Righteous02 - Mighty and Strong (11 page)

“So you believe you are the One Mighty and Strong from Joseph Smith’s prophecy.”

“I don’t believe it,” Brother Timothy said, “I know it. The Lord Himself called me.”

“Why you, why now?”

“The end is here. The time to convert Jew and Gentile is over. Only the saints remain, and they will either gather or perish. That’s all you need to know. And what I need to know is this. Will you help me?”

“When I help, I do it on my own terms.”

“I need humble men, not hard-hearted.”

“But not every man is a foot soldier, either. Your army needs generals, too.”

“Are you claiming you’re a general?” Brother Timothy gave him a sorrowful look. “You might be the most prideful man I’ve met.”

“I’m prideful? I’m not the man who claims he’s the One Mighty and Strong, who thinks he’ll bring ruin upon the world and stand as God’s viceroy until the return of the Lord. That, my friend, is pride. I’m just an independent thinker.”

“I’ve never called myself that,” Brother Timothy said. “It was the Lord who called me.”

His eyes were so intense, his words almost congealed with sincerity, that Jacob found himself drawn in, but only for a moment. And then his doubt reasserted itself.

The Lord called you? Yeah, well he called a lot of other guys, too.
Every crackpot between Death Valley and Waco believed God had chosen him personally for some grandiose scheme.

And for every crackpot prophet, there were a thousand followers willing to drink the Kool-aide.

#

The courtyard was big, but not big enough to hold everyone, so they ate in shifts, the organizing principle of which Jacob didn’t yet understand. Timothy said Brother Clarence would take him to the irrigation fields, but so far the man hadn’t surfaced. The prophet rejoined his family with pauses to break bread and bless the food for the newest arrivals.

Within another fifteen minutes, most of the men ate and left and only now did Jacob see Brother Clarence. Even the prophet rose to his feet, embraced several children, then left.

Brother Clarence came and sat down. He was not eating. “Ready to work?”

“Absolutely.” He made to stand up.

“No, go ahead and finish. Long time until lunch. You’ll need a good bellyful.”

“I’m done. Just nibbling bread to pass the time until you showed up.”

A woman stood on the far end of the courtyard. “Can I have the sisters’ attention, please?”

To Jacob’s surprise, it was Sister Miriam—FBI Agent Haley Kite, rather.

“I need three sisters to come with me to the farmers market in Price tomorrow to sell produce. We’ve got pickling cucumbers and tomatoes, in addition to the usual baked goods. It will be a good chance to grab supplies in town, if you need anything.”

At least a dozen hands went up. It wouldn’t be hard to find women who were happy to get away from the compound for a day, from cooking, mending, child care. The Lone and Dreary World, it seemed, still had some pull.

Agent Kite would be visiting the town of Price. Away from the men of Zarahemla. Now all Jacob needed was a pretext to get away himself.

Chapter Twelve:

Jacob’s would-be second wife approached midway through his first clinic at the Zarahemla compound. He saw her as he ushered out the boy with the improperly healed broken arm.

Emma Green wore a tight, eager smile that turned shy as soon as Jacob glanced her way. She twisted something in her hands.

He’d commandeered two rooms in the newest part of the compound, set some teenage girls to scrubbing the walls and floor and the benches and tables he’d brought in. He had a small bag of supplies brought with him the previous night when he’d met the men at the pageant. He’d burn through them in about two days. Already, he’d given antibiotics to a child who was suffering an ear infection, and to an elderly woman with an ominous damp cough.

And then there was the improperly set bone. He’d run his thumb down the boy’s radius. There, just before the wrist, near the head of the bone, he could feel the break. He didn’t need an x-ray to know it needed resetting. Near the growth-plate, too, so sooner, rather than later. Bottom line, he needed to get the kid to Sanpete County, where he could do it properly.

A man sat with one of his wives on the other side of the room, then a woman and a child who looked to be suffering from varicella, or some other chicken-pox-like rash. And Emma. He was anxious to see what she needed, then get rid of her.

“Sister Emma, come back, I’ll see you now.”

She nodded, an eager, flushed look to her face, then gathered her dress and hurried after him into the examination room. Jacob caught himself looking for the nurse, but he was by himself this time.

Emma closed the door and handed him an embroidered handkerchief, decorated with figures of the Manti Temple in each corner, stitched in gold. In the middle, in smooth, evenly stitched script: “A Family is Forever.”

“It’s lovely, did you make it yourself?” He tried to hand it back.

“No, please, keep it. I made it just for you.”

“I can’t take this, that wouldn’t be right. I’m your doctor, and we can never take gifts from our patients.”

Jacob pushed it toward her again, more insistent, and she took it back, looking crushed. He felt guily, but he had no intention of giving her a wrong impression.

“Here, have a seat. Now, what seems to be the problem?”

“I need an examination. Like at the hospital.”

The way she said it made him wary. “But what’s the problem?”

She hesitated and he waited. Maybe it was just training, but he didn’t like being back here alone with his patients. Most of them would have done anything he asked, no matter how outrageous. He was a doctor, the prophet had brought him to Zarahemla. His word would be gospel.

Emma had that look, too.
Take off all my clothes, doctor? And yours, too? Lie with you like this? Thou sayest.

But that wasn’t the danger. Jacob had no concerns about his own self-control. It was what a girl like Emma might say to others when she left. What she might remember had happened, or believe through wishful thinking.

The thing was, he had to see these people alone. Especially the women and children. Ask questions, let them reveal things they might otherwise be afraid to admit. It was the dangerous side of a closed community. Ranks circled to protect an abuser, not to bring crimes to light, and not to protect the vulnerable.

“If you’ll just give me an examination, like the one at the hospital, you’d see.”

“Emma, I’m busy. I’ve got thirty-four more people to see today. I can’t give you an examination unless you tell me what’s wrong.”

And you’d better make it damn convincing, because I’m starting to doubt everything you tell me.

“Here, I’ll show you, Jacob.” She stood and in a single motion pulled her dress over her head and let it fall in a heap.

And she wore nothing underneath. Her slender, girlish body shivered in front of him and he looked away. He kept his face neutral, fought down a grimace.

“Emma, put your dress back on.
Now.
”

“But Jacob. You’ll be my husband, it’s okay to look at me. Like a man looks at his wife. She belongs to him.”

He turned back with a sharp look and said with an angry edge, “In the name of Jesus Christ, I command thee to dress thyself.”

Emma gasped and snatched up her dress and held it in front of her. Her tremble was almost violent, now. She was frozen in place.

“Put your dress on, Emma,” he said in a quieter, more soothing voice. “Do it now and we’ll talk. If you don’t, I’ll tell your father and the prophet what you tried to do.”

Her eyes widened, she nodded. And then, to Jacob’s relief, she pulled her dress back on. Her lower lip trembled and she kept swallowing as if trying to keep from bursting into tears. One wrong word and he’d send her bawling from the room.

“Emma, please sit down. We need to talk.”

She sat down. “What did I do wrong? I don’t understand, I prayed. The Lord told me, and then I thought the Prophet—”

“Emma. Listen to me, Emma. You’re only fifteen.”

“Almost sixteen.”

“It’s so young, you’re a child.”

“I’m not. I feel things, like a woman. Strong feelings, and, and…”

“It’s all natural. You’re changing from a girl to a woman, but it doesn’t happen overnight. You need to give it time, be patient.”

“The Lord told me—”

He wasn’t getting anywhere. “You know I’m married already.”

“Of course you are, silly. I’ll be your second wife. I would be the second, right? And she will see, I won’t be any trouble to her. I’ll do what she says, and I can clean and cook, and sew.” Emma held up the handkerchief she’d stitched for him. “See, it’s not bad. My mother taught me and everyone says Mom’s the best seamstress in Zarahemla.”

What the hell was wrong with the world? This girl was young, pretty, and sincere. Shouldn’t she be shyly kissing her first boyfriend, who would be a young man of fifteen or sixteen? And then she’d learn about love and her body as she matured. Five years, maybe ten, she’d be ready to get married, and to someone her own age, not fifteen years older.

“There’s nothing wrong with you, I’m sure you’ll make someone a good wife.”

“Not someone,
you.
I’ll make
you
a good wife.
”

“But I told you I’m married already, and I would have to ask her permission, first.”

“You don’t think she’ll say yes?”

“No, Emma, she wouldn’t. You know what she’d say? She’d say, ‘Only fifteen? Are you crazy? We’ve already got a baby in the house.’” Jacob smiled and stepped forward to pat her shoulder. “But you won’t be fifteen forever.”

“So when I’m sixteen…?”

“I’ll tell you what,” Jacob said. “Keep this to yourself, keep praying about it, but otherwise don’t worry about it. When you’re
seventeen,
if you still feel this way, come back to me. I’ll pray to the Lord and see what he says.”

“Oh, thank you! That’s not that long. It’s only a year and two months, right? I can wait, you’ll see.”

“But until then, nobody can see anything between us. You’re just a girl and I’m just a doctor and we have no relationship.”

“I can do that.”

Jacob felt like a jerk as he led her from the waiting room. With any luck, she’d forget about him before she turned
sixteen,
let alone seventeen. But it didn’t matter, because he had no intention of being anywhere near the Zarahemla compound or the Church of the Last Days by the time she turned seventeen.

With any luck, he’d had his last encounter with Emma Green.

#

A desperate woman will resort to desperate measures to help her children. And so Fernie decided to use her children as props.

She rummaged through the children’s drawers until she found a couple of old outfits, the kind that are not quite retired from service, but worn enough, small enough that she kept them in reserve for when she got behind on the laundry. Daniel’s shirt, in particular, looked effective, with a twice-mended front pocket and the left sleeve stained from too many wipes at a snotty nose.

As for the baby, Fernie left rice cereal crusted around his mouth, dressed him in a diaper and a hand-me-down onesie. She hiked him on her hip, pushed the older two kids ahead of her and the four of them made their way upstairs to Mr. Hoover’s apartment.

The apartment building was a converted Victorian mansion in the Avenues. She thought Mr. Hoover had grown up in this house, raised his own children here, and then converted the building, ad-hoc, when he needed retirement money. It must be depressing to have spent his life in the house, know there was a nice brick fireplace behind this wall, or that under this carpet was a hardwood floor your father put down when you were a boy. And now it was filled with tenants.

Mr. Hoover opened the door, seemed to take them all in with a single glance. He wore a bathrobe and slippers. “Well hello, I didn’t expect you. Don’t usually see you before the first. You’re two days early.”

Normally, he was offering the older kids a candy from his bowl, making grandfatherly noises at the baby. Never mind that his house was crammed with Mormon knickknacks, and he seemed aware that Fernie and Jacob were something different. But today, for some reason, he was frowning, as if he already knew that Fernie was about to fall behind on rent.

Fernie cleared her throat. “Mr. Hoover, you know we always pay our rent on time. And we’re good tenants, nobody ever complains about us. I weed the front flower beds and I bring in your mail when you’re out of town. And remember when your wife was in the hospital?”

She’d never done these things expecting a reward, but she had to use them now. For her children.

“I don’t want any trouble, I never did,” Mr. Hoover said.

“We don’t want trouble either, we’re good tenants. And this is just for a few weeks, maybe less, until I can figure something out. I promise, I’ll get you the rent as soon as we can and we’ll pay a late fee if you need us to.”

“What do you mean, rent?” Mr. Hoover asked.

“The rent, we don’t have a paycheck coming this week. Isn’t that what you’re talking about? I was counting on that money to pay our bills and now it looks like it’s going to be late and—”

“Rent? That’s not what I’m talking about. Why is your rent going to be late? No, never mind. What I’m talking about is that the Attorney General called me this morning.”

She felt like someone had punched her in the gut. “He did?”

“Said he suspected you were involved in illegal activities—very vague on that, I don’t like it. You haven’t, uhm, kept assault rifles or anything in your apartment, have you?”

“What? I’ve got kids in the house. We don’t have guns, we’re not like that. And we’re good people, no problems at all.”

“Right, right, of course you are. The thing is, I don’t want any trouble in my building. It might be better if you, if all you just…”

“What?”

“Isn’t there somewhere else you could stay?”

Her legs felt weak, she wobbled and gripped the baby so tight, afraid she was going to fall, that he squawked. “This is our home. Where would we go?”