Clara’s mother turned to Paul. “There is one more place we must look for my brother’s trust document.”
Paul’s eyes brightened. “You know where it is?”
“These are just stalling tactics,” Ralph said. “I have the only valid copy.”
Their conversation had attracted the attention of Paul’s family. Sheriff Bradley made his way through the crowd and stopped beside Paul. “What’s going on?”
Clara tried to hold back her growing excitement. She didn’t want to be disappointed again. “Sheriff, this is my mother. She believes she knows who Eli gave the documents to.”
Her mother smiled brightly. “Daniel isn’t a person. It is a bible verse. Daniel 6.” She walked over to the bible cabinet.
* * *
Paul’s heart sank. “We have already looked through the bible. It isn’t in there.”
“Not in the bible. In the cabinet.” Clara’s mother pushed on the panel with the inscription and it slid open to reveal a hidden compartment. “My brother and I discovered it when we were little. We hid many things from our parents that we thought were valuable, like our comic books and a transistor radio. Our father heard us listening to the radio one night. The next morning, he asked us both where it was. Eli said with a straight face, ‘I gave it to Daniel for safekeeping.’ I almost gave him away by laughing.”
The mine owner, Alan Calder, came up to them with a fierce frown on his face. “I thought we were having an auction today, Bowman. Let’s get started. I don’t have all day to waste.”
The sheriff ignored him and stepped up beside the cabinet. He glanced at Clara’s mother. “May I?”
She nodded and moved back.
“What is going on here?” Calder demanded.
“We are getting to the truth.” Nick bent to look inside and pulled out a tightly rolled-up sheet of paper and an envelope stuffed with cash.
“This is ridiculous,” shouted Ralph. “You don’t believe this last-minute charade, do you, Sheriff? This is just a stunt to delay the sale.” He began backing away.
“Stay where you are, Mr. Hobson.” The sheriff nodded to someone in the crowd and one of his deputies moved to block Ralph’s retreat.
The sheriff then carefully unrolled the document. “This appears to be the original trust drafted by Eli along with a notarized amendment naming Clara Fisher as his beneficiary.”
“It’s a fake,” Ralph said, looking wide-eyed and frantic.
The sheriff fixed his steely gaze on Ralph. “I happen to know the man who drafted the original document for Eli. He’s here today. It will only take a few minutes to have him verify that this is the original. I strongly suspect the fake is in your possession, Mr. Hobson. You’re looking at some very serious charges.”
“You aren’t going to pin this on me. It was their idea.” He pointed to Calder. “Eli wouldn’t sell the mineral rights. That’s all he had to do—let them mine the coal under his farm ground. He would have made more money in a year than he ever made from growing corn.”
“Shut up, Hobson,” Calder muttered.
“Are you saying that the New Ohio Mining Company was directly involved?” Nick eyed the man.
Paul had suspected that Ralph was a coward behind his bullying exterior. There was fear in his eyes. “Yes. Calder came up with the whole plan. He knew the land was in a trust when he checked to see who owned it at the courthouse. He said all I had to do was claim Eli made me the new trustee and then lease the mineral rights to them.”
Calder leveled his angry gaze at Sheriff Bradley. “If you have any questions for me, speak to my lawyer.” He turned away.
Ralph caught his sleeve and stopped him. “I’m going to need your lawyer, too.”
“I’m afraid that presents a conflict of interest for him. You’ll get a public defender.” He jerked away from Ralph and left.
“I don’t understand,” Clara said. “Why go to all this trouble? My uncle didn’t have long to live. Why not wait and make the offer to me? I would have gladly sold the mineral rights.”
Jeffrey Jones joined the group and tipped his hat to Clara and her mother. “Because they needed to be sure the new owner wouldn’t start asking a lot of hard questions.”
Paul started to see the picture. “The new fence on the east side of the property. It wasn’t on the original boundary line. It had been moved to make it look like the mine owned more land.”
The sheriff shook his head. “Seems like a lot of trouble just to hide a few extra acres.”
“It wasn’t the acres on top that they wanted to hide,” Jeffrey said. “They discovered a large coal vein that travels due west of the main mine. They started mining it without checking to see if they held the mineral rights. Most of the mineral rights in this area were sold to the mining companies back at the turn of the century so they assumed they were within their rights. When they discovered their mistake, they had to take action.”
“That’s when they started pressuring my uncle about selling the property,” Clara said.
Sheriff Bradley eyed Jeffrey closely. “Who are you exactly?”
“Jeffrey R. Jones.” He handed over his identification and a letter. “I’m an investigative reporter. I’ve been looking into the New Ohio Mining Company for the last eighteen months and I have found a lot of dirt.”
Ralph folded his arms over his chest. “I’m not saying another word without an attorney.”
Jeffrey smiled. “Your attorney is going to make a ton of money off you, Ralph. I have had you under surveillance for quite some time, too. As a person of interest in several insurance scams in the past, I thought that’s why you were here, to pull another scam. But when you wouldn’t even hear my offer for the property, I knew you were onto something bigger.”
Sheriff Bradley handed back Jeffrey’s credentials. “If he wasn’t pulling an insurance scam, what was he doing?”
“New Ohio Mining Company had been illegally taking coal out from under this farm for at least a year. If that had become known, the company would have had to pay millions in fines and legal fees. When Eli King wouldn’t sell and then passed away, they still didn’t know who owned the land. A little background checking would have shown them there were two contenders. An upright, law-abiding Amish woman and a less-than-upright swindler. They saw their chance to quietly get the mineral rights by making Ralph the new owner.”
“I’m willing to testify against them if you cut me a deal,” Ralph said. “They supplied the attorney, the notary and the forged document after Eli’s death. No one knew Eli had amended the original trust until Clara told me.”
Clara had moved closer to Paul. He took her hand in his. Her fingers were ice-cold. “I still don’t see why Ralph needed to auction off the property. Why didn’t he just sell it to them? No one would have been the wiser to the moved boundaries.”
Jeffrey took his hat off and smoothed his hair. “Unfortunately, Ralph got greedy.”
Paul remembered their first conversation. “They gave you a lowball offer.”
“They thought I was stupid. They had a lot more to lose than I did.”
Clara squeezed Paul’s hand. “What does he mean?”
He gave her a comforting squeeze in return. “The mining company would have to buy the place no matter how high the bidding war went. Any other buyer would want a boundary survey done and the questions would start rolling in.”
Ralph chuckled. “I thought they needed to sweat for underestimating me.”
“Who was your accomplice?” the sheriff asked.
Jeffrey tipped his hat to Ralph. “I’m sure he or she is long gone. It was a clever plan but you were toying with some really bad characters. You got off easy. Calder’s company has popped up and folded a half dozen times under different names. Two people who opposed him went missing. It will be interesting to see how it all washes out in court.
I expect a lot of finger pointing and that will make my story worth even more.”
“Ralph Hobson, you are under arrest for forgery, fraud and attempted grand theft.” Sheriff Bradley read Ralph his rights as he led him away.
Paul took both of Clara’s hands in his. “As the rightful owner of Eli King’s estate, what are your wishes?”
“I want you to hold a farm sale. I will match the commission offered by Ralph if that is agreeable to you.”
“I accept your offer. When would you like me to hold the sale?”
“Would today be too soon?”
“I think today would be perfect. I’d better get started before the crowd gets restless.”
* * *
Hours later, the western sky was aglow with beautiful orange and gold colors painted across a few clouds above the horizon. Paul and Clara both paused to take in the beauty after the crowds had gone home with their treasures.
Paul gestured toward the beautiful sky. “My sister-in-law, Helen, says, ‘Peace is seeing a beautiful sunset and knowing who to thank.’”
Clara knew she couldn’t let one more sunset fade into night without telling Paul what was in her heart. Life was too short and too unpredictable not to tell him what he had come to mean to her and her children.
“Paul Bowman, I love you,” she said softly.
She felt him stiffen beside her. “You are just caught up in the joy of having things turn out as they did.”
“That’s true but it doesn’t change the fact that I’m in love with you.” She wanted to be held in his arms and feel the touch of his lips on hers.
He shoved his hands in his pockets and looked at the ground. He kicked a small stone and sent it flying. “Now you think I should declare my love, ask for your hand in marriage and we will live happily ever after, is that it?”
“I was hoping for something like that.”
“I care for you, I do but I’m not the kind of man you need. With me, you’d be getting another kid.”
She squeezed her hands together until her fingers ached. She may have made the biggest mistake of her life. “You are selling yourself short, Mr. Auctioneer. I’ve seen how you are with my children. I’ve seen how happy you make them and how happy they make you. I think you are exactly the kind of man I need and want.”
“Now see, that’s where you’re wrong. Your kids are wonderful. You’re a beautiful and amazing woman but...”
When she realized what he couldn’t say, her heart overflowed with love for him. “But? You were about to tell me you don’t love me. You can’t say it, can you?”
“Clara, I think you just like to argue. I can’t give you the things you need. You know that.”
“I don’t. What is it that you think I need?”
“You need a serious and steadfast man as your helpmate. I’m not serious. No one would call me steadfast. You deserve far better, and as much as I admire you, I can’t let you make this mistake.”
She took his face between her hands. “Honestly, Paul. Why don’t you just say what is in your heart? Stop denying it.”
“I don’t know what you mean.”
She rose on her tiptoes and slipped her arms around his neck. “Say you love me.” Then she kissed him.
* * *
It took every ounce of willpower Paul possessed not to gather Clara close and kiss her. He loved her with all his heart and soul. He had nearly robbed her of her inheritance and her chance to see Sophie well and whole. It was only by God’s grace that the truth came out.
Just when he thought he would break, she stepped back. He saw the confusion in her eyes and hated himself for causing it.
She didn’t need a joker making her laugh. She needed a man who would believe in her completely, and not allow his own wants to blind him to her needs. Everything that led to the happy outcome for her today had been done by others. They were the ones who saved her, not him. “You deserve a better man than I am.”
“I don’t want a better man. I want you. Faults and all.”
“You need to aim higher, Clara. Your children deserve better. Think of them. Find someone who isn’t in love with the sound of his own voice. Find someone who loves you and you alone.”
“I have, only he’s too stubborn to admit that.”
“I care about you, Clara, I do. And about your children, and that’s why I have to stand aside.”
He walked to his trailer, climbed in and turned his horses for home.
Clara ran after him. “You’re not making this easy for me, Paul Bowman, but if you think I’m going to give you up because you didn’t get to play the hero you are sadly mistaken!”
* * *
Two long, lonely weeks later, Paul stood on the banks of the river tossing pebbles in the water and watching the ripples spread out until they disappeared.
“That’s a slow way to build a dam.”
Paul turned to see his cousin Samuel walking toward him. Paul turned back to the water and tossed in one more stone. “It helps pass the time.”
“Until when?” Samuel stopped at his side.
“Until I grow up and stop being a restless kid.”
“I hope that never happens. I like you the way you are.”
“I think I made a big mistake, Samuel. I don’t know how to fix it.”
Samuel reached down and picked up a handful of pebbles. He tossed one into the water. “I assume you are talking about Clara and her children? What kind of mistake did you make?”
“I think I fell in love with her. Worse yet, I let her fall in love with me.”
“So you love each other. That’s not a mistake, Paul. It is God working in your life for the good of you both.”
“Now see, that’s where you’re wrong.” Paul heaved the last pebble as far out into the river as he could. “I’m not husband material. I’m sure not husband and father material rolled into one.”
Samuel chose a flat rock and sent it skipping across the surface before it sank. “Exactly what is husband and father material?”
“You are. Joshua is. Luke is. You guys aren’t insecure about taking care of a family. You know what to do and you do it. I don’t have a clue where to start taking care of someone else. I can barely take care of me.”
Samuel chuckled, causing Paul to frown at him. “What?”
“Paul, none of us had an idea of how to be a good husband and a good father. I pray for guidance every night and every morning. Raising a child is the most important task God has ever given me. Of course I am afraid I will make mistakes. But I trust in the Lord to guide me. As does Joshua and Luke. A man can’t do the job alone.”
“I guess I’m scared.”
“As are a lot of men who stand in front of the bishop and promise to love, honor and cherish a woman for the rest of their lives but they stand there anyway.”
“And if I fail at the most important task of my life?”
“Then you must pray that your spouse is strong enough to help you get up and go forward again. Life is not stagnant. It’s not a stone.” Samuel tossed the pebbles in his hand into the river. “Life is like the water out there. It keeps moving forward. It flows around the stone. Build a dam and the water will stay still until it gets deep enough to flow over or around the dam and cut a new path. You have to ask yourself if Clara can be strong for you and if you can be strong for her.”
“She’s the strongest woman I have ever met.”
“Goot, because I suspect you will be a challenging husband but a fine one in the end. When is her surgery?”
“Tomorrow morning.”
“Then you should see about getting a driver to take you to Pittsburgh. I heard Abner Stutzman was looking for more work.”
“Do you really think I can do it?”
“It doesn’t matter what I think. What matters is that you and Clara love each
other. Support each other and the rest of life will work itself out like water flowing around a stone.”
Samuel began walking back to the house. Paul dropped his handful of pebbles, dusted his palms together and went to use the phone.
* * *
Early the next morning, Paul entered the hospital in Pittsburgh and learned that Clara and Sophie were already in surgery. He chastised himself for failing her yet again. He wanted to tell her how much he loved her before she went into surgery but he was too late.
He was directed to a waiting room. As he entered the room, he saw Clara’s mother, Betty, and her friend talking to a woman in blue scrubs. They all looked worried. A television played in the corner of the room but he paid no attention to it.
When the woman in scrubs left, Paul took a seat beside Betty. She smiled at him. “I’m so glad to see you, Paul. Thank you for coming.”
“Have you heard anything?”
“The doctor who spoke to us said Sophie is doing great but they are having trouble keeping Clara’s blood pressure stable.”
Paul shivered against the chill that touched his soul. “She’ll be okay, won’t she?”
“We must pray for her and for the people caring for her. She is in God’s hands. Sophie is doing fine and that is what Clara wanted more than anything. She is grateful to you, Paul, for earning enough money at the sale to pay for this surgery.”
If all his efforts only led to her death, he wasn’t sure he could live with that. He rose to his feet and paced the length of the room and back. “Where’s Toby?”
“Bishop Barkman and his wife are looking after the boy until Clara comes home.”
“It’s good that the church is helping.” He should have offered to watch Toby.
Paul crossed the room to look out the window. His last conversation with Clara played over and over in his mind. She had been right. He was in love with her but he had been too afraid of failing her to admit it.
A phone rang and the receptionist at the desk answered. After speaking softly with the caller, she put her hand over the receiver. “I have a call for anyone here with Clara Fisher.”
His New Amish Family Page 17
