Finding Mercy

by Karen Harper

  A buggy went by. She recognized the folks who stared but went on.

  “Well, then?” he prompted, frowning.

  “A black van bumped into the back of my buggy about a quarter hour ago, and I didn’t realize the sign was gone.”

  “Yeah, sorry,” he said, whipping off his glasses and bending closer to the damage, then brushing his hand across the scuff marks. “Your left wheel rim’s askew too. Can you give me a description of the vehicle?” he asked, taking from his jacket pocket a small device that must be a cell phone, but one he typed things into with his thumbs.

  “I’m not sure of the make. Tinted windows so I can’t describe anyone inside. And what’s scary is they had their license plate blacked out.”

  “Someone with malice aforethought,” he muttered, straightening and putting a hand on his gun belt. “And this was where, ma’am?”

  “I was taking a shortcut through the fields between Troyers Mill and here. I intend to tell Sheriff Freeman about it. I’d like to head home now.”

  “Which is where?” he asked, his thumbs busy again on his little machine. A car went past; it slowed and people stared.

  “I live at the Lantz farm, 400 Oakridge Road. I’m Ella Lantz.”

  “Oh, yeah, the lavender farm. You and one of your brothers helped the guy in the wreck the first day I was here. Sorry for being so curious, but I’m trying to familiarize myself with your people. So, three brothers still at home?”

  “No, Seth just moved out to the Troyer place. That was my cousin who found the accident with me.”

  “Oh, yeah, that’s what the sheriff said. So your cousin is living here now?”

  How much had the sheriff told his new deputy? she wondered. And why did Andrew even figure into this? A police officer trying to get his feet on the ground here or not, this man was being too nosy about Andrew. After deadly persecutions of the Amish in Europe years ago, it wasn’t her people’s way to trust government men, lawyers or law officers. After all that Sheriff Freeman had been through with the Amish community here, he was the exception. Besides, as bedraggled and upset at Ella was, her hackles went up in her desire to protect Andrew.

  “I’ll be sure to get another safety sign, Officer Hayes,” she said, hoping to change the topic. “We have one in our barn. I got caught in the rain, and I don’t want to catch my death of chill, so I’d like to head home. I plan to talk to the sheriff soon.”

  She edged away from him toward her buggy. He was frowning now. She got in, hoping he didn’t call her back or ask another question. But he let her go—that is, if she didn’t count the fact he followed so close behind her in his black cruiser all the way home that it brought back the panic of the black van. She fought hard to keep an attack of the drowning darkness at bay. When she turned into the farm lane, he sped away.

  * * *

  “I don’t need to be scolded like a child, Daad!” Ella protested at her father’s reaction to her telling him what had happened.

  The rain had stopped drumming on the barn roof. The men had come in from the fields, but only Daad was still here when she buggied in. Though wet and shivering, she’d told him right away. He’d wrapped her in a horse blanket and unhitched Fern for her while she talked.

  “Then don’t act like a child, going out on your own after those footprints around the houses!” he said.

  “Those weren’t targeting me anymore than the boys!”

  “Ach,” he went on, shaking his head so hard his beard wagged. “My fault for not insisting you take someone with you. That theft of your cape from your parked buggy at the mill, and then dragging it behind the van—what next?”

  “I’m going to talk to the men who were working there, see if they can describe or identify someone who might have been near my buggy so I can follow up—”

  “No! No. For all we know, it could be one of those men who followed you, been watching you—looking in windows. All right, you want to tell Sheriff Freeman what happened, fine. His deputy will probably tell him.”

  “But I intentionally didn’t tell the new deputy everything. Especially when he started asking questions about our family and Andrew.”

  “A new man, trying to learn the territory, that’s all. Police are too nosy anyways, always were. But you cannot go out without one of your brothers with you until we find out more!”

  “Daad, I have a business to run, and Abel and Aaron are busy in the fields with you. I can see why I shouldn’t take Andrew with me, but—”

  “But why? Someone is stalking you, I still think so, ya,” he said, starting to wipe Fern down with an old towel. Their raised voices obviously didn’t bother the horse, who was already munching from the feed trough.

  “I mean,” Ella said, forcing herself to speak more slowly and calmly, “Andrew should stick close to home to keep himself safe.”

  “And have people wonder if he’s sick? Folks would start talking about it and lots of others would get curious about him. He’s going to attend Seth’s wedding, so he’ll be on display then anyway. Besides, I think he has cabin fever already. It’s a hard time, his waiting to do the right thing, waiting to get his life back again. I didn’t ask, but wherever they were hiding him before, I think something bad happened.”

  She almost blurted out, You mean he was stalked? but she kept quiet on that one. Was her protective father suggesting he trusted her going off alone with a worldly man? Her mind raced as she watched Daad hang Fern’s tack on the wall pegs. He immediately started to hammer her bent metal wheel back into place. She pulled the blanket tighter around her wet shoulders.

  “You mean,” she said, having to talk louder again over the din, “you think I should take him with me when I leave on deliveries or errands? You didn’t even want me to show him how to hitch a buggy.”

  “Never said that, just wanted to give Aaron more responsibility. You should take Andrew and visit just once to your places that sell the lavender. Tell them for a while they need to come here to pick things up.”

  “But I’ve promised them I would make deliveries and included that in the price. All six of my vendors are busy women, and I’m hoping to expand. Daad, I’m twenty-four and am self-supporting and have my own home now, so—”

  “That’s a problem too,” he said, stopping the hammering and turning to her. “At night, for a while, you should not sleep alone in that house, but come back inside with us.”

  “But you just gave my room to Andrew.”

  Daad sighed and put down the hammer. His shoulders slumped. His anger seemed to ebb from him. “We will set it up for Andrew to sleep in your mamm’s quilting room, since the three men in one room would be too much.”

  “I can sleep in the quilting room.”

  “Must you always argue with your father, girl? You think Andrew would go for that? I see him as good man and not only because of what Mr. Branin told me about him.”

  “Here I thought Andrew was the one who had to be guarded, be worried about—not me.”

  “With the sheriff’s help, we will find out who is bothering my girl, ya?” He put an arm around her shoulders, and they walked toward the barn door together. “And maybe it is not as bad as we fear, but you just let me explain to your mother.”

  “I know it probably doesn’t mean much, but I thought I saw a light on the lavender hill the other night,” she said as they walked out of the barn and he slid the wooden bar across to close it. “I was pretty sure it was a reflection off one of my tin pans that scare the birds away.”

  “Not a flashlight?”

  “No, unless the battery was bad—dim. It was single, like an eye that opened and blinked shut.”

  He put her between the runners of the sleigh they had put outside, propped up on its end against the barn so they could fix the bottom of it. He moved away from her and, hands on his hips, stared up the hill, then looked toward the house.

  “I’m going to walk to the phone shanty and call the sheriff to come out,” he said.

  “After I dry
off and change clothes, I’m planning to take Ray-Lynn Logan her weekly lavender products into the Dutch Farm Table and also stop at the gift shop and B and B. I can ask Andrew to ride with me and see the sheriff then.”

  “Ya, I guess, if you stay on the main roads, with others around from now on. And no asking those men at the mill if they saw someone take your cape. Pranksters, I pray, just that.”

  She was glad to see no one in the kitchen, because she knew she must look a drowned cat—though it jolted her to think of it that way. Despite all she’d been through today, she had a hopeful heart. Blessedly, none of the feelings of impending doom that so often plagued her when something went wrong hovered over her head. However independent she’d been these past years, maybe she felt better because she liked the idea of Andrew taking care of her, just as she’d watch out for him.

  * * *

  Ella made sure Andrew heard her entire story before she asked him to accompany her for her deliveries that afternoon. He’d already agreed to move into the smaller quilting room. Abel and Aaron had moved his bed there and were muttering about having to move Ella’s bedroom furniture back into the farmhouse after just taking it in the other direction.

  Andrew had said he’d like to go along in the buggy. They sat companionably close as they headed toward town three miles away. She didn’t know how he felt, but she felt good just to be with him.

  “Want to handle the reins?” she asked.

  “Always,” he said with a tight smile as he took them from her. Their fingers touched. His were strong and warm, smooth too, not like a farmer’s or a carpenter’s. She showed him how to hold the reins, wrap them a bit around his hand.

  “I guess ‘always’ means more than it sounds like,” she said. “You were an important man—are still—if you can get things settled at home, right?”

  “Some would think so. Also an ignorant man. I got taken in and in over my head. Now I’m trying to make amends. Do the right thing, as they say.”

  “I admire you for that. I know all about making mistakes. I almost married a man who couldn’t give up his drinking. It was a blessing I had the courage to pull out, even though I’d said yes. Hold the right rein a little tighter, not all that slack.”

  “You need a rearview mirror.”

  “Some buggies have them. I just never saw the need—until earlier today.”

  “Being followed like that is one of my worst fears.”

  “I can’t begin to imagine what you’ve been through or still have to face. But maybe what happened to me today gives me a little hint of how hard it’s been for you. Do you think a lot about what you’ve left behind—what you’re missing—besides your car to impress your corporation?”

  “You are a smart and very persuasive woman, Ella Lantz. If I were my enemies, I’d send someone like you to get me to confess all.”

  “You’re teasing.”

  “Yes and no. All right, I know a lot about you, so let’s play something like twenty questions—or ten. You tell me things you think you know about the other me, the real me. As long as you’re correct, you can ask another question.”

  He smiled at her, a bit prideful, she thought, but she was grateful to have the chance to learn more about him.

  “You’re from a big city, but not one in Ohio,” she said.

  “That’s two questions, clever Ella, but yes and yes.”

  “You’re not married.”

  “How did you guess that? I could hardly wear a wedding ring around here, not an Amish man.”

  “Because on your left ring finger, there is not a hint of white circle, but on your right hand, where you took off a ring, there is.”

  “I think the sheriff and that new deputy should be asking you for help.”

  “Don’t change the subject or think flattery will get you anywhere, not with the Amish,” she told him. “For us, cooperation, just like we have now, and not competition is the best way to live.”

  “Which means we are worlds apart. You should see the dog-eat-dog environment I came from. And, you know, this stay here has really been lucky for me.”

  “Not lucky—blessed. Blessed by God. Okay, here’s another guess. You believe in God but you hardly ever think about Him anymore, because you’ve been too busy. You think you can solve your problems your way.”

  He turned to look at her as they clip-clopped along. He’d been turning his head away a lot and leaning out to look behind them. “I’d say that’s fair,” he admitted. “Until everything blew up in my face and what I was facing was the ruin of my dreams and maybe even death.”

  She gripped his left wrist. “I know. That changes things, doesn’t it? Then you need something and someone to lean on. Oh, I have my questions too about life’s troubles, but I never think that the Creator of the world—of these hills and fields and my lavender—doesn’t have the answers. Last night I saw you go outside and look up at the stars, even though you were hobbling. You felt the strength and power out there in the vastness, didn’t you?”

  “Sure. Yeah, I believe that. But I also know we’ve got to use what we’ve been given—gifts and time and talents—to do our best and accomplish something in life. I’ve said it before, but I mean this—I really admire your people and your family, so close and supportive, despite some pretty strict rules.”

  “We’re almost to town. One more guess about you. Your company had something to do with the Chinese—maybe you’ve even been to China—but you’re worried they might be after you now.”

  His eyes widened in surprise. His nostrils flared; he sniffed sharply, but he only shook his head and didn’t answer. As they headed into the fringe of town with more intersections, she took the reins back from him.

  “So much for that game,” he said. “I don’t want you involved in any way.”

  “But by coming along today and telling my father you were willing to help keep an eye on me, you are involved, so I am too. All right, you don’t want to say more, that’s fine. So, whatever big city you are from, this is lovely, little Homestead,” she said with a sweep of one hand at Main Street.

  She pointed out the Dutch Farm Table Restaurant and told him the pizzeria was partway down the block and the two fast-food places were at the very end. Pulling Fern into the hitching post in front of the sheriff’s office, she gestured here and there. “That’s the volunteer fire department, the string of shops, Kwik Stop food store where we usually get our groceries, the pharmacy and hardware store. And that’s the newspaper office, down there near the only traffic light in town.”

  “A one-traffic-light town! Never thought I’d live in one, though I did see one once in Scotland.”

  “Oops, something personal slipped out. You’d better guard your mouth, Mr. Modern Andrew Lantz.”

  The corners of his taut mouth crimped in an almost-smile as he intently studied her mouth. She wet her lips with her tongue. His eyes widened, then he turned abruptly away. “And my heart,” she was amazed to overhear him whisper as he grabbed his crutch and climbed carefully down to tie Fern to the hitching post.

  * * *

  The sheriff invited them both into his office at once. Before they even sat down, Ella said, “I want to apologize for not telling you who Andrew really was before, but we were sworn to total secrecy until Mr. Branin filled you in.”

  “Which he did in his own good time. I understand, Ella. Like my Dad used to say, ‘Loose lips sink ships.’ Go on and tell me about the incident yesterday. Is there more to it than what you told Deputy Hayes?”

  Ella told him about the “incident,” including the theft and misuse of her cape, which she hadn’t shared with the deputy.

  “Did you see the way it was dragged behind the van as a threat?” the sheriff asked, frowning.

  She wasn’t sure what he meant. “I— No. You mean like a threat they would drag me? I think it was just a stranger or strangers picking on an Amish girl who was alone—easy game to scare. They stole my cape, then to be sure I didn’t get their license, they co
vered it with what they had at hand but not—not like a message or a threat.”

  “I don’t mean to upset you more, Ella,” the sheriff said, sitting forward in his chair so that it squeaked. He folded his hands on his desk over the papers there. He glanced from Andrew to her. “I just gotta look at all possibilities. I haven’t had any similar incident reported.”

  “You know our people don’t like to deal with officials, don’t like to complain or make reports like that. We handle things on our own. Maybe no one’s been telling you, that’s all.”

  “True. I’ll send my new deputy out to look for the spot with the oyster-shell feed you dropped and the buggy’s safety triangle. He may be able to spot something to help us ID the vehicle. Also, I’ll check out who could possibly own it, if it’s local. Besides checking vehicle records, I’m gonna ask around about who has vans like that locally, especially with those tinted windows. In the sunny South, that’s fairly common, but can’t say I’ve seen it much here. If it’s from outside the county, taking in the whole state or country would be a needle in a haystack. My deputy and I will keep our eyes peeled. I’m real glad to have your report on top of what he told me. It’s great to have him out in the field, so to speak, so I can have more time for people, Amish and English.”

  The sheriff turned toward Andrew. He sat, leaning intently forward in his chair with his crutch against the back of it. “Have you been with Ella in her buggy before today? Any way whoever followed her could have thought you were with her, then saw you were not and so drove away?”

  Ella saw Andrew grip the wooden arms of his chair. His knuckles went white, but his voice was steady.

  “No—today’s the first I’ve been out with her. Sheriff, if I thought for one second Ella or the Lantzes or any of the Amish were being targeted or harassed because of me, I’d leave.”

  Ella jerked her head around, trying not to look upset.