"It ought to be made fit for women and for little children!" cried Mr.
Fowler, with sudden vehemence. "I should have done it. But I failed
there as I have everywhere. I didn't bring God to Lost Chief, nor to
Judith, nor worst of all, to Douglas."
"Don't you two young people believe in God?" demanded Elijah Nelson.
They stared at him without replying.
"Who guided Judith over the Pass?" asked the Mormon. "Her own smartness,
I suppose, or chance, anything but the hand of the Almighty!"
"It was Destiny. All of it has been Destiny," said Douglas suddenly.
"And what is Destiny but God?" asked Elijah.
No one spoke for a moment. Then Elijah went on, with Mr. Fowler's own vehemence:
"You folks over in Lost Chief have seen fit to treat us Mormons as if we were a pack of coyotes bedding down too near your herds. Did you ever try to find out what kind of people we really are and why we stay and win out when we settle in a place? I'll tell you. The church makes our settlements for us. When she calls us to settle in the wild she says, Go, five families, or ten, or twenty, and settle in such a place. Take with you your wives and babies. Put your roots deep in the soil. Build for the future generations. Make a community deep fertilized by the idea of Mormonism, train your children in it, cling one family to the other in helpfulness and to the church in faith. Co-operate with each other and with the church, and the church will stand by you and loan you money, give you advice, be your very fountain of life.
"And the church does stand by us and we by it. And we are building up God-fearing communities all over the West, just like the Puritans once built up in the East. Why? Because we pioneer, inspired by our church and the love of God! What Gentile church is doing this, answering the economic needs of its people as well as the spiritual? Why should a settlement like yours prosper? Why, the most promising young man in it is deserting it to chase after a flighty girl! It has no church. It has no minister. Ha! As long as you Gentiles are so, the Mormons can ride over you and crowd you out!"
"You can't do anything of the kind!" declared Judith.