Emma Smith and the Golden P(i)lates

It all began with tobacco.

In those days, we would meet in the upstairs room at Brother Newel’s invitation, a quorum of elders in the Whitney Store. Sometimes the feeling of the Spirit was so strong that the roof seemed to pop off the top of the house to allow the word of heaven to flow down like the waters of a rushing fall. Of course, it was easy to feel at home in such a place. Spacious and clean, busy with prosperity and industry, the store invited lingering. The Smiths lived downstairs, guests of Brother Newel. 

Brother Joseph seemed to us like a summer sun, with the power to warm up an entire room and shining equally as bright. Sister Emma was gracious, albeit quiet and generally unsmiling. During our meetings, she made herself readily available to answer to any of our needs. She had a pair of black eyes that seemed to glitter in front of a riot of thought in the brain, and I confess that more than once I turned my head to watch her leave a room, only to find others among us doing the same. Either Brother Joseph did not notice, or he noticed but did not see fit to reproach us. I would often imagine them, Brother Joseph and Sister Emma, eating a meal together or going for a walk in the neighborhood as the sun set. How did they act when nobody was around? Was any sort of veil dropped?

The tobacco had taken hold of nearly all of us. Now, of course, the memory of our use of it brings great shame, but at the time we thought nothing of filling our mouths with a pinch and pausing our conversations to spit away excess as we discussed matters of great importance. If we occasionally missed the spittoon, what of it?

One afternoon Sister Emma was bustling about, keeping to the corners of the upper room while tidying. Brother Joseph was receiving direct word from God as Oliver made haste to record it. How the room seemed to be on fire with the power of the Spirit! I felt as though my heart was going to burst out of my chest at the feel of it, a hot coal alight from God’s heavenly touch. 

I had nearly forgotten that Sister Emma was in the room, until I heard a small gasp just over my shoulder. I turned to find her kneeling over a puddle of tobacco juice on the wood, pausing as though she’d heard a strike of thunder. She held a stained brown rag in her hands. Her gaze was not directed at the rag or the tobacco but at a land far distant, her eyes unfocused.

“Are you well, Sister?” I whispered.

She nodded, though it seemed she barely heard my words. I considered kneeling on the ground beside her, if only to have a closer look at the way her dark hair framed such sharp features. 

I found myself longing to know the thoughts tumbling around in her mind. “Is it not a wonder, what your husband is doing?” I asked. “Can you not feel the power he holds?”

Sister Emma then did something very strange. She began to stand, then paused and crouched down once again. She repeated this puzzling standing and squatting movement two more times, looking as though God were lifting her to heaven before He thought better of it and sent her back down to earth. 

“I had never thought of repetition,” she said in a quiet voice. 

I said her name again, and she jumped as if jolted out of a trance. She looked at me with narrowed eyes. 

“When you use tobacco in the future, Brother, I would ask you to please try to aim your mouth in a more accurate manner,” she said. 

I had to pull my head back to avoid being hit by her shoulder as she stood to her full height. Her footsteps were clipped as she left the room. Meanwhile, the word of God continued to flow through Brother Joseph like water from melting snow.

I might never have thought of this incident again, had I not caught Sister Emma doing something equally strange several days later. The early morning sun marked the arrival of our weekend meeting at the store, and I was anxious for the day to begin. After arriving, I hastened to the kitchen to see if Sister Emma might fetch me water to drink.

I stepped quickly down the hall but drew up short in the doorway. There was Sister Emma, dressed for the day, performing the same squatting and standing and squatting ritual that I had witnessed previously. 

I could not hide my shock and curiosity. In doing so, I made a noise of surprise.

Sister Emma looked over at me with a wide smile. “It is becoming easier to do,” she said. 

Her words left my mind a tangled thicket of confusion. “Easier to do?” 

She blinked several times, as though seeing me anew. A new set of footsteps sounded out in the hallway. The noise must have startled her out of some sort of reverie, for she gave a small, distracted shake of her head. “Never mind.” 

“Sister Emma,” I said, but she was already scurrying past me to leave the room.

I did not see much of Sister Emma until a few weeks later, when I happened to spot her on Main Street. She was in close concert with two Sisters, including Brother Newel’s wife, and speaking more animatedly than I had ever seen her. What could she be saying to set her expression alight in such an enchanting manner?

My curiosity overtook me. I decided to pass by close enough to overhear without being seen. 

“. . . feel as though I could lift a boulder!” Sister Emma was saying. “I am reminded of the many times I lifted the Golden Plates to clean. Did you know, doing so became easier and easier over time? I had never thought of it as such, but I believe that’s exactly what was happening. And I find with daily consistent practice I am seeing such strength in my stomach and legs as I’ve never seen before. You simply must join me at the store next week to—”

My brow furrowed as I turned the corner and made toward my residence. What could such a discussion mean? Lifting boulders? Strong legs? 

A few days later, I saw Sister Emma speaking animatedly to more Sisters on Main Street, and after worship on Sunday, a small crowd of about six or seven women had gathered around Sister Emma as she spoke in hushed tones. The way she commanded an audience reminded me of her husband, who could preach the word of the Lord to a congregation for upward of several hours without stopping.

The next time the elders met at Brother Newel’s store, I was greeted on the first floor by Brother Joseph himself. Such an occurrence was so rare that I was briefly alarmed. As he led me upstairs, I heard the distinct sound of several women speaking with one another in quite a state. It sounded as though they were in the storage room, where I know Brother Newel kept extra goods and supplies. I nearly asked Brother Joseph about the sound, and I would have, were there not something in his solemn expression that kept me from opening my mouth.

“Sister Emma will be with us shortly,” Brother Joseph informed us after we opened the meeting in prayer. When she later failed to appear, a flicker of some unreadable emotion flashed across Brother Joseph’s face, and he left to bid her bring our refreshment. At the meeting’s conclusion, I saw that various women were leaving the store, too. They had reddened faces and were wiping away what appeared to be sweat from their brows. 

At a meeting two weeks later, the feminine voices from the storage room seemed greater in number than before. When Sister Emma did not appear for the tidying she usually performed an hour or so into our meeting, several of the men exchanged glances that were easy enough to read: was Brother Joseph’s wife becoming unreliable in her duties? Brother Joseph stood, announcing that he would fetch her, but I must confess that my curiosity overruled my good sense. I volunteered to go in his stead. 

My attempts to be as silent as possible as I descended the stairs proved successful, because as I neared the storage room door on the first floor, the laughter and chatter of the women did not cease. Should I open the door straightaway? Yet this would perhaps cause the women to retreat. What were they doing in there? I occasionally heard bumps, and heavy breathing, and much discussion. I knew not what actions could bring about such sounds.

I tried peeking through the keyhole to no success. The only other option was to observe from an outside window. I exited through the front door as quietly as I could, then rounded the house toward the window that I guessed might bring the sisters into view.

The sun was bright, and I had to cup my hand over my eyes to peek inside. What I saw forced all the breath from my lungs.

The women were all in white, and there were so many of them—at least ten, possibly twelve, women. They appeared to have stripped down to their undergarments. Gone were the layers of heavy skirts and high collars, stockings and thin black shoes. Some of them even had their hair flowing freely and scandalously down their backs, unbraided and uncovered by bonnet. They were lined up, lying on blankets in two neat rows. Sister Emma faced them in front of the fireplace, lying down as well. 

The women lay on their backs and shot their feet in the air as one. For some time, they kicked their legs back and forth like they were a pair of sewing shears. They stretched their arms up over their heads and swung upward, like they were trying to reach through the heavens and shake hands with God Himself. They hugged their knees to their chests. They set their arms behind their heads, their feet on the ground, and shot their waists toward the upper room, steadily, over and over again. They rested their cheeks on their palms and curved their bent legs again toward the skies. Occasionally the entire group would break into giggles, starting with one sister and spreading to the rest. Whether the laughter was from exhaustion or from something else, I simply could not tell. 

I watched Sister Emma kneel on her blanket, using her arms to demonstrate some movement of which I could not make heads or tails. Her forehead glistened. She breathed deeply from the exertion. I could see the skin of her shins, ankles, and bare feet as easily as I might read the black font of scripture on a white page. Her smile, the largest and most genuine I’d ever seen on her face, was a captivating sight.

Their movements were odd. I could not look away. Oh, God forgive me, but I could not look away.

I might have watched them even longer had an insect not flown right in front of my eyes. I used my hand to shoo it off, and when I looked back in the window, Sister Emma was staring right at me.

Her eyes narrowed, much as they did in the upper room and the kitchen when I attempted to inquire after her state of being. She stood—the sight made my mouth go dry—and then she was stalking towards me.

When she reached the window, she stretched her arms wide and yanked the heavy curtains to a close. A single feminine murmur reached my ears, and then the women in the room burst into laughter. 

Their laughter was so loud and so sudden that the sound was like a lit match thrown on kerosene, transforming into an instant, golden blaze.

Shayla Frandsen earned her MFA in fiction in Utah. She previously earned an MA in English in New York City. Her writing can be found in New England Review, Iron Horse Literary Review, Under the Sun, Blood Orange Review, Literary Mama, Exposition Review, and others. In 2023 she was nominated for Best of the Net and Best Small Fictions. Her writing can also be found in Dialogue, Irreantum, and Exponent ii.

Art by Anna Wright.