"No wonder the box was locked and the key gone," he heard some one say, but it moved him not. His thoughts were elsewhere. What would she think? What would his flock think? Their pastor a base thief! It was terrible. Why had such a cross been laid upon him? What had he done to deserve it all? He thought of another, of One, sinless and pure, who had borne His cross alone; who had been mocked, laughed at, and spit upon. He would not desert him now, anyway, in his time of trial.
The idea comforted him somewhat. A new feeling took possession of him, a strength which he had seldom experienced before. He felt a Presence very near, some unseen influence giving him a marvellous calmness and courage. He looked at the men, and listened to their cruel words unmoved. He saw Pritchen standing by, with Satanic delight stamped upon his features, but it affected him not.
Base and sordid though they were, his companions could not fail to recognize the dignified, lofty bearing of the man before them, and the new light which illumined his face. Mickie O'Toole paused in the midst of a jocular remark, reverently crossed himself, and forgot to finish his sentence. Perdue remained silent, and even Pritchen failed to pour forth his quota of filth and blasphemy. They all felt, though none would have acknowledged it, that some mysterious power was in that room, before which their guilty souls shrank and feared. Keith, alone, knew that One who said, "Lo, I am with you alway," had not deserted him in the hour of distress.
It was only after they had left the house and moved down the hill through the gloomy night that the miners recovered from their temporary fear. When at length they thrust Keith into the saloon among the astonished waiting men, the vilest words in the English language were none too strong with which to introduce the wretched man.
CHAPTER XVIII
YUKON JENNIE
On the afternoon preceding the miners' meeting, Yukon Jennie sat silently in the corner of the old chief's lodge. Her busy little fingers were arranging a number of small pictures, choosing out the best and laying them carefully by themselves. Her face was full of animation as she bent over her task, and her eyes sparkled with delight as she gazed tenderly upon some favourite sketch.
"The pale-face woman will like that," she said to herself. "When she sees the little stream running through the woods, playing with the sunbeams, laughing at the trees, kissing the flowers, and singing, singing all the time, she will be glad."
Since the night she had fled from the church, clutching the keen knife in her hand, a transformation had come over this dusky, wayward maiden. As long as her terrible resolve was pent up in her little heart it possessed her whole being. But when she had given vent to feelings in passionate words, the outcome was marvellous. It had proven a veritable safety-valve to her surcharged soul, a relief, which in others of a different disposition would have been effected by scalding tears.