Pillar of Light

by Gerald N. Lund

  Lydia walked directly over to Emma and crouched down in front of her. “Good morning, Sister Emma.”

  “Good morning, Lydia.”

  “Are you feeling any better?”

  She managed a smile. “Yes, I’m doing fine this morning.”

  Lydia nodded but didn’t believe it for a moment. Emma’s eyes, usually lustrous and among her most striking features, were dull and listless. Dark circles beneath them made them seem more sunken than they were. Emma had not been well for almost a month. She was pregnant again, and judging from how large she already was at three months, Mary Whitmer was predicting twins for her. She had lost her first baby, and there was much concern among the women, especially with her condition now.

  Joseph’s head came up as he watched Lydia talking to his wife. He stood and came over to join them. He took Emma’s hand and began to rub the back of it. “Emma, you do still look very tired. Won’t you please just go back upstairs and rest for a time?”

  She smiled up at him. “We have to finish those last two overcoats and the undershirts. The missionaries have got to have warm clothing.”

  She was right, of course. It was already past the season for safe travel, and these four men were preparing to launch out on foot on a trip that would take them more than two thousand miles by the time they returned. Unfortunately, the Lord had said nothing about waiting until the weather was more hospitable, so October or not, they would leave the day after tomorrow.

  “We can do it, Emma,” Lydia said. “Nathan and I don’t have to be back for anything. I can help. You go rest.”

  She shook her head. “It will take every pair of hands to get things ready by then.”

  Joseph straightened and looked at Lydia. “She pushes herself so hard. She just won’t let up.”

  “Just like you do,” Emma chided him.

  “But I’m not sick.”

  “I’m not that sick either. Just a little tired. I’ll be fine, Joseph.” She reached out and took his hand. “You and the men go collect the firewood, and we sisters will get breakfast over with and start to work.”

  “Is it true, Emma, that Joseph received a revelation just for you?”

  Elizabeth Ann Whitmer, the youngest of the Whitmer children, was stitching up the hem on a heavy woolen coat. Even at fifteen she was an excellent seamstress, and her eyes did not leave Emma’s face as her fingers fairly flew in and out with the needle.

  Emma smiled at her. “Yes.”

  Her older sister, Catherine, looked up from where she was helping her mother cut out pieces of cotton cloth from a pattern traced on newspaper. “Really? Just for you?”

  “Yes. Joseph received it in July just after he came back from one of his trips to Colesville.”

  Lydia looked at Emma more closely. The two of them were working on sewing the pieces of cloth together. Each had a sleeve and sewed it into one side of what would be a heavy undershirt. Lydia was doing the left side, Emma the right. When they finished they handed it to Thankful Pratt, who then sewed the whole shirt together.

  Emma colored slightly under Lydia’s gaze. “What a wonderful thing that must be,” Lydia said.

  “Yes,” Thankful echoed. “Imagine, a personal revelation, direct from the Lord. Just for you.”

  “What did it say?” Elizabeth Ann said, her eyes eager.

  “Elizabeth,” Mother Whitmer chided. “It’s not polite to pry.”

  “Oh, I don’t mind, Mother Whitmer. It was a wonderful experience.” Emma dropped the piece of material into her lap and sat back. “The Lord called me his daughter. He told me that my sins were forgiven me, and then he said I was an elect lady.”

  “An elect lady,” Catherine breathed. “What a wonderful title!”

  “You are an elect lady, Emma,” Lydia said quickly. “We all think you are the perfect match for Joseph.”

  The color deepened along Emma’s cheekbones. “Why, thank you, Lydia. What a kind thing to say.”

  “We all agree,” Thankful said fervently. The Whitmer ladies all nodded vigorous agreement.

  Emma went on. “Let’s see...oh, yes, he told me that my calling was to be a comfort to Joseph, that I was to console him in times of affliction.”

  “Heaven knows you’ve had enough of those,” Mother Whitmer broke in.

  “The Lord also said that I was to serve as a scribe for Joseph. I’ve done that before, so that wasn’t a great surprise.”

  “What else?” Elizabeth Ann pressed.

  “I am to make a collection of hymns for the Church.”

  That brought all of their heads up. “Really?”

  “Yes. I love how he said it too. The Lord said that he delights in the song of the heart, that the song of the righteous is like a prayer unto him.”

  “Hmm,” Lydia murmured. “Isn’t that interesting? There are some churches that say that music is evil and refuse to sing any hymns. But music can always touch my heart about as fast as anything.”

  “Mine too,” Catherine said.

  Emma dropped her eyes now and stared at her hands. The others fell silent, sensing there was more she wanted to say. Finally she took a breath and looked up, letting her eyes run from one to the other. “The Lord also told me that I was not to murmur about the things which I had not been allowed to see. They had been withheld from me for a wise purpose.”

  “What is that supposed to mean?” Lydia wondered.

  “The gold plates.”

  “Oh.”

  Emma went on now, her voice very quiet. “Back in Harmony, right at the first, I sometimes served as scribe for Joseph. I knew the plates were there, because I had seen the outline of them covered by a linen tablecloth. But as Joseph translated he always arranged things so that I didn’t see the plates themselves. I wanted to see them, but Joseph said that he could show them to no one unless the Lord told him to.”

  She looked over at Mother Whitmer, her eyes large and sorrowful. “I didn’t mind that too much, I guess. Martin Harris had not been allowed to see them. Neither was Oliver when he came. So I felt a little better. Then...” She let it die with a little shake of her head and picked up her sewing again.

  Elizabeth Ann and Thankful blurted it out at exactly the same moment. “What?”

  Mother Whitmer was nodding in understanding. “Then I had my experience.”

  Emma looked up, the pain evident on her face now. “Yes,” she whispered. “When you came back into the house that night and told us what had happened, I couldn’t believe it. I was really upset.”

  “What, Mother?” Elizabeth Ann said, totally caught up now in Emma’s account. “What experience?”

  Catherine was looking intently at her mother. “You mean with Moroni?”

  “Yes.”

  Both Lydia and Thankful jerked around sharply. “You saw Moroni?” Thankful blurted.

  Mother Whitmer laid the scissors down. “Yes.”

  “Go ahead, Mother Whitmer,” Emma said, smiling her encouragement. “I have come to grips with this now. I don’t mind at all. Tell them what happened.”

  Mary Whitmer’s face was illumined with a happy glow as she half closed her eyes in remembrance. “It was shortly after Joseph and Emma moved here from Harmony with Oliver. This would have been a year ago last May or June. Well, as you know, Father Whitmer and I don’t have a small family, and our cabin is not large and spacious. We were already crowded. Then in one day we added three more adults to our family.”

  “The burden fell directly on her shoulders,” Emma explained to Lydia. “Father Whitmer and the boys were busy with the farming. Oliver and Joseph spent all day translating. I was still not in good health and not of much help.”

  “You were of great help,” Mary said firmly. “But it was still a great deal of work. I began to wonder why this had come upon me, why I was asked to make such a sacrifice.” She sighed. “Then one night, after finishing my many duties, I started out to milk the cows. To my surprise, as I came around the barn there was a stranger standing there.
He was dressed in plain clothing and had a knapsack on his back.”

  “And it was Moroni?” Elizabeth Ann burst out. She obviously had not heard this story from her mother before.

  Sister Pratt was troubled. “But I thought Joseph said Moroni was glorious and wonderful to behold.”

  Mary Whitmer nodded thoughtfully. “I suspect he appeared as a normal man to me so I would not be frightened. I wasn’t; I was just surprised to see this stranger standing there in our yard. It was only later that Joseph told me it must have been Moroni.”

  “What happened?” Lydia was like Elizabeth Ann. She was eager to hear this story told and wanted Mother Whitmer to get on with it.

  “He came up to me and said, ‘You have been very faithful and diligent in your labors, but you are tired because of the increase of your toil. It is proper therefore that you should receive a witness, that your faith may be strengthened.’

  “With that, he untied the knapsack on his back and removed from it the gold plates. He held them right in front of me,” she said, her voice tinged with awe. “He turned over each leaf one by one and pointed out the engravings.”

  “So you actually saw them?” Thankful breathed. “You saw the gold plates?”

  “Yes. As clear as I see you now. Then Moroni told me that I was to be patient in bearing the increased burdens. If I did so and endured in faith to the end, my reward would be sure.”

  For several moments the Whitmer kitchen was silent as the women contemplated what they had just heard. Then something occurred to Lydia. She turned to Emma. “Did Joseph’s mother ever get to see the plates?”

  Emma shook her head. “No.”

  She turned back to Mother Whitmer. “So you’re the only woman who got to see the plates?”

  She nodded, not returning Lydia’s gaze but watching Emma closely.

  “Do you know how that made me feel?” Emma asked softly. “It was not as if I hadn’t been asked to sacrifice. It was not as if I hadn’t been carrying a burden.” Her voice suddenly broke. “I lost the baby...”

  She couldn’t finish, and Lydia got up quickly and went to her. But Emma gave a little shake of her head and waved her back.

  “I’m all right,” she said. “For a long time I was really hurt by it all. What had I done wrong that the Lord would not give me that privilege? I suppose that’s why the Lord told me not to murmur.”

  “But why wouldn’t he allow you to see them?” Elizabeth Ann demanded with all the subtlety of youth.

  For a long moment Emma stared back at her, then she finally shook her head very slowly. “I don’t know. But...” Her head came up, and this time the smile was genuine and deep and touched her eyes as well as her mouth. “But for now, I am trying very hard not to murmur.”

  Chapter Six

  It was a cold and drizzly December day in western Missouri. The wife of Joshua Steed sat rigidly in her sitting room, not meeting Doctor Jonathan Hathaway’s saddened eyes. To say that she hated this man would be to overstate the case, but Jessica Steed certainly found everything about him distasteful—his perfectly fashionable clothing, his clipped New England accent, the way he minced when he walked, his habit of speaking to Joshua about her as though she were not in the room. Many of the other women in town thought it wonderful to have a real doctor from back East, but she could barely tolerate him.

  He laid a hand on her shoulder and she cringed, fighting the temptation to jerk away. “I’m really sorry, Mrs. Steed.” The words were right, but there was no sorrow in his voice—only that clinical detachment that so characterized Doctor Hathaway. “You don’t seem to have any problems conceiving a child, but your body just can’t carry them full term.”

  Jessie nodded woodenly. It had started again yesterday, the cramping, the pain, the bleeding. And the anguish in Joshua’s eyes. “I understand, Doctor. Thank you.”

  He was shaking his head, not looking at her, faintly irritated because she had presented him with a problem beyond his medical abilities. He didn’t like to think that anything was beyond his abilities.

  “Am I all right now? May I go out?”

  “Yes. You’re still a little weak, but I think you’ll be fine if you take things a bit easy.”

  She stood up. “Have you told my husband this?”

  “What?”

  “About your opinion that I’m not able to carry children.”

  His eyes dropped and his fingers fumbled at his watch fob. Of course he had.

  “And what did he say?” she asked quietly.

  Again he would not meet her eyes.

  “Where is he now?” He didn’t answer. She already knew. “Which saloon?”

  “Now, Mrs. Steed,” he began, a little indignantly, “you’ve got to realize, when a man’s got his heart set on having children, he’s bound—”

  She cut him off curtly. “I’ll not be needin’ your services any longer.”

  His head snapped around, and for a moment his mouth went on working, though no sound came out.

  “Thank you for your efforts. My husband will see that you are paid adequately.”

  “But, Mrs. Steed...,” he spluttered.

  “You already said it, Doctor. I can’t carry children. So I’ll not be needin’ your services any longer.”

  “But Mr. Steed and I have an agreement. I can’t just—”

  “Yes, Doctor,” Jessie said bitterly, “you can. And don’t be worrying about telling him. I’m on my way to find him now. I’ll explain that it was my decision.” She turned her back on him. “Good-bye, Doctor Hathaway.”

  She stood motionless, listening to his muttering as he got his hat and walking stick and left, slamming the door behind him. Inwardly, she was trembling, but at the same time she felt a thrill of exhilaration. She had done it. The little barmaid had spoken her mind. The daughter of Clinton Roundy, the timid girl who had once found it difficult to raise her head and look anyone in the eye, had stood her ground, had made her will be known. That, at least, was one thing she could thank Joshua for.

  She took a deep breath, then walked to where her shawl was draped over a chair. This next confrontation would be much more difficult, but the anger burning way down deep inside her was still there. Maybe it would be enough to see this one through as well.

  She found him in one of her father’s taverns, bottle of whiskey in front of him, playing poker with his foreman and some of the other men of the town. Her father was behind the long bar that filled one end of the room.

  She paused at the door for several moments, peering inside. She had not been inside either of her father’s saloons for over a year, but the moment she smelled the stale smell of beer, the tobacco, sawdust, and unwashed bodies, the memories all came flooding back. In that instant she knew she hated it, hated it all, hated the idea that men needed some kind of place where they could be with other men, where they could talk “men talk,” where they could turn to the bottle or the jug to find whatever courage or solace they thought they needed.

  Good, she thought. The anger was still there. It would be enough. She pushed through the swinging doors and walked into the room.

  Joshua looked up in surprise, then almost instantly his brows lowered and his face darkened. “I thought I told you that I didn’t like you comin’ in these places anymore.”

  She stopped directly in front of him. The men at the table had frozen in position and were staring at her. The other men at the bar and around the tables were also gawking. They knew who she was, but they also knew that Joshua Steed had said his wife wouldn’t be found in no saloon anymore.

  “I would like to talk with you, Joshua.”

  His jaw tightened. “Not here.”

  “Then come outside with me.”

  “I’m busy,” he growled.

  There was a snicker from the man across the table from Joshua. Jessie turned and looked at him, and the sneer on his face instantly faded. He began to study his cards carefully. She turned back to her husband. “It makes no difference to me,” s
he said evenly. “We can go outside or stay in here. But I need to talk with you.”

  He laid his cards down, very slowly, tipping his chair back on its two legs. “Jessie, I’m warnin’ you.” He wasn’t stone drunk, but she could tell from the heaviness of his speech that he had been drinking steadily. It always made him sullen, mean, ugly. She hated it.

  Her father was coming around from behind the bar, wiping his hands on his apron and calling even as he came. “Jessie, honey, what brings you here?”

  She didn’t turn, just looked down into the eyes of her husband. “I told Doctor Hathaway I would not be needin’ his services any longer.”

  The chair came back down with a crash. “What?”

  She was aware that every eye was fixed on her, but she no longer cared. “I can’t carry a child. There’s nothing he can do about it. I told him not to come back.”

  She spun on her heel and walked swiftly out of the tavern, her head high, her face calm.

  Matthew Steed was now ten and a half years old. He was still short for his age, but had hit into a growth spurt which left his feet poking too far out of his trousers and his hands too far out of his coat sleeves. It endeared him all the more to his mother, who felt a touch of sadness when she realized that the last of her children was soon to be a child no more.

  “Did you get all the eggs gathered, Matthew?”

  “Yes, Mama.”

  Becca looked up from where she was practicing writing on a piece of slate with a piece of soapstone. “Did you check behind the manger where the old white biddy loves to hide hers?”

  “Yes.” This time it was said with a touch of exasperation. He didn’t like having to report to his sister, who was only two years older than he was anyway.

  “Good,” Mary Ann said. “Where’s your pa?”