her. She owned all the ground and many of the cottages.
Withersteen House was hers, and the great ranch, with its
thousands of cattle, and the swiftest horses of the sage. To her
belonged Amber Spring, the water which gave verdure and beauty to
the village and made living possible on that wild purple upland
waste. She could not escape being involved by whatever befell
Cottonwoods.

That year, 1871, had marked a change which had been gradually
coming in the lives of the peace-loving Mormons of the border.
Glaze--Stone Bridge--Sterling, villages to the north, had risen
against the invasion of Gentile settlers and the forays of
rustlers. There had been opposition to the one and fighting with
the other. And now Cottonwoods had begun to wake and bestir
itself and grown hard.

Jane prayed that the tranquillity and sweetness of her life would
not be permanently disrupted. She meant to do so much more for
her people than she had done. She wanted the sleepy quiet
pastoral days to last always. Trouble between the Mormons and the
Gentiles of the community would make her unhappy. She was
Mormon-born, and she was a friend to poor and unfortunate
Gentiles. She wished only to go on doing good and being happy.
And she thought of what that great ranch meant to her. She loved
it all--the grove of cottonwoods, the old stone house, the
amber-tinted water, and the droves of shaggy, dusty horses and
mustangs, the sleek, clean-limbed, blooded racers, and the
browsing herds of cattle and the lean, sun-browned riders of the
sage.