Saints (24 page)

As always, Dinah wasn’t allowed to hold her own children during the meeting. Val was a great favorite with the young unmarried women. He could flirt audaciously and never offend—there were advantages to being three. And there were several older women who either never had children of their own or missed their babies who had grown up and left home, and one of them always ended up jealously cuddling Honor, refusing to relinquish her until the meeting ended.

So Dinah was left without the burden of the children as she sat in the midst of the sisters who gathered to her. It was a testimony meeting, the Saints rising to their feet to give little impromptu speeches about their love for God. The words were so often the same that Dinah only occasionally listened. Then a sister arose whose husband had threatened to have her put in the asylum if she continued her madness of being a Mormon. The sister spoke of how nothing would stop her from associating with the family of God as long as she was able, and the emotion in her voice and the story behind her words were profoundly moving. Here, touched by real faith, surrounded by women who depended on her, Dinah’s momentary affection for Matthew faded. Here is where I am at home, thought Dinah. Here is my family. How could I have thought otherwise? When the boat leaves for America, I will be on it. I have put my hand to the plow and I will not look back.

As that surety grew within her she felt the light also grow, with a fire that burned behind her eyes. It grew so hot and bright she thought she would burst with it, and she longed to leap to her feet and cry out—what, she did not know.

Suddenly the woman stopped speaking in midstream. Dinah realized that the woman was looking at
her
, and Dinah was sure she could see the light coming out of her eyes. The woman paused for just a moment, and then she began to speak again. But now the words did not come in the accents of Lancashire. They were a rush of syllables that sounded like no language Dinah had ever heard, sounds cascading from her lips and filling the room. It was the gift of tongues, which Dinah had heard of but never seen before, someone so caught up in the Spirit of God that English would no longer contain her feelings.

Suddenly Dinah realized that she understood her, that playing about at the back of her mind were the words the woman was really saying, only the words were swords of light, and they could pierce the veil that bound them, they could be expressed. Without thinking, Dinah leapt to her feet and began to translate, saying the words that formed themselves within her. She hardly understood herself; all that mattered was to speak. For five minutes it went on; it went on forever. Dinah and the woman who spoke in tongues looked steadily at each other, noticing only the tears that flowed from the other’s eyes, not their own.

Finally the woman stopped speaking and slowly sat down, and Dinah felt the words fade within her. Physically spent by the experiences, she sat and trembled as the women near her touched her. Dinah saw that her own mother was weeping. What had she said? She couldn’t remember. She only knew that it had happened as she knew it must. She had been a mouthpiece for the Lord; the light within her had been born, had come alive for all to see. It frightened her, it thrilled her, it gave her peace. I have chosen aright. I am acceptable to the Lord. It is my validation, my assurance. Father, she said silently, I will follow you forever, across the sea, away from my husband if need be, over the mountains of death, through whatever storms of suffering. The face she had imagined for Joseph Smith smiled at her.

And at the front of the room, standing at the pulpit, Brigham Young was also smiling. “Brothers and Sisters, the Lord has been gracious to us today. Remember that the gift of tongues is given as encouragement to the Saints, to strengthen our faith, and not as doctrine.” And with that he announced the closing hymn and sat down.

Not as doctrine. What did he mean by that? Dinah resented it; she had only said the words that came to her from the Lord. Brigham made it sound as if she had been trying to usurp the role of a prophet.

She soon forgot him, however, for when the hymn and prayer ended the meeting, she was surrounded by Saints, and this time not just sisters. Bit by bit from the things they said she gathered enough to remember most of what she had said. She had promised that no barrier would stand in the way of Saints who wanted to gather to Zion, as long as their faith was pure. She had promised that there were some in the room who would be present at the second coming of Christ, though whether or not in the flesh she did not know.

What must have annoyed Brigham Young was when she said that they would see St. Paul’s promise fulfilled, when he said, “What do they who are baptized for the dead, if the dead rise not at all? Why then are they baptized for the dead?” The widows kept asking her what she meant; did she mean that their dead husbands would be baptized? The women who had lost children unbaptized asked her if it meant their little ones could receive baptism and be saved. And she understood why Brigham had given his warning. She had to repeat again and again that she didn’t know what her statement meant—she had only said what the Spirit gave her to say, and it was the business of the apostles to interpret scripture, not hers. Yet still they clung to her, and some wept, and now what had been unspoken before became plain for all to see: Dinah Kirkham was the first among the women, and had their hope in her keeping. For the first time she heard the word, whispered softly in a conversation behind her back, that she would hear again and again through her life, and always deny:
prophetess
.

She did not know herself how powerful her words had been until at last she gathered her children and began the walk home with Charlie and Anna. For Anna, too, had been touched by some of the words she said.

“You promised that children would be restored to their parents, and brothers to sisters. And husbands who were lost would be returned to their wives. Don’t deny you said it, Dinah. I heard every word of it, and it’s written in my heart. Husbands who were lost shall be restored to their wives. It was the Lord speaking the truth to me through you, even though you doubted it yourself.”

Dinah didn’t try to argue with her mother. She cared very little, really, for
what
she had said. What meant most to her was the saying of it. I am acceptable to God. I made up my mind to go to America regardless of the cost, and only then did God choose to speak through me.

They were almost home before Dinah noticed how quiet Charlie had been all the way. Poor Charlie! she thought. Ordained an elder today, and all we’ve been able to talk about is my gift of tongues. She put her arm around him and said, “Charlie, I’m so proud of you. To have the power of the priesthood in my own family.”

It was a small thing, but it was enough to soothe his envy. He smiled and talked until they got to Anna’s and Charlie’s home, where they planned to have supper.

They were all so involved in the conversation that none of them noticed the man who followed them from the meeting. He was so close behind them that he knocked on the door before they had even had time to lay the sleeping Honor on Anna’s bed. With the women in the bedroom, Charlie opened the door. The man was a stranger in filthy, shabby traveling clothes, covered with dust and stained with unnameable liquids. He looked to be about sixty, and there was a smell of alcohol about him. Charlie was afraid—the smell reminded him of dark nights in foul places in his childhood.

“What do you want?” he asked.

“Don’t I even get a good afternoon?” The man cocked his head oddly. “But then I don’t look too lovely, do I?”

“If you’re hungry,” Charlie said, “I can give you some bread and cheese.”

“I’m hungry indeed, but it’s not food I came for. Would you be Robert?”

Charlie’s eyes narrowed. What business had a man like this to know one of the family’s names? “No,” he said.

“Charlie, then. Won’t you invite me in, Charlie?”

He had known audacious beggars before, but this man talked as if he had a right, as if he had some claim on Charlie. “I think not, sir.” But hadn’t he seen this man earlier today? Lurking about the meetinghouse, yes, standing outside the meetinghouse when he went inside. “Did you follow us here?”

“I’ve been searching for you for a week. Seems you’ve moved around a bit. I even thought of asking at the Kirkham Locomotive Works, but then I remembered that Robert wouldn’t be more than twenty-four, and you wouldn’t yet be eighteen, and so it had to be another Kirkham. Still, I finally found you from the Mormon handbills, advertising the conference you had today. Said that Brother Kirkham was to be a speaker, and I thought that was possible, though I supposed it would be Robert, and not you.”

Now Charlie knew who this man was, though he dared not put it into words. “Let me give you some money, sir, and then go away. We don’t want you here. Do you understand that? It’ll be better if you just go, now. Will twenty pounds do it? Come to the firm tomorrow, I’ll give it to you—”

“You don’t understand, Charlie. I didn’t come for money.”

“Leave. Now.”

Behind him he heard footsteps coming into the room. “Who is it, Charlie?” Anna asked.

“Charlie,” said the man, “I’m your father.”

Charlie heard Dinah gasp, and Anna murmured, “John.” Charlie turned and saw the look of pathetic hope in his mother’s eyes, the sadness in Dinah’s, and he turned and with his right hand pushed at the man, driving him back from the door. “I don’t have a father!” he shouted. “Go away!”

But Anna clawed at his arm and pulled him back, and Dinah walked out to John Kirkham and touched him as if he were a dream.

“You’re not my father.” Charlie spoke quietly and intensely, more frightened of his mother’s and sister’s strange reactions than of the vagabond threatening them with his imposture. “In the name of God, if you were going to leave us, couldn’t you at least have profited from it? I’ve seen better men than you lying in their own piss outside the pubs, and you dare to call yourself my father?”

But Charlie’s words made no difference to the women, and John Kirkham knew it. He looked at his daughter and said, “Dinah, will you deny me, too? I don’t ask for love. I only ask you to say you know me.”

“You’re my father,” she said, “but I don’t know you.”

“No, I daresay not. Nor you, either, Anna?”

Anna’s answer was to cry out his name and run into the house.

John stood for a moment, not looking at either Charlie or Dinah, just at the door where his wife had fled from him. Charlie looked at him with contempt, but the longer he studied him, the more he wondered how much of his misery was real and how much a pose. The clothing was old and frayed, but it had been neatly patched by someone with a good hand with a needle. His face was wrinkled beyond his years, but he was not gaunt with hunger or disease. He was dirty from traveling, but his hair had been cut, and not more than a month ago, by competent hands. Why have you made yourself seem worse than you need, when you came to us? Did you hope to win by pity what you once could have had by love?

Then Anna appeared again at the door, her eyes red-rimmed but not weeping now. “Come in,” she said. Immediately she vanished again, and her husband ducked his head sheepishly and followed.

Charlie and Dinah stood outside for a few moments, until Charlie said, “He found us because my name was on the handbills for the conference. He followed us from church.”

“I saw him outside the meetinghouse,” Dinah said. “I didn’t recognize him. Or perhaps I did, without knowing it.” She did not say, Perhaps that’s why I prophesied his return.

“I don’t want him here,” Charlie said.

“Mother does,” Dinah answered.

“I hoped that he was dead.”

“If God had been merciful,” Dinah answered, “he would have been.” Then she walked into the house, and Charlie, after a moment, followed.

To his credit, John Kirkham seemed determined to spare himself nothing. He insisted on hearing every detail of their suffering after he left them, and his tears, however beery, seemed sincere. He made no excuses, he dodged none of Charlie’s recriminations and accusations. Once, when Charlie said, “I only have one regret, that we didn’t change our names so you couldn’t find us,” John’s eyes caught fire for a moment and he said, “Charlie, I’ve been cut by masters until I’m good at bleeding. You want my blood? I’ll shed it for you.” But other than that he made no resistance, only accepted the burden of guilt that was heaped upon him.

“Why did you come back?” Charlie asked again and again. “For your wife to throw her loving arms around you? For your little ones to run to you so you could bounce them on your knee? What are you here for?”

Dinah looked around at her family and silently asked the same question. Why would God actually grant Anna’s prayer and send the old bastard back? For it brought no one joy. Even Mother, with her tears of joy, didn’t know what to do with the man, and was now sitting as far from him in the room as possible, as if now that he had returned she regretted her many prayers. He was back, it was the final sign that her sins were forgiven, but now what in heaven’s name was she supposed to do with him? As for Charlie, he raged, he was snide and cutting, but mostly he was afraid; Dinah could see the uncertainty in his eyes whenever he wasn’t speaking. What was he afraid of? Many things that Dinah could not hope to understand, she was sure; but one thing she did understand. Charlie had just been ordained to the priesthood, he was a man in his own right now, but if John Kirkham returned to their home, Charlie would be a child again. He was unskilled in having a father. There was no hole in the family now to hold a father. After all the years they had needed him, why did he come now, when they did not need him at all?

“I’m worse than you ever thought,” John said abjectly. “I’ve failed at everything. Even at leaving you. I’ve done every black sin in the book and some not, Anna. Charlie’s right, you ought to throw me out, though I beg you not to. I don’t deserve any goodness at your hands.” Anna watched him through red-rimmed eyes, fearing what he would say next. He said it. “Anna, in these years I’ve kept company with other women. I thought that was the only sort of woman a man like me deserved. But I finally reached the end of that road, and I couldn’t face it, I said, Sweet Lord Jesus, how can I stop, how can I undo all this, where can I go? I thought of dying and it looked good to me, but then I heard it like a voice, it said, Go home, John, that’s where they loved you once, and where you hurt them first, and if there’s any forgiveness for you in the world it’s there. I don’t expect forgiveness, Anna, I don’t have a right to it, if you threw me out of the house it would be better than I deserve, but in the name of God, can you give me peace?” His voice ended in a whine that turned to sobs; his body shook.