True Sisters (36 page)

Jessie shook her head, and Rebecca bowed hers in sorrow. “They say many died, that those living had a cold, hard time of it, but you are safe now, and we will take you home to a supper and good beds. You and Emeline will sleep in my bed, and Ephraim can have Amelia’s. She is my sister-wife.” Jessie pointed to the young woman with her chin.

A look of defiance came into Amelia’s eyes, and she retorted, “You will not give away my bed, Sister.” She turned to Jessie. “I have not been married yet six months, and I have my pride.”

The two women looked to Thomas as judge. With a glance at Jessie, he squared his shoulders. “Be still now. Hush your noise, Amelia. You would be ashamed of your selfishness if you knew how Rebecca’s kin have suffered.”

At that, the younger wife flounced away, climbing into their wagon and sitting down on the seat. Thomas and Rebecca helped Jessie and her brother and the two children into the back, then, seeing Amelia on the wagon seat, Rebecca, too, got into the wagon bed. When everyone was settled, Thomas seated himself beside Amelia and reached for the reins. But before he could slap them on the animals’ backs, he looked at his second wife for a moment, then at Rebecca and her family, and said, “You must ride in the back, Amelia. You have seated yourself in Rebecca’s place.”

*   *   *

Maud sat down on a wall in the tithing yard, not so far from Nannie Macintosh. She could have gone with Jessie, but she knew the house would be small and cramped, that it was a hard life Jessie’s relatives lived. She did not want to add to the family’s burden. Someone would come along to care for her. Robert was watching over her and would make sure of it. So she sat and watched the sun cross over the Salt Lake to the west, shivering as the air grew colder. Seagulls flew in the sky above her, sending their cries across the valley. The wind picked up. Maud drew her cloak around her and peered into the sky. She had made it to Zion, made it for both herself and Robert. She knew Robert would protect her, although he might just let her fall asleep and never wake up. Wouldn’t that be something! But what matter if her journey ended there?

She didn’t hear the man approach, for he was always stealthy. She was not aware he stood in front of her until he spoke, “You didn’t go with Sister Jessie?”

Maud shaded her eyes and looked up. “No.”

“Have you found a home, then?”

“Not yet.”

“I could taken ye home myself.”

“You?”

“My old wife died tuthree years since, and there was only the one. Now I’m lonesome as a stray dog. I could stand the company if you could stand Old Absalom. I think we could have some good few times.”

Maud thought that over for a very long time, for she had not thought to marry again. Would Robert like her to marry another? Would he object? He had always wanted her happiness. He would bade her to have done mourning him, to bide with Absalom, because he was a kind soul. Besides, she and Robert would have eternity together. So she said, “I believe I could stand you.” She could stand a man who held his own against authority, who didn’t belittle her skills with the herbs. She’d missed doing for a husband, sleeping against a warm body. Perhaps in the cold of winter, this man, like Robert, would whisper in her ear to stay under the sleep-warm quilts while he brought her coffee. Old Absalom seemed such a man.

She placed her hand on Absalom’s ancient arm, and together, they left the tithing grounds.

*   *   *

Thales Tanner insisted on walking the last miles into Zion, Louisa beside him. At the sight of the valley opening up before her, the tabernacle in the distance, white mountains in the background, she dropped to her knees and prayed. Thales did not join her, but waited until she was finished. “You must show me where our home is,” she told him.

Thales pointed to the south. “That way, but you cannot see it.”

“I am anxious to meet your parents. I hope they’ll like me. They don’t know about me, do they?”

“I’ve told you before that I wrote no one.”

“Perhaps one of the riders mentioned it to them.”

“No. You will be a surprise.”

Louisa had brushed her hair with her fingers until the snarls were gone and mended her clothes, so she looked as good as could be expected. “I wish I had the flowered bodice I discarded in Iowa,” she told her husband. “I have always been choice of my clothes. Now look at dreary, dreary me,” she chattered.

“Not as it matters,” Thales told her, and Louisa was rebuked for her foolishness. Still, nothing could stop her excitement, even Thales’s disheartenment. He did not seem to share her joy. He walked slowly, letting the wagons pass him, until they were among the last of the emigrants to reach the city. Louisa wondered if her husband feared censure by the church authorities for his role in the handcart disaster and if that was why he seemed reluctant to reach the tithing grounds. But it was not his fault. She would say that to them. Others would tell how Thales had sacrificed for the emigrants, how he had worked himself almost to death on their behalf, carrying the sick from the wagons to the fire each night, then carrying them back to the wagons in the morning. Why, one Saint who was dying of hunger said Thales had saved his life by giving him an onion. Thales had shared his little bit of food with others until his flesh sagged against his bones.

As they reached the tithing yard, Thales was greeted warmly by several men who congratulated him on making it home and inquired about mutual acquaintances in England and in the Martin Company, whether they had survived, whether they were maimed. Louisa held back a little, for she was shy, and Thales did not introduce her.

And then a woman came up to Thales, threw her arms around him, and said between sobs, “I am so glad you are returned. I feared for you.”

“And you are well, Tabitha?” he asked.

“I am.” She smiled at him and clasped his neck again. Then she saw Louisa. She looked first at Louisa’s face; then her eyes moved down until she saw her belly, which had already begun to swell. “Thales?” she asked uncertainly. “What is this?”

Thales turned and stared at Louisa for a long time, watched as her smile faded and her face took on the blank look of polygamous wives. “This is my wife Louisa,” he told the woman. Then turning to Louisa, he said, “And this is my wife Tabitha.”

The two women stared at each other, not with hatred or even bitterness, but with blank faces that hid their emotions. So this is what it’s like, Louisa thought. She said dully, “You should have told me, Thales.”

“And me. Oh, you should have written me, asked my permission,” Tabitha said. She looked at her husband a long time, then turned abruptly, announcing she would get the carriage.

“Did you forget you had a wife at home?” Louisa asked when the other woman was gone.

“Sarcasm does not become you.”

“Nor does lying become you.”

“I never lied.”

“You lied with the sin of omission,” Louisa said, then cried, “Why? Why didn’t you tell me? Why did you let me find out this way?”

“You might not have married me, and I wanted you to marry me.”

“But you had no right to deceive me.”

“You know plural marriage is our way, that I would have taken another wife one day. So what difference is it if I took her before or after you?”

“You should have told me, you who preached to me of truth and righteousness. It wasn’t right. Didn’t it bother you even a little bit?”

“It bothered me a great deal. But I needed your lovering. I would not have made it to the valley without you.”

“And without you, my family might yet be alive.”

“Do you hate me, then?”

“No.”

“Then you must love me.” He smiled at her in a way that had always made her glow.

“Do I?” Louisa asked. “Or do I have no choice?”

“Oh, you will adjust to each other in time. Good nature is Tabitha’s normal manner, and yours, as well.”

Tabitha returned with the carriage, and the three started off, the first wife on the front seat beside her husband, the second wife in the seat behind, staring at their backs.

That evening, the two wives were civil but barely spoke to each other while Thales recounted the story of their ordeal. “I might have lost my faith in myself without Louisa,” he said.

“I cannot believe you would ever lose your faith,” Tabitha told him. “You have a great future in the church. Everyone says so.”

Louisa rose to help clear the table and scrub the dishes, but Tabitha told her, “Don’t bother. It’s my kitchen, madam, and I know how everything is done.”

When the work was finished, the two women sat at the table with Thales until he yawned and said he was looking forward to the first night in a bed in many months. “Louisa?” he said. She stood, and despite her unhappiness, she was glad that Thales would spend that first night in Zion with her. He walked her to the door of the bedroom she had been assigned, one of two in the house. “Good night. Look to your prayers, my dear,” he said, and kissed her cheek.

Then taking Tabitha’s arm, he went into the other room with her. As Tabitha shut the door, she glanced at Louisa, unable to conceal her glee. Louisa closed her own door and sat down on the bed, where Tabitha had laid out one of her own worn nightgowns. She did not see to her prayers, however. She felt dull and stupid and wondered if she would ever want to pray again. Instead of getting down on her knees, Louisa lay on the bed fully clothed until she heard her husband’s boots drop in the next room. And then she truly understood polygamy.

*   *   *

Levi had not visited Nannie since that day when she had shown him her legs. She no longer talked about marrying him, nor did she even mention his name. Instead, she was quiet, brooding, wondering what would become of her if Levi deserted her. She did not want to be a burden on her sister, but there would be no work for a cripple other than sewing, and judging from the looks of the people in Zion, there were not many who could afford to hire a seamstress. Perhaps some compassionate man would add her to his household, a plural wife to be ignored by him and the other wives, an object of resentment and pity. Nannie wondered if she should have refused to let Old Absalom amputate her feet. Perhaps she should have taken her chances between a miracle and death.

She sat with Ella on the wall near the tithing office, staring at the women of Zion. Ella knew Nannie was waiting for Levi, and to distract her, Ella said, “Look at how many that one has.” She pointed with her chin to a large man who was surrounded by half a dozen women and a brood of children.

“Are they happy?” Nannie asked.

“How could they be? I never thought about all the children. How does a man support twenty-five children?” Despite herself, Ella giggled, and as Nannie laughed, too, she thought how much she would miss her sister when the two were settled. But maybe they would not live so far from each other, and Ella could visit her every day.

Nannie was thinking about that when she saw Levi striding toward her. He looked purposeful, and she knew he had made a decision about her future—not the decision she had hoped for, because if he had, he would have sought her out earlier. Ella saw him, too, and reached for her sister’s hand.

Levi stopped in front of Nannie and said, “I have something to say to you.”

“I must join Andrew,” Ella said, but Nannie told her to stay, and Ella, the baby in one arm, squeezed her sister’s hand.

“I’ve done a great deal of thinking,” Levi began, not looking at Nannie, but shading his eyes as he stared out over the tithing yard, which was muddy from the snow and the wagons and the people milling around. “I have asked you to marry me, and I will honor that. I will not deny you a second time. I know my duty, and I will be a man of my word.”

Nannie should have been pleased, but those were not words of love. Besides, the tone was ominous, and she clutched her hands in her lap, digging her nails into her flesh.

“You must know that I cannot take on the care of a wife in your condition, not by myself. There will be other wives.”

“Ye hae already said as much.”

“So I’m to marry Matilda Weaver, a widow who was a member of the company. She has agreed to care for you.” Nannie knew the woman—pretty, vain, not unlike Patricia. Nannie had heard her complaints from the time they left Iowa City and had seen her snatch a bit of bread from her mother’s hand at Devil’s Gate. She had suffered as had the others, but that had not made her more sympathetic. She would not take kindly to someone crippled.

“I’m not an invalid. I will care for myself,” Nannie said.

“Not in all ways. You will need someone.”

Nannie had to admit that was true. As the first wife, however, she would have some authority. She would not let Matilda rule her.

“Matilda and I will marry today. Later, when you’re better healed, you and I will be married.”

“But ye said I would be the first wife,” Nannie cried.

Levi shrugged. “Things are different now. Can you deny it?” Nannie did not answer, and Levi added, “Those are the conditions under which we’ll be married. I promised Matilda.”

Nannie bowed her head to hide her tears, feeling Ella grip her to keep her from sagging. Did she have a choice? No, of course not. She could not be a maid in a fine hotel, nor own a shop of her own. She would be a second wife in Levi’s house, and with luck, she might even bear him children, although she did not know if he would want her in that way. At best, she would be cared for, and at worst, she would become a bitter, barren woman, ignored by everyone.

“In a week or two, then, you will be my wife.”

Ella glared at Levi, and then she said, “Nay, Levi.” She straightened her back as her eyes moved to Andrew, who had returned and was standing on the other side of Nannie.

“Are you denying your sister the right to marry?” Levi asked in a mocking tone.

“Nannie disna need my permission.”

“Then you have nothing to say.”

“I do.” Ella swallowed and, looking directly at her husband, said, “Nannie canna marry ye, because she is going to marry Andrew. She will be his plural wife.”

Andrew’s face turned white, and he looked at his wife in shock. Nannie muttered, “Och!” in a strangled voice. “I widna! I widna ever! I’ll marry Levi.”