Then she comes in and says with business-like directness to her faltering abigail, "You wish to leave me, Marie, here alone?"
"Yes, I am afraid. Mademoiselle will pardon me."
"Certainly. Here are your wages! Here is money for your ticket to New York. Now go."
"Mademoiselle will pardon me?"
"Yes, leave me," and Marie departing, Erma Travenion feels that she is indeed alone in a strange country, for she hears the noise of the Livingstons' trunks as they are packing them and getting ready to depart in a hurry that does not seem altogether flattering to her.
Early the next morning, the widow, Louise, Mr. Livingston, and Ferdie depart for Ogden, though the California train does not start from that town until the evening; they are so desperately anxious to shake the dust of Salt Lake City from their feet.
At the depot, Ferdie notices Bishop Kruger, who gazes at the party as they board the train, and approaching Mr. Chauncey, remarks, "I'll see Miss Ermie up at the hotel. She ain't going with ye, sure?" peering about with curious eyes, as if to be certain of this fact. Then the train runs out, bearing the Livingstons toward the Pacific Coast, and Bishop Kruger, about eight o'clock on this day, finds Miss Travenion waiting for him at the Townsend House.
The girl comes down into the parlor very simply dressed, but perhaps more beautiful than ever, to his pastoral eyes, for he remarks to himself, "Be Gosh! She looks homelike and domestic."
"My father!" she says shortly. Then gazing round, she goes on impetuously: "He is not here—he feared to see me—he is ashamed!"
"What! that he's a Mormon?" yells Kruger, savagely. "A true man glories in that; so does your daddy. Perhaps some day you'll jine him."