For Time and Eternity (21 page)

Elder Justus and Sister Amanda pulled two chairs so they could sit nearly knee to knee in front of our cold fireplace. Melissa and Lottie were finally convinced to go into their room, but they were allowed to sit in the open doorway with their dollies on their laps and listen as long as they remained perfectly silent. I sat at our table across from Nathan, both of us with our hands folded and still, prepared to be witnesses to the dialogue that would come. After a lengthy, impassioned prayer delivered by Elder Justus—during which I found myself nodding off several times—the older man cleared his throat loudly and began.

“Sister Amanda Dunn, do you believe in God, the Eternal Father, in his Son, Jesus Christ, and in the Holy Ghost? And do you have a firm testimony of the restored gospel?”

“Yes,” she said, as I had.

“Do you sustain the president of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints as the prophet, seer, and revelator; and do you recognize him as the only person on the earth authorized to exercise all priesthood keys?”

“Yes.” Once again she echoed my response from years ago, and I wanted to jump from my chair and shake her. That prophet was the man who brought her into our home, who made it acceptable to live in such flagrant disregard to the true teachings of Scripture. I could no more have answered yes now than I could have answered no when it was initially asked of me.

Holy Father, forgive me for sustaining any power other than you.

Despite my repentance, I remained silent.

“Do you live the law of chastity?”

“Oh yes.” A bit of hesitation, enough to render me nauseous. When Nathan prepared me for that same question, he’d reassured me that the affection expressed between us had been good and pure, given that they were physical manifestations of the gift of love bestowed by Heavenly Father. Besides, we were already legally, if not spiritually, married.

What had he told her?

The questions went on, where she assured that she had no affiliations with anybody who opposed the church’s teachings, that she paid her tithe faithfully, that she kept the Word of Wisdom.

“Has there been any sin or misdeed in your life that should have been resolved by the priesthood and has not?”

“No. Nothing.”

Even my unseen smile was bitter. Apparently coveting her neighbor’s husband did not apply.

“And finally, Sister Amanda, do you consider yourself worthy in every way to enter the temple and participate in temple ordinances?”

“I do, sir. In every way.”

Looking up, I saw Nathan’s face beaming with pride, and I believe we both exhaled for the first time. We all stood, and an unmistakable air of relief swirled around with the late afternoon breeze. Then, in a tone that matched the shadows creeping into the room, Elder Justus said, “Before we can proceed with the temple marriage plans, I think it best to discuss the matter of your particular temple recommend, Sister Camilla.”

“Mine?” I thought about the slip of paper, tucked away in a drawer, that deemed me worthy to enter the temple, where the highest ordinances were practiced.

“I assure you my wife is a member in good standing.” Nathan swiftly came to my side.

“There has been talk. And you may not realize that your wife did not attend Sabbath meetings during the months of your absence. Or, I might add, for several weeks prior.”

“My wife was in mourning for the loss of our son.”

“What better comfort could be had than the company of her fellow Saints?”

“She was quite inconsolable.”

They might as well have been bargaining the price of a horse for all the say I had in my own spiritual condition. Yet I knew I had no answer that would satisfy either one, so I tucked in my chin and assumed a posture of meek acquiescence that would sate their need for control.

“You poor thing.” Sister Amanda held a dainty lace kerchief to her mouth, and her bright blue eyes were wide with grief. “Nate—Brother Nathan said the boy died in your very arms. I would have wanted to die right along with the dear little thing.”

“Part of me did,” I said. The very part that made me worthy of witnessing a temple sacrament.

Nathan’s hand on the small of my back stopped me from saying anything more.

Elder Justus took a step forward and loomed above me, his words dripping down like melting ice. “I will see to it that the bishop honors your current recommend. But I charge you, Nathan, that you bring your wife through a thorough examination before the baptism of your daughter.”

“We will bring it before Heavenly Father.”

I could tell by the control in his voice that he was not happy to have the matter brought forth in this manner, and his response brought an end to the discussion. Elder Justus and Sister Amanda offered their good-byes, and we wished them well on the walk back to the elder’s home. I had only a moment to bask in the silence that came after I closed the door behind them, for as I turned around, I noticed the girls standing hand in hand in their bedroom doorway. Lottie rubbed sleepy eyes, but Melissa’s were sharp and focused.

“You’re getting married again, Papa?”

Time suspended as I waited to hear his response. Then again after the simple, spoken yes.

“To the lady that was here?”

“Yes. She’s to be your aunt Amanda.”

“She’s pretty,” Lottie said through a yawn.

“She is a good woman,” Nathan said.

“Do you love her?” Melissa asked.

“Yes.”

“As much as you love Mama?”

He put his arm around me and kissed me gently on my temple. “Nowhere near.”

And I believed him.

Chapter 19

Nathan must have been confident that I would give my blessing to his proposal, because the next morning two men arrived at our home, each driving a wagon full of freshly cut lumber.

“We’ll build a new room at the back of the house.” He took my hand and led me through the plan, making me feel like an invited guest. “We don’t have a place to cut a new door in the front room, so we’ll get to it through the girls’ room.” Then we walked outside, where stakes and ropes marked the perimeters of the walls to come. “We’ll build it all along the back. Twice the size of the other rooms. What do you think?”

“You keep saying ‘we.’ Whose room will it be?”

If he had an answer, he managed to hide it behind a sigh fueled with what seemed to be genuine confusion. “We’ll decide that when the time comes.”

“It seems cold. I’m thinking that, in the winter, so far away from the fire—”

He tapped his brow. “Already thought about that. We’ll have a little fireplace right here.” He walked away and tapped his foot on a hard clump of grass pierced by a wooden stake. “We could make part of it into a little sitting room. Like your own private parlor.”

So it is to be mine.
“It all sounds lovely, Nathan.”

He came up behind me and placed his hands on my shoulders, gently turning me until my back was to the house and I looked out to where the sun had just fully risen over the mountains. “We’ll put in two big windows—” he reached his hand out—“one at each end. Can you imagine seeing that sunrise every morning?”

“Certainly ensures that whoever’s in here won’t sleep past dawn.”

Tears caught my voice, and strong arms pulled me close to the man behind me. Then breath on my neck, a soft kiss. “Promise you’ll try, Camilla. You’ll try to be happy.”

“I am happy, Nathan.” Oh, how grateful I was to have my face turned.

“You’ll grow to love Amanda, I know. She’ll be like a sister to you.”

“I have
your
sister as my sister. And Evangeline.” I turned in his arms and reached my hands to his face. “Couldn’t you marry her? I already love her, and she so needs somebody . . .”

He smiled, a fitting expression for my petulant outburst. “The Holy Spirit did not bring me to love her as a wife.”

“Because she isn’t beautiful?”

He shrugged. “I cannot dictate what the Holy Spirit tells me. I can only respond.”

“Well,” I said with forced cheerful resolution, “if I am to share my husband, perhaps Sister Amanda will be kind enough to share her furniture. We’ll need something grand to fill this room.”

* * *

Plans moved quickly after that. For a solid week my ears rang with the sounds of hammers and nails and saws. I’d seen Saints work together to build entire houses in one day, but the task of extending our home fell to Nathan alone. It was he who refused to accept the help, insisting that everybody had better uses for their time with winter coming on. I have to admit part of me thrilled at the progress. Our home had always been cozy and functional, but left to his own devices, my husband graced the new room with details of design and carpentry he would never have thought to include years ago. Most obvious of the improvements was the walls themselves—smooth planks rather than chinked logs. The windows were expertly framed, with boxes built out on either side of the wall for flowers to be planted outside and treasures displayed inside. The floor was smooth too, and when the space reached its point of empty completion, the girls had a marvelous time running its length, making a clatter of echoing footsteps.

I could tell Melissa quickly warmed to the idea of her father’s taking in a new bride. She sparked off the fire in Nathan’s eyes as he spoke of our celestial family and gazed at me with a triumph that made me ill. Regardless of my own temple worthiness, she would be baptized into the church when she turned eight, and I wanted nothing more than to grab her hand and run away.

Up to that point, I’d never considered such a thing. But right then, at our little family table, I realized I didn’t need Nathan’s promise of a swift horse. He’d taken one away, and he’d come back. He’d never, never leave. He’d never take me away. He might not let me leave. The more he talked, though, about the prophet’s plan for our family and the rewards we would receive from Heavenly Father for our obedience, the more I realized that I could have no part of this.

Still, I said nothing, voicing my resolve only to the Lord in my prayers. As far as anybody—my husband, my daughters, my neighbors, and my future sister wife—knew, I joined my husband in his joy, even if my expression was more reserved. Only Kimana sensed my unsettled spirit, and anytime we were alone, I sought her comfort. Her arms became my haven, as she would wrap them around me in a loving embrace I never remember getting from my own mother.

“It is not right,” she’d say, patting my back, “all this business with another wife.”

“Nathan is a good man,” I reassured her. “As good as he’s ever been. I know the Lord has a plan.”

“I pray so.”

I knew she did. She was the only other soul on the face of the earth who knew my true heart, and she was the only person in my life who shared my faith. We hadn’t met together to study the Bible since Nathan’s return; he kept the girls enthralled with tales of his summer’s journey, and I’m sure I didn’t imagine his watchful eye whenever Kimana and I did have a chance to whisper together in a corner. But well I remembered our early days as man and wife, and though I loathed the images I conjured, I knew Sister Amanda’s arrival to the household would give him a new focus for his attentiveness.

The wedding was scheduled for the first Saturday in October. Sister Amanda would spend the intervening time as a guest in Rachel and Tillman’s home, so as to be close to the temple to complete her Endowment. Melissa had asked once about what happened during the ceremony, but Nathan was quick to remind her—as she well knew—that the rites of the temple were secret, to be revealed only at a time ordained by Heavenly Father.

“People talk about things when they want to remember them,” he explained gently. “But the time in the temple is sacred to the Lord, not something to be talked about like any other event. When we keep silent, we keep the sacredness of the sacrament in our hearts, and we remain holy.”

My memories of the ceremony, however, were anything but holy. The humiliation of the ceremonial washing. I can still smell the oil touched to my head, neck, shoulders, stomach, and below. My legs. My feet.

“To cleanse you of the sins of this generation,” the woman had said.

The sacred garments, the pure white dress and veil. The green apron. The faces of the actors performing the dramas. Why could Nathan hold me breathless and enthralled by firelight, when these dressed in costume proved so unsettling?

And my name. My whispered, secret, sacred name. The name that would buy my passage into heaven.

Mara.
Bitterness.

I wondered what name Sister Amanda would be given. Would we have the same? Only Nathan would know, and he’d never tell. Moreover, I wouldn’t ask. For the time being, Amanda was as absent from our life as she had been before her arrival.

How I cherished those final weeks. It’s a rare thing in this life to know when your world is going to change. Every night Nathan came to our bed, exhausted from the day’s construction labor, and every night I lay with him, hoping to prove myself a worthy offering. With every act of marriage, I prayed that God would give me another child, thinking that if I could bring us back to the joy we shared before our son died, I could shake him from this folly. Three days before the wedding, however, my time came and with it the end of that dream.

“Maybe you should stay home?” Kimana said when she noted my condition. “Do you feel up to making the trip?”

Of course I didn’t feel like making the trip, but I still had three days. In the meantime, the Dunns’ own wagon appeared in our yard, still laden with the furniture that had been precious enough to make the journey from England. Given that Sister Amanda was in Salt Lake City, I was given charge of what would come into our home and what would be left to some other fate. I’m ashamed to admit how much I relished even that little bit of power. Sister Amanda and I had spoken with each other only during the Sunday dinners she and her father shared with us, but I knew exactly what she envisioned. Somehow she thought our log walls would magically stretch to accommodate her mahogany breakfront and rolltop desk, just as our marriage would stretch to welcome her.

In my head I heard Rachel, deftly giving her sister wives instructions. I had that same authority. I’d never had authority over anyone or anything in my life. My children, yes, but that was a responsibility I shared with Nathan, and the balance of power was hardly equal. So that afternoon, as Nathan and Brother Kenneth stood, hats in hand, ready to do my bidding, my instructions were swift and sure. My voice dropped to a lower register, mimicking Rachel’s confidence.

“Take the rolltop into the new room,” I directed. “And both the upholstered chairs.”

Nathan gave me one look askance. If he didn’t approve my choices, he said nothing. Neither, surprisingly, did Brother Kenneth, even though these were every bit as much his worldly goods as they were Sister Amanda’s.

“Never cared about a bit o’ this when her mother bought it,” he said, hoisting the small table over his shoulder. “Nothin’ but a load o’ trouble since the day we landed. And a good bit before that, if you ask me.”

“What about the breakfront?” Nathan asked, wiping his brow.

“They can bury it.” I’d heard of such stories, emigrants burying pianos wrapped in canvas along the trail, marking the place so they could return later for it. “There’s no room for it here.”

Without any further discussion, Nathan and Brother Kenneth resumed their task. I watched, numb, as bits of Sister Amanda made their way into our home. Harmless pieces of furniture, yes, but also trunks that I knew held her dresses, her nightclothes, all the things that a woman hides away for the day she becomes a bride. I had none of those things. I became a bride with nothing but the dress on my back and a now-tattered journal.

The word
bed
jolted me from my reverie. I looked back to see the two men bringing an intricately carved headboard from the wagon. No need for discussion here. The bed Nathan and I had shared for all these years would be moved into the new room, while this one, infinitely more ornate, would preside in much humbler surroundings, accompanied by a six-drawer bureau and matching washstand.

That night, by the light of my blue glass lamp, I finished moving my things into the new room, hanging dresses on beautiful brass hooks attached to the wall and storing my other clothing in the trunk at the foot of the bed. A beautiful braided rug—woven by Kimana and presented to me as a gift after supper—warmed the exposed floor and softened my steps. On the other side of the wall, Melissa and Lottie were already in bed, early, due to the journey we would take the next day. The door between my room and the girls’ was open, and I stepped as close as I dared, trying to listen to the prayers they said with their father, but I heard only soft, girlish, lilting voices, chorusing with Nathan in the final amen.

The next thing I knew he was in the doorway, then in my room, bathed in soft blue light. “It looks nice in here.”

“Sister Amanda has some lovely things.” I smoothed the doily on the small round table. “I crocheted this last winter and never had any place to display it properly.”

“It’s perfect.”

“What do you know of doilies?” I cocked my head in near flirtation.

“I know they look good on tables.”

Our warm, nervous laughter joined the shadows, and I felt more nervous than I had on our own wedding night. In fact, I could think of nothing else, given how closely my lamp produced a glow akin to that of the moon. Then he said it, my name, the way he had before our first kiss. Not my full name, just that first hard syllable dissolving into a sigh, and he stepped toward me, arms outstretched.

“No.” Such a small sound, and I covered my mouth to hold back my sobs and to block his kiss.

Still he advanced, and I backed away until I felt the edge of my bed behind my knees. I sat upon it, burying my face in my hands and finally breaking down into body-wracking tears. A click of the closing door, and the room went dark. I felt his weight beside me. Not touching at all, we sat, side by side until, zapped of my own strength, I sought his. Just an inch or two and my cheek found his strong shoulder, then his chest. My breath still ragged, I allowed him to maneuver my body until we were lying next to each other, my head cradled in the crook of his arm.

On the other side of the door, my daughters shuffled in their beds, and the sound of their little-girl voices echoed in my mind. I wanted to say my own prayer, but at that moment, my head was filled with such skull-splitting pain, trying to form words to lift up to God seemed too daunting a task. Instead, my spirit turned to the prayer I’d said as a little girl, and my lips moved against the warm cotton of my husband’s shirt.

“Now I lay me down to sleep;

I pray the Lord my soul to keep.