The Massacre Mechanism (The Downwinders Book 5) (10 page)

“How exactly
will it release Deem?” Winn asked.

“I’m not at
liberty to go into the details,” Carma replied.

“After what
happened in Paragonah,” Winn said, “I’d like to know if there’s more to the
story.”

“As I said,
I’m not at liberty to say,” Carma replied. “As in that case, if you follow the
instructions precisely, everything should be fine.”

“But
sometimes shit happens,” Winn said. “It’d be nice to know contingencies in case
something does.”

“There are a
million contingencies and I can’t get into every possible scenario,” Carma
replied, becoming uncomfortable at Winn’s questioning. “The best thing is to
follow the directions to the letter, and I’m sure everything will be absolutely
fine. Well, that settles it, I guess!” She stood, pressing down the cloth of
her dress once again. “I’m sure Lyman will be very appreciative. I need to go
down and talk with him, and I’m a little late, so if you’ll both excuse me.”

They watched
as Carma walked around the table and into the hallway. Once Winn heard her
heading down the stairs to the basement, he turned to David.

“I guess we
should leave here at 1, just to be safe,” he said.

“Yeah, that
should give us more than enough time,” David replied.

Winn looked
down at the ebony box between them. “Any idea what’s inside?”

“None
whatsoever.”

“Carma
seemed a little skittish.”

“She did.”

“I think she
made up having to talk to Lyman just now. I think she was uncomfortable talking
to us, and wanted to leave.”

David stood
and reached out to lift the box. “It’s light,” he said. “That’s a plus.”

“Be careful
with it,” Winn warned. “I’ve known Lyman to deal with explosives. The cannery,
remember?”

David held
the box at arm’s length and slowly placed it back on the table. “Carma asked me
to intercept another drop off from Warren,” he said, looking at his watch.
“That’s in an hour. Plenty of time for a nap after that before we go out to do
this thing. Want to come along?”

“Sure,” Winn
replied, standing up. “Do you have enough time for me to get cleaned up a
little?”

“If you’re
quick. It’s at Quail Lake.”

Winn walked
out of the room and upstairs, heading for the shower.

It had been
twenty minutes since they parked in a spot overlooking the picnic area next to
the lake.

“He’s late,”
David said.

“I don’t
like this setup,” Winn said. “Too open. Anyone could see us.”

“That might
be why they’re using it,” David replied. “Suspicious about the dumpster. Let’s
give it a few more minutes.”

“Even if he
shows up, you can’t just walk down to one of those benches and retrieve it.
You’ll be seen.”

“Yeah,”
David agreed, looking out the windshield. “You’re right. This isn’t a good
setup.”

David’s
phone began to buzz inside his pocket, and Winn watched as he fished it out.

“Whoa,”
David said, looking at the phone. “It’s Carma.”

“Carma?”
Winn replied. “She never calls.”

“Hello?”
David said into the phone. “Carma?”

Winn waited
while David listened.

“OK, got
it.” David put his phone away. “Drop location moved. Head into St. George.”

Winn started
up his Jeep. “Where in St. George?”

“Behind the
Seven Wives Inn,” David replied. “Next to the Brigham Young home.”

Winn made
his way back to the entrance of the picnic area and left Quail Lake for the
highway to St. George.

“This
monument we’re going to tonight,” Winn said.

“The
Mountain Meadows Massacre?” David said.

“Sounds
ominous. I wonder why Lyman’s got us going there?”

“Beats me.
You trust Lyman, right?”

Winn paused
for a moment. “I think I do. He’s the only hope for getting Deem back, I know
that.”

“Then I guess
we need to follow Carma’s instructions,” David replied. “From what Lyman
described, she’s in a pretty terrible place.”

“Yeah,” Winn
said, feeling a pang of guilt once again.
She stepped in the way,
he
thought. He was tired of thinking it. It was easier to just feel guilty.

“What’s the
deal with the Mountain Meadows Massacre, anyway?” Winn asked, wanting to change
the subject away from Deem.

“You know,
the whole Indian thing.”

“No, I don’t
know,” Winn replied. “I’ve heard the name before, but I don’t really know why
there’s a memorial there, or what actually happened.”

“There was
an immigrant wagon train passing through Utah on its way to California,” David
said. “A party of families from Arkansas named Baker and Fancher. Mormons
dressed up as Indians and slaughtered them all. Except for a few kids.”

“What?” Winn
asked, shocked. “Really?”

“Yup.
Something like a hundred people killed. Men, women, and children.”

“When was
this?”

“A hundred
and fifty years ago,” David replied. “1850, 1860, something like that.”

Winn shook
his head. “Why?”

“Well,
there’s never a good reason for mass murder, right?” David replied. “The story
I remember from history class was that the Mormons around Cedar City were
really paranoid at the time. There was talk about a war with the United States,
and anybody passing through the area was viewed with suspicion. They saddled
the whole thing on John D. Lee, who claimed the go-ahead to kill the immigrants
came from Brigham Young.”

“No shit!”
Winn said.

“I can’t
believe you’ve never heard this story,” David said. “Didn’t you grow up around
here?”

“I grew up near
Tucson,” Winn replied. “Never heard anything about it.”

“Well, the
church always liked to play it down,” David replied. “I mean, if what John D.
Lee said was true, the stake president from Cedar City was in on the whole
thing. Didn’t look good for the church. They executed Lee for it, but many
people considered him a scapegoat.”

“So there’s
a monument out there?”

“There was a
ratty one for years,” David continued. “About a decade ago they fixed it up,
made it more respectable.”

“Why does
Carma want us to go out there now?” Winn asked, almost to himself. “What does
Lyman have planned?”

He took the
exit for St. George and they made their way down the main boulevard until they
reached Ancestor Square, where Winn made a turn and they found themselves at
the winter home of Brigham Young. Winn pulled his Jeep to the curb and left the
motor running.

“Creeps me
out, hearing your story,” Winn said as he looked at the mansion. Signs out
front with the familiar church logo invited visitors inside for a tour.

“There’s the
inn,” David said, pointing to a collection of buildings kitty-corner from the
Brigham Young home. “If you pull over there, we can keep an eye on the back.”

Winn
repositioned the Jeep where the rear of the inn was within eyesight, and rolled
down the windows before turning it off. It was beginning to get dark, but the
air from outside was still nice and hot.

They waited
another twenty minutes, watching as people came and went from the inn. No one
appeared behind the establishment, where a fence separated the property from
the other houses on the block.

“What time
was this supposed to happen?” Winn asked.

David check
his watch. “Fifteen minutes ago.”

“I think
it’s a bust.”

“Let’s wait
longer.”

“What if it happened
while we were on our way here? If I was suspicious, I’d switch the location last
minute, too. They’re onto us.”

“Maybe,”
David said. “But I don’t want to head back until we’re sure.”

They waited
another ten minutes. Winn adjusted in the seat of the Jeep, feeling his clothes
stick to the upholstery. He glanced over to the Brigham Young home and watched
as suited workers closed it up for the night. Exterior lights popped on.

Finally
after forty-five minutes of waiting, David threw in the towel.

“Alright, I
guess it’s not happening,” he said. “I hate to go back to Carma empty handed.”

“Either we
missed him, or he’s not coming,” Winn said. “We might have been outplayed on
this one.”

“You’re
probably right.”

They drove
back to Leeds and informed Carma of the bad news. She seemed to take it well,
though she appeared nervous, drawing long drags from her cigarette as they
explained how the evening went.

“Were you
seen?” she asked.

“At Quail
Lake, maybe,” Winn said. “It’s wide open. You can see everything. We didn’t see
anyone there at all, so who knows.”

Carma’s
irritation grew. “It’s now more important than ever that your work tonight at
the monument go as planned. Promise me you’ll make sure you follow my
instructions to the letter!”

“We will,
Carma,” David replied.

“If they’ve
figured out how to avoid us,” Winn said, “we might not be able to intercept any
more of Warren’s drops.”

“It may not
matter,” Carma replied, stamping out her cigarette. “If Lyman’s plan executes
as intended, it won’t matter at all.”

▪ ▪ ▪

They pulled
off the highway onto the short road that led to the monument, only to be met
with a metal gate barring the path. Winn turned off the headlights.

“You used to
be able to come out here anytime,” David said. “I guess since they improved the
site it now has ‘hours’.”

“No
problem,” Winn said, pulling the Jeep off-road to the right, heading down a
small hill into the meadow below. “It might be better to not leave a vehicle in
the parking lot of the monument anyway. People might notice. It’s reasonably
flat out here. We can off-road it to where we need to be.”

The Jeep
bumped and lurched as they passed over terrain that wasn’t exactly smooth but
had no large impediments. After he’d gone a thousand yards, he stopped the Jeep
and they turned to look behind them. The monument, resting on a small hill, seemed
far away in the distance.

“Here good?”
Winn asked David.

“Well, she
said north and west of it,” he replied. “That’s where we are.”

“What time
is it?”

“2:05. Three
minutes to spare.”

“Let’s get out
and get that box going,” Winn said, turning off the engine.

Their eyes didn’t
take long to adjust to the darkness; a bright, full moon was overhead,
radiating a cool glow to the landscape.

David retrieved
the ebony box from the back seat and held it as the two of them walked away
from the Jeep and into the meadow.

“So this is
where it happened?” Winn asked. “The Mormons killed all those people?”

“Yeah,”
David replied. “The immigrants had fought them off for days, thinking they were
Indians, because that’s how they were dressed. The Mormons realized that some
of the immigrants saw through the disguises, and that’s when they decided to
kill them all so there would be no witnesses. They lured them out with a truce
flag, promising them safe passage, but it was a trap. Killed them all, except
for a few little kids they figured wouldn’t remember.”

David held
the ebony box carefully, walking slowly over the ground, moving away from the
Jeep. Winn could see the brightness of the moon reflecting on the edges of the
box as he walked.

“What’s
supposed to happen?” Winn asked.

“She said it
would vibrate.”

David took
another step and stopped. Winn looked down at the box. The reflection of the
moon was shaking back and forth on its surface.

“You doing
that?” Winn asked.

“Nope,”
David said, and took another step. The box began to vibrate even more quickly.
David held it away from his body.

“Don’t drop
it!” Winn warned.

“It’s
freaking me out a little,” David said. “Why don’t you open it.”

“Me?”

“Yeah, open
it and take out the thing Carma said to plant in the ground.”

Winn
approached the box in David’s hands. It was shaking quickly, as though it might
be full of rabid mice. He reached for the lid and lifted, pulling his head back
in case something leapt out at him.

Inside were
dozens of small white objects, no more than an inch long, bouncing around. He
reached in and removed one, holding it up so both he and David could see it.

“What is
it?” David asked.

Winn
examined it closely. “It’s so small,” he said, noticing a sharp end and two
small joints.

“It kind of
looks like the bone of a finger,” David said. “A really small…” He stopped
himself.

Winn had the
same realization at the exact moment as David. He looked up at him.

“A child’s
finger?” David asked.

Winn felt
his stomach drop out a little. “Oh, fuck no!” he said, moving to drop it back
into the box. David pulled the box back.

“We’ve got
to plant it!” David said. “You heard Carma! Getting Deem back depends on it!”

“This isn’t
just a child’s finger,” Winn said, holding it up for David to see. “It’s an
infant’s. A toddler. Not a ten year old. A baby. Look how small it is.”

“If that’s
what it is,” David said.

“Well, what
else could it be?” Winn asked, exasperated.

“Who knows?”
David replied. “It’s Lyman, it could be anything.”

“Including
baby fingers,” Winn said. “You’re holding a box full of baby finger bones.
Doesn’t that bother you?”

“Incredibly,”
David said. “If it’s true. I don’t know. You don’t know. I only know you need
to plant it, right here. Just do it.”

Winn looked
down at the ground. It was covered in a light grass and low weeds. He knelt
next to David, reaching for a bare spot. He turned the small white bone so that
its tip was pointed toward the earth, and he dropped into the River, feeling
the atmosphere of the place change dramatically. He stopped for a moment to
look around; a dark mist covered the ground everywhere, and an oppressive
feeling descended upon him, something he had encountered before in his life,
but couldn’t quite identify. He turned his attention back to the bone and
pressed down gently. It sunk into the soil easily, and Winn kept pressing until
his own finger sunk an inch into the ground, burying the bone completely. He
dropped from the River, and the mist around them disappeared.

“It
stopped!” David said. Winn looked up. The box in David’s hands was now
motionless. “I’m going to take that to mean you planted it successfully.” David
began to walk again, although Winn stayed in place, looking down where he’d
shoved the finger into the ground.

“Come on!”
David said. “We’ve got to plant as many of these as we can, and we’ve only got
a half hour!”

Winn wasn’t
sure he shared David’s enthusiasm for the task.
He doesn’t have to touch the
things,
he thought.
I’ll finish this, but I don’t like it.