The pair looked at each other for a few seconds, and then the Mormon reached out his hand with an affable smile, but Grenville contemptuously rejected his offered courtesy, saying coolly—
“No offence, my friend, but it will be time enough to indulge in handshaking when we understand each other better.”
Fire flashed from the Mormon’s eyes at this affront, for such he evidently considered it; he, however, suppressed all outward exhibition of feeling, and replied in English, as pure as Grenville’s own—
“You are right, sir! Now to business. I believe I am addressing the leader of your party, which is composed of brave men, and has given us a great deal of trouble.”
“You may consider me the head of my party,” replied Grenville.
“Well, sir, I am here by command of the Holy Three, and now propose, before matters go beyond the possibility of arrangement, that we should become allies. If you and your friends will take the oaths of our fraternity, you shall receive high personal rank in the nation, and yourself and friends will be liberally endowed with wives, with lands and cattle; Winfield the Englishman, and also the black man Amaxosa, must die by our laws, which they have transgressed; the Rose of Sharon becomes my property as Commander of the Forces, and the Lily of the Valley will fall to the lot of the Holy Three. All these munificent offers must be accepted before sundown, or—his voice growing hard and stern as it had hitherto been winning and courteous—Englishman you die, you all die like dogs, without the hope of help or mercy. I am but the mouthpiece of the Holy Three; they have spoken, and they will not repent.”
For fully half a minute Grenville looked the Mormon in the face, and gave no answer; he could not trust himself to speak.
Then in tones of thunder he uttered the one word. “Go!”
“And my answer?” snarled the Mormon.
“Tell your wretched Trinity that what Richard Grenville gets, he keeps with a strong hand, and that the English rifles which have already decimated the cowardly Mormon nation, will very shortly sweep the Holy Three themselves from the face of the earth. Go! I have spoken.”