Danites who had been powerful and feared, found their former friends
turning against them. Even the Mormon Church pretended to denounce them.
John D. Lee, chief in the Mountain Meadow butchery, was captured, tried,
found guilty, and shot. There were others as guilty as Lee, and they,
who had been the hunters, found themselves hunted. They fled to the
mountains, hid, disguised themselves, changed their names, and did
everything they could to escape retributive justice.

"It seems that Dugan was still with them, and he found himself a
fugitive like the others. Somewhere in Southern Utah, west of the
Colorado, and amid the wild mountains that are to be found to the north
of the Escalante River, the hunted Danites found a home where they
believed they would be safe from pursuit, and there the last remnant of
the once terrible Destroying Angels are living to-day.

"In his wanderings, Ben Barr came upon this retreat of the Danites, and
there he saw Uric Dugan, who is now the chief of the band. Barr barely
escaped with his life, and he lost no time in writing to my mother,
telling her what he had discovered.

"This was enough to revive old memories and set mother to brooding over
it. Her health was not very good, and I am sure that she worried herself
to death. Before she died she told me of a dream that had come to her
for three successive nights. In that dream she had seen my father, and
he was still living, although he was unable to return to her. Just why
he could not return was not very clear, but it was because of Dugan.

"As she was dying, my mother called me to her side and told me of the
dream. 'My boy,' she said, 'I know your father is still living, and I
want you to find him. Something has told me that you will be successful.
Promise me that when I am gone you will not rest until you have found
him or have satisfied yourself beyond the shadow of a doubt that he is
dead.'

"I gave that promise, and I am here to search for my father and for Uric
Dugan. If father is not living, I may be able to avenge him, and that
will set me at rest.

"By accident I was thrown in with Mr. Merriwell, and we became somewhat
friendly. I told him my story, and he was intensely interested in it. He
asked me to let him go along. I did not refuse, and he said he would
obtain your consent. That is all."

"Young man," said Professor Scotch, "I sympathize with you, and I
sincerely hope you may be successful; but I do not care to have Fr