by Linda Byler
Chapter 6
IN THE DAYS THAT FOLLOWED, THE WHOLE FAMILY rallied around Reuben.
Anna bought him his favorite candy bars, baseball cards, and red licorice from the store in town.
Rebekah let him drive Charlie when she went to visit Aunt Elma who lived about eight miles away. Mam baked pumpkin whoopie pies and chocolate ones, filled with thick, creamy frosting and wrapped in Saran Wrap individually.
Dat called the hide and tanning company. He traveled with the truck up the field lane to the field of wildflowers, where they loaded the carcass. He never said a word about any of it to Reuben, which had to be the best, leaving him to remember his horse as he loved her, alive and well, running fast.
There was a huge controversy going on down at the ranch. Sadie busily pieced together snatches here and there, unable to come to a conclusion of her own. It was difficult pondering why any person or group of people would aim a rifle and shoot an innocent, unassuming horse in its own pasture.
There were no tracks, no leads for the police. A few days of discussion on the news, then nothing.
The Miller family did not report Cody’s death; it was their way of staying out of the public eye. They looked on the incident as something God allowed to happen. Whether it was evil or not, it had occurred. The family accepted it, mourned the horse, then everyone moved on, including Reuben.
Only Sadie understood his pain. Really understood it.
When he flopped on the recliner and stared into space, then picked up a hunting magazine to hide his face, Sadie knew he was biting down on his lower lip, blinking madly as he vowed not to cry.
One evening, when dusk was settling over the back porch like a soft, gray blanket of comfort, promising rest to the tired occupants of the porch swing, Dat broke the silence. He was building a screened-in deck for a man who had an old buckboard he’d give to someone who would restore it.
Instantly Anna sprang up, clapping Reuben’s shoulder.
“There you go, Reuben!”
Reuben snorted.
“What would I want with a buckboard? I don’t know how to fix it up, and besides, I have no horse.”
“Paris,” Anna countered quickly.
“She’s not broke to drive.”
“Charlie!”
That was met with an unenthused snort.
“Would you restore it, Dat?” Sadie asked.
“I don’t know. It’s not really my thing.”
“Who does that?”
“I have no idea. Plenty of people in Ohio, but here… I don’t know of anyone Amish, anyway.”
“Would you do it, Dat?” Sadie asked.
“I don’t really want to.”
“If Reuben and I help? If we get a horse that matches Paris, we could really have something neat. Maybe even drive them at horse sales.”
“Or shows! Or rodeos!” Reuben shouted.
“Now!” Mam said.
That long drawn out “now” was always Mam’s way of reprimanding gently but firmly, sort of like pulling back the reins on a horse. You knew you had to stop and consider, not go so fast; there might be an obstacle along the way, and you needed to be aware of it.
Still it was an idea.
For one thing, it might help Anna. She desperately wanted to feel needed and to rebuild a kinship with Reuben, the way it was when they were younger. Sadie often felt guilty for taking Reuben from Anna the way she did. But unlike Reuben, Anna was not a rider. She was becoming quite chubby, her cheeks round and rosy with good health and lots of good food, and absolutely not a care in the world about it.
Her face was very pretty and tanned, with greenish-gray eyes that looked blue when she wore a blue dress and gray when she wore anything else. She was going on 15 now and looking forward to being finished with school. Anna was as happy and easy to get along with as any of her sisters.
Sadie sat up, adrenaline filling her body with energy.
“Dat! If you bring the buckboard home, we’ll fix it up, and we’ll keep watching for a horse for Reuben, and we’ll teach that horse and Paris to be hitched double. Anna can help.”
Anna was chewing on a hard pretzel, sounding very much like a horse crunching an ear of corn. Reuben watched her out of the corner of his eye.
“Do you have to crunch that pretzel so hard?” he asked, his eyes narrowing.
“What’s it to you? Maybe my pretzel’s good!”
Mam got up, yawning, gathering her housecoat about her, saying it was time all decent, hardworking people went to bed.
Sadie caught a whiff of Mam’s talcum powder as she neared her chair, the same warm, silky scent she always wore, sort of like fresh baked bread mixed with a flowery odor of roses. She had just washed her graying hair; it hung down her back, held fast by a black, elastic ponytail holder. The long, thin ponytail made her seem as vulnerable as a child.
Mam always had her hair up in a bun, a white covering obscuring most of it. She appeared neat, clean, and in charge of her life and her family. Somehow, at moments like this, Sadie knew Mam was a tender sort of person, though still dependent on medication. Her mental condition had greatly improved but was still delicate.
Mam despised the fact that she was on “nerve pills,” but she never wanted to return to the abyss of breakdowns she had earlier slid into.
Thankful now, Sadie said goodnight. She took a cool shower and tumbled into bed. She was too sleepy to read. It was too warm to be very comfortable, so she lay on her back, her hands propped behind her head, and stared wide-eyed at the ceiling, thinking.
The giggles from Rebekah’s room irked her. It irked her more when the giggles rose to shrieks of glee and Leah dashed across the hall to the bathroom, slamming the door.
Sadie harrumphed inwardly. They acted so childish these days. Both of them were very interested in their guys and acted as if it was the only subject worth thinking about. Likely they’d soon be dating.
Sadie felt old and a bit useless, except for Paris and the ranch. If that Mark Peight insisted on acting so bupplich, then she’d just ignore him, and he could go fly a kite for all she cared. She was getting thoroughly sick of his strange ways. Besides, anyone with a childhood like that was bound to have some dysfunctional issues, and she wasn’t going to marry anyone like that.
She had felt so sure that God was leading them together, that this was her destiny. Well, no more. She was done. She rolled on her side, punched her pillow, and sighed.
So that was how it was going to be. Mark Peight would just have to live in Montana if he wanted to; it didn’t mean she had to be his wife anytime soon. Or…anytime at all.
Suddenly, a train of nostalgia rolled over her heart, its mournful whistle causing her to wince with remembering Ezra.
He was so good. So kind, uncomplicated, and easy to figure out. Life with Ezra would have been like calm waters, serene, her days floating by with no turbulence.
It was unreal, at times. He was no longer here on earth. If anyone deserved a home in heaven, it was surely Ezra. Maybe she was meant to be alone, then reunited with him once she got to heaven. Who knew?
Pi-i-ng!
The sound was only heard in her subconscious mind. The second time she heard it, she figured the temperature must have been higher than usual this afternoon, the way the house was creaking and snapping.
She heard another pinging noise, this time against glass.
What?
She sat straight up, kicked the sheet off, and headed to the window.
Crack!
Sadie recoiled, taking a few steps backward.
Someone was throwing a small, hard object against her window, above the screen.
Clutching her throat in horror, she stood in the middle of the room in total darkness, wondering what to do. Grab her robe and make a dash for the stairs? Get Leah and Rebekah? Wake Reuben?
She heard her name, a hissing sound.
Someone was out there. Someone who knew her and knew which room was hers.
“Sadie! I
t’s me!”
A hoarse whisper. “It’s me! Mark!”
Mark Peight! Throwing pebbles at her window like some lovelorn hero of the past. What a loser!
Anger gripped her, its claws tightening her senses, until she realized it would never work to go to the window and tell him exactly what she thought of him. Storming out of the ranch house because of who knew why, then showing up at her window in the middle of the night almost.
She had a notion to stay exactly where she was until he went away.
“Sadie! It’s me. Mark!”
Again, she heard the urging in his voice.
“Sadie!”
Pushing her face against the screen, she looked down at his tall dark form, his face lifted as he eagerly awaited her answer.
“What do you want?”
She didn’t mean to sound as grouchy as she did. She wished the words, or rather, her tone of voice, would stick in the screen and stay there, or dust the night breeze without harming anyone.
“What do you think I want?” he hissed in return. There was so much anger in his tone, Sadie took a step back, her eyes opening wide.
“I have no idea.”
“I need to ask you something.”
“Ask away.”
What possessed her? Why did she answer with barbs emphasizing every word? She wanted to hurt him, like he’d hurt her by storming out of the Caldwell dining room, then ignoring her, and leaving her to wander a desert of insecurity.
How could she ever have felt he was her destiny? He was too hard to understand.
“Come downstairs.”
The words were a curt order.
She pursed her lips, considering her answer. She no longer felt that panicky heartbeat in his presence, which uncomplicated things a lot. Folding her arms, she took her time in giving him an answer.
“Well, I need to get dressed.”
“No, you don’t. Just grab a robe.”
“Hush! You’ll wake Mam!”
Sadie knew Mam was a very light sleeper, as alert as the mouser in the barn. There was no way she could creep down the stairs without Mam knowing. Dat would go right on sleeping, the proverbial log. If Mam caught her sneaking outside in her night clothes, she would be in some very serious trouble.
“Hang on!”
She dressed quickly and crept down the stairs, her heart pounding now, which puzzled her. She thought she had surely moved on from that childish emotion. But by the time she reached the kitchen door, it was hammering against her ribs, drying her mouth until her tongue felt like cotton. She was still trying to be angry, but she couldn’t keep the anger if the excitement of seeing Mark again drove it away.
Rounding the side of the house, she found him sitting on the lawn, his back to a tree, looking as if he had been there all evening. It was dark, but not so dark that she couldn’t see his features or the shape of his head, the slope of his shoulders.
Dropping to her knees, breathless now, she said, “This is a weird time for you to come talk to me.”
“Yeah, well…”
There was a silence, swelling with question marks.
Then, “Sadie, I have to know. What does Richard Caldwell mean to you?”
“Mean to me? What are you talking about?”
“I … was eating breakfast, and… You have never talked to me like that. Never. Your whole face lit up. You moved your hands. You pushed back your dark hair. It was like … suddenly you had a great reason to care about life. Almost like… I don’t know.”
He leaned forward, his elbows propped on his knees, the picture of misery. The great shoulders slumped in dejection.
Sadie sat down, pulled her skirt over her knees, and said nothing.
How could he? Surmise, presume, suspect, whatever. It was all the same. She could not believe him.
“Mark, he’s my boss. I work for him. That’s all.”
“It didn’t look that way.”
“He’s old enough to be my father!”
“So? That doesn’t mean anything in the English world.”
“It does, too.”
“Look, Sadie, I know a lot more about that world than you do. A man like him, with his wealth, his status…”
“What about me? You think I would actually encourage him to … to … ? So that’s what you think I am?”
There was no answer.
Sadie’s chin lifted. She felt the anger literally course through her veins. Scrambling to her feet, she stalked across the lawn, through the darkness, glad for its cover as the heat rose in her face.
She felt no tears, she was far too angry.
“Wait!”
Sadie did not wait. She walked as fast as she could, past the shrubs, up onto the porch. She had just reached for the door handle when she was caught, a hand on her waist. She was forcibly whirled around to face a very tall, ominous Mark.
“I didn’t say that.”
“You meant that!”
The screen door opened, and they were both caught in the blue glare of a blinding LED flashlight.
The deep, sleepy voice of Jacob Miller boomed, “Vass geht au?”
Dat!
Mark smiled sheepishly, then stuck out his hand.
“Hello, Jacob Miller. I’m just … here to talk to Sadie about something.”
“You that Peight guy?”
“Yes, I am.”
“Well, if you have something to talk about, I suppose the porch swing would be a proper place to sit, and since I doubt if you want me to hear what you’re saying, I’ll go back to bed again.”
With that, the flashlight clicked off, the darkness covered them, soft and merciful, the screen door closed softly, and he was gone.
Mark cleared his throat, shuffled his feet.
“Can we sit down?”
The last thing Sadie wanted to do was share the intimacy of the porch swing with him, but she said stiffly, “We can.”
Like robots they were now, turning and sitting down as if on cue. Sadie sort of hit the edge of the swing, miscalculating its position in the dark. Then she sat back too far and almost slid off, causing the swing to lurch like a boat hitting waves. She had to brake with her feet. Then the whole ridiculous situation hit her, and she burst out laughing, a sort of unladylike snort that caught her totally unaware.
They were both laughing now. With great swells of relief, the tension between them evaporated, welcome as summer showers on a parched earth.
Laughter was like that. A smile worked the same magic. It eased tension, opened the way for friendly conversation; it lowered a drawbridge for large ships that had to arrive at their destinations on time.
“You just about sat on the porch floor,” Mark said finally.
“Hard, too!” Sadie laughed.
“What was I going to say?”
“You were talking about my boss. Mr. Richard Caldwell, himself.”
“Yes, I was. And I plan on finishing my questions. What were you talking about?”
“Didn’t you hear the men’s conversation? It’s all over the ranch. Someone is going around killing horses. Like a sniper. It started in Laredo County, sort of … well, I think the area where the horse thieves were. You know those thieves were never caught and brought to justice. Black Thunder, the leader of the wild horses—he’s dead. His owner is devastated. It’s awful, Mark. You surely heard about Reuben’s horse?”
“What?”
“Reuben’s horse. He was shot. Up on the field of wildflowers where we caught Paris and Cody.”
“You can’t be serious!”
“Yes. It was horrible. Reuben is being brave, but he’ll never forget it. He’s so young. I mean, I was what, 18 when Nevaeh died? I’ll always remember that day.”
“I will, too. Certainly. That was the day I finally held you in my arms. I could have died there. On that wagon. My life was fulfilled then. I knew what heaven feels like.”
Sadie did not know what to say, so she said nothing. The chain attached to the heavy steel hook cr
eaked with each moment of the swing, and Sadie could sense Mark’s agitation.
“That’s why I get so… I don’t know.”
Suddenly he burst out, “I am so jealous of you, it’s scary. When I saw you talking to your boss, I felt like a great black beast that wanted to … punch him, drag him away from you. It’s shameful and awful, but I don’t know what to do about it.”
“What hurts me most, is that you would even think I would be … having an affair with him or something? How could you?”
His answer, a lowered head, moving back and forth, was his denial. “I’m like a colt that’s been mistreated. I don’t trust anyone. Not one single person. I want to, but…”
“I would never do anything as out of … just plain unheard of…” She was cut short.
“It’s not unheard of!” he shouted.
Instinctively she put a hand over his mouth, like she would to try and shush a small boy.
“Shhh!”
“Sorry,” he said quietly. “My mother, my lovely, beautiful mother, had a horrible affair with a real estate man. They slunk around the house like deceiving liars. Snakes. That’s what they reminded me of. You know the kinds of snakes that are the exact same color as the grass and twigs and leaves?”
Sadie nodded.
“That’s how it was. His car would drive in, my father would be in the fields, dragging that rusty, ancient, screeching harrow across his rocky soil with two skinny brown mules that looked as if they’d fall over any minute. He’d knock at the front door … and, well, I was only a kid, but I wasn’t dumb. I knew. I think finally, that was the end of everything. The farm was sort of put up for sale, I guess, and that’s when my father … wanted to stop living.”
“But … did your mother run away with the real estate man?”
“Yes. There was an awful fight.”
“But … I don’t understand. If your parents were of the Amish faith, why did they act like that? Wouldn’t they… I mean, surely they knew they did wrong?”
“My father did nothing wrong! Not one thing. He was a good man. He tried his best. I think he married way out of his league, if you know what I mean. Dat was sort of ordinary looking, a bit thin, and didn’t have the… I don’t know. Mam was beautiful, probably could’ve had any guy she wanted.”
