"Alone in a Mormon house?" shudders the girl.
"Oh, you'll be as safe thar as if you were in your bed on Fifth Avenue. You can travel all over here, provided you do not hurt our feelings, as safe as if you was in Connecticut—more so—we don't have no burglars around here!" says Lot, reassuringly.
Making inquiries at the hotel office, Miss Travenion finds that the Mormon bishop's advice has been good. Then, being provided at the hotel with a private team, she comes down at ten o'clock in the day, to depart for Tintic, and is surprised to see the attentive Kruger ready to assist her into the light wagon, which has a top to keep off dust and sun.
"You didn't expect any one to see you off!" he remarks. "But most every one here would do a heap for Bishop Tranyon's darter." Then he chuckles: "Ye're kind o' one o' us now!" and drives the iron into Erma's soul.
"Thank you. I suppose you mean it for a compliment," she says, attempting lightness, though her lip twitches. "But I am a little different still, to a Mormon girl!" and gets into the carriage before he can aid her.
"So you are! Ye're a prize-book picture," he mutters, looking at her till his eyes blink from some subtle passion, for Miss Travenion is dressed in a cool, gray linen travelling costume, that fits her charming figure with a "riding habit" fit, till it reaches white cuffs and snowy collar, and a little foot, that in its French kid boot looks as if it had come out of a fashion plate. Thus attired, she makes a very breezy, attractive picture; though there is no one to enjoy it, save Kruger, for the heat, even on this October day, has driven loungers from the sidewalk.
Then turning from her, as she drives down the State road, this Mormon fanatic remarks: "Gee hoss! Don't this give the Church a pull upon the daddy, and Lot Kruger a hold upon the darter!" and so goes to a little building on South Temple Street devoted to the business affairs of the Latter-Day Saints.
Miss Travenion, raising a little sunshade over a face made beautiful by conflicting emotions, journeys down the State road, which leads towards the south—past the Utah Southern Railway, that is now being graded, and after a dusty seven hours' ride comes to the Point-of-the-Mountain. Here she is very hospitably entertained, and well treated, by one of the many wives of Milo Johnson, who lives at this place.
Then the next morning, so as to travel in the cool portion of the day, leaving almost at daylight, after a hot breakfast, and taking her lunch with her, she crosses the ford of the Jordan—the river that runs from the fresh lake of Utah to its salt inland sea. So coming to its western shore, she journeys along the banks of beautiful Utah Lake—placid as a mirror—leaving Ophir and Camp Floyd and Tooele far to her west.
To the east, across the limpid waters, she notes, buried in their orchards, the Mormon towns of Provo, Springfield, Payson, and Spanish Fork. Behind them the great Wahsatch range, and, further to the south, the great mountain that they call "Nebo," which rises snow-capped, dominating the scene.