The Six Messiahs - Mark Frost [166]
And for some reason, these children were still free, even happy. Living together, apart from their families.
They are just waiting for them to reach the right age, Kanazuchi realized. Like ranchers raising a herd of livestock.
One of the children, a tiny curly-headed girl, chased a bright red ball to the edge of the fence. It rolled underneath the strands and stopped at Kanazuchi's feet; he picked up the ball and held it out to her. She looked at him coyly; he made the ball disappear with a deft sleight of hand, then reached through the fence and produced it from behind the girl's ear. She accepted it with a delighted gasp of astonishment and ran off laughing toward the others.
One of the adults inside the fence had noticed their inter action; Kanazuchi raised the dead smile back onto his face waved blandly, and walked away.
A two-story warehouse drew into sight, standing apart from the shanties in a clearing. He waited for the area to empty before crossing to its walls. Barn-style double front doors slightly open; two yawning whiteshirts patrolling with rifles Kanazuchi walked slowly around to the rear, where he found a single door. Tried the handle, twisted quietly with all his strength until it yielded, then slipped inside.
Stacked wooden crates covered with canvas and tied to the ground by rope occupied most of the open floor space. Kanazuchi walked between rows piled as high as his head. Out of sight of the front doors, he cut the rope holding one stack and wedged open the crate. A dozen rifles inside, his estimate, more than a thousand rifles in the room.
A row of irregular shrouded shapes stood across from him; he lifted the canvas. Four round-barreled guns mounted on sturdy tripods. Countless smaller boxes stenciled with the word GATLING and filled with coils of linked ammunition belts piled nearby. He had never seen one before, but he had heard of such weapons: machine guns. He had also heard it said that one man armed with' a machine gun in open ground could kill a hundred in less than a minute.
Sound nearby; a gentle rasp of snoring. He traced it to a white shirt sleeping on the ground three rows away, rifle beside him. An Asian face.
Chinese.
Kanazuchi picked up the rifle, reached down and tickled the man's nose with the tip of the barrel. He woke sluggishly, offering no reaction, even with the gun staring him in his face.
"Why are you sleeping on duty?" asked Kanazuchi in Mandarin.
"Will you report me?" the man answered flatly.
"What if I had been an intruder?"
"Don't talk in that language," the man said in English. "It is against the rules."
"I will report you if you do not answer my questions," said Kanazuchi in English.
"You should report me. I have broken the rules. I should be punished," the man said almost eagerly, the first emotion he'd exhibited. "That is your responsibility."
"Do you know what will happen to you?"
"I will be sent to the Reverend."
"What will the Reverend do to you?"
"I will be punished."
"How?"
"You must tell them what I have done. That is the rule. If you do not tell them, then you have broken the rules...."
Kanazuchi grabbed the man's throat, cutting him off.
"When did you come to this place?" Kanazuchi asked in a whisper.
The man stared at him, not even bothered by the constriction to his breathing.
"How long ago did you come here?" asked Kanazuchi.
"Two years."
"There were men here who worked with explosives, Chinese; did you know them?"
The man nodded.
"They worked for the railroad; did you work for the railroad, too?"
The man nodded again.
"Where are they now?"
"Gone."
"They built something here, a room underground, under that church, do you know where this room is?"
The man shook his head. He told the truth.
"Is the Reverend the man they have built this for?" asked Kanazuchi.
The man nodded again. "Everything is for the Reverend."
"Where is the Reverend now?"
The man shook his head.
"Tell me where he is or I will kill you."