"Avoid always any discussion upon religious topics, unless you are perfectly certain that your remarks cannot annoy or pain any one present. If you are tête-à-tête with a friend, and such a discussion arise, inquire your companion's church and mention your own, that you may yourself avoid unpleasant remarks, and caution him."

"Jesus Christ is Lord," Sister Ruth sang softly to herself.

She was bored. They were going over particularly bumpy terrain, which made it near impossible for her to read her Bible. Kid Cole was napping or at least he had his hat pulled down over his eyes. The man across from her, who was at least a decade or two older than her which made him quite elderly, was hard of hearing. She knew because she'd already tried to strike up a conversation with him and failed because of it.

"I've always thought that song should say Son of God," remarked the lady on the man's other side. Ruth hadn't even tried speaking to her because up until now the younger woman had been involved in her reading.

Sister Ruth immediately perked up at the imminent religious discussion. "Well, He is, sister, but being that He's also Lord, there ain't nothing wrong with the lyrics."

She smiled politely in return but in a way that said she disagreed.

"'In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.' Can't say it any plainer than that. 'The Lord our God is one Lord.'"

"You know your scripture," the woman remarked.

"Well, I'm a revivalist and a faith healer but mostly I just love the Lord and His Word. My name's Sister Ruth. My husband and I are heading to San Francisco. What about you?"

"I'm Miss Benson. I'm moving west with my grandfather. Not as far as California though just into Utah territory. It means more opportunities for me to marry as there are more like-minded people there."

"How'd you come to know Jesus as your Savior?" Ruth doubted she did if the start of the conversation was a true indication of her beliefs, but she couldn't be sure until she spoke with her more.

"I grew up in the church. What church do you attend?"

Asking her what church she attended was an avoidance tactic that she recognized, but Ruth answered anyway. "Whatever church is handy: Baptist, Methodist, Lutheran, so long as they worship the same Jesus I do and preach from the Bible."

"I'm from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints." A clear warning that they should drop the subject of religion without saying it outright.

Ruth didn't care to drop it though, and she was extremely curious. She'd heard much of their group but never yet had occasion to meet one. She knew they'd added a book of their own to the Bible. "Can I see your Bible, sister?"

That was one thing the ladies had in common, carrying Bibles. Miss Benson obliged.

She skimmed the extra book as much as she could. The bouncing had lessened to a tolerable shaking, but it still wasn't easy to read. What she did read made her frown, not that she'd even considered it could be another biblical book, but she had hoped it lined up with Christian teaching better than that.

She handed the book back. Miss Benson was tense, so Ruth picked a lighter topic for the moment. "Looky yonder. A rattler's sunning himself on that there rock."

"I came across a man about to kill a baby rattlesnake when we left the station. Can you believe that? I just stuck the poor thing in my reticule." Miss Benson was in the process of opening up her bag.

"Oh, Lord in heaven," Ruth cried, nudging Kid and praying simultaneously. The girl had a venomous baby snake in a moving stagecoach. It wasn't going to be happy about being shut up in a small bag or all the bumping that had been going on. If Ruth backed up any further into the corner, she was going to be hanging out the window by her ankles. She didn't even know what she expected Kid to do in this confined space.

She immediately relaxed when Miss Benson drew out a simple piece of candy and finished her statement, "And dropped him next to the creek. The pitiable creature."

"Saints alive, child, you about sent me onto heaven a little earlier than I'd planned just from pure shock." Her heart was still pounding over the encounter. "You could've been killed your own self, picking it up. The man had the right idea."

"They'll be resurrected same as us. Their life should be respected."

"There'll be animals in heaven, sure enough, but the Bible just speaks to people being resurrected. We should care for the animals up to a point, but God gave the breath of life to man alone. And thank the Lord. I'm not sure how I'd feel about sharing eternity with a rattlesnake."

"Joseph Smith said differently," Miss Benson said, speaking of the Mormon prophet.

She almost answered that she didn't care what Joseph Smith said, but that was likely to offend the woman. Instead, she spent the rest of their time trying to persuade her to various truths by having her turn to verses with her. But in the end, it was useless as the Book of Mormon trumped the rest of the Bible to Miss Benson's way of thinking. And showing her how Revelations spoke of the completeness of the Word didn't change her mind. But she gave it everything she had in trying to persuade her.

When they disembarked, Miss Benson barely said goodbye before she ran off with her grandfather, and though it wasn't a dead run, it was quicker than a lady should walk.

"I wasn't trying to annoy her," Ruth explained to Kid. "I just feel so sorry for her and others like her who don't understand the message of salvation."

"I know, baby, but you can't save every soul no matter how much you might want to."

"On our way back from California, maybe we should stop in Utah."

"Why? So you can convert the whole Mormon population?" he asked with a laugh.

But Sister Ruth was serious. "They have to know who Jesus Christ really is or they have no hope. You can't accept Him as Lord if you don't understand He's the Lord. And why didn't you say anything in the stagecoach?"

"Because you could argue circles, especially religious ones, around anybody I know, including me, and it doesn't seem quite polite to discuss religion when the person's got no way of escape." He said the last part with a half smile. "Providing they don't decide to jump out of a moving stagecoach, of course. Which I think I saw her considering a time or two."

"I reckon I do come on too strong sometimes, and I don't always know when to be quiet. I hope I didn't scare her off from the truth."

"You were very gentle in your explanations and things do have to be said, but words only go so far when someone's that wrapped up in their ideas. That's when faith has to speak louder than words. When you led me to the Lord, it was the way you loved people that didn't like you, the way you loved without discrimination that drew me in more than your arguments. I saw Christ in you."

"That's very wise, honey, and scriptural." She gave him an affectionate kiss. Then she shook her head in disbelief. "I still can't believe the girl picked up a rattlesnake and carried it in her pocketbook. You know, she had to be one of the most interesting traveling companions I've ever had."

He grinned. "I'm sure she's saying the same thing about you."