The Bishop’s Wife (Linda Wallheim Mystery, #1)(62)
The news vans slowly pulled away from the Helm house and by afternoon, when we came home from church, Jared, Kelly, and Alex were free.
By the time Kurt came home that night, I found that my annoyance toward him had dissipated considerably. I kissed him goodnight and let him hold me for a long time in bed. Then I turned over and thought about what I had to do now. Did I give up and let Carrie live with the consequences of her own bad behavior? I might have been tempted by the thought, except that there was still Kelly. And for all that Jared Helm might have reason to complain about his wife, I did not think that Alex Helm was a hero here. He had called Carrie a whore and I wondered how much he had pushed her into it with his attitude about women. What I wanted most now was the assurance that Kelly was safe.
CHAPTER 22
Anna Torstensen called me Monday afternoon to ask me if she could come over. A few minutes later, I opened the door and let her into the front room. She seemed full of energy, which I rather envied after the exhausting time I’d had dealing with the Helms. She was carrying a manila file folder and spread it out in front of me on the coffee table.
“I found these papers,” she said, tapping at them vigorously, “after I talked to Tobias’s lawyer. He claimed that Tobias had never revised his will from before we were married. But he has an address listed on some of Tobias’s correspondence that he thinks is Tobias’s first wife.”
“What?” I said.
She nodded, and I realized that I had misinterpreted her energy. She was shaking with anger and fear, not joy. “He says that half of the money could potentially go to her, if she is still alive.” Her voice was moving all over, up and down. “He also said that it’s possible that if she is still alive, Tobias’s marriage to me is illegal and that she could claim that all of his money is hers. That my marriage to him was bigamous because there was never any divorce.”
I was stunned. “She can’t be alive, surely.” The hammer with hair on it. The dress with blood on it. The odd gravestone in the garden. Had I misunderstood all of it?
“The lawyer had photos of her, and several letters. It sounds like she talked about coming back home at some point, when the boys were older and she could explain where she had been.”
“Where had she been?” I asked.
She pushed one of the pages at me, neatly written in nice schoolteacher loops. “She was in California, I guess.”
“But why?” Why any of this? Why would she leave her sons so mysteriously? I scanned the letter, but there was no answer there. It was just kind words about coming home and how much she missed Tobias and the boys, and how sorry she was. Was that what a woman who felt guilty about leaving would write? Was it what Carrie Helm would write if she had to explain herself to Kelly?
“Even if she’s dead now, my marriage to Tobias wouldn’t have been legal at the time. I can’t inherit because there’s no common law wife statute in Utah.”
“I’m so sorry,” I said. I knew she didn’t care about money or even the house. The boys would let her stay in it anyway. But the humiliation and disrespect she must feel—and she had to deal with it at the same time as her grief. So unfair.
Anna was pacing in a short line, up and down the small space of my front room. “He was even corresponding with her two years after he and I were married. And yet he never said a word to me about her being alive or coming back into his life. He didn’t say anything about needing to get a divorce.” She stopped pacing and threw up her arms. “What kind of man does that?”
I took the moment to draw her down to sit on the couch. “I don’t know. I’m sure you feel very confused.” Though in a way, this made more sense out of the fact that Tobias hadn’t wanted to be sealed to Anna. He must have known that the more scrutiny he brought to himself and his marriages, the more likelihood there was that his deception would be discovered.
In order for a couple to be granted a temple divorce, a lot of paperwork has to be filled out, and often the couple has to wait a year. The First Presidency of the church has to approve it officially, and while I don’t know exactly how much personal supervision that entails, it isn’t a rubber-stamping process. The Mormon church wants to make sure people take marriage seriously, both before and after making their covenants.
“I feel so betrayed.” Anna stared out the window, as if she couldn’t bear to look me in the face.
“Of course you do. You were betrayed.”
“Do you think he was planning to divorce me and remarry her all along?” she asked desperately.
I patted her hands. “No, I’m sure he wouldn’t have done that. He was in love with you. And besides, she had left him once. Why would he give her a chance to do it again?” I paused, thinking. “It must have been for the boys. Were they having a particularly hard time when all this happened? Can you remember?”
I must have said the right thing because Anna turned back to me, her eyes glistening. “Oh, yes,” she said. “How could I have forgotten? The first year Tobias and I were married, Tomas and Liam got along very well with me. But the second year—Liam was so angry with me. He would try to push me out of the room when we were all together. He refused to call me Mom or even Anna. I was ‘her’ or ‘the lady.’ ” She was smiling at this old memory, instead of feeling hurt. That said a lot about her and how she was capable of moving past hurt. I hoped it would serve her well in this.