He wanted to put pressure on the homeowners' association and all of the residents, a tactic that each of the individuals quoted in the article as well as the newspaper itself seemed to support wholeheartedly.
Surprisingly, there was no quote from the sheriff, and Barry wondered where Hitman would stand on this, whose side he would take. No matter how great his loyalty to Bonita Vista, no matter how much he was being paid off, there was no way he could turn a blind eye to a killing. Not of a child. Not in a small town. Not if he wanted to keep his job.
"I don't like the sound of this 'rally,"" he said, handing back the paper.
"Me either. I see a bunch of drunk bubbas bringing their shotguns and talking themselves into mob violence."
"There's nothing scarier than groupthink," Barry agreed.
"So what should we do?"
"What can we do?"
Maureen sat down on the bed next to him. "I thought we could take a trip. There's probably more national parks within driving distance of this place than anywhere else in the country, and we haven't been to any of them. Why don't we drive out, find someplace to stay in Cedar City, and go to Bryce or Zion or Cedar Breaks."
"You've really been thinking about this."
"I've been looking through our Triple A book," she admitted. She took his hand. "I don't want to be here tonight. I have a bad feeling about it."
He leaned over and gave her a quick kiss.
"I'm serious. There's the potential for danger here."
"From which side?"
"I don't know. It doesn't matter. I just don't want to be here when it happens."
Barry sighed. "I don't think anything will happen--"
"How can you say that!"
"We have a gate with an armed guard. And even Hitman can't ignore something like this. The sheriff'll make sure things don't get out of hand."
Maureen laughed shortly. "Right."
He was about to argue that their home was far enough up the hill that even if the Corban protesters got through the gate and went on some kind of rampage, the mob would probably be stopped or spent by the time they reached their place Rampage --but he stopped himself. What the hell was he doing? What was he thinking? After everything he'd seen, after everything he knew or suspected, was he honestly arguing for the probability of normalcy reasserting itself? This wasn't a normal situation, this wasn't a normal place. Normal logic did not apply. Shit, if he didn't know better, he'd think that he'd been influenced or corrupted, bombarded with association mind rays or magical spells to make him more complacent and compliant and agreeable to the party line.
"You're right," Barry admitted.
"So we'll go?"
"Yeah," he said. "After breakfast, after I take a shower. Just pack enough for overnight, though. We're coming back tomorrow."
"To survey the damage?"
"Hopefully not."
She kissed him. "You're a good man, Charlie Brown." She stood up.
"Go take your shower."
"Want to join me?"
"Tonight," she promised.
Barry had finished his shower and was up in the kitchen pouring himself some coffee when he heard a loud knock at the front door. Maureen, already downstairs, answered it and a moment later called his name.
He moved around the corner and looked over the railing to see Mike enter the living room, newspaper in hand. "Hey!" Barry called, walking downstairs. "How's it going?"
Mike held up a copy of the Standard. "I assume you saw this?"
Barry nodded.
"They're calling it a 'rally,"" Mike said angrily, "trying to make it sound like some sort of happy high school thing. It's a planned assault is what it is, an attack on us. They want to get enough people together so that they can storm the gates and ... I don't know what."
"That's why we're leaving," Barry said. "Mo wants us to spend the night in Cedar City just in case things get too hairy."
"I don't..." Mike shook his head, confused. "What are you talking about?"
"I have a bad feeling about this," Maureen said. "I don't claim to be psychic or anything, but I just think we need to get out of here.
Something's wrong. Something's going to happen."
"Yeah, something's going to happen. They're going to vandalize our property. You'll come back to smashed windows and shot-up car tires and ... who knows what all."
"Exactly. That's why we don't want to be here when it happens." Mike turned toward Barry. "What's the matter with you?" he asked. "This is your home. This is your property. You can't tell me you wouldn't stay and fight a fire to save your house. Hell, we'd all be up on our roofs with hoses, wetting down everything in sight."
Barry nodded reluctantly.
"Same thing here. I know the association is fucked up, but we have no choice but to back them on this. Besides, this is what the association is supposed to be doing. Protecting Bonita Vista, standing up for the residents."
"There wouldn't even be this rally if the association hadn't..." He looked into Mike's eyes. "If those kids hadn't been poisoned."
"It's a deal with the devil," Mike admitted. "But we have no choice.
Whether we like it or not, those Corbanites see this as an us-versus-them situation. And we're 'them.""
Barry tried to smile. ""What do you think they'll do? Burn down our houses?"
"Vigilante justice is not exactly unheard of in this part of the world, and, yes, that is something I think they might try to do."
"Me, too," Maureen said. "That's why I don't want to be here. You can't fight a mob, you can't reason with a horde of angry stirred-up people, particularly ones whose children have been killed."
"I understand your feelings," Mike said to her. He turned to Barry.
"But why are you going? Because you fear for your personal safety?
That's okay if it is; that's a legitimate reason. But if you're doing this to get back at the association, because you think it'll somehow hurt them, then you're wrong. You read that article. They blame us, all of us, not just the association, and I don't think the rest of us should suffer collateral damage because of it."
It was the fire analogy that had gotten to him. As much as Barry hated to admit it, as much as he wanted to stick with Maureen and the promise he'd made to her, Mike's argument made sense. He should stay with his house, make sure his home was safe. It was his duty.
And there was something else.
"We can't leave," he told her. "Not this macho bullshit!"
"Who's going to protect our house--"
"What, you're going to buy a gun and sit on the porch to shoot at intruders? Come on! This is craziness! If there is any damage, our homeowners' insurance will cover it. Half the homes here are unoccupied! They're vacation homes! What about those people? They're not rushing back for the last stand at the O.K. Corral." She looked into his eyes. "There's no reason to do this."
"What if it's a test?" he said quietly.
"What?"
"What if the association just wants to know who's willing to stay and fight?"
"Fight?" she practically screamed.
"Figuratively, not literally. What if they're just trying to gauge the mettle of their opponents? Us."
"I'll let you two discuss it," Mike said, backing off toward the door.
"I think you should stay, though. There's strength in numbers, and we need all the bodies we can get. Like she said, there aren't a lot of full-timers up here, and we don't have a newspaper recruiting people for our side like they do." He stepped outside, and carefully closed the screen. "It's something to think about."
She slammed the door behind him. "It's not something to think about."
"Mo..."
"You promised me we'd leave."
"I know."
"What is this? The great iconoclastic horror writer Barry Welch is afraid of what his neighbors will say about him? Fuck them! If you want to show someone that you have balls, show me, your wife, and stand down this peer pressure and get the hell out of here for the night."