“You knew that was a lie,” Gideon said quietly. “But you couldn’t tell anyone.”

“Because they’d kill me, too. And then Abigail would have no one. And then, on Saturday, I cut my finger.” Amos looked at his finger, now wrapped in a fresh bandage. “It seems like a year ago, but it was just four days. I went to the healer and got a glimpse into her office. And I saw she had a computer.”

Gideon whistled. “That must have been a shock.”

“Oh, it was. I mean, I’d seen computers before I joined Eden. But they were certainly not the same as they are now. We knew about the Internet. We heard about it from people who joined in the last twenty years or so, but the way I pictured it was nothing like it really is. I was shocked, mainly that other people besides Ephraim were lying. Ephraim killing the Comstocks shocked me as well, but I already knew he was a brutal man. That Sister Coleen was part of any of the secrecy . . . Well, it was hard not to show how stunned I was. Luckily the cut was bad and she attributed my reaction to blood loss. Later that night, I overheard Pastor talking on the phone. A cell phone, as it turns out.”

Mercy smiled. “You got catapulted into the twenty-first century, huh?”

Amos nodded. “I knew about phones as well, but nobody was allowed to speak of them. Abigail told me that one of the children in her class was beaten for telling the other students about them. I didn’t realize how widespread the lies were. I didn’t know who to trust.”

“Who was Pastor talking to on the phone?” Gideon asked.

“He made two calls. The first, I don’t know. He was looking for Ephraim. The second call was to Ephraim himself. Apparently Ephraim should have come back to Eden already. We thought he was fasting and praying on the mountain like he did four times a year, but he must have told Pastor that he’d been hurt and needed to rest, because Pastor acted like he felt relieved that there was a good reason because DJ had told him otherwise. Ephraim and DJ do not get along, but you already knew that, Mercy.”

Mercy’s throat went tight. She didn’t want to talk to Amos about her mother’s death. It still hurt and it would hurt him, too. But keeping it secret wasn’t right, either. “DJ shot Mama. Twice. He killed her. But before he did, Mama told him that Ephraim would kill him—DJ, I mean. DJ laughed and said that he couldn’t. I assumed that meant that DJ had information on him.”

“I know about that,” Amos said heavily. “Agent Molina told me. I wish I’d known when I climbed into his truck last night. I would have killed him myself and saved us all the danger.”

Mercy squeezed his hand. “So you left Eden after Pastor’s call?”

“No. On Monday I followed DJ out of the compound and heard him make a call as well. He talked about you, Mercy. That’s why I’m here.”