Salt Lake City
From one temple to another...
Professor Henry Kanosh, a member of the Northwestern Band of Shoshone, was the first Mormon Indian to stand at the threshold of this temple's Kodesh Hakodashim, the Holy of the Holies' chamber at the heart of the Mormon temple in Salt Lake City.
Starting at dawn, he'd prepared himself: fasting and praying. He now stood in a vestibule of polished rock, before a door few men knew about. Pounded of raw silver, the portal rose fifteen feet high and eight wide, split down the middle.
In Hank's hands, he held the one gift he had to offer, the key to the temple's inner sanctum.
Ahead, the doors parted, and a single figure stepped out.
Hank knelt, bowing his head.
Soft footsteps approached, unhurried, calm.
Once they stopped before him, Hank raised his arms and offered up his gift. The gold plate was taken from his grasp, slipped from his fingers, and gone.
He had recovered the plate at the Old Faithful Inn. While everyone had been distracted by NASA's call, announcing that they had found a match to the landscape depicted on the canopic jar, Henry had been standing next to the Frenchman's case. He dared not take both plates, as Rafael would then have noted the theft much sooner. So setting aside greed, he satisfied himself with slipping one free and pocketing it in the back of his pants.
The gold plate belonged with the church. After seeing the re-creation of Solomon's Temple, he knew that for sure.
Footsteps retreated, again unhurried and calm.
Hank risked a glance up as the doors started to sweep closed.
Brilliant light flowed out from that inner sanctum. He caught a slivered glimpse inside. A large white stone altar. Beyond it, gold shone forth, coming from shelves that seemed to stretch forever.
Were they Joseph Smith's original tablets?
A tingling washed over his skin, awe prickling the small hairs over his body. Then the doors shut-and the world seemed a far darker and more ordinary place.
Hank stood, turned, and walked away.
Carrying some of that golden brilliance with him.