by Karen Harper
“And, Mr. Mayor,” the sheriff would say to Connor when he arrested him for painting Christmas trees and Josh’s barn, “I’m hauling you in for questioning, too. I hear you’ve been mean to Lydia, your neighbor, for years.
“And, Congresswoman Stark,” he would say, holding up both hands when Bess rushed in to rescue Connor so his arrest wouldn’t hurt her career, “did you once keep secret company with Sol Brand? Did you have his baby and give her away?
“And, Sol, I know you’re recovering from a heart attack, but I need to ask this, anyway. You’ve been a loving adoptive father to Lydia, but are you her real father, too? She needs to know. And, Sol, is your marriage bad because your wife lost your son or because she can’t love Lydia—or you because you were unfaithful?”
“Lydia, you listening?” the sheriff asked, leaning closer and tapping her arm. She jerked her head. Had she nodded off? “You’re exhausted. You almost fell asleep sitting here. Can’t you go on home, get some rest?”
“I’ll sleep tonight, Sheriff. Things to do, but I thank you and Ray-Lynn for all your help. As my father used to say when I saw he was exhausted and I begged him to get some sleep, ‘Someday, Liddy, I’ll sleep forever.’”
They both stood. “Then you have a good, safe day,” he said, and patted her shoulder. “And be extra careful.”
She had to, Lydia thought as she went out. There was nowhere to go but up...was there?
* * *
“So, Lydia,” Gid greeted her outside her office at the store, “you may think you can’t live with me, but can you live without me? I mean running the store for you and Sol while you have other serious concerns. How’s he doing?”
“Better,” she told him, not breaking stride or going into her office where he could corner her. She headed toward Naomi at the front desk. Lydia hoped she was having a good day, at least.
“Can I stop in to see him, then?” Gid asked, matching her strides. “You probably can’t brief him about things in depth, since you haven’t been here much.”
She knew it would look suspicious if she kept avoiding this man. If he was the one behind the paint jobs and house intrusions, she couldn’t give him a clue she was on to him. Just before they reached the front desk—Naomi was busy with customers, anyway—Lydia stopped, turned to Gid and forced a weak smile.
“I’ve just been so worried about Daad. We are all grateful for the job you do here for us.”
“Which I am honored to do. Lydia, you look really tired. Circles under swollen eyelids on your pretty face. You aren’t helping your mother sit up with him at night, are you? Is there anything I can do to help there as well as here?”
“No. Danki. You’ve done enough,” she managed before she went up to Naomi’s desk to chat. Perhaps Gid had done enough—even too much.
When Lydia hurried home to go with her parents to Mamm’s doctor’s appointment, she found a note from Daad on the kitchen table.
Liddy—Our driver came early to tell us he’d been called that the dr.’s appt. had been moved up. Do not worry that you wanted to go with us. Mamm’s exhausted and sore today and has the chills, is coughing and doesn’t remember much about last night. I told her you and Josh saved her. I’m hoping this dr. will recommend mental dr. Get this—your mother says you should visit Josh and thank him again.
Love and blessings,
Daad.
It was a bit of a victory about Mamm and Josh, but Lydia, once again, regretted people not telling everything. If Daad had known about someone being in the house—twice—he would never have assumed she should stay here alone. And Mamm had probably been too out of it to object. So Lydia’s own secrets had put her at possible risk of danger. And had Daad’s secrets about her parents put his Liddy in real danger somehow? She did not want to be “next” about anything but getting answers and a normal life.
She decided to do the unexpected. She would not stay here alone but would go back to the store after closing time and search Gid’s office. If he was the one lurking outside her home, she wouldn’t be anywhere around when he showed up after dark.
* * *
When Lydia entered the store through the back door with her master key, it seemed an alien place. She had put Flower, still hitched to the buggy, in the shelter of the big horse shed. At least there was a sliver of moon tonight, because no way were there interior or exterior lights in an Amish establishment. But she had planned ahead and brought two flashlights with her.
Yet, even inside, everything familiar seemed so strange. The back door closed behind her with a hollow thud. The cleaning couple weren’t here yet, and she planned to be out when they arrived. The silence of the usually busy, noisy workroom stunned her. Her pulse picked up as she swept a flashlight beam on the sawdust-sprinkled floor and headed toward the door to the short hall with the offices.
She was surprised she had to use her key again, but that was best. She hadn’t realized this area was locked at night. On second thought, so she wouldn’t have to open this door again, she wedged a small block of wood there to keep it ajar.
She wondered what the vast alleys of furniture inside the showroom would look like after dark. However well she knew the layout, would she get lost? But she would not go into that big room tonight.
She went to Gid’s office, as he must have gone to Daad’s more than once recently. She hesitated at his office door, but it wasn’t really fear she felt, just anticipation. Yet she was going to be risking everything tonight—doing this, stopping to see Bess then talking to Daad however late he got home. No more just being curious or afraid. She was getting answers.
She used the master key again and went into Gid’s lair, closing the door. A sweep of both beams around the room caught nothing out of place. His desktop looked tidy. But, oh, so many files, just like in Daad’s office. She’d never have the time to go through those if he’d hidden something the way her father had. Maybe this was a desperate, too-crazy idea.
She turned off one flashlight, put it down on the desk and, opening his central desk drawer, swept the other beam inside. Everything in its place. After all, Gid was a by-the-rules bookkeeper and controller. Her flashlight illumined only paper clips, pencils, pens. And—oh!—red pens. She’d heard that accountants talked in terms of black-and-red ink. She had no doubt Gid could have written that note she’d found this morning in her drawer.
She jumped when she heard a distant, muted noise. Had something dropped or toppled over? Had the door she’d wedged open closed? It was on a tension bar. But if it had closed itself, it wouldn’t be with a bang.
She closed Gid’s drawer and tiptoed to the door, putting her ear to it. No other sounds, except the ticktock of the clock on the shelf behind his desk. But then—someone walking in the hall? She clicked off her flashlight.
Maybe Marta and John Kurtz were here early to clean, and she could tell them she’d just come in for something she needed for Daad. But she’d have to get out of Gid’s office, or Marta might just blab to him.
She opened the door but still stood inside, barely breathing, listening in the utter blackness. Had someone passed in the hall, or did footsteps echo from the other direction? She heard nothing now. Though Amish to her core, it suddenly seemed the lack of electric lighting was not a blessing, as Bishop Esh had called it in a recent sermon.
From down the hall, someone cast a wan light on the wall, coming this way from the back room. She was about to call out to Marta when someone coughed. A man. Had Marta’s husband come without her tonight?
Instinct told her to dart away, and she did, after closing Gid’s office door quietly behind her. On her tiptoes, she rushed down the hall toward the coffee room, then into the maze of showroom furniture she’d thought could be downright dangerous in the dark.
She crawled under a desk and huddled there. Shifting shadows etched the outline of an Amish man—she could tell by his hat—as he approached and walked past. She dared not stick her head out to look up. Ya, Amish trousers stuffed in plain black b
oots. Had Gid hired a new night watchman, not trusting the Lord to care for this place at night, or could that be John Kurtz, come to clean? Or Gid himself? Had he stopped by and found Flower and her buggy? But he would have called out to her, wouldn’t he?
She wanted to confront the person but she dared not. Especially not since this could be her house intruder. Yet she ached to know who it was, what he was doing here. Without others to help carry things, it would be hard to steal store merchandise, and they never kept money on-site at night. So what business could this person have?
She was going to make a run for it. Then she could see if the doors had been broken into on her way out. If it was a break-in, she’d get the sheriff. If not, she’d go home, get the note from Bessie to Sol in case she needed it then go to confront Bess.
As she crawled out from under the desk and started away, she chanced a look back. The man’s lantern cast his shadow on the far wall, and she could hear him opening and closing drawers, maybe over by the dining room highboys or corner cupboards. But looking for what? Something he’d put there rather than in his office?
On tiptoe again, she hurried from the big, dark room. When she could turn on her flashlight again, she tore down the office hallway to the workshop door. It was closed. She had to fumble for her key. Then, as she turned it in the lock, it hit her: she’d left one of her two flashlights in Gid’s office on his desk. But she dared not go back for it now. If that was Gid in the showroom, he hadn’t gone into his office—yet. Maybe he’d think the cleaning people had left it.
Despite the fact she had to run farther toward the horse shed, she was glad she had not left Flower and her buggy outside to be seen. Because Gid’s horse and handsome buggy were tied to the back hitching post.
* * *
“Okay,” Sheriff Freeman told Josh as he surveyed the barn once again, especially studying the paint on the outside of the camel door, “tell you what. Let’s you and me take turns staying awake here tonight. We can hot bunk—that’s what they call it in the navy and marines. Guys take shifts, sleep in the same bunk when the other one’s not there. And that cot of yours looks a lot better than some of the bunks I had in my days in the service. I’ve got to go into town to help Ray-Lynn—and I’m a guest—at a party Bess Stark’s giving later tonight. But you’ll only be alone about an hour then. How’s that for a fast plan?”
“Suits me,” Josh said. “I’m just hoping when you’re in here without me, the donkeys don’t rile the others up, so you can sleep. And when one of us is on watch outside, let’s go through the woodlot and take a look around the Brands’ house and barn. They’re probably back from seeing the doctor in Wooster by now, but you never know if someone’s hanging around over there.”
“Their place was dark when I went by, but sometimes lanterns don’t light up windows well. After what Lydia said happened at the pond last night, no wonder they might have gone to bed already. You got more coffee over there? It’s gonna be a long night,” he muttered.
“I’ll go brew a new pot in the house and be right back,” Josh told him, and went out the camel door.
He glanced back at the terrible message U KILLED S. In a way, he had.
* * *
Panicked that Gid would hear her buggy and follow, Lydia took a different way home, repeatedly looking back on the road as she urged Flower from a trot to a gallop. Since he didn’t follow her, at least she knew he was busy elsewhere. It wouldn’t take a minute to grab the Bessie note, the broken snow globe, go to the bathroom then rush back to the buggy and head for the Starks’ next door.
But, as soon as she drove up she realized that, unless her parents had gone to bed when they got back, they weren’t home from Wooster yet. The house was as dark as it was outside. Maybe they’d been sent to the hospital there. Poor Daad must be tired of hospitals right now. Maybe that chill and cough of Mamm’s had gone into something worse, like bronchitis or pneumonia. Besides trying to get the truth out of Bess tonight, Lydia figured she could use her phone to call the driver her parents had hired.
She hesitated a moment at the back door. She’d have to get these locks changed yet again since Daad had left the house open last night and someone had come in. Someone who had obviously been watching and—
“Hey, Ms. Brand,” came a man’s voice close behind her.
Lydia gasped and turned.
A squat figure emerged from the shadows next to the house. Leo Lowe! He was wearing a bulky coat with a hoodie. She couldn’t see his face but she’d never forget his voice. Had he been in this area the whole time the sheriff had been looking for him? Her knees went weak and she propped herself up against the storm door.
“Oh, Mr. Lowe, you startled me. Please leave me alone,” she told him, trying to keep her voice strong and calm. “The sheriff’s looking for you so you’d better leave town.”
“I know. Listen, I didn’t kill Ms. Myerson.”
“Then you should not have run. You should go turn yourself in, tell the truth and clear it all up.”
“You told the sheriff I scared you—threatened you and bad-mouthed Ms. Myerson,” he said, his voice rising. “That’s another reason he was looking for me, the wife said.” He came closer, just one step down from where she stood with her back against the door.
“But I did not ask for a restraining order or file a complaint. We Amish don’t do that.”
“Don’t have any truck with violence neither, right? Yet you don’t think the guy next door knocked Ms. Myerson off for her big mouth? I’ll bet the newspapers think he’s guilty.”
Leo must be the person who’d painted on Josh’s barn, accusing Josh to throw suspicion away from himself. He surely didn’t mean Connor was the guy next door.
He came up another step. If she could just unlock the door behind her, dash in. But if Leo was her intruder, he had the latest key. And she’d heard criminal acts got worse. Someone who at first just spied might later break in, damage property. She saw again her messed-up bed, her underwear. Then the criminal got bolder and would try an assault, or worse...
She did the only thing she could think of besides run and, in the snow, he could probably catch her, anyway. With her back truly against the wall, she lied.
“Get away from me, or you’ll really be in trouble. Sheriff Freeman said he has no case against you and he just wanted an alibi from you, not from your family and friends he visited. Besides, he’ll be here soon.”
“Yeah—you’re right about my family at least. He’s been talking to them.”
“I said we Amish don’t testify, but I will privately tell the sheriff I don’t think you had anything to do with Sandra’s death.”
Dear God in Heaven, he had a knife! It glinted in the pale moonlight and then went dark against his black clothes.
“You mean that?” he demanded.
“Ya—yes, and I’m hardly going to run or hide out like you. I’ve got my family waiting for me inside.” Steady, she told herself. He might know that was another lie. “Besides,” she continued, clearing her throat, “my friend, the sheriff’s wife, told me—”
“Yeah. Ray-Lynn. I checked out their place a couple of times, and he didn’t even know I was there.”
He was bold. Desperate. And she kept imagining the thrust of that knife.
“I was saying,” she went on, “Ray-Lynn told me that the sheriff would be in his office in town late tonight, so why don’t you get it over with—the hiding out, I mean. Clear your name with him, get back to your family, especially your father, who must be very worried about you. I’m sorry he went to prison for hitting an Amish buggy, but I was only an infant, and that’s all said and done. And...forgiven.”
“Forgiven,” he repeated. “Yeah, I hear you Amish are good at that, too, like they forgave the man who killed some Amish schoolgirls over in Pennsylvania.”
He was calming down now, wasn’t he? But he still didn’t budge. A long time seemed to stretch by. And he still had the knife. She felt frozen in place, afraid to flee, af
raid to stay here, afraid for her life as Sandra must have been in her last moments.
“You forgive my father for hitting that buggy, killing your folks?” he asked.
She almost told him, If they were my folks. But instead, she said, “We all need to be forgiven.” Those were Daad’s very words to her when they talked about the quilt he’d made for her.
“I’ll go see the sheriff,” he said, and turned away. He went into a half run down the driveway. Only then did she realize she was hardly breathing and that, even in this cold, she was dripping with sweat.
Eager to get to the Starks to use their phone, she unlocked her back door and dashed inside. The winter night was young, and she had much to do.
28
Lydia almost lost her courage when she saw how beautiful Bess looked—how worldly. No long denim skirt or casual clothes. She wore a turquoise wool dress and a chunky gold necklace and earrings to match. Even her high heels—really high ones—matched her dress. Makeup highlighted her pretty face even more.
Lydia began to tremble. Of course, there was no way in all God’s creation this woman could be her mother. They didn’t even look alike—well, maybe eye color and the shape of the mouth. But Lydia didn’t look like Daad, either. Did she have a bug in her bean to pursue this?
“Sorry to bother you when you’re going out,” Lydia apologized. “I’m hoping I could make two calls from here instead of going way down the road to the phone shanty.”
“Of course you can,” Bess said, smiling and encircling her shoulders to bring her inside. “As you can see, we’re stepping out, but we don’t have to leave yet. Since Connor is mayor now, the family is giving a holiday appreciation dinner for the small businessmen in town. We had invited your father, but I believe he planned to send Gid Reich to represent your family, even before he had his heart attack.”
Family, family. She knew she shouldn’t even ask Bess if the two of them could be family, but that note she had in her sack with the broken globe would always haunt her. Ach, Josh was right. That didn’t really prove anything.
