“Looks like we have a few minutes if you want to take a look around.” Her supervisor set the emergency brake. “Let’s meet back here in half an hour.”
Ruth nodded and opened the passenger door, uncertain how close she wanted to go. This place was a good fifteen miles from the Beiler farm. She had had a vague notion of where Karl Kramer’s ranch was, but she had no idea any structures this old remained on it. Slowly, she ambled closer and wondered where Bryan was and what his role in this event would be. In full gear, all the firefighters looked alike.
She looped around one of the water trucks and saw a ladder truck roll in and take its position. While Westcliffe and neighboring Silver Cliff together amounted to a pin dot on a map, the fire protection service based in Westcliffe served all of Custer County. Ruth knew they worked hard to keep their equipment plentiful and up to date.
It was not Bryan whom she spotted but Annalise gesturing past a firefighter. Annalise had not said anything about coming out to watch, so what was she doing here with that characteristic look of determination on her face? A few seconds passed before Ruth realized that the firefighter staring down Annalise was Bryan Nichols.
Ruth approached.
“Here’s Ruth now,” Bryan said, grinning.
“Should my ears be burning?” She put her hands to her mouth at her own bad joke. “Sorry. What’s going on?”
“Leah was staying here,” Annalise said. “I just wanted to make sure she got out.”
“And I have assured your friend that the fire department has made absolutely certain that no humans or kittens are inside this building, whether voluntarily or involuntarily.”
“Then I’m sure she’s out,” Ruth said.
“The chief had firefighters out here all day yesterday setting up for today. No one is in this structure.”
Annalise blew out her breath. “Okay, then. I won’t worry anymore that you didn’t let me double-check.”
Another yellow-uniformed figure approached them, the pieces of his headgear in place. A deep voice boomed. “I’m afraid unauthorized personnel must vacate this area immediately.”
“Of course.” Ruth stepped back, pulling Annalise’s elbow with her.
Bryan, however, moved toward the man and flipped up his mask. “Wellner, where have you been? The chief is about to strike your name from the training manifest.”
Ruth rolled her eyes. It was Alan.
“I couldn’t get away from work any sooner. I just spoke to our fearless leader.” Alan tugged at his gloves. “Not only is my name on the manifest, but the chief is bouncing with joy at my mere presence. Words do not express the abounding gladness.”
Ruth held her textbook against her chest with both arms. Alan showed none of the tension she had observed in the presence of his father the day before.
Alan smacked his hands together. “Are we going to burn something today or not?”
Annie looked from Ruth to Bryan to the stranger. “Hello. I’m Annie Friesen.”
“Alan Wellner, future fire chief of Custer County. Pleased to meet you.”
Annie couldn’t help but laugh at this young man’s exuberant self-confidence.
Bryan elbowed Alan. “As you can see, my friend does not lack belief in his own ability. But he’s right. You ought to move farther away from the house, or the present fire chief of Custer County will be breathing down our necks.”
“He’s a dragon, he is,” Alan said.
The foursome began slow but direct progress away from the house and past the line of fire engines.
“Isn’t that your friend Capp?” Bryan asked.
Annie raised her eyes to see Elijah Capp standing behind a water truck, his feet planted shoulder width apart and his arms crossed behind his back. His brown hair fluttered in the breeze.
“I wonder what happened to his hat,” Annie said.
“Hello, Elijah,” Ruth said softly.
Elijah nodded.
“Looks like we have quite a turnout to watch the spectacle,” Bryan said. “We’d better make it a good show.”
Annie glanced at the growing crowd. She came because she was worried about Leah. It had not occurred to her that half the town would want to see this old building in flames.
“You all had better get behind the safety line now.” Bryan guided the elbows of both Ruth and Annie.
“Actually, I am supposed to meet my supervisor,” Ruth said. “I’ll see you all later.”
Ruth barely looked at Elijah, Annie noticed. But neither did she meet Bryan’s eyes. She simply turned and walked around the water truck toward the area where most of the cars were parked.
“We’d better take our positions, too.” Bryan nudged Alan. “We’ll catch up with you guys after the drama is over.”
“Nice to meet you both,” Annie said. A moment later, she was left standing alone with Elijah Capp. “I came looking for Leah Deitwaller. As long as I’m here, though, I suppose I should stay and watch.”
“Let’s find a better vantage point,” Elijah said. “We won’t be able to see anything from behind these trucks once the fire starts.”
“Okay.” Annie followed Elijah’s lead. “Should we look for your hat first?”
“My hat?”
She pointed to his bare head, uncharacteristic for an Amish man.
“My hat is not lost. I did not put it on this morning.”
“Oh.”
They walked together for a few yards.
“Franey Beiler tells me that your mother has repainted her kitchen cabinets. How do they look?”
“They were only half-finished the last time I saw them. I hope she is pleased, though.”
Annie reached for Elijah’s arm to stop his pace. “How can you not have seen your family’s kitchen cabinets?”
He sighed and looked away. “I moved out.”
Annie’s eyes widened. “Where to?”
“An apartment. A large room and bath in an English house.”
“When did you do this?” Annie could not make sense of what she heard. Elijah had moved out of his Amish home and had deliberately come today without his black felt hat.
“Last week, days ago.” Elijah resumed walking. “I’m thinking of becoming a volunteer firefighter. What do you think?”
“Wait. Let’s go back to the part about how you moved out of your family’s home.”
“It’s better this way.” Elijah kicked a rock and sent it skittering. “They will have a hard time with my decision and will have to shun me. And I don’t want to be a hypocrite under their roof.”
“What decision are you talking about?” Elijah Capp was one of the most devout, respectful men Annie had met in the Amish church. “What do you mean about being a hypocrite?”
He met her gaze, silent.
“Elijah—”
“It would dishonor my parents to stay where my heart no longer lies.”
They had turned their backs on the old house while they walked. The sudden roar of fire startled them both, and they pivoted in tandem. Bright orange flames poured out from the center of the house and shot up billowing black smoke.
None of the firefighters moved.
“What are they waiting for?” Annie asked.
“A fire always has a head start, does it not? Perhaps they are waiting for the response time it normally takes for the engines to arrive.”
“This house is a pile of dry sticks. Nothing will be left of it.”
As she spoke this time, the teams went into action, each one unrolling hose and positioning themselves. Ladders appeared and rose in height.
“That house won’t hold any weight,” Annie insisted. “They shouldn’t try to climb.”
Elijah smiled. “Mainly they are trying out different hoses to see how they perform. That’s why the water trucks are spaced as they are. The ladders are an extra drill to improve their time.”
Annie drew her head back and stared at Elijah. “And you know this how?”
He tilted his head then str
aightened it. “You are not the only one who knows how to use the resources of the public library.”
“Elijah Capp, have you been on the Internet?”
Twenty
If Elijah heard Annie’s question, he refused to acknowledge it. He spread his feet and crossed his wrists in front of him, eyes forward focused on the fire. Annie stood beside him, mesmerized by both the enormity and the proximity of the inferno. Teams of firefighters rolled into action now, raising nozzles, supporting hoses, controlling the flow of water from the massive tanks.
“Did you know my parents’ barn burned down when I was young?” Elijah tapped one booted foot.
“No, I never heard that.” Annie watched him out of the side of her eye. “What happened?”
“Well, it wasn’t an electrical fire. They were sure of that much.”
Annie snorted.
“The investigators said it was a gasoline fire, but I’m not sure if they figured out where the spark came from to light it.”
“It’s amazing what they can determine when you think all the evidence would have burned up.”
Before them, the feeble front wall of the house gave way. Annie flinched.
“I was a little boy,” Elijah said. “My parents always shooed me from the room whenever anyone talked about what happened. I’ve always wanted to know.”
“You’re grown now. Why don’t you ask?”
He shrugged. “It was fifteen years ago. No one was hurt, not even any of the animals. As soon as the rubble was cleared away, the church came for a barn raising.”
“Still. If you want to know…”
“We are not that sort of family. My family carried on. We moved out here. What’s the point?”
They watched the flames. Around them, people in huddles shaded their eyes and pointed at shooting flames. Annie peered at the hurried movements of people in bulky yellow jackets and helmets, trying to pick out Bryan and Alan, the only two firefighters she knew by name and only because she had met them an hour ago. She suspected four of the figures she saw were women who did not miss a beat keeping up with the men.
“So you want to be a firefighter because of what happened to your family?” she asked.
Elijah leaned one direction and then the other without lifting his feet. “It seems a worthy cause, even as a volunteer. Perhaps especially as a volunteer.”
“It takes a lot of guts. I’m not sure I could do it.”
“You underestimate yourself, Annalise. Look at what you have already accomplished in your life. How can you think there is anything you could not do?”
“It’s risky. Scary.”
“And necessary, don’t you think?”
“Well, yes,” Annie admitted. “The rest of us depend on it.”
“I would like to be able to do what I am willing to ask of others in this one area.”
Annie waited, biding her time and rolling possible words over in her mind.
“Do Amish men become firefighters?” she finally asked. “I mean, the technology…”
Elijah turned his head and looked down at her from his height, nearly as tall as Rufus.
“No, I don’t suppose they do,” he said.
“So, you’ve made some decisions that are…permanent?”
He nodded. “I believe they will be.”
“And Ruth?”
“I don’t give up as easily as she hopes I will.”
Ruth had long ago lost the thread of what her supervisor was explaining to her. She had, however, observed the fact that the woman’s husband was one of the volunteer firefighters training on the back side of the structure, which explained more convincingly her belief that being present at the fire had learning value for Ruth.
The remains of a second wall surrendered, and one end of a beam that ran through the house thundered to the ground, shifting the primary direction of the blaze. Unlike the charred half-built house containing Rufus’s cabinetry, nothing would be left of this one. The fire department would intentionally let the structure collapse and smolder, instead concerning themselves with ensuring flames did not spread into the meadow around the house.
Ruth cleared her throat and consulted her clipboard, trying to find her place in the oral review of procedures that her supervisor was in the midst of.
Staging area.
Triage.
Chain of command.
Safe transport.
Ruth glanced across the scene to watch Bryan Nichols in action. He was focused, attentive, on task. A few feet away and sharing Bryan’s hose, Alan Wellner divided his gaze between the burning house and a clump of spectators. Ruth followed his line of sight and saw the sheriff, no doubt present to be sure the assembly on the gentle meadow slope abided by all safety precautions of the event.
The pen in her hand reminded Ruth to focus again on her list. Her supervisor had stopped speaking, though. Eyes all around the perimeter of the burn focused on the galloping flames and the disappearing structure. Slats of wood that had once been a wall popped and crumbled. Ruth covered her mouth to cough even as smoke infiltrated her nostrils. The movement of lifting her elbow transferred her gaze once again.
Annalise and Elijah stood out of earshot but close enough for Ruth to see they were conversing regularly. Annalise’s hair was neatly coiled and tucked under her kapp. Well, perhaps not neatly. No matter how long Annalise let her blond hair grow or how many pins she used, strands always seemed to escape her efforts.
Ruth’s own brown hair was pulled back and fastened simply at the back of her neck with an oversized plain brown barrette she would never have owned growing up. By Amish standards, it was ornate and might tempt the wearer to vanity. One hand went up now to check the clasp.
Standing across from them and twisting her lips in thought, Ruth’s first instinct was to wonder what Annalise and Elijah would be talking about with such concentration. Were they discussing her?
She scribbled at the bottom of her checklist. So what if they were? Annalise had joined the church, after all. Soon enough Rufus would propose and they would marry. Why should she not talk to another member of the church in a public setting? They were the only two Amish people present. Annalise was probably just being friendly.
Tom Reynolds’s red pickup roared into the meadow with the horn blaring as if someone had strapped a rock to it. Adrenaline surged through Ruth’s midsection as Tom nudged his way past a couple of onlooking families and got as close to the security line as he could. He then jumped out of his truck and marched along the line, waving his hands at the fire chief. A moment later, the chief began pointing and shouting orders. The water supply to Bryan and Alan’s hose abruptly shut off, and they began rolling the hose rapidly. Two ladders came down while a second water truck also stowed gear.
Back in his truck, Tom gunned the engine and began backing up. Ruth ran straight toward him, slapping her hands on the hood.
“What’s going on, Tom?”
“A fire.” Tom turned the steering wheel.
Ruth moved out of the way of the turning front left tire but would not release her grip on Tom’s lowered window. “What are you talking about? The fire is right here. They have it all under control.”
“Another one.”
“Where?” Her heart thudded.
“An old outbuilding on the other side of the highway, about three miles out. I think it’s on county land. At first I thought it was the training burn, but I realized it was the wrong side of the road.”
Behind Ruth, the engine of a water truck howled. She was glued to Tom’s pickup.
“Get out of the way, Ruth.” Tom slapped at her fingers on his window and let his foot off the brakes. The truck rolled, and Ruth jumped back.
A moment later Bryan was behind the wheel of his water truck and rumbling through the meadow. His focus was strictly on navigating out of one fire scene and toward another. Beside him in the cab, Alan lifted three fingers in a wave. Ruth gaped at three vehicles being redeployed to the new fire even as she heard
the shriek of the siren beckoning volunteers from around the county.
Ruth turned back to the fire behind her just as the final wall tumbled and remaining firefighters rushed in to fill the gaps left by the departing trucks. The glory of the construction burn was nearly extinguished, outblazed by the potential of an unattended fire in open grassland. Spectators were already jumping into their cars and turning them around toward the road.
Gripping her clipboard, Ruth ran toward her supervisor’s car, where the older woman already had the ignition fired up. The clinic would need to be ready if someone were hurt.
Word of the second fire advanced through the crowd. Annie saw nothing to be gained by dashing off to watch another fire. Suddenly, though, she wondered how Elijah had gotten to this destination. She had not seen a buggy all morning, and anybody with half a brain would have kept away animals that might bolt. She turned to ask him.
He was gone, already lost from her sight.
Annie turned back to the training burn, which was fast becoming a haphazard pile of glowing half boards. Water still flowed from two trucks but with less fury. When the traffic thinned a bit more, Annie decided, she would fetch her bicycle and head back to town.
A flash of blue caught the corner of her eye, and Annie snapped her head around. Amish blue. The more she handled Amish fabrics, the more distinctive that shade became in Annie’s mental palette. It was not the mass-dyed hue of a commercial manufacturer that clung to the surface of an inexpensive material, but the rich saturation that emanated from the core of tight-woven cloth.
Annie realized she was holding her breath and blew it out. Forgetting her bicycle—it was in the wrong direction—she ran after the flash of blue. At least where she thought she had seen it.
Leah had been there. Annie was sure of it. She must have left home with only the dress on her back, because every time Annie saw her, Leah wore the same hue, sometimes with a purple apron and sometimes without. But always the same blue.
At the edge of the dissipating crowd, Annie systematically scanned from left to right. When she finally spotted the girl, she was looking at her back. With her skirts gathered in her fists, Leah ran with surprising dexterity, and Annie did not think she could catch her.
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