Avenging Angel by Rex Burns Read Free Book Online Page A

“LDS—some of them don’t like to be called Mormons, and some Mormons don’t like to be called LDS.”
    When Wager was a kid, all non-Catholics were lumped under the heading “black Prods,” and either were pitied or laughed at because they had traded religion for superstition. There were even a few fights over who was the most Christian. But for a long time now all the sects and their jealousies had made no difference to him, and it was hard to imagine people getting upset over rituals. “What’s this got to do with the picture?”
    “You were sent here to learn you say? You want to learn or not?”
    Wager picked at an imaginary piece of lint on his trousers and managed to hold his temper. “Go on.”
    “I aim to.” Tice waited for Wager to say something more, but he didn’t. “Now out here we got people scattered over the benchland that don’t like either bunch because they think they’re the only real Mormons left. They’re the ones that still believe in the avenging angels or destroying angels or sons of Dan or whatever you want to call them.”
    “Why?”
    “Because the Mormon church used to have avenging angels, and these people stay with the old ways. They’re the ones that think Negroes are Satan’s children—that’s why their skin’s black; and that Indians are red because they broke God’s commandments. And that polygamy’s still one of God’s laws. They’re what you might call your basic, hard-shelled, unreformed Mormons.”
    “Polygamy?”
    “You going to tell me that’s against the law?” The sheriff had that look of a man who’d argued the question before and was damned if he wanted to go over the same ground again.
    “I don’t have to tell you that.”
    “No. You don’t. But around here we got people living together without marriage, we got people living together that are still married to somebody else, and we got people living together that are married to each other—except there’s more than one woman that’s married to the same man. As far as I know, we don’t yet have two men married to each other, not like they do over in Boulder. But we got a few of that kind living together that ain’t married. We got a whole variety of connubial bliss in these mountains, Detective Wager. Maybe it’s something in the water. But as long as those people don’t endanger life or property, I don’t bother them.”
    “You have any men and women that are just married to each other?”
    Tice coughed something like a laugh. “A few. They seem to be the unhappiest of the lot.”
    “What’s the avenging angels have to do with it?”
    “Nothing—it has to do with Mormons. The avenging angels were Mormon vigilantes. When Brigham Young started to settle groups of Mormons in the corridor down from Salt Lake City to San Diego, California, they ran into people who didn’t like Mormons. Some were on the land first, like around here; some tried to move in after the Mormons did the improving. Brigham Young sent out a chosen few to convert or kill off anybody they couldn’t buy out. And to go after any Mormons who wanted to stray from Brigham’s path. Since Brigham spoke for God, these vigilantes were just doing what God told them to, so they were called avenging angels or Danites or what-all.”
    “And …?”
    Tice shrugged. “There were some killings by Mormons around here. Massacres just west of here. But that was a long time ago—a hundred years. And it was kept pretty secret even then. I doubt you find many Mormons today that know much about them. Sure as hell few that believe in them.”
    Wager looked at the drawing spread in its plastic wrapper. “Mueller was one of these unreformed Mormons then?”
    “No, he wasn’t. I can’t find any link between him and any kind of Mormon or any other religion. As far as I can learn, he spent his Sundays—Saturdays, too—getting drunk by himself up in his cabin. Your Mormons of all kinds aren’t supposed to drink coffee even, let