The Missing Nine Months

The three soggy campers had wrapped themselves in garbage bags and were huddled under a rickety awning, waiting out the downpour. They were spotted by Ryan McKenzie, 19, who had spent the morning of March 4 rock-climbing with two friends high in the coastal mountains, 35 miles north of San Diego. Ryan was retreating from the rain when he saw the trio and offered them a lift back to civilization. The six packed into a 1990 Subaru, and Ryan's friend Becca was worried that there weren't enough seat belts to go around. "I hope the cops don't find us," she said. Everyone shared a laugh.

During the ride, the man did all the talking. He told them his name was Peter and that he had grown up in a small town in Maine. He was on a religious mission with his wife and daughter "Augustine," who had just graduated from high school. Their next destination was Las Vegas. About 40 minutes into the trip, "Peter" inquired whether they could be dropped off at a grocery store. "They didn't ask us for any money," recalls Ryan. "They just said they were going to depend on people like us to get them from place to place. We're Christians too, so we thought we'd give them a hand if they were really doing something for the Lord."

Little did they know that the "father," Brian David Mitchell, 49, thought that he himself was divine. He had spent the past five or so years wandering the streets of Salt Lake City, Utah, with his wife Wanda Barzee, dressed up like Jesus and spouting biblical prophecies. They were just a pair of eccentrics until Mitchell had a revelation that transformed his earthly mission. He was directed, as Barzee told a mental-health advocate last week, to collect seven new wives. And lacking volunteers willing to join a polygamous union, Mitchell allegedly resorted to kidnapping. His first quarry was Elizabeth Smart, then 14, whom he took from her home to a nearby primitive campsite. There, according to the Salt Lake Tribune, a self-styled "marriage" ceremony took place. Smart's cousin was next on his list, but he failed in that attempt.

Mitchell and Barzee were deep within their newly concocted universe last Wednesday morning as they walked along a highway in Sandy, Utah, just south of Salt Lake. They wore crowns of flowers in their hair, and they had a young girl dressed in a long robe and white veil in tow. Recognizing Mitchell's face from a recent episode of America's Most Wanted, passersby dialed 911. When police officers arrived, the girl was trembling. Three times she told them her name was Augustine. "I know who you think I am. You guys think I'm that Elizabeth Smart girl who ran away," she told the cops. They separated her from the couple and held up a flyer with her picture on it. "We think this is you," said one officer. She responded, "Thou sayeth."

The arrests of Mitchell and Barzee concluded the strange nine-month odyssey that began last summer amid a string of high-profile kidnappings that had set an already jittery nation on hyperalert. Smart's abduction was every parent's worst nightmare: she was plucked from the safety of her own bed, with a sister watching and her parents sleeping nearby. Though the 24-hour media vigil had long ago moved on, the family never gave up hope; Elizabeth's uncle Tom was even quoted in the paper on the very morning of her rescue, castigating police for slowing down the search.