The Prophet himself was downstairs, as white-faced as if it was his own daughter injured. John looked to him for explanations, of course, as everyone expected Joseph to speak, but the Prophet looked away, and it was William Clayton who explained. "She fell, the whole flight. She took a bad blow to the hip, we think, and her foot may be broken -- bruises on her face -- she doesn't wake up -- "
"The girl who came to me said there was a baby in the accident, too."
Clayton went red, and stammered something unintelligible.
John could guess why as well as anyone. It was what the girl had said. Dinah was pregnant. Pregnant and upstairs alone with Bennett. "She's pregnant, and you're letting that bastard have his hands on her?"
The room went silent. Joseph looked at John distantly, as if he were puzzled about something. "He's the only woman's doctor in Nauvoo. He was here in the house."
"Whether she played the whore or not, I'd rather she saw no doctor at all than see him," John said. He headed for the stairs.
Hyrum reached out to stop him. "He said he wasn't to be disturbed, too dangerous -- "
"I have no doubt of it. But the only danger he's worried about is danger to him."
"What are you trying to tell us?" Joseph asked.
John had no intention of stopping to answer. He was halfway up the stairs when he heard Charlie come in. "Where is she?" Charlie demanded.
Someone started to explain, when a door opened upstairs and John Bennett came to the top stop. "I've done what can be done," he said. There was blood on his hands. "There was no more clean water. Will someone draw me water so I can wash?" He brushed past John on the way down the stairs.
"Bennett!" John said, and Bennett turned to face him only a few steps down.
"How is she?" Joseph asked. John noticed how concerned he seemed to be. Was he somehow responsible for her falling?
Bennett was looking at the Prophet when he spoke, but John could see his face clearly, and it seemed to him that the man was gloating. "It's not mine to comment on whoever it was who got her with child. Providence apparently determined that the child should not live. The babe was too small to survive anyway, but no matter. It was already dead before I took it." A pause, and then, as if it should mean something to Joseph, "It would have been a boy."
Charlie still was waiting stupidly at the front door. "Dinah was going to have a baby?"
"Not now," Bennett said. "And it's tragic to say, but not ever. The injury was too great. I had to choose between her life and trying to save organs that could not be saved. She'll never have a child again."
The words hung in the air for a moment. Bennett sounded so convincing, so authoritative. There was no choice. He saved her life. And yet there was a hint of triumph in his voice, and John could not keep from hearing the harlot's voice saying, "Well, somebody has to clean up." Dinah's baby was dead, Dinah's womanly parts had been destroyed, and the man who had his hands in her to do it, the man who still had her blood damp on his fingers, Bennett was an abortionist. John did not decide to kill him; it was not the thing a man decides. He simply tried to do it. and if they hadn't stopped him, would gladly have finished the job. Standing three steps higher on the stair, it was almost effortless to kick out at Bennett. Bennett was off-balance, having turned to look at Joseph again. The heel of the boot caught him at the side of the face, just in front of the ear. The blow had force enough that Bennett's feet did not touch the three steps that remained below him; he sprawled on the floor, trying to raise himself to his feet. John did not wait to see if he had strength to rise. Someone was shouting the foulest language John had ever heard as he bounded down the stairs and kicked at Bennett's unprotected belly. Even when they grabbed him, began to pull him away, John got free enough to put a boot into Bennett's crotch. Bennett's cry of pain at last stopped the string of curses and obscenities. John realized only then that he had been doing the shouting himself.
"Brother Kirkham!" Hyrum was saying to him, "in the name of heaven, don't blame the doctor for doing his work!"
"Doctor!" John's throat hurt him when he spoke, and all he could manage now was a rasping sort of voice that he didn't recognize. "He's a butcher. He's an abortionist for the local whores, that's what he is!"
William Clayton tried to hush him. "It's not right to call such names -- "
"I'm not calling names!" John cried out hoarsely. "I'm telling you what he is! One of the tarts told me so, and I've heard it again since then. He does the cleaning up when the whores get pregnant, he keeps them in business, he's their doctor, and you let him get his hands on my daughter!"
Someone was helping Bennett to his feet. "I didn't think you were the sort of man who visited prostitutes," Bennett said, his voice sounding sad.
The man could lie even after a beating. John wanted another try at killing him, but they were holding him too tightly.
"You knew I was, Bennett, from the time you saw me with the tart in Springfield. And you knew her, too; I saw you greet her."
"I don't know what you have to gain by lying about me, Brother Kirkham. I saved your daughter's life. When you're not so worried about her, you'll regret saying these things. But don't worry. You won't need to come apologize. I forgive you already. And the Lord will forgive you for adultery, as well, if you truly repent."
John looked around him, wanting someone to rebuke Bennett, to denounce his pose of righteousness, but the other men were embarrassed to meet his gaze. It was plain that whether they liked Bennett or not, they weren't going to take John's word. Except about his having been with a whore -- they'd take his word for that.
"Brother Charlie," Hyrum said, "maybe you ought to take your father home."
"Not till I see my daughter," John said.
"No," Bennett said. "She's too weak, she couldn't bear to see him now. It would endanger her life."
"I'm her father," John said, "and she has no husband here, and I'll not have a bloody abortionist tell me not to see my daughter."
"I tell you it's too -- "
Joseph interrupted. He spoke quietly, but Bennett fell silent when he spoke. "I'll go with Brother Kirkham myself," Joseph said, "to make sure he doesn't do her any harm. A man has a right to see his daughter -- that's not a matter for a doctor to decide." Joseph reached out to John, and the men let him go. The Prophet took him by the shoulder and began to draw him toward the stair. His touch was firm and welcoming, and John wondered if perhaps the Prophet believed him after all.
Bennett limped to the stairs ahead of them. "I'll go too," he said, "to make sure she's doing well."
"No," Joseph said, firmly moving him aside. "I think you won't be needed with her anymore."
It did not take the murmurs from the watching men and women to tell Bennett what they all could see. Joseph believed John Kirkham, however unlikely his story sounded, and Bennett knew it now. He stepped back, letting them pass, and for the first time John could see an impression that might have been fear pass across Bennett's face. It lasted only a moment, however, before plain hatred took its place.
Charlie followed them up the stairs. The room stank of blood and sweat and vomit; Dinah was retching over a chamberpot, writhing in agony after every empty heave. John marked how Joseph ran to her at once, had his arm around her, supporting her as he took the pot and held it with his other hand. The action said more than any explanation could have done. There had been no hesitation. Joseph knew Dinah more intimately than John would have supposed.
Charlie, of course, didn't see it. "How are you?" Charlie said.
"Don't let him near me again," Dinah whispered after gasping for breath. "Don't ever." She retched again.
"Bennett?" Joseph asked.
Dinah clung to him and wept. "He was hurting me," she said. Her voice was almost too weak to hear. "I woke up. His hand in me." Joseph held her as she shuddered, tried again to vomit, twisted again in pain when she was done. "The baby's dead. I'm sorry, I'm sorry."
A woman whose husband was thousands of miles away w
hen her baby was conceived might apologize to the Prophet for being pregnant. But she'd never apologize because the baby died unless the Prophet was the father.
"What's happening?" Charlie asked. "How could Dinah -- "
Of course Charlie didn't understand. Or perhaps he did, John thought, but would not believe it unless someone put it into words. At any rate, he stopped with the question unasked. Joseph said, "I'll explain it to you. Tomorrow, Charlie."
"Don't let him near me," Dinah whispered.
"I won't."
"Spiritual wifery," Dinah said.
Joseph tried to lean her back on the bed, putting pillows under her. "Don't try to talk, Dinah. Try to rest. Try to sleep."
Desperately she tried to stay sitting up, but without his support she couldn't do it. "Listen to me."
Joseph stood up. "Later, Dinah. When you're stronger."
It was agony for her, but still she tried to shout it: "I don't want to die without telling you!"
"Listen to her," John ordered. Rest would do her no good if her mind was not at peace.
Joseph listened.
"Bennett. Telling women they're his spiritual wives. Just before they marry, telling them to let him -- afterward -- " She started to gag, then stopped and lay on her back, panting. "Sally was one. A week before the wedding. And Dorcas Paine. Ask them. He tells them you had a revelation."
" My Sally?" Charlie asked.
"Stop him, Joseph," Dinah whispered.
"I will," Joseph said.
"The baby's dead," Dinah said again.
"Sleep now, Dinah. We won't let him near you. Go to sleep."
She was crying softly, but it was so calm that it seemed to John almost as though she were happy now. She awoke with Bennett's hand in her. John wanted to spew the memory of the words out of his own mouth, though he had not said them; he wanted to drive the picture from his memory, but it stayed before John's eyes no matter where he looked, as he silently cursed his clear imagination and the way that strong pictures lingered with him. Bennett bowing over Dinah's naked body, unwomaning her with his delicate fingers as she awoke from the pain. "I wish I had killed him."
Joseph closed the door behind them. They stood at the top of the stairs. "No, Brother John. Vengeance is God's." They both whispered, so that they would not be heard downstairs.
"Don't tell me about God, Prophet," John said. "There's damned few men who could get a child on Dinah, damned few she couldn't say no to."
"Don't judge what you don't know," Joseph said.
"I'm no stranger to that, sir," John answered. "I know how little bastards come to be."
Joseph suddenly held him by the shirt front, in a strong grip that included a little bit of the loose skin of John's aging chest. "Your daughter is not a harlot, Brother John," he whispered, "and the child who died today would not have been a bastard. I'll take it out of the skin of the man who says otherwise." His voice was so quiet that John was sure even Charlie could not hear him. But Charlie could see the way that Joseph held him, could see that a warning had been given. John nodded, and Joseph let go of him.
"What will you do about Bennett?" Charlie asked.
"We were going to build the City of God together." He was speaking calmly, but John saw how his hands gripped each other too tightly, as if he were trying to hold himself in check by brute force. "I have to think. Give me time to think." Then, like a man awaking after talking in his sleep, he looked from John to Charlie and said, "We'll care for Dinah here, of course, until she's stronger."
Joseph started down the stairs. "John Bennett," he said. "I must have a word with you. We have something to discuss." He sounded distracted, unsure of what he meant to do.
It didn't matter. "He left," William Clayton said. "As soon as you went upstairs, he was out the door."
"Is it true?" asked Vilate. "He's an abortionist?"
Joseph nodded.
"But he was my doctor."
"Sister Vilate," Joseph said, getting control of himself because the others needed him to be in control, "would you go up with Sister Dinah? She needs you."
Vilate went quickly. Joseph then addressed the whole group. "It's too much to ask that no word of these things leave this room. I will say only this. Anyone who says that Dinah Kirkham Handy was carrying a bastard in her womb is a liar, and I will testify against him at the judgment bar of God." He did not shout, but the words had all the more power for that.
Joseph waited a moment, as if he meant to say something else, but he either forgot or thought better of it. Instead he walked into the parlor. Only then did John notice Emma, who was sitting on a chair facing a window. Joseph took her by the hand, and she arose from the chair and let him escort her out of the room. She looked as grim as a condemned prisoner.
"What happened to her?" Charlie asked.
John shook his head. He cared nothing for the periphery of the picture, what lay beyond the frame. All he could think of was Bennett and Dinah and the Prophet's baby. "I should have killed him," he whispered. If I'd been ten years younger I'd have done it. Killed him as he stood there with his hands bloody, like a wolf howling in triumph over the gory kill -- even God would have congratulated me for that.
40
Charlie Banks Kirkham Nauvoo, 1842
The next day, Joseph took Charlie to the river's edge where no one else could hear, and when the hour was over, had told him who the father of Dinah's baby was and why the Principle was not spiritual wifery.
"It will break Sally's heart," Charlie whispered.
"Don't be modest," Joseph said. "It will break yours, too. And then make you both again, more perfect than you ever were before. Happier."
"If I hadn't been there yesterday, if I hadn't known that Dinah was carrying a child, would you have taught me this doctrine?"
"Eventually. But the Lord chooses the time, not me. You're in the hidden Kingdom now, Charlie, and I'm glad of it. You're a man that should know my secrets, because I can trust you." Joseph embraced him, kissed him on the cheek the way he kissed the Brethren, and left him there on the shore to think.
The inner Kingdom. Charlie could not even exult. For he had to go tell Sally what the Lord required now. Let it be yesterday, Charlie wished. Let it be a week ago, when I knew nothing, when I was a child. Let it be last winter in Washington, when I lived in dreams. Let it be last summer, when Don Carlos was still alive and I was still his friend. Let it be years ago, when I did not love Sally, and so did not have the power to break her heart.
Sally was scrubbing the floor when Charlie came in. Her face was flushed from the exertion, from hanging her head as she ground the wad of rags into the boards. She didn't even hear him enter, and so he stood and watched her. It was scullery work, the way his mother had served in Hulme's house. Sally's arms were as strong as Anna's, and younger, and the play of muscles under the skin had a delicate grace to it that answered the gross flexions and extensions of arms and back and chest. Her hair was done up in a bun and wound with a rag, except for a few strands pasted across her face with sweat. She huffed as she worked.
At that moment Charlie loved her more than he ever had before -- not out of gratitude, for everyone had work to do in this place and it was no surprise when someone did it, but rather because he felt the movements of her body in his own arms and back and hips, felt the shape of the house the way she felt it, because in this year -- no, in these months since he came home from Washington -- they had become each other. People spoke to him as if he were only himself, but he knew that hidden from them was someone else entirely, the Charlie that Sally had created out of him. Eve was made from the rib of Adam, Charlie thought, watching her scrub, but Adam was also made from the womb of Eve.
Sally stopped, hung her head and caught her breath, then laboriously got up to move the bucket to another place. Charlie saw that she was so caught up in her work that she would not notice him even now, so before she could set to work again he called her name.
"Oh, Charlie!" she said. Her f
irst response was one of pleasure. Then she looked crestfallen. "I hate it when you take me by surprise, I look like such a pig." Charlie reached to embrace her. She refused. "I'm filthy all over, and I'd get a gallon of sweat on your coat." But Charlie embraced her anyway, and pulled her close until her face rested on the deep blue cloth, and when he had held her longer than any greeting could require, she said, "What's wrong, Charlie?"
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