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Show 1*37 My mother clucked her tongue. "Not a l l of them. But that Ervil - h e ' s worse than Ben or even Lucinda. Do you know that the followers who made t h i s raid were only teenagers? Just kids! And some of them were g i r l s ! Can you imagine? And they're supposed to be l i v i n g the Fullness of the Gospel." My fingers began to^tremble so that the receiver shook against my ear. This Ervil must be some kind of genius! I had heard of Mafiosos using juveniles to do t h e i r d i r t y work but was i t possible that a fundamentalist Mormon a born and raised inAdesolate polygamist-refugee settlement, had created such a scheme? He must have planned i t , realizing that the teenagers, if caught, wouldn't be prosecuted as severely as adults. "Mama, what w i l l Daddy do? Is he doing anything to protect himself?" brethren "Some of the A in the group guarded him l a s t night and went with him to the office this morning. But they have their jobs and t h e i r f a m i l i e s . . ." Of course the men would watch out for him; he was their leader. I f e l t useless, helpless. "What about you? If they'd attack women and children in Los Molinos..." "I keep my doors locked. And the boys are here." I thought of my younger brothers, neither of them very experienced with weapons. "Maybe Brian and I should stay with you." Maybe Vietnam wasn't a l l for nothing, I thought. "Thank you darling. But I don't think t h e r e ' s any need for that. Just come and v i s i t ." "This i s the l a s t thing you needed, on top of everything e l s e . . . " Sho know I was speaking of her breakdown. |