by Zane Grey
Shefford saw, before he reached the square, that this day in Stonebridge was one of singular action and excitement for a Mormon village. The town was full of people and, judging from the horses hitched everywhere and the big canvas-covered wagons, many of the people were visitors. A crowd surrounded the hall—a dusty, booted, spurred, shirt-sleeved and sombreroed assemblage that did not wear the hall-mark Shefford had come to associate with Mormons. They were riders, cowboys, horse-wranglers, and some of them Shefford had seen in Durango. Navajos and Piutes were present, also, but they loitered in the background.
Withers drew Shefford off to the side where, under a tree, they hitched their horses.
“Never saw Stonebridge full of a riffraff gang like this today,” said Withers. “I’ll bet the Mormons are wild. There’s a tough outfit from Durango. If they can get anything to drink—or if they’ve got it—Stonebridge will see smoke today!… Come on. I’ll get in that hall.”
But before Withers reached the hall he started violently and pulled up short, then, with apparent unconcern, turned to lay a hand upon Shefford. The trader’s face had blanched and his eyes grew hard and shiny, like flint. He gripped Shefford’s arm.
“Look! Over to your left!” he whispered. “See that gang of Indians there—by the big wagon. See the short Indian with the chaps. He’s got a face big as a ham, dark, fierce. That’s Shadd!… You ought to know him. Shadd and his outfit here! How’s that for nerve? But he pulls a rein with the Mormons.”
Shefford’s keen eye took in a lounging group of ten or twelve Indians and several white men. They did not present any great contrast to the other groups except that they were isolated, appeared quiet and watchful, and were all armed. A bunch of lean, racy mustangs, restive and spirited, stood near by in charge of an Indian. Shefford had to take a second and closer glance to distinguish the half-breed. At once he recognized in Shadd the broad-faced squat Indian who had paid him a threatening visit that night long ago in the mouth of the Sagi. A fire ran along Shefford’s veins and seemed to concentrate in his breast. Shadd’s dark, piercing eyes alighted upon Shefford and rested there. Then the half-breed spoke to one of his white outlaws and pointed at Shefford. His action attracted the attention of others in the gang, and for a moment Shefford and Withers were treated to a keen-eyed stare.
The trader cursed low. “Maybe I wouldn’t like to mix it with that damned breed,” he said. “But what chance have we with that gang? Besides, we’re here on other and more important business. All the same, before I forget, let me remind you that Shadd has had you spotted ever since you came out here. A friendly Piute told me only lately. Shefford, did any Indian between here and Flagstaff ever see that bunch of money you persist in carrying?”
“Why, yes, I suppose so—’way back in Tuba, when I first came out,” replied Shefford.
“Huh! Well, Shadd’s after that.… Come on now, let’s get inside the hall.”
The crowd opened for the trader, who appeared to be known to everybody.
A huge man with a bushy beard blocked the way to a shut door.
“Hello, Meade!” said Withers. “Let us in.”
The man opened the door, permitted Withers and Shefford to enter, and then closed it.
Shefford, coming out of the bright glare of sun into the hall, could not see distinctly at first. His eyes blurred. He heard a subdued murmur of many voices. Withers appeared to be affected with the same kind of blindness, for he stood bewildered a moment. But he recovered sooner than Shefford. Gradually the darkness shrouding many obscure forms lifted. Withers drew him through a crowd of men and women to one side of the hall, and squeezed along a wall to a railing where progress was stopped.
Then Shefford raised his head to look with bated breath and strange curiosity.
The hall was large and had many windows. Men were in consultation upon a platform. Women to the number of twenty sat close together upon benches. Back of them stood another crowd. But the women on the benches held Shefford’s gaze. They were the prisoners. They made a somber group. Some were hooded, some veiled, all clad in dark garments except one on the front bench, and she was dressed in white. She wore a long hood that concealed her face. Shefford recognized the hood and then the slender shape. She was Mary—she whom her jealous neighbors had named the Sago Lily. At sight of her a sharp pain pierced Shefford’s breast. His eyes were blurred when he forced them away from her, and it took a moment for him to see clearly.
Withers was whispering to him or to someone near at hand, but Shefford did not catch the meaning of what was said. He paid more attention; however, Withers ceased speaking. Shefford gazed upon the crowd back of him. The women were hooded and it was not possible to see what they looked like. There were many stalwart, clean-cut, young Mormons of Joe Lake’s type, and these men appeared troubled, even distressed and at a loss. There was little about them resembling the stern, quiet, somber austerity of the more matured men, and nothing at all of the strange, aloof, serene impassiveness of the gray-bearded old patriarchs. These venerable men were the Mormons of the old school, the sons of the pioneers, the ruthless fanatics. Instinctively Shefford felt that it was in them that polygamy was embodied; they were the husbands of the sealed wives. He conceived an absorbing curiosity to learn if his instinct was correct; and hard upon that followed a hot, hateful eagerness to see which one was the husband of Mary.
“There’s Bishop Kane,” whispered Withers, nudging Shefford. “And there’s Waggoner with him.”
Shefford saw the bishop, and then beside him a man of striking presence.
“Who’s Waggoner?” asked Shefford, as he looked.
“He owns more than any Mormon in southern Utah,” replied the trader. “He’s the biggest man in Stonebridge, that’s sure. But I don’t know his relation to the Church. They don’t call him elder or bishop. But I’ll bet he’s some pumpkins. He never had any use for me or any Gentile. A close-fisted, tight-lipped Mormon—a skinflint if I ever saw one! Just look him over.”
Shefford had been looking, and considered it unlikely that he would ever forget this individual called Waggoner. He seemed old, sixty at least, yet at that only in the prime of a wonderful physical life. Unlike most of the others, he wore his grizzled beard close-cropped, so close that it showed the lean, wolfish line of his jaw. All his features were of striking sharpness. His eyes, of a singularly brilliant blue, were yet cold and pale. The brow had a serious, thoughtful cast; long furrows sloped down the cheeks. It was a strange, secretive face, full of a power that Shefford had not seen in another man’s, full of intelligence and thought that had not been used as Shefford had known them used among men. The face mystified him. It had so much more than the strange aloofness so characteristic of his fellows.
“Waggoner had five wives and fifty-five children before the law went into effect,” whispered Withers. “Nobody knows and nobody will ever know how many he’s got now. That’s my private opinion.”
Somehow, after Withers told that, Shefford seemed to understand the strange power in Waggoner’s face. Absolutely it was not the force, the strength given to a man from his years of control of men. Shefford, long schooled now in his fair-mindedness, fought down the feelings of other years, and waited with patience. Who was he to judge Waggoner or any other Mormon? But whenever his glance strayed back to the quiet, slender form in white, when he realized again and again the appalling nature of this court, his heart beat heavy and labored within his breast.
Then a bustle among the men upon the platform appeared to indicate that proceedings were about to begin. Some men left the platform; several sat down at a table upon which were books and papers, and others remained standing. These last were all roughly garbed, in riding-boots and spurs, and Shefford’s keen eye detected the bulge of hidden weapons. They looked like deputy-marshals upon duty.
Somebody whispered that the judge’s name was Stone. The name fitted him. He was not young, and looked a man suited to the prosecution of these secret Mormons. He had a ponderous br
ow, a deep, cavernous eye that emitted gleams but betrayed no color or expression. His mouth was the saving human feature of his stony face.
Shefford took the man upon the judge’s right hand to be a lawyer, and the one on his left an officer of court, perhaps a prosecuting attorney. Presently this fellow pounded upon the table and stood up as if to address a court-room. Certainly he silenced that hallful of people. Then he perfunctorily and briefly stated that certain women had been arrested upon suspicion of being sealed wives of Mormon polygamists, and were to be herewith tried by a judge of the United States Court. Shefford felt how the impressive words affected that silent hall of listeners, but he gathered from the brief preliminaries that the trial could not be otherwise than a crude, rapid investigation, and perhaps for that the more sinister.
The first woman on the foremost bench was led forward by a deputy to a vacant chair on the platform just in front of the judge’s table. She was told to sit down, and showed no sign that she had heard. Then the judge courteously asked her to take the chair. She refused. And Stone nodded his head as if he had experienced that sort of thing before. He stroked his chin wearily, and Shefford conceived an idea that he was a kind man, if he was a relentless judge.
“Please remove your veil,” requested the prosecutor.
The woman did so, and proved to be young and handsome. Shefford had a thrill as he recognized her. She was Ruth, who had been one of his best-known acquaintances in the hidden village. She was pale, angry, almost sullen, and her breast heaved. She had no shame, but she seemed to be outraged. Her dark eyes, scornful and blazing, passed over the judge and his assistants, and on to the crowd behind the railing. Shefford, keen as a blade, with all his faculties absorbed, fancied he saw Ruth stiffen and change slightly as her glance encountered someone in that crowd. Then the prosecutor in deliberate and chosen words enjoined her to kiss the Bible handed to her and swear to tell the truth. How strange for Shefford to see her kiss the book which he had studied for so many years! Stranger still to hear the low murmur from the listening audience as she took the oath!
“What is your name?” asked Judge Stone, leaning back and fixing the cavernous eyes upon her.
“Ruth Jones,” was the cool reply.
“How old are you?”
“Twenty.”
“Where were you born?” went on the judge. He allowed time for the clerk to record her answers.
“Panguitch, Utah.”
“Were your parents Mormons?”
“Yes.”
“Are you a Mormon?”
“Yes.”
“Are you a married woman?”
“No.”
The answer was instant, cold, final. It seemed to the truth. Almost Shefford believed she spoke truth. The judge stroked his chin and waited a moment, and then hesitatingly he went on.
“Have you—any children?”
“No.” And the blazing eyes met the cavernous ones.
That about the children was true enough, Shefford thought, and he could have testified to it.
“You live in the hidden village near this town?”
“Yes.”
“What is the name of this village?”
“It has none.”
“Did you ever hear of Fre-donia, another village far west of here?”
“Yes.”
“It is in Arizona, near the Utah line. There are few men there. Is it the same kind of village as this one in which you live?”
“Yes.”
“What does Fre-donia mean? The name—has it any meaning?”
“It means free women.”
The judge maintained silence for a moment, turned to whisper to his assistants, and presently, without glancing up, said to the woman:
“That will do.”
Ruth was led back to the bench, and the woman next to her brought forward. This was a heavier person, with the figure and step of a matured woman. Upon removing her bonnet she showed the plain face of a woman of forty, and it was striking only in that strange, stony aloofness noted in the older men. Here, Shefford thought, was the real Mormon, different in a way he could not define from Ruth. This woman seated herself in the chair and calmly faced her prosecutors. She manifested no emotion whatever. Shefford remembered her and could not see any change in her deportment. This trial appeared to be of little moment to her and she took the oath as if doing so had been a habit all her life.
“What is your name?” asked Judge Stone, glancing up from a paper he held.
“Mary Danton.”
“Family or married name?”
“My husband’s name was Danton.”
“Was. Is he living?”
“No.”
“Where did you live when you were married to him?”
“In St. George, and later here in Stonebridge.”
“You were both Mormons?”
“Yes.”
“Did you have any children by him?”
“Yes.”
“How many?”
“Two.”
“Are they living?”
“One of them is living.”
Judge Stone bent over his paper and then slowly raised his eyes to her face.
“Are you married now?”
“No.”
Again the judge consulted his notes, and held a whispered colloquy with the two men at his table.
“Mrs. Danton, when you were arrested there were five children found in your home. To whom do they belong?”
“Me.”
“Are you their mother?”
“Yes.”
“Your husband Danton is the father of only one, the eldest, according to your former statement. Is that correct?”
“Yes.”
“Who, then, is the father—or who are the fathers, of your other children?”
“I do not know.”
She said it with the most stony-faced calmness, with utter disregard of what significance her words had. A strong, mystic wall of cold flint insulated her. Strangely it came to Shefford how impossible either to doubt or believe her. Yet he did both! Judge Stone showed a little heat.
“You don’t know the father of one or all of these children?” he queried, with sharp rising inflection of voice.
“I do not.”
“Madam, I beg to remind you that you are under oath.”
The woman did not reply.
“These children are nameless, then—illegitimate?”
“They are.”
“You swear you are not the sealed wife of some Mormon?”
“I swear.”
“How do you live—maintain yourself?”
“I work.”
“What at?”
“I weave, sew, bake, and work in my garden.”
“My men made note of your large and comfortable cabin, even luxurious, considering this country. How is that?”
“My husband left me comfortable.”
Judge Stone shook a warning finger at the defendant.
“Suppose I were to sentence you to jail for perjury? For a year? Far from your home and children! Would you speak—tell the truth?”
“I am telling the truth. I can’t speak what I don’t know.… Send me to jail.”
Baffled, with despairing, angry impatience, Judge Stone waved the woman away.
“That will do for her. Fetch the next one,” he said.
One after another he examined three more women, and arrived, by various questions and answers different in tone and temper, at precisely the same point as had been made in the case of Mrs. Danton. Thereupon the proceedings rested a few moments while the judge consulted with his assistants.
Shefford was grateful for this respite. He had been worked up to an unusual degree of interest, and now, as the next Mormon woman to be examined was she whom he had loved and loved still, he felt rise in him emotion that threatened to make him conspicuous unless it could be hidden. The answers of these Mormon women had been not altogether unexpected by him, but once spoken in cold blood und
er oath, how tragic, how appallingly significant of the shadow, the mystery, the yoke that bound them! He was amazed, saddened. He felt bewildered. He needed to think out the meaning of the falsehoods of women he knew to be good and noble. Surely religion, instead of fear and loyalty, was the foundation and the strength of this disgrace, this sacrifice. Absolutely, shame was not in these women, though they swore to shameful facts. They had been coached to give these baffling answers, every one of which seemed to brand them, not the brazen mothers of illegitimate offspring, but faithful, unfortunate sealed wives. To Shefford the truth was not in their words, but it sat upon their somber brows.
Was it only his heightened imagination, or did the silence and the suspense grow more intense when a deputy led that dark-hooded, white-clad, slender woman to the defendant’s chair? She did not walk with the poise that had been manifest in the other women, and she sank into the chair as if she could no longer stand.
“Please remove your hood,” requested the prosecutor.
How well Shefford remembered the strong, shapely hands! He saw them tremble at the knot of ribbon, and that tremor was communicated to him in a sympathy which made his pulses beat. He held his breath while she removed the hood. And then there was revealed, he thought, the loveliest and the most tragic face that ever was seen in a court-room.
A low, whispering murmur that swelled like a wave ran through the hall. And by it Shefford divined, as clearly as if the fact had been blazoned on the walls, that Mary’s face had been unknown to these villagers. But the name Sago Lily had not been unknown; Shefford heard it whispered on all sides.
The murmuring subsided. The judge and his assistants stared at Mary. As for Shefford, there was no need of his personal feeling to make the situation dramatic. Not improbably Judge Stone had tried many Mormon women. But manifestly this one was different. Unhooded, Mary appeared to be only a young girl, and a court, confronted suddenly with her youth and the suspicion attached to her, could not but have been shocked. Then her beauty made her seem, in that somber company, indeed the white flower for which she had been named. But, more likely, it was her agony that bound the court into silence which grew painful. Perhaps the thought that flashed into Shefford’s mind was telepathic; it seemed to him that every watcher there realized that in this defendant the judge had a girl of softer mold, of different spirit, and from her the bitter truth could be wrung.