Lost

by Samantha Price

  Lost: Amish Mystery

  Ettie Smith Amish Mysteries Book 12

  Samantha Price

  Print ISBN 978-1545533581

  Copyright © 2017 by Samantha Price

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  This is a work of fiction. Any names or characters, businesses or places, events or incidents, are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  Contents

  Free books

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Other books by Samantha Price:

  About the Author

  Chapter One

  “Is he still a boy?” Ettie asked her sister, speaking of Snowy.

  Elsa-May clutched Snowy, her small fluffy white dog, in the backseat of the taxi. “Well, what else would he be?”

  “He’s not a proper male now that he can’t—”

  “He’s just the same in every other way. What a strange thing to say. Do you think he should be called a female now?” Elsa-May rolled her eyes.

  “Not really.”

  “Oh, you poor little mite.” Elsa-May made kissing noises in Snowy’s ear, causing him to struggle to get away.

  ”See what you’ve done now?” Ettie said.

  “Snowy, stop it.” Elsa-May did her best to keep the small dog in her arms.

  The driver glanced in the rearview mirror. “I told you I don’t want the dog on the seats.”

  “He might need to relieve himself,” Ettie suggested. “I think that’s why he’s acting up.”

  The driver swerved the car off the road and stopped abruptly. “Take him out. I’ll even turn off the meter. I don’t want any accidents in my taxi. I only just had the seats steam cleaned.”

  “Thank you,” Ettie said while Elsa-May opened her door and put Snowy down on the ground.

  Then Elsa-May swiveled both legs out of the car and then maneuvered the rest of her body out. Leaning down, she said to the driver through the window. “Sorry about this. He’s just been to the vet.”

  “Here, give me the leash,” Ettie said, seeing Snowy was anxious to do his business. Once she’d tugged the leash out of Elsa-May’s hands, she let out an ear-splitting scream as Snowy bolted off, ripping the leash through her hands.

  Elsa-May straightened up, and when she saw the small white dog streaking through the countryside, she took off moving as quickly as she could after him. “Stop, Snowy, stop! Come on, Ettie, we’ve got to get him before he tears those stitches.”

  “He’s still drowsy because of the anesthetic,” Ettie managed to say as she tried to keep up with her older sister.

  “Does he look drowsy to you?”

  Ettie didn’t answer the question. “Something’s upset him, or he’s seen a rabbit or such.”

  When they came to a clearing, they stopped and looked around. Snowy was nowhere to be seen.

  Then, the taxi driver caught up with them. “I thought you were being murdered the way you let out that scream. It was enough to wake the dead.”

  “I don’t want him to bust his stitches. That’s what’ll happen if we don’t get him soon,” Elsa-May said, craning her neck as she looked for him.

  “Which direction did he go in?” he asked.

  “There he is!” When Ettie pointed him out, off to the far right, they all ran after him.

  Ettie and Elsa-May lifted up their long full dresses to enable them to run faster through the tall grass.

  “Maybe if we don’t chase him, he’ll come back,” the driver suggested as he overtook them.

  “No. He’s not concerned with us. He’s chasing something,” Elsa-May yelled ahead to the driver, who had by now passed them both and taken the lead.

  When Snowy stopped to paw at something in the ground, the driver caught up with him.

  “Don’t touch him. Just pick up his leash.” Elsa-May was still worried about his stitches.

  When she got closer, the driver handed her the end of the leash.

  “What’s he found that’s so interesting, Elsa-May?” a breathless Ettie asked.

  “I don’t know, but let’s get him back to the car.”

  Ettie turned around to head back when something caught her eye. Leaning down, she moved some undergrowth out of the way. She jumped back and let out a yelp, and as she did, she stepped on the driver’s foot.

  "Ouch!" he hollered.

  “What is it, Ettie?” Elsa-May asked.

  “Look! It’s a skull.”

  The driver frowned and then stepped forward to look, and then he too recoiled. “It certainly looks like it.”

  “And there!” Ettie pointed beyond them to a long bone and then she stared again at the skull that looked like a rock. It was covered in a layer of moss, and grass was growing through it. Intrigued, she took a step closer and crouched a little.

  * * *

  Ettie couldn't believe they had come across a body out here in the middle of nowhere, where there wasn't even a walking trail. What had the person been doing out here? Could they have gotten trapped in a blizzard or a sudden downfall of snow in the wintertime? Or had the person come to a violent end? Perhaps he, or maybe she, suffered an asthma attack, a heart attack, heat stroke. "What do you think the person was doing out here? There’s nothing around."

  "Do you see any belongings anywhere? A backpack? Perhaps he was a birdwatcher; in that case shouldn't there be binoculars?"

  The driver looked around as Ettie and Elsa-May moved closer to one another.

  “We better get outta here and call the cops.” The driver strode briskly back in the direction of the car.

  “Come on, Ettie. There’s nothing we can do.”

  “Why on earth would a body be out here? It’s not far from the road, so it’s not as though he lost his way and starved to death.”

  “He? It could be a woman.”

  “Jah, it could be, but my guess is that it’s a man.”

  “Are you ladies coming, or what?” the driver called to them.

  “Yes, we’re coming.” Elsa-May carefully picked up Snowy. “It feels a little creepy around here now.”

  “How’s Snowy?”

  Elsa-May took a quick look at the stitches. “He seems okay. He’s got a few little scratches, but nowhere near the stitches. It’s a good thing he didn’t pull all of his stitches out completely, running like that so soon after the surgery. Let’s get out of here.”

  Ettie followed along, looking all around as she walked, alert for anything out of the ordinary.

  "I can't see anything else. Let's get back to the taxi."

  With Snowy in her arms, Elsa-May made her way back through the undergrowth, stepping over the long grass and ducking under the low-hanging branches, while Ettie stayed close behind her.

  When they got back to the taxi, the driver was pacing up and down smoking a cigarette. He looked at them. "I’ve called the cops. They'll be here soon. We have to wait and show them where the body is."

  "Very good," Elsa-May said.

  "I don't think there's anything good about it. I could've done without this today. Firstly, they di
dn't tell me I was taking a dog in my taxi, and now this. Time is money in my business."

  Elsa-May and Ettie stood still in silence.

  The driver groaned from the back of his throat. "You might as well sit in the car and wait."

  The two sisters and Snowy waited in the car, getting out when two police cars pulled up behind them.

  “Ach nee, Ettie. It’s Detective Kelly.”

  Ettie stood next to her sister, waiting for the detective to walk over to them. “Oh my, he doesn’t look too happy.”

  “Nee, he doesn’t.”

  Snowy was in Elsa-May’s arms and struggled to get down when he saw the detective.

  “Look at Snowy,” Ettie said, “he wants to say hello. Close him inside the taxi. You don’t want him to hurt his stitches.”

  Elsa-May glanced over at the driver. “Can I put the dog in the car for a moment?”

  He looked back and called over his shoulder. “Okay.”

  “Quick, close him in before the driver changes his mind,” Ettie whispered.

  Chapter Two

  After a brief word with the taxi driver, Detective Kelly directed his officers to follow the driver to where they had found the bones, telling them he’d be there shortly. Then Kelly directed his attention to Ettie and Elsa-May. He stepped forward with his hands casually on his hips. “Well, well well. Who do we have here? Mrs. Smith and Mrs. Lutz.”

  Ettie and Elsa-May started talking at once.

  Kelly held up his hands. “One at a time, please.”

  Ettie licked her lips. “You go first, Elsa-May.”

  “Just give me the short version rather than the ‘round-the-world version,” Kelly said, crossing his arms over his chest.

  Elsa-May glared at Ettie. “We didn’t want him to have an accident in the taxi, so we let him out to relieve himself. Then he took off up the hill.”

  “Wait. The taxi driver had to relieve himself?”

  “No. Snowy did.”

  “The leash slipped right out of my hand,” Ettie said. "Well, Snowy pulled it right out."

  “We just took Snowy to the vet.”

  “Yes, we had him fixed,” Ettie explained. “And we were taking him back home when he started scratching and trying to get out.”

  “I see.”

  “We ran after him and when we caught up to him, he was right near the bones.”

  Kelly turned around, looked over his shoulder at the officers making their way through the undergrowth, and then turned back and took another step closer to Ettie. “And what happened to Snowy?”

  “He’s in the taxi.”

  The detective took a deep breath, giving Ettie a piercing look. “You already knew the bones were there though, didn’t you, Mrs. Smith?”

  “Me? How would I know the bones were there?”

  “I heard the call myself.”

  “What call?” Ettie put her hand on her chest, trying to calm her thumping heart, as she tried to make sense of what Kelly was saying.

  “You called the station just two days ago and said you witnessed a murder many years ago. It brought to mind a missing-persons case, a man who disappeared quite a few years back. And now, here we are.”

  “I never called the station about a murder. I don’t know anything about this, Detective,” Ettie said.

  One of the officers signaled to Kelly and he called out, “Coming.” When he turned back to the ladies, he said, “Neither of you leave town. How are you getting home?”

  “The taxi,” Elsa-May said.

  “No, I don’t want you talking to the driver. We’ll need to question all of you separately.”

  At that moment, another police car arrived along with a white van. Ettie knew enough to know the forensic investigators were in the van.

  “I’ll have Struthers drive you home.”

  “Thank you,” Elsa-May said. “We’ll just get Snowy out of the taxi.”

  “Mrs. Smith, we’ll need you to go to the station. You too, Mrs. Lutz.”

  “Right now?”

  “Yes, today.”

  “Can’t we do it tomorrow?”

  “We’re old and tired and we’ve already had one outing for the day,” Ettie said with a pout. "And a run to catch Snowy, which we certainly don't do every day."

  Kelly heaved a sigh. “Come into the station first thing tomorrow.”

  “Are you sure that will be okay?”

  Kelly narrowed his eyes. “I just said so. And you too, of course, Mrs. Lutz.”

  Elsa-May nodded and the detective stared at them both before he turned and walked away.

  “What was that all about, Ettie?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “You’ve really done it this time.”

  “I’ve got no idea what he was saying. He thinks I knew about … something about a murder.”

  “Did you?”

  Ettie crinkled her nose. “I would’ve told you if I did.”

  “We’ll have to wait for tomorrow to find out what he’s talking about. There’s always something happening.”

  They watched the detective talk to a uniformed officer and then Kelly turned and pointed to the two of them.

  “I’m guessing he’s the chosen one who’s taking us home.”

  Ettie chuckled, and then looked back at Elsa-May. “Haven’t you gotten Snowy from the taxi yet?”

  “Nee, I was trying to listen to what Kelly was telling you.”

  “Just get him.”

  The young officer walked toward them looking glum. “Good morning, Ma'am.”

  “I don’t know that it’s good,” Ettie said. "And you look like you'd agree."

  Elsa-May had gotten Snowy out of the car, and she joined them with him in her arms.

  The officer explained. “That was going to be the first murder case for me to help with, and now I’m driving you two home instead.”

  “You’re welcome,” Elsa-May said. “And no one said it was a murder, did they?”

  “Guess not, but it’s likely. It’s that car there.” He walked with them to his car. “I wanted to work on the case.”

  “In that case, we’re sorry,” Ettie said.

  As the young officer drove them home, Ettie, who was sitting next to Elsa-May in the back seat, tried to find out as much as she could from him. “Does Kelly know who the dead person might be?”

  “I can’t say.”

  “You can’t say, or you don’t know?” Elsa-May asked.

  “Yes”

  Ettie and Elsa-May exchanged glances.

  “Detective Kelly told us that there was a case of a man who went missing in the area years ago. It sounded like Kelly thinks it might be him turned up dead,” Elsa-May said.

  The officer glanced in the rear view mirror. “We won’t know anything more until the coroner delivers his report.”

  Elsa-May frowned.

  “Well, do you know anything that you can tell us?” Ettie asked.

  “No, I’m sorry. I’d just arrived when I was asked to take you two home.”

  “Take this road just coming up to your left.”

  “Then will you have to go back there after you’ve taken us home?” Elsa-May asked.

  “I’ll form part of the search team.”

  “Searching for evidence?” Ettie asked.

  “Yes. We’re trying to find some identification or a clue to why the deceased might have died there or why his body was left there. You two were lucky to have found the body.”

  “Lucky? It’s never a good thing to be around unnatural death.”

  “I’m making my career around it. I want to become a detective.”

  “It’s the house here, the one on the right,” Elsa-May said.

  Ettie and Elsa-May got out of the car and thanked the young man. Once they were clear of the car, he executed a U turn and sped away.

  “Look how fast he’s going, Ettie.”

  Ettie shook her head.

  When the elderly sisters walked through their front door, Elsa-May
put Snowy in his basket and he made himself comfortable.

  “How do his stitches look now?” Ettie asked.

  Elsa-May rolled him over to look underneath him. “The same. I think he’ll be okay as long as we keep him quiet.”

  “Hmm. That’s not so easy sometimes. I’ll make us a nice casserole for tonight and we’ll try to forget what happened this morning.”

  Elsa-May sat in her chair and took hold of her knitting by her feet. “That sounds nice, but it’s going to be hard to forget about it, particularly since we have to talk to Kelly in the morning.”

  “The good thing is that Snowy’s okay. We might have had to rush him back to the veterinarian.”

  Elsa-May nodded and looked over at Snowy who was now fast asleep. “Look at him. Not a care in the world.”

  “Hmm. I do hope they can find who the person is. He would be missed by someone.”

  Chapter Three

  Ettie couldn’t sleep that night; she’d tossed and turned, worrying about the body she had found and who it might have been. Was that man murdered like the detective thought? She finally got up in the early morning, made herself some tea, and sat at the kitchen table while her mind continued to chew on the puzzle.

  Later in the morning, Elsa-May and Ettie sat opposite the detective in his gray office.

  “I don’t know anything,” Elsa-May insisted. “Ettie was the one who spotted the bones.”

  Ettie turned to her sister. “You were there too.”

  Elsa-May opened her mouth to reply, but the detective spoke first. “I need to speak to the two of you since you were both there, as your sister just pointed out, Mrs. Lutz.”

  “Was it a man or a woman?” Elsa-May asked.

  “More than one person, Detective? Or just the one?”

  He frowned at Ettie. “Just one." Then he turned to Elsa-May. "As I suspected, the body was male. Estimated to be in his late thirties or early forties. He’s been there for a number of years. To start with, the grave was quite shallow and over the years the soil eroded away.”