“I need to see Talitha again tonight,” I said, when Kurt and I were alone.
Kurt looked around the room, as if measuring it against the mental image he had of our own master bedroom. “I understand that. Maybe you could sneak away during dinner,” he suggested.
“Good idea,” I agreed.
“I’ll see what I can do to cover your absence with Stephen,” Kurt said. “But there is no way I’m staying in this house overnight. I’ve never in my life felt so certain that Satan held sway over the spirit of God in a specific location before. You feel it, too, don’t you?”
“Mmm,” I said. So he hadn’t changed his mind. I wasn’t going to argue that the Carter compound had a good spirit about it, but I couldn’t leave until I assured myself that Talitha was in no physical danger. The rest I would have to figure out later.
Was there any way I could get Stephen to send her to live with me and Kurt? Our marriage wasn’t perfect, but it had to be better than this. But then what about all the other children here, and the wives, too? It was too easy to have my attention fractured. I’d only promised to stay long enough to figure out if Talitha was being hurt. I couldn’t fix everything in every family in the world. I wasn’t even sure I could fix my own.
I remember Kurt telling me after about six months of being bishop that he’d finally learned that important lesson, that people had to solve their own problems and were only resentful if you tried to tell them what they were doing wrong. Of course, he’d meant adults, not vulnerable children.
“At least no one is starving to death here,” I said, as the smell of the roast pork wafted toward us.
Kurt grunted at that and together we walked down to the dining room. The table was really two long wooden tables put together, with a handmade white tablecloth stretched over both. The cloth was all one piece, and had been elaborately cross-stitched with names, a kind of seating chart for the table. There were three real wooden dining room chairs, a few folding chairs, a piano bench, a worn picnic bench, and a long wooden church pew jammed against the wall.
Stephen took one of the wooden chairs and directed me and Kurt to the other two, while Sarah and Rebecca sat on folding chairs. I felt guilty about taking Rebecca’s and Sarah’s spots, leading them to take Esther’s and Lehi’s, and on down the line until the five youngest children shared the space of three on the church pew. Kurt tried to stand to insist that Sarah come back to her normal spot, but she refused with a stubborn glee.
Brigham reached in to stick a finger in the bowl of mashed potatoes. Rebecca slapped at his hand, but not before he’d already gotten a hunk of it into his mouth.
Sarah made a sour face, but she didn’t seem to feel any obligation to participate in the child management, even of her own children.
I saw Lehi—I think that was his name; the embroidered names were no help because of the mixed up seating arrangement—twist one of the girl’s fingers very roughly, for no reason that I could tell. “Maddie is a baby, crying like a baby,” he taunted.
Madeleine twisted her mouth to stop herself from crying, and the oldest boy, Nephi, resolved the situation with a threatening finger at his brother. Or half-brother. Whatever the relationship was.
I couldn’t help but think that this could easily be my own boys if they’d had so many younger siblings. There were so many odd things about this polygamous group that bothered me, and then a moment like this, that seemed just so—ordinary.
Rebecca clapped her hands loudly. “Manners in front of our company, please,” she said. She pointed at Lehi and Brigham, then mimed a smile to Madeleine with fingers at either side of her lips. Madeleine responded by making a false smile that seemed all too much like Sarah’s.
I looked at Sarah. Even if she had been in charge of dinner preparation, she didn’t seem to be looking after the children at all. I couldn’t tell which ones were hers and which ones were Rebecca’s based on anything other than my memory of what Stephen had told me. As far as their responses to maternal authority, Rebecca seemed the mother of them all.
Then Stephen Carter stood and stared balefully around the room, the children going absolutely quiet. He bent his head and closed his eyes for prayer. Kurt and I bowed our heads, too, but in that moment, I felt Kurt was right about the spirit of God being pushed away. I felt only a cavernous spiritual darkness here.
Stephen began his prayer with a long list of things he was grateful for, including every child in the room and the two wives who were present. He was grateful for his “abundant wealth,” for “our election and calling being made sure,” and for God’s “saving us from the wrath of hell which so many others must face.” The prayer went on and on.