• Choose a category
• All
• Classic-Fiction

By Root 276 0

—did what she was told without resentment—and brought home good reports from her teachers at school and church. But according to my mother, there was something more to Alta than that. She knew how to play the surfaces, how to appear as if she was giving people what they wanted, yet behind that pose of compliance, Alta led her own life. Like Patta and my mother, she pretty much did what she wanted, but in secret, without the defiance the others flaunted. Whereas Bessie and Patta might stay out late against their parents’ instructions—bringing holy hell on their heads when they got home—Alta would wait until after her parents were asleep, then sneak out and meet her sisters, or a boyfriend. It was easy to do; Melissa’s deafness was already bad enough that she couldn’t hear the window opening and closing in the next-door bedroom.

Even though my mother was half a decade older, she felt closer to Alta than any of her other sisters, and Alta felt the same bond—or so Bessie later claimed. They would tell each other their best guarded secrets, and though Bessie could not emulate Alta’s social finesse, she admired it. “Alta was the best of us,” my mother said. “She was the one who showed the most promise. We never got over losing her. We were less of a family after that.”

IN THE WEEKS BEFORE HALLOWEEN IN 1929, when Alta was twelve and Bessie sixteen, the two girls, along with the rest of their family, sat in Sunday School one afternoon while the bishop railed against the danger of Ouija boards and other spiritualist trappings. The Mormons had a special calling to be on guard against spiritualism, the bishop said. More than most people, the Saints understood that spirits were real. It had been a spirit, after all, in the form of the Angel Moroni, who had led Joseph Smith to the golden plates at the start of their religion, and in the generations since, spirits had made themselves manifest to the Mormons a thousand times, in a thousand ways. But some spirits, the bishop warned, were like some people: troubled and ignoble. They might reach for the living through such means as Ouija boards or séances, but any such occult connection would be the work of Satan. Once such a spirit was in a person’s life, it could lead him or her wayward—to unredeemable sins, or even a horrible death. The bishop personally knew of young Mormon men who had gone astray. They had tried to contact the dead, but they had raised something evil instead, and one or two of them had been found nailed to the wall, their hair turned shock-white, a Ouija board under their feet.

Have fun with Halloween, concluded the bishop. Dress up and scare yourselves silly. But remember that you are Saints, and Saints do not invite Satan’s spirits into their home.

A week or so later, Bessie, Alta, and the others were down on Provo’s Center Street, shopping for decorations for a Halloween party, when Bessie found a Ouija board in a five-and-dime store. She bought it, hid it in her shopping bag with some other items, and sneaked it home. Late that night, after the parents had gone to sleep, Bessie and Alta lit a candle in the girls’ bedroom. They sat cross-legged next to each other on the floor and put the Ouija board on their knees. The others sat up in bed to see what they were doing. Patta joined Bessie and Alta, but Mary was indignant. “What are you doing?” she said. “You know what the bishop said. Do you want to bring the devil into our house?”

Wanda started to whimper. “I’m going to go tell Mother.”

Bessie glared up at her. “You’ll do no such thing, unless you want a good slapping.”

Bessie turned back to Alta and Patta. The three of them placed their fingertips on the heart-shaped planchette that rested on the board. Their sisters stood around watching, frightened and transfixed at the same time. “What do we say?” asked Patta.

Bessie looked at Alta and shrugged. Alta shut her eyes tight, tilted her head back, and intoned: “Is there anybody there?”

The room was quiet. Everybody watched the planchette. After a few moments it began to move, with the girls’ fingers resting