been Vikings, savage chieftains who bore no cross and brooked no
hindrance to their will. Her father had inherited that temper; and at
times, like antelope fleeing before fire on the slope, his people fled
from his red rages. Jane Withersteen realized that the spirit of wrath
and war had lain dormant in her. She shrank from black depths hitherto
unsuspected. The one thing in man or woman that she scorned above all
scorn, and which she could not forgive, was hate. Hate headed a flaming
pathway straight to hell. All in a flash, beyond her control there
had been in her a birth of fiery hate. And the man who had dragged her
peaceful and loving spirit to this degradation was a minister of God's
word, an Elder of her church, the counselor of her beloved Bishop.

The loss of herds and ranges, even of Amber Spring and the Old Stone
House, no longer concerned Jane Withersteen, she faced the foremost
thought of her life, what she now considered the mightiest problem--the
salvation of her soul.

She knelt by her bedside and prayed; she prayed as she had never prayed
in all her life--prayed to be forgiven for her sin to be immune from
that dark, hot hate; to love Tull as her minister, though she could not
love him as a man; to do her duty by her church and people and those
dependent upon her bounty; to hold reverence of God and womanhood
inviolate.

When Jane Withersteen rose from that storm of wrath and prayer for help
she was serene, calm, sure--a changed woman. She would do her duty as
she saw it, live her life as her own truth guided her. She might never
be able to marry a man of her choice, but she certainly never would
become the wife of Tull. Her churchmen might take her cattle and horses,
ranges and fields, her corrals and stables, the house of Withersteen and
the water that nourished the village of Cottonwoods; but they could not
force her to marry Tull, they could not change her decision or break
her spirit. Once resigned to further loss, and sure of herself, Jane
Withersteen attained a peace of mind that had not been hers for a year.
She forgave Tull, and felt a melancholy regret over what she knew he
considered duty, irrespective of his personal feeling for her. First
of all, Tull, as he was a man, wanted her for himself; and secondly,
he hoped to save her and her riches for his church. She did not believe
that Tull had been actuated solely by his minister's zeal to save her
soul. She doubted her interpretation of on