Carolyn Jessop; Laura Palmer (17 page)

Merril walked past the kitchen after sleeping with Barbara again. He sent one of the children in and asked that I bring coffee upstairs to his office. When I returned, Tammy was in the kitchen, her cheeks flushed with anger.

I asked Cathleen what was wrong. “She knows,” she said.

“Knows what?”

“She knows Merril hasn’t been sleeping with me, either. He hasn’t slept with anyone but you and Barbara.”

I was shocked. I told Cathleen I’d thought she had slept with him on her wedding night.

“No, I have been married to him for a week now and he hasn’t stayed with me at all.”

Tammy had not been badgering Merril as much in recent days because she thought he was sleeping with Cathleen. Now she knew the truth and stormed right up to Merril’s office. I followed, curious to hear what would happen.

Barbara was with Merril. Tammy entered and said, “I guess for some men when they get a new wife it is off with the new and on with the old.” Merril started to laugh.

Barbara chimed in. “Father, I think it would be good if you took Tammy and me on a drive to look at the Saturday work projects. Maybe Tammy would be interested in learning about her husband instead of you listening to how she feels.”

I left the office as fast as I could. I didn’t want to get stuck driving around all day with the three of them listening to Merril’s sermons about all his good work. When they got back that night, Barbara said they’d decided Ruth needed to go to Hildale and have Aunt Lydia give her a vitamin B12 shot.

This was ridiculous. Ruth had barely slept or eaten for a week. She needed major medical intervention, not a vitamin shot. Barbara went searching for her half sister and found her at the table, crying. “Ruth, you are to come with me at once. Merril has had enough of your nonsense. We’re going to Hildale for a B12 shot and then all this crying can end and you can straighten up and be some use to your husband.” Hildale was the clinic where we delivered our babies. Aunt Lydia was the wife of the bishop and acted as nurse and midwife. She had no degree, but her years of experience made her very reliable. She did most of the basic medical care in the community.

Ruth lit into Barbara. “Get away from me right now. I am not going anywhere with you. You are all puffed up with pride and filled with the devil.”

“Ruth, you are in rebellion to your husband and you are to stop this at once. I command it. If you rebel against me, then you are rebelling against your priesthood head and God will not be able to help you.” Barbara grabbed Ruth by the arm.

Ruth found energy I didn’t know she had to push Barbara off her. After she did, she seized her by the throat and began choking her. She pushed Barbara back against the stove until the other woman was nearly lying on top of it. “I am going to kill you. You deserve to die for what you have done to me.” Ruth was enraged.

Barbara managed to push herself free momentarily. She screamed, “Go get Merril!” before Ruth lunged again at her and pinned her down.

I ran outside to the van and banged on the window. Merril could see that something was really wrong and he opened the door. I just shouted, “You have to get downstairs now.” The fear in my voice sent him running.

By the time he got in the house, Ruth had retreated to her bedroom and was crying. Barbara was in her bedroom. Frightened children were huddled in the corner of the bathroom next to the kitchen, crying.

Merril stormed into Ruth’s room and started screaming at her. His words were muffled by her loud crying. I felt so dizzy I suddenly found it hard to stand. Several of Merril’s teenage daughters came running. When they saw the small children crying they looked at me in shock. “What happened? What’s going on?”

I looked at them blankly. What was I supposed to say—
I just watched your mother try to kill your aunt
? I merely shook my head and walked away. Someone else could fill them in. I was too depleted.

Barbara and Merril slept together again that night. Cathleen and Tammy were still shut out. Tensions kept rising.

Honeymoon

T
wo weeks after Merril’s two weddings, he decided it was time for a honeymoon and that all of his six wives and thirty-four children would go.

For years, Merril had been promising the family a trip to the San Diego Zoo. His construction company was working on a major project in Yuma, Arizona. In a maniacal moment of multitasking, he opted to combine a honeymoon, site visit, and trip to the zoo into a five-day ordeal.

Merril rented a Greyhound bus from a friend who lived in the community. It was old and had been out of service for several years. Merril assigned his twenty-year-old son Nathan to drive the bus. Five wives would ride with Merril in his van. Faunita was assigned to travel in the bus with the children.

Tammy had finally spent a night with Merril. She was so excited afterward that she couldn’t talk about anything else. She told Cathleen that she felt like she would count every breath she breathed until he slept with her again. But Cathleen still had not slept with Merril. Faunita remained sequestered in her bedroom. She was angry about not being invited to the double wedding and now rarely left her room. Ruth was still in the throes of madness. Aunt Lydia had prevailed upon Merril to let Ruth take some potent sleeping medication, so at least she now slept for a few hours every night. But it had been weeks since she’d been able to care for any of her fourteen children.

Cathleen broke the news to me about the trip one morning when I walked into the kitchen for coffee. She was washing the breakfast dishes and motioned for me to sit down. “We are going on the largest family trip I have ever been on in my life, and we’re leaving in less than a week.” She looked dazed and stricken. The full horror of our family life was becoming increasingly obvious to her every day.

“No one has even started talking about how we are going to take care of the children on this trip. If Barbara and Ruth treat them on the road the way they do at home, then you and I will be doing everything.” I knew she was right. She said we could expect no help from Tammy, who had been completely spoiled and pampered by Uncle Roy’s family.

I told her that I didn’t see why we should be made to be responsible for Barbara’s and Ruth’s children.

“Carolyn, it’s not about right or wrong. It’s not about fair.” Her voice was firm. “You and I are the only ones in the family fixing meals, combing hair, doing dishes, changing diapers, and cleaning. The trip won’t be any different. We can spend the next few days working around the clock trying to get ready, or we can find the responsibility dumped on us at the last minute with no way of making any provisions to care for the kids—a sad place for both of us.”

I started to tremble from nervousness. I’d never had this kind of responsibility before. Cathleen did not seem scared. Nor did she ever mention the word
honeymoon
. I think she still held out hope that she might be able to escape from her marriage to Merril.

We quietly made preparations. Forty-one people—thirty-four of them children—was too large a group to eat in restaurants. We would have to take all our food. Cathleen and I began baking bread and cookies. We packed cereal and lots of snack food such as raisins, pretzels, and gigantic bags of chips that we separated into small zip-top bags.

Merril had a charge account with the local grocery store, so after Cathleen and I did five days’ worth of menu planning, we went shopping multiple times.

But food was only half the battle. We had to pack clothing, bedding, and other supplies for all the children, four of whom were still in diapers. Planning and organizing were overwhelming. But the worst was yet to come.

A day or two later, Cathleen and I were placing dozens of loaves of homemade bread into boxes and plastic bread bags when Barbara marched into the kitchen and said in her authoritarian way, “What kind of arrangements are you girls making for food? What plans have been made for the children’s clothing?” None of our answers were satisfactory. “Father has given me the job to see to it that you girls get things together in the way he wants them handled. It’s clear neither one of you is in harmony with him or you would have been checking in with me before you started this project.”

Barbara was adamant that everything we had done so far was wrong. But she was unable to tell us what to do to fix it. When I said to her, “Barbara, how much sandwich meat do you think we will need for one lunch?” she looked clueless. I told her we were doing the baking first and would get the items for the cooler last. She stammered as she said, “I think that the amount of meat is of no importance. The thing that is important is if you girls are packing the kinds of meals that are agreeable for Father’s children to be eating. I will be telling you what to do from this point on.”

If the look on my face could have spoken, it would have said,
I don’t think so.
Instead, I quietly said, “Barbara, maybe Merril needs to come and talk to us. Cathleen and I will gladly explain what we are doing. We’ll listen to anything he has to say. Rather than complaining, maybe you could offer some input about what we’ve done right rather than nit-picking everything we’ve done so far.”

Barbara stiffened. I was surprised by my candor. I usually didn’t talk back to her, but this time she’d really pushed me. I had to push back. I clearly caught her completely off guard. “I will talk to Father about the way you girls have treated me. I only want the trip to be prepared in a way that will be of comfort to my husband. Both of you have enough jealousy and hostility toward me that we will never be united behind our priesthood head.”

Cathleen now had one more reason to be shocked and upset. After Barbara left, she said, “Uncle Roy would never have allowed one of his wives to treat another wife the way we were both just treated. I don’t care what she accuses me of if I don’t suck up to her abuse.”

Barbara returned to the kitchen the day before the trip. The tables and countertops were covered with sweet rolls Cathleen and I had baked the night before. We’d made over a hundred and left them out overnight to cool. Barbara went to Merril’s office and reported on us. Tammy was always coming to Cathleen and me and reporting on what Barbara was saying to Merril. Either Barbara would tell her or Tammy would eavesdrop outside Merril’s office. “Father, I have a concern that Cathleen and Carolyn are making too much food. I have spoken to them several times about this. It’s an enormous expense and a huge amount of food will be wasted. They have also packed almost all of the clothing in the children’s closets. This will all have to be cleaned when we get back. I also don’t understand why they are packing any bedding because we’ll be in a hotel. Things seem out of control and they need to be disciplined.”

Merril was realistic and told her that disciplining us at this stage wouldn’t fix anything, especially since the food was purchased, packed, and baked. His attitude was that we’d have to live with the consequences of our actions.

Barbara didn’t give up easily. “I had no input into what they prepared for the children. I would have far preferred that the children eat bread sticks instead of sweet rolls,” she said. “These girls have no concern for the health of your children.”

We were both summoned to Merril’s office. Neither of us was surprised by Merril’s interrogation. It was clear to us that since we had bypassed Barbara and not asked her permission for everything we were doing to get ready for the trip, she’d see to it that we were in trouble with Merril. There had been many episodes before this where she’d been complaining about us to Merril and Tammy came to give us the full report.

Merril’s interrogation began as soon as we sat on the couch. “I am getting information that you girls haven’t prepared anything healthy for the children to snack on during the trip. I’m also concerned that you’ve made too much food and there will be a lot of waste.”

Cathleen jumped right in. She was not intimidated by Merril, but she stopped short of defying him. “Merril, we’ve purchased several cases of apples and oranges for the children to eat on the way,” she said. “We have sandwich bags with vegetables and carrot sticks. Most of what we’ve prepared is healthy.”

“Sweet rolls are not healthy.”

I interrupted Merril. “We only made enough for each person to have two. After that, the rest of the snacks will all be healthy.”

Merril seemed confident that he now had the upper hand. He laughed nervously. “I think you should work with Barbara on making something healthy. Barbara has always been a wife who is interested in doing what her husband wants.”

My spirits sank. I did not want to prepare one more thing for this awful trip. I knew Barbara would do something now to make us miserable.

“Father, I think that bread sticks would be a good thing to make for the children. Instead of two or three apiece, why don’t we have these girls make enough for each child to have ten?” Barbara now seemed pleased.

Bread sticks were a ton of work. Cathleen and I would be working all day and into the night. I spoke up. “Merril, if you are so concerned with there being too much food, it would seem like ten bread sticks per person is way too much.”

“Why don’t you make as many as you can. We can always bring them back and eat them afterward.” Merril was matter-of-fact. I knew he’d never overrule Barbara but felt compelled to try. She smiled, secure and satisfied in her complete dominance over Cathleen and me.

Cathleen and I spent the rest of the day in the kitchen. Neither one of us said much. We were hot, exhausted, and robotic in our efforts.

Tammy spent the day before our departure strolling around with Barbara and praising her every move. She had figured out that her success as Merril’s wife depended on winning Barbara’s favor. Cathleen and I both knew that Barbara would drink up the flattery and stab Tammy in the back whenever it suited her needs. “I have never in my life met a woman as selfish and cruel as she is,” Cathleen said. I nodded in agreement.

I slept through my alarm the next morning. Cathleen shook me awake at five-thirty and said my alarm clock had awakened everyone else in the house except me. We were due to leave at eight o’clock. We got everyone dressed and fed, then cleaned up the kitchen.

The children were excited. Going to the zoo was a huge event for them. It was beyond imagining. Merril’s teenage daughters were smiling and laughing, upbeat and eager to be going on a trip. Nathan said the mechanic had checked out the bus and it would not break down. Faunita boarded the bus with the children. Thirty-two would travel with us and the two smallest babies would come in the van with the other wives. Barbara’s son Jackson was about sixteen months old and Ruth’s daughter Ruthie was just under a year.

It’s nearly five hundred miles to San Diego from Colorado City. But with so many children, we had to stop in every small town and at every highway rest stop for someone to go to the bathroom. It was tedious travel. We’d drive for forty-five minutes and then stop for fifteen or twenty. Several children would jump off the bus and run inside. No one took roll call before we got started again, and in Flagstaff, one of them was left behind at a gas station.

Truman was Barbara’s talkative nine-year-old son who was a grade behind in school. When he returned from the bathroom, the big Greyhound bus was gone. He tried not to attract any attention and sat alone on the sidewalk. After a while one of the cashiers inside noticed him and wondered if he might have been part of the busload of kids dressed in strange clothing that had stopped by earlier.

Truman told her he’d been on the bus. The cashier took him inside and called the police. When the police arrived they began questioning him. (Truman recapped this for us after he was rescued, and it was a story told and retold in the family for at least five years.) As he told us the story, Truman said that when he was asked where he lived, he said, “At the creek.” He told the officers, “My dad’s name is Father, and sometimes I hear people calling my mom Barbara.” The police asked if he was on a school trip with other children. Truman told them, “Of course not. It is only my father’s family. We don’t take other families with us.” He said he had fourteen brothers but he didn’t know how many sisters, except that there were more girls than boys.

At the police station the questioning continued. Somehow the officers figured out that Truman’s father owned a construction company called General Rock and Sand, in Page, Arizona. With that information as a starting point, police were able to get the license number for Merril’s van. When the police officer asked Truman why his family was taking a vacation, he said, “It’s because father just married two new wives and he is taking them on a honeymoon with the whole family.”

An alert went out with the license number of Merril’s van. We had driven several hours beyond Flagstaff without Truman. I was thinking what a relief it would be to finally get to Phoenix and sleep when I heard sirens from a police car and saw the flashing lights. Merril’s van pulled over and so did the bus. The officers spoke to Merril, who then boarded the bus.

When he got back in the van he said, “Well, I guess we left Truman at one of the rest stops in Flagstaff. I’ve sent the bus on to the hotel and Nathan will get everyone settled in for the night. We are going to drive back to Flagstaff and get Truman.”

Even though we didn’t have to stop at every rest stop, it still took nearly two hours. Once we got there we all stayed in the van while Merril went into the police station to find Truman. Barbara was disgusted that the people on his bus had not taken better care of him, and she seemed very moody and irritated. She wasn’t at all consoling to Truman when he rejoined us. He acted as if nothing special had happened. Truman came out of the police station walking behind Merril. Merril rarely touched his children or held their hands. They got into the van and we started driving back to Phoenix. It was around one in the morning when we finally arrived.

At the hotel Merril began assigning rooms to each wife. He told Cathleen she’d be staying with him. This was the first night they spent together since their marriage. They’d only have five hours together since we were getting up at 6
A.M
. I felt so sorry for Cathleen. She’d been hoping this would never happen.