton over the encampment and explained that the company was called a traveling “Stake of Zion” and divided into sections of ten, each of which was under the immediate charge of some reliable “Brother;” that ten of these sections composed another subdivision, subject to the direction of the Elder placed in command, and that the whole was under the guidance of the Captain or President. Thus every man, woman and child in the train had his allotted place and duty, both in camp and on the march. Hagar felt despondent, but was carried on by the novelty of the scene, the mirth and rural jollity of the people, and the busy preparations for the start. She realized fully that she now had either to share the journey of the emigrants, or go penniless and alone to one of the neighboring towns: and when they told her she had been placed with Miss Dayton in Elder Spencer’s hundred, she silently acquiesced. Those to whom she had been introduced addressed her as “Sister Miles,” and one old saint who had occupied the honorable post of “assistant working gardener” on the estate of an Earl not far from Coventry, expressed the opinion of several who had met her in the camp, when he said that “she looked like a bird of Paradise among a lot of barn-yard fowl.” There was an appearance of refinement and gentility about her in spite of her poor attire and the ravages made on her beauty by months of grief and anxiety. Many of the coarse but good-hearted emigrants had noticed her, and as she was made a subject of gossip among them, a statement, winked at by Elder Spencer, soon gained currency to the effect that she was the widow of a young officer who had been killed in one of the combats near Corinth in May. This was sufficiently vague, but answered every purpose, as it set at rest the tongues of mischief-makers who were already inventing scandal to account for the fact that she was soon to become a mother. It nipped their curiosity in the bud and Hagar was secretly grateful for the deception when told of it by Miss Dayton, though she dreaded the mystery which she felt to be enveloping her.
Then followed a long and dreary pilgrimage such as the people of no other age or country have seen the like of. Travellers of to-day who fly along in palace cars can form no conception of that dreadful journey. For days at a time not a drop of water could be had that was fit to drink; fuel was equally scarce, and the hard rations of squalid poverty offered but slender comfort to one of Hagar’s mould, whose physical and mental condition was on the verge of utter prostration.
To add to the horrors of hunger, thirst, burning heat and blinding dust, the train was attacked by Indians near the crossing of the North Platte, and was only saved by a stratagem of Spencer.
The Indians were posted in an old stockade which had formally been a stage station, and were trying to burn the Mormon encampment during a stormy night. They had already stampeded a large part of the stock, and the train was in great jeopardy owing to the craven cowardice of the emigrants, and the short-sightedness of the commander.
Unknown to all except Hagar, whom he took care to inform in case he should be killed, Spencer extemporized a bombshell by loading a large iron bake-kettle with powder, shot and scraps of iron. He fixed a short fuse to it, and wrapped it round and round with strong wire. Then, at the risk of his life, he approached the stockade in the darkness, and threw his infernal machine into the midst of the Indians. An explosion immediately followed which drove from the stockade all whom it did not kill or maim.
The Mormons thought it a thunderbolt from Heaven. Their courage was revived, and next morning their hearts were cheered by the sight of a troop of U.S. Cavalry approaching from the westward.
The loss of the stock which the redskins took away with them was a sad blow to the train, and caused the company much delay and privation. But they struggled on, sustained by their faith and by the hope of a better time which awaited them in Zion. Many and loud were the murmurs at times, and often among those who made the strongest pretensions of religion, but no complaint escaped Hagar’s lips, though she was approaching a crisis which she might well dread.
The train finally reached Bitter Creek, one of the dreariest sections of the route, towards the middle of October, and though still far from Zion, the chilly nights and frequent storms spoke gloomily of approaching winter. Hagar had been ill for some time with Mountain fever, and had become so enfeebled that much anxiety was felt for her.
One day as the wagons were jolting and grating over the rocky road of a steep and narrow canyon they were descending, word was brought to Dr. Richardson (a young returning missionary who was a mere tyro in medicine) that Sister Miles had suddenly become worse and required immediate attention. Her wagon, however, was half a mile ahead of the doctor, and when he arrived he found some of the women attending her, and that she had been prematurely delivered of a male child.
There had been deaths and marriages, but this was the first and only birth that had occurred during the journey, and it created a momentary sensation, which was only prevented from developing into a demonstration of a somewhat coarse character, by the critical state of the young mother’s health. A halt of but one day could be allowed the poor sufferer for repose, so precious was every moment if they would pass the mountains before the roads were blocked with snow.
The little stranger was not destined to become either a joy or sorrow to its desolate and broken-hearted mother. It was very frail from the first, and after a few days, had passed away. Hagar named him Ishmael when they took his tiny body from her and buried it there in the sands of the desert, and among the mourners who bore it to its final resting place, the saddest was Spencer, who believed the scene was but the precursor of one more solemn still, when they should be called on to bear its mother to a grave as lonely.
But, thanks to a strong constitution, she soon afterwards began to mend and was much improved in health before her arrival at Salt Lake. Some wagons from the Mormon settlements laden with fresh vegetables and other provisions, met the train at Green River, adding greatly to the comfort and happiness of the company for the remainder of the journey. They were, however, delayed by snow and bad roads and only emerged from the wintry gorges of Emigration Canon, on November 10th, and caught a glimpse of the beauteous Valley of the Lake, with the silvery Jordan winding through it from South to North, and the “City of the Saints,” that looked like paradise to their weary eyes, lying far below them in the midst of leafless trees. The circle of mountains covered with glittering snow, formed a suitable frame for the dull autumnal landscape of the valley.
The sun was setting in all his splendor beyond the great blue lake of brine, as the emigrants hurriedly and merrily formed their last camp, regarding their perils and hardships as nothing now that the goal was reached, which seemed even more fair than their faith had pictured it.
The next day broke bright and warm and an early start was made towards the attractive looking town, that some half suspected would vanish during the night. On account of the wretched condition of the roads, it was evening when they reached the “Emigration Square,” a ten acre plot on the southern side of the town where the Mormon recruits camped on their arrival. Much of the illusion of the previous evening faded on a nearer approach, the frightful roads alone being sufficient to cause criticism and apprehension. The houses were small, poor-looking and much scattered; the streets broad, deserted and overgrown with weeds and sunflowers, the dry stalks of which formed thickets about the square. The wagons sank to the axles in the mud, and the square itself, being located on low and marshy ground, presented few advantages as a place of encampment.
Some of the emigrants were not required to spend that night in camp. Bishop Dayton was there to receive his niece and take her to his home. The Mormon President and his counsellors, together with other magnates, had come out to greet the company, and to give them a hearty welcome to the land of promise.
Spencer’s mother, a kind and intelligent, but very fanatical old lady, was at the square with one of her daughters, to meet the young missionary (whose praises had resounded throughout Zion during the past year), and they received Hagar most cordially, insisting that she must make her home with them for the present. Many of the emigrants were no less kindly dealt with by relatives, former acquaintances, or new-found friends, who now came forward to offer them such shelter and comfort as they could provide. The entire company were almost imperceptibly absorbed in a few days, some going to the country towns in the various parts of Utah according to the allotment made by the Mormon leaders, others finding employment in Salt Lake at their former trades, or being quartered on such brethren as were able to provide for them during the winter. Most of the young girls and widows had no difficulty in finding homes, and were soon made members in full standing of the families into which they were received, by becoming the “plural wives” of the brethren who gave them this timely shelter.
It was only the year previous that Congress passed its first law against Mormon polygamy, and the practice was never in a more flourishing condition.
The fact that there was a young American widow of good family and education among the newly arrived company of emigrants was not slow in gaining general currency, and Spencer was not only taken to task concerning her, by a certain young ‘lily of the valley’ to whom he had given more or less definite pledges before he went away, and by the young fellows in the neighborhood who knew that Hagar was domiciled at his father’s house; but, when he went to Brigham Young’s office a few days later to report, that dignitary, after commending him in his fatherly way, and congratulating him on the success of his labors, rallied him upon ‘the unsaintly deed he had committed in spiriting away the attractive Sister Miles whose praises had reached him from several sources.’
“What do you say, Brother Edwin,” asked the Mormon prophet, addressing in a good-natured way, a man with full dark beard whom Spencer had greeted on entering as Bishop Langley—“Shall we cut him off for this contumacious conduct? If the young elders go on in this way, the authorities will not be able to get any wives at all.”
“I don’t know about that, Brother Brigham,” the Bishop replied, “but I was just telling Brother Heber when Brother Spencer came in, that I consider I have the first claim on the young widow, sister Miles, and for this reason: She’s come all the way from the Missouri in one of my wagons, and she’s lived on my bacon and meal nigh on to three months. Now brethren, including you, Brother Spencer, state your claims.”
Though the conversation had turned on a mere jest, the Bishop spoke seriously, and both Brigham Young and his counsellor Heber C. Kimball, were greatly amused by his rejoinder. The prophet winked slyly at Kimball and Spencer, and then said:
“It strikes me, Brother Edwin, that you are a little out in your reckoning, ‘and for this reason,’” he continued, quoting the Bishop, “that the pretty widow came all the way from the Missouri in a Church wagon, and has lived fully three months, and is still living on Church bacon and meal—for when you donate wagons, bacon, meal or anything else for the use of the Church, it belongs to the Church. I’ll leave that to Brother Heber; and, therefore, as head of the Church and Chief of the emigration fund, I hold that the first choice falls to me. What do you say to that, Brother Heber?”
“Most emphatically correct—nothing more certain,” replied the prophet’s first Counsellor with a twinkle in his small brown eyes. He then passed his hand over his bald head, which was as round as a bullet, and continued—“But as I come in for a second choice and am so much better looking, I guess both you and the Bishop may as well give in. If the pretty widow wants money she’ll have Langley; if she aspires to high station, of course she’ll take the president; but if she’s lookin’ for beauty, I’m her man.”
This was merely a bit of characteristic by-play on the part of Brother Heber, it being a point of honor with him to have his joke whenever occasion offered. He was a merry old soul, and often kept the prophet out of the blues by his funny sayings.
“Well,” said Bishop Langley, stretching out his legs, and shoving his hands deep down into his trouser pockets—“so far I’ve got the wind of you both, for I’ve seen her, and she’s just A 1, a little fagged and worn out by the trip, but all there, and as pretty as a peach. The first fine day I’m going around to take her for a sleigh ride and show her the town and the surrounding country.”
“But you have not been introduced, have you, Brother Langley?” asked Spencer, who was not over pleased by the remarks he had been listening to.
“Barely. I met her on the street with your sister.”
“My own belief is that she will remain a widow for some time to come. She is deeply grieved by her bereavement, and nothing would shock her more at present than an offer of marriage, no matter who made it. Of this I am certain. But, of course, it’s no affair of mine; I only feel the same interest in her as in other members of my company.”
The subject was presently dropped, and the prophet resumed his official dignity, which quickly reduced the others to seriousness.
With the setting in of winter, Hagar’s experiences began in earnest. The mountains were a sealed barrier between her and the world, and she was entirely isolated in the stronghold of the Mormons. The snows were unusually heavy in the higher passes, and for four months, communication with the civilized world was almost suspended.
But withal, Hagar found the seclusion not unpleasant in her then state of mind, and soon became so much interested in the habits, practices, characters and beliefs of the people with whom her lot had been so strangely cast, that the time passed quickly. While remaining entirely free from the influence of their teachings, she observed closely every phase of their life with which she came in contact. Her circle of acquaintance was gradually extended, and included before the end of winter, all the principal families in the Capital of Zion.
She became a regular and welcome visitor at the prophet’s house, which was but a short distance from her home, and gave music lessons to some of his girls, and to those of a few other families who had pianos. To them she seemed a brilliant musician, and her gentle manners together with her other attractive qualities, gained her many friends.