The Spoken Word

by R. R. Irvine

  Decker backed away from the picnic table. “Something’s happened to Lael, hasn’t it?”

  “Help me find her,” he said. “That’s all I’m asking.”

  “We’d better tell him,” Hoyt said.

  Decker nodded. “We’ve taken our cue from the mother church. We send out missionaries in pairs, using young women instead of men. Lael and Amanda are one such couple, Amanda leading, of course, as the senior officer.”

  “Where are they?” he said.

  Sarah Decker collapsed into one of the folding chairs while the younger woman spoke. “I made out the missionary schedule myself. They’re in the northern part of the state.”

  “You can do better than that,” Traveler said.

  “Our missionaries pay their own way just like the men do in the mother church,” Hoyt said.

  “The church has its ten percent tithe,” Decker added, “not to mention parents who pay for their son’s missions. We’re not so lucky. Our missionaries depend on charity. They stay with sympathizers whenever possible. As a result, we don’t really know where they are much of the time. All I can tell you is that Amanda has an aunt living in the area. We’re hoping she’ll be able to use that as home base.”

  “Ware is a prominent name,” Traveler said. “Nearly as prominent as Woolley.”

  Decker nodded. “That’s why we teamed them up together. Someone else might have been overwhelmed by Lael’s connections.”

  “Let’s get this straight,” Traveler said. “Just what is Amanda’s relation to Caleb Ware?”

  “His daughter,” Hoyt said.

  “Does he know she’s a member of your group?”

  Hoyt smiled. “We made certain of that.”

  “Who recruited her?”

  The women looked at one another and shrugged.

  “She must have been a walk-in,” Decker said.

  “Ware is one of the church’s most important theologians,” Traveler said.

  “Caleb Ware is an archconservative, out of date and out of touch with reality,” Decker said.

  “That’s not what I hear,” Traveler said.

  Hoyt jumped in. “The man’s a right-wing fanatic.”

  Decker raised a calming hand. “Whatever he is, we don’t hold that against Amanda.”

  According to Mad Bill, Caleb Ware was in trouble with much of the church hierarchy, who considered him too liberal on any number of subjects, including women’s rights. Only his popular books, published by the church itself, and his close friendship with Elton Woolley kept him immune from excommunication.

  “You mentioned the girl’s aunt,” he said. “I’ll need her name and address.”

  “Excuse us for a moment,” Hoyt said.

  Both women withdrew to the middle of the room, well out of earshot. Within a few seconds, Decker returned to the picnic table while Hoyt disappeared behind the whitewashed screen.

  “Jemma has some calls to make,” the older woman explained. “Now what was it you were asking?”

  “An address for Amanda Ware’s aunt.”

  “Oh, yes. Let me check the files.” She, too, disappeared behind the screen.

  He paced for a while, then unfolded a chair, sat down at one of the tables, and began reading one of the army’s leaflets. It was entitled The Betrayal of Joseph Smith and claimed that the modern-day Mormon Church had turned its back on Smith, its founding prophet, who had originally intended to give women the priesthood. Smith had even named his first wife as a priestess, the pamphlet said. But the succeeding prophet, Brigham Young, had reformed the church into an all-male club.

  Traveler read one passage out loud, though not loud enough to reach the screen at the rear of the room. “ ‘If females are pure and innocent,’ Joseph Smith said, ‘they may come into the presence of God. They need no male to intercede for them.’ Yet the church today says man is answerable to God and that women are answerable to men. It’s known as the triangle concept, with God on top, man in the middle, and woman on the bottom.”

  Smiling, Traveler finally understood the bright red glyph on the back wall, the triangle with a negative slash through it.

  Behind him the front door opened. A woman said, “What’s so—”

  He stood up and turned around in time to catch her startled look. At the same time, a second woman crossed the threshold.

  Traveler glanced toward the screen, where Decker and Hoyt were now watching him. Obviously, they’d sent for reinforcements. The new arrivals moved around the picnic tables so that all four of them could face him as a group.

  “He’s here about one of our members,” Hoyt told the newcomers, both of whom had stiffly sprayed hairdos above their slashed triangle sweatshirts.

  “He says he’s looking for Lael Woolley,” Decker added, “but we think the church is investigating us.”

  Traveler started to say something but one of the newcomers beat him to it. “Christ was a feminist,” she said. “The men of his time didn’t allow women to preach or study scriptures. Yet he discussed the Torah with Mary. What do you say to that?”

  The other newcomer continued the attack. “Jewish law did not allow women as witnesses, yet Christ made women witness to his resurrection.”

  All four women nodded. Decker said, “The Book of Mormon teaches us that only the priesthood is valid. All other ministries, Catholic, Protestant, what have you, are unacceptable to God and don’t even qualify as Christian. Thus, without the priesthood Mormon women are nothing. Nothing but doormats, as the old saying goes. Doormats that keep their men from going in to God with muddy feet.”

  Traveler felt a cold draft on the back of his neck. Three more women had arrived.

  “You’ve been very helpful,” he said and started for the door.

  “Wait,” Decker said. “You’ve paid for a full course of our literature. We wouldn’t want to cheat you.”

  They surrounded him, filling his arms with pamphlets as they backed him over the threshold. Just before the door closed in his face, Decker shouted, “We want to be more than wives and mothers. More than doormats.”

  14

  IDA WOOLLEY, the missing girl’s mother, lived high on Capitol Hill. Driving all the way there, even in a four-wheel-drive truck, was too risky, a decision Traveler reached the moment he encountered his first mud slide.

  Maneuvering carefully, he swung the truck around until it was pointing downhill, back the way he’d come. After double-checking the emergency brake, he got out, tucked his trousers into the top of his galoshes, and started walking.

  The river-roar of rushing water increased as he made his way up Wall Street’s steep grade. At the intersection of Zane Avenue, he stopped to admire the view of the valley below, rain shrouded though it was. To the west the Great Salt Lake lay like black slag. To the east, he could see the foothills of the Wasatch Mountains. Once behind that mountain fortress, Brigham had laid out God’s city according to holy logic, a master plan with the temple at its center. Every aspect of Mormon life radiated out from the temple hub, a rational progression all the way to the city limits. These days, however, Brigham’s vision ended at those boundaries, where the secular chaos of the postwar building boom had taken over. Now the city was called Greater Salt Lake, with over a million people and everything that went with them.

  Blowing on his hands, Traveler turned east on Zane Avenue. His feet were soaked by the time he reached the Woolley address. The house was smaller than he expected, one of those bleak red brick relics from the 1870s that inevitably squatted on rough-faced sandstone foundations. Its builder had tried to disguise his work by adding a front gable and a bay window. The woman watching him from that window looked as cheerless as her dwelling place.

  Stick-figure maple trees lined the front walk leading to the porch. At the side of the house, his father’s Jeep station wagon was parked in the driveway.

  Martin opened the door before Traveler had time to knock. “Moroni, what kept you?”

  “I don’t remember making an appo
intment.”

  Martin stepped out onto the narrow porch and partially closed the door behind him, while keeping his hand on the knob. “I was rummaging around the genealogy library and decided to look up the Woolley clan. As soon as I saw the layout, I knew you’d head for the girl’s parents.” His voice dropped. “They’re separated, did you know that?”

  Before Traveler could answer, his father added, “I would never have believed it of the prophet’s family. It’s revelations like this that make me think my generation is the last one to have any sense. By the way, if you’d kept me informed of your movements, I could have driven you here myself and saved you getting your feet wet.”

  Traveler freed the soggy cuffs of his trousers from his galoshes. “Have you questioned Mrs. Woolley yet?”

  “You know me better than that. We’ve been talking about genealogy. There are more Travelers in this world than I ever dreamed.” Martin sighed. “It’s not just the dead we’re going to have to look up when this is over.”

  “Remember,” Traveler whispered, “no mention of kidnapping or ransom. As far as everyone’s concerned, this is strictly a missing person case.”

  “Just like my ancestors.”

  Traveler groaned. “Come on. Let’s get out of the cold.”

  “If you’re coming down with something, it’s your wet feet to blame, not me.” Martin stomped up and down vigorously. “A son should learn from his father’s example. Don’t put things off until you have to seek the dead like I’m doing.”

  Traveler was about to question his father’s sanity when the doorknob was pulled out of Martin’s hand. The tall, narrow woman who stood on the threshold was dressed all in gray: skirt, blouse, sweater, and stockings. Her hair was gray, too, though probably by design. Her eyes were like those of her daughter in Willis Tanner’s photograph, large and dark, almost black.

  “Miz Woolley,” Martin said, “this is my son, Moroni.”

  She backed away from the door and ushered them into a small living room where the rose carpet showed recent sweeper tracks. There was only one window, the bay. The walls and woodwork had been painted ivory. An eight-foot sofa covered with a gold, nubby material took up one wall, two matching armchairs another. The remaining wall belonged to an upright piano so highly polished its wood was mirrorlike. The only other piece of furniture was a glass-topped coffee table. It held a photo album and a year’s worth of Ensigns, the official church magazine, arranged in an overlapping row like reading material at a dentist’s office. A single painting, sofa-art of an autumn landscape dominated by golden leaves matching the upholstery, hung on the wall.

  Mrs. Woolley perched on the edge of the sofa, sitting rigidly with her knees pressed together, her ankles crossed and her hands in her lap. Martin settled on one chair, Traveler the other.

  She spoke looking at Traveler, who found her attractive in a gaunt sort of way. “The First Apostle called me shortly before your father got here. He says I’m to trust you completely.” Her tone said Traveler would have to prove himself first.

  “I’m afraid we’ll need to ask some personal questions,” he said, admiring her slim legs.

  She caught him looking and tugged her skirt down as far as it would go.

  “We might as well start with the easy ones,” Martin put in. “Have you heard from your daughter or from anyone else concerning her?”

  She shook her head. “She’s still unaccounted for, if that’s what you mean. Nothing has changed.”

  “Has she gone missing before?” Martin asked.

  “Never.”

  “Do you have any idea what might have happened to her?”

  She stared at Martin for a long time before answering. “You should know that Seth, her father, and I are separated.” She glanced down at her hands, which came to life and clutched her knees. “That’s a lie. I keep telling people we’re only separated, that something will happen to make him come back. But it’s not a separation. We’re divorced. I . . . we’ve gone against God’s commandment. That’s probably why we lost her, as punishment.”

  “You mustn’t blame yourself,” Martin said.

  “Be fruitful and multiply, God tells us. And what did we do? We had one child.” Her hands abandoned her knees to come together. “It’s me, of course. I’m to blame. It was my barrenness, my inability to have a son, that drove Seth to another woman.”

  “We’ll need her name,” Traveler said.

  “The second wife is Crystal Woolley,” Martin said for his son’s benefit. “I already have the address.”

  The first Mrs. Woolley shuddered. “She isn’t much older than my daughter.”

  Martin nodded sympathetically.

  Tears leaked from her eyes. “A divorced woman can’t remarry in the temple. You know that, don’t you? But Seth can and did. Now he’s sealed to her for time and eternity. Where does that leave me when I’m called home? Answer me that.” She sighed deeply. “I’ve fasted until I was faint, but God hasn’t shown me the way yet.”

  “Do you think the church is wrong?” Traveler said.

  The breath caught in her throat. “I know what you’re thinking. That my daughter has strayed because of me.”

  “There are those who believe that women deserve equal rights.”

  Her hands swept in front of her face as if she were trying to deflect his words. “I know what they’re saying about Lael. That she lost her faith and joined those trouble-making women. But anyone who knows my daughter knows that isn’t true. Faith is behind everything Lael does.”

  Traveler watched her with fascination. Martin coughed to get his attention.

  “Tell us about Lael,” Martin said, glaring at his son.

  The woman looked bewildered.

  “Anything that comes to mind,” Martin prompted.

  She took a deep breath, looked from Martin to Traveler and back again. “This house is very old and very small, not what Seth had in mind when we got married. But my parents left it to me, free and clear. It’s one thing my husband can’t take away from me. Anyway, the prophet, Seth’s uncle, has been after us, Lael and me, to move to bigger quarters. We could even have a suite in the old Hotel Utah if we wanted, near his penthouse. Lael was excited about the idea at first. She thought there’d be room service and things like that. But it’s a church office building now, I told her, and not really a hotel at all.”

  She paused to wipe her eyes with a tissue that had been tucked into the sleeve of her sweater. “I don’t know why I’m telling you this.”

  “You never know what might help,” Martin assured her.

  She nodded and opened the photo album on the table. Martin and Traveler took up positions on either side of her to get a closer look. The first page contained baby pictures.

  “Lael was special even as a child,” her mother said. “Just look at her and you can see what I mean.”

  Traveler and his father raised eyebrows at one another.

  As she slowly turned the pages, Lael grew into a teenager. “She’s like me,” the woman said. “Not pretty so much as sensible.” Smiling thinly, Mrs. Woolley watched them closely as to gauge their reaction to her self-assessment.

  “Your husband ought to have his head examined,” Martin said as was expected of him.

  Traveler was thinking the same thing.

  Her smile broadened momentarily. Then she sighed and bent over the album again. “Lael never had any boyfriends, not serious ones, not until Dwight Hafen came along. I used to wonder if being related to the prophet didn’t scare them off.”

  “It might attract them, too,” Traveler said.

  She didn’t seem to hear him. “I thought Lael was going to do the same thing I did, marry her first beau like I did with Seth.”

  Martin said, “We’ve been told that Hafen and your daughter broke up.”

  “I don’t understand it. Dwight is studying church history, one of Lael’s favorite subjects. Even the prophet thinks he’d make her a good husband.”

  “When did h
e say that?” Traveler asked.

  “Six months ago, maybe a little less. I haven’t seen him since, not to talk to alone, because of his health.”

  “I spoke to Hafen myself. He hasn’t seen your daughter for a week or so.”

  Ida Woolley grasped the album’s covers and snapped them shut. “You don’t have to beat around the bush. I know she went off with a man. God knows, I saw it coming. I don’t know how many times I warned her father. ‘Seth,’ I said, ‘it’s the shy ones who fall from grace.’ You and your father being here prove I was right.”

  “We understand the young man’s name is Roo,” Martin probed.

  “Short for Reuben, Lael told me. She wouldn’t tell me his last name, which can mean only one thing. He isn’t one of us. He isn’t a Saint.”

  “You can’t be sure,” Martin said.

  “Lael knows how we feel about her. How the prophet feels. You know what Elton said to me once? ‘If Lael were a man,’ he said, ‘she’d be an apostle when the time came.’ ”

  “What about other friends?” Traveler asked. “She must have some here in the neighborhood. Someone she might confide in.”

  “There aren’t many young people in these old neighborhoods like Capitol Hill. She did have one close friend, Adele Moyle. But she moved away years ago.”

  “Where to?” Martin asked.

  She shrugged. “Her parents left the church when they moved, so we never kept in touch.”

  “Do you know Amanda Ware?” Traveler said.

  “The name doesn’t ring a bell.”

  With a sigh, Ida Woolley reopened the album and turned to the last page, which contained a high school graduation photo. Even there, in a studio portrait, Lael’s eyes had that same haunted look Traveler had seen in Willis Tanner’s snapshot.

  Mrs. Woolley touched the photo’s surface as gently as if it were flesh. “My daughter is a great faster, you know. She has been for years.”

  Traveler looked at his father, whose raised eyebrow was the equal of a full-bodied shrug.