Heat seared my chest and rocketed upward. I didn’t want Robert or Mike to see my face turn crimson, but I didn’t want to run from the room like a spooked whippet. I spun toward the coffeepot and made a show of pouring a cup.
“Actually,” Mike said, “that was our lucky break. We hired her to work on a case.”
I could have kissed him.
“Really?” Robert’s sarcasm permeated every syllable.
“Yes.”
My face had cooled enough to casually turn and look at the two men. I wanted to confront Robert about sneaking back to the house when he thought I was gone, but Aynslee’s presence made me bite my tongue. “So. What did you need here?”
Robert’s eyes slid toward Aynslee, then back to me, making sure I remembered our agreement to not fight in front of our daughter. “I just need to look around. Come on, sweetheart.” He headed down the hall, Aynslee in tow.
I turned, dumped out my coffee, and cleaned the grounds out of the coffeemaker, waiting for my heart rate to slow. How blind I’d been those many years ago.
Mike waited until Robert shut the office door. “You’ll need to hurry, Gwen. We have a bit of a ticking clock. We’ll need to get that sculpture to the conference. We need time to build up publicity. I’ll figure out a story for how Smith ended up in Utah.”
I thought of Robert’s smirk and wink. “I’ll do it.”
“Do what?” Mike asked.
“I’ll come up with a way for Smith to be in Utah. I’ll write an exposé to go with the reconstruction.”
“Oh, Gwen,” Beth said. “Your reputation—”
“Is nonexistent right now.” However, my reputation as a nut was clearly established.
“Good,” Mike said. “Your credentials as a facial identification expert will lend authority to your article.”
Beth looked at me. “But you’ll be crucified by the press.”
“Mike is right. If we don’t come up with a proactive plan, I’ll forever be looking over my shoulder.” And if the Avenging Angels didn’t take the bait, they’d continue to come after me. And my family. My daughter. My friends. I thought of Jane Doe’s ripped body, then shook my head. “I have to make this work,” I said quietly.
“You know I’ll do anything to help you, but why are you so sure they’ll steal the reconstruction?” Beth asked.
“If you make the Smith story good enough, of course,” Mike said. “Plus the date of the Peace Conference.”
“September eleventh,” Beth said. “The day the Muslim terrorists attacked the US.”
“Yeah.” I nodded. “And the date of the Mountain Meadows Massacre.”
CHAPTER
FIFTEEN
MIKE RETURNED TO HIS CAR AND BROUGHT IN a black, FBI-embroidered messenger bag. Inside were a laptop, files, and spiral notebooks. He commandeered the kitchen table and immediately booted up the computer.
I moved to the studio. After finding a box knife, I opened the shipment with the skull casting, placed it on my sculpture stand, then slipped onto the drafting chair. Slivers of golden sunlight striped the studio floor through the half-closed blinds. They looked like prison bars.
Jane Doe flickered across my mind. The Avenging Angels showed no mercy. Their holy grail had to mean so much to them that murder was reasonable. I had to make both the sculpture, and Smith’s presence in Mountain Meadows, believable.
Before I started on the reconstruction, I called Craig.
“I always knew Dave was hardheaded,” Craig said. “He must have ducked at the last moment. The bullet hit his head at an angle, wrapped around under the skin, then exited the other side. He has a bad concussion, fractured tibia, and cracked ribs.”
“But he’ll live?”
“Yeah.”
“Is he awake?”
“Off and on. No memory and no witnesses have come forward. No evidence other than the bullet.”
“Can I see him?”
“Not yet. I’ll let you know.”
After we hung up, I cradled the phone in my hands. The dial tone buzzed at me like an angry wasp. Dave’s going to live.
I cried. Not a teeny, ladylike flutter of tears. I gave in to a good old-fashioned deluge of boohoos. I hugged myself and rocked until the squall passed, leaving hiccups and snorts. A box of tissues appeared and I tugged out a handful.
Beth gently set the box next to me. “I’m afraid to ask.”
“Dave’s going to live.”
Beth strolled to my desk and made a show of rearranging papers. “Your wracking lament is over Dave’s survival?”
“Sometimes a person just needs a good cry.” I blew my nose.
“Could seeing Robert . . .”
“That too. He’s like dropping a blob of screaming phthalo green onto the middle of a finished portrait.”
“Oh. That’s bad?”
I grunted and blew my nose again. “So much for your ‘everything happens for a reason.’ What reason is there for Dave to be shot?”
Beth sat at the desk. “I don’t know the answer, Gwen,” she said quietly. “But if in your lifetime you find out why something bad happened, it’s a blessing.”
“Yeah, okay.”
“Do you want to be alone right now?”
“No. We’ve got work to do.” And a strong motive. My life and the lives of anyone close to me.
Beth grinned. “How exciting! My first case. Where do I begin? Do you think it will eventually involve litigation?”
“It is. Yes. Research. I don’t know.”
The smile vanished. “Why do you always answer like that?”
“I’m teaching you not to ask compound questions.” I chucked the tissue into the garbage. “Okay, we need a believable story about how Joseph Smith ended up in Utah.”
“I’ll start with his death in Carthage, Illinois.”
Beth set to work as I rummaged through the supplies for the reconstruction materials. A tackle box held a set of precut tissue depth markers, nothing more than electric eraser refills with inked numbers on one end. I measured the nasal aperture, teeth, and nasal spine, then recorded the numbers. Using a chart designed for a European male, I glued the markers on the casting. We worked at our projects for an hour, the only sounds the clicks of the keyboard and mouse.
Finally, Beth read from the computer screen. “Here’s the official account. On June 27, 1844, Joseph Smith was incarcerated—”
“Whoa, stop right there. He was arrested?”
“That would be a logical conclusion, yes.”
“Let me guess,” I said. “Polygamy?”
“That was an underlying cause. A former member of his church owned a printing press. In his first, and only, edition, he wrote a scathing exposé of Smith’s polygamous practices. In retaliation, Smith had the Nauvoo Legion, his private army, rally. The Legion marched to the newspaper office, destroyed the press, and burned every copy of the paper.”
“Ah.”
“The non-Mormon residents of Hancock County were incensed at the polygamous behavior and the wanton demolition of property. With the possibility of civil war breaking out in Illinois, the governor called the Warsaw Militia to active duty and asked Smith to surrender and face trial for riot and treason.”
“Ah again.”
Beth glanced at me and frowned. “He originally fled, but changed his mind and surrendered to the authorities. Smith was incarcerated awaiting trial in the jail in Carthage, Illinois.”
“Jail. Do you have a photo?”
“Hold on.” She clattered on the keyboard for a moment. “Here. It looks a bit like a house.”
I moved so I could see the screen. “This is recent. It looks like it’s been restored.”
“It has. The Mormon Church purchased it in 1903.” She paused. “Rather an odd priority.”
“What is?”
“Remember I told you the Mormons forgot where they buried Smith? They acquired this building twenty-five years before they bothered to look for Joseph Smith’s body.”
<
br /> I glanced at the plaster skull on my stand.
“Smith wasn’t in a cell,” Beth continued. “They were in the jailer’s bedroom upstairs. Here’s a photo of the bedroom.”
“Who is ‘they’?”
“Oh, sorry. Smith, his older brother Hyrum, Doctor Willard Richards, who was Joseph’s private secretary, and John Taylor.”
John Taylor. I’d heard that name before. I closed my eyes. Frances, the woman who’d rescued me outside of Jarom, whispered in my ear, “Prophet John Taylor had the keys to the kingdom.” “Who, exactly, is Taylor?”
“Eventually he became the third president of the church after Brigham Young. He wrote a large part of the history of the church,” Beth said.
“Thanks, sorry for the interruption. Go on.”
“Apparently they were quite comfortable. They’d enjoyed a bottle of wine and smoked pipes. An earlier visitor smuggled a pistol into the jail for the Smith brothers. Something called a pepper-box revolver.”
The average high school had better security. I resumed my seat at the sculpting stand.
“Now that Smith was jailed, the governor disbanded the Warsaw Militia, but the men were still incensed at the Mormon leader. At about five in the afternoon, the renegade militia surrounded the jail. To hide their identities, they’d blackened their faces with mud mixed with gunpowder.”
“Mud and gunpowder? Strange combination.”
“Maybe the mud alone wasn’t enough.”
“Or they wanted an explosive reaction to their disguise.” I snorted at my pun.
Beth stared at me.
“Never mind.” My mirth disappeared as I pictured the scene. One pistol against a hoard of men looking like demons.
“Hello?” Beth asked. “Are you okay?”
“Yeah. Just thinking.”
“Well then. Some of the militia rushed the stairs, shooting wildly.”
“Do you have a photograph or diagram of the layout of the jail?”
“Sure.” Beth pointed at the computer. I crossed the room and peered over her shoulder. “The stairs and upper hall are open to the floor below.” She traced the outline on the screen. “The hall is about three and a half feet wide.”
“Hmm.” I wandered back to my sculpting stand. “The mob probably had muskets. Lots of noise, smoke, confusion. And in that narrow hallway, the men wouldn’t be able to stand close together because of the side blast of those guns. Plus, they have to reload after every shot.”
“You’re so erudite about guns.”
“Yeah. That’s me.”
“All four men ran to the door to hold it closed, but the latch didn’t work. The militia first fired through the closed door. Startled, the men inside leaped away. The second bullet struck Hyrum in the face, and he fell to the floor, dead. Joseph stuck his hand through the opening and discharged his pistol at the men in the hallway. Three bullets found their mark, but three misfired.”
“Found their mark? Did Smith kill someone?”
“Let’s see. Several sources report two men were killed.”
“Okay.” I smoothed the clay on the cheeks. “Go on.”
“John Taylor was the next to go down. He rushed to the window opposite the door and attempted to climb out. He was hit several times by gunfire, gravely wounding him, and ended up taking refuge under the bed.”
“Where are Joseph and Doctor Richards at this point?” I asked.
“Willard Richards stood by the door with a walking cane, which he used to whack muskets shoved through the opening. Joseph Smith stood beside him.”
I pictured the room Beth had shown me. Something tugged at the edge of my brain. “I need to know the exact eyewitness wording for what happened next.”
Beth moved the mouse around until she’d found what she was looking for. “About ten years after the murders, John Taylor wrote—”
“Stop there.” I paused from my work. “Ten years later? Wasn’t Taylor shot and hiding under the bed?”
“Yessss,” Beth said slowly.
“Not much you can see from under a bed. We need eyewitness testimony, not hearsay.”
“Yes. Right.”
“Did Willard Richards give an account?”
“Richards said Joseph ran across the room to the same window Taylor had tried to jump from. He was struck twice by bullets shot from the door. He fell outward, saying, ‘Oh Lord, my God!’ Richards stuck his head out and saw Smith land on his left side.”
I added strips of clay across the frontal bone, wrapping them around the supraorbital process. “Interesting.”
“That’s not helpful.”
“Sorry. Describe Richards.”
“Hmm.” Beth clicked on the keyboard. “He was substantial, weighing nearly three hundred pounds. Why do you want to know that?”
The elusive thought crystalized in my brain. I stood, wiped my hands on my jeans, grabbed up a sketchpad, and began drawing. “Come here.”
Beth joined me at my drafting table.
“Here’s the room. The door is here and window here. According to the photos you showed me, a bed flanked the window on the right, and a desk and chair on the left.”
“Okay.”
“Smith proved that he was armed by shooting at the mob. The mob doesn’t know for sure if there’s another gun or if Smith is reloading, so they play it safe and poke their guns through the opening. After each volley, the men have to reload. That could take as long as a minute, but more likely, loaded muskets were passed up the stairs. Regardless, we have a time interval. Once loaded, they’d shove the barrels through the opening, and Richards would whack at them with the cane. Probably during the reloading lull, Smith bolted for the window. Richards followed close enough to see Smith land on the ground, right?”
“Correct. He said he stuck his head out as soon as Smith fell.”
“There’s a bed on one side of the window and a desk on the other, so Richards cannot be standing beside the window, he must be behind Smith.”
“Okay.”
“Look at the angle of door and window. If Richards is close enough to the window to see Smith land on the ground, his three-hundred-pound body will form a pretty good barrier between the men at the door and Smith at the window, unless the bullets are curving around Richards’s body.”
“Maybe the desk was smaller, and there was room to stand on the side.”
“It still doesn’t work. That window ledge is what, two feet deep? Smith would have dropped straight down. You can’t just peek out, you have to lean on the ledge to see anything.”
Beth blinked at my sketch for a moment, then at me. “Richards sustained no injuries.”
“That’s right. He should have been shot in the back.”
Beth nodded. “Richards’s version doesn’t line up with the physical layout.”
“We seem to have more questions than answers.” I picked up some clay and added it to the mandible. “What happened next?”
Beth returned to the computer. “That depends.”
I looked up from my work.
“Are you ready for this? Starting with Smith at the window, every eyewitness account differed on Smith’s injuries: he was shot in the room; he was unharmed when he fell from the window; he was alive when he landed; he was dead. Some say he was propped up against a wall and shot, execution style. He was stabbed with a bayonet. Someone tried to cut off his head but a beam of light—”
“Stop! Talk about overkill.” I chewed my lip for a moment. “Skip over the differing accounts on Smith. What happened to the militia and the men in the jail?”
“The Warsaw rebels fled. Willard Richards writes that he was fearful that they’d return, so he dragged the injured Taylor to the next room and hid him under a mattress.”
I touched the damaged left bone of my casting, just under the eye. “Was Joseph struck, shot, or otherwise hit in the face?”
Beth quietly read. “Yes. Both Smith and a man on the stairs had facial injuries.”
“Two ind
ividuals?”
“Yes. Several members of the militia relayed that when Joseph landed on the ground outside the window, a man named Webb struck him in the face with either the end of his gun or a bayonet.”
“Who was the second person with a facial injury?” I asked.
“It says here that Smith’s bullets struck the face of a man on the stairs.”
A quiver went through me and I touched the scar I’d created on the reconstruction. “Yes, yes, it could work.”
“What?”
“This injury to Smith’s face is the key to the solution. Willard Richards is a doctor, fiercely loyal to Joseph Smith—”
“He offered to die in Smith’s place.”
“Yes. Excellent.”
“Keep going. Please.”
“Substitution, that’s the answer.”
Beth repeated it like a magic word. “Substitution!”
“He would have walked past, perhaps even stepped over, the man on the stairs with the facial injury. Then, think of it, he goes outside and finds not a dead Smith, but a live Smith with the same type of head injury. Richards would know that if Joseph Smith simply disappeared, he’d be hunted down. They needed a body.”
“But if Joseph Smith got up and walked away, wouldn’t people see him—”
I shook my head. “Not with a big bandage on the cut and his face covered with mud. Folks would assume Smith was one of the militia.”
Beth didn’t just digest that. She savored it. “And the men supposedly shot on the stairs dropped off history’s radar. Substitution would also explain why Hyrum’s clothing is still around to this day, but Joseph’s is not.”
“More than that. With Hyrum’s clothing, every bullet hole, every wound can be examined. Without the clothing we are left with the conflicting eyewitness accounts.”
Her face sank. “But Joseph only successfully fired the gun three times. The switched body had four bullet wounds.”
“Entrance and exit wounds. What happened to the men next?” I asked.
Beth seemed to cheer up immediately. “This is interesting.” She hummed under her breath for a few moments. “Joseph and Hyrum weren’t wearing their garments that day.”
A Cry from the Dust Page 14
