Revealing, The (The Inn at Eagle Hill Book #3): A Novel

by Fisher, Suzanne Woods

  “So you think Jake sent Paisley here to find the key?” Allen Turner said.

  “He might’ve, but it wasn’t here,” Tobe said. “I hid it at my mother’s.”

  “Wait.” Bethany’s eyes were round as silver dollars. “Wait a minute. Tobe, what kind of a key? Mammi Vera said Paisley was looking for a key to her apartment.”

  “She was lying,” he said. “It was a small key for a safety deposit box.”

  Bethany gasped. “I know that key. But it isn’t there. During Christmas, I was visiting Mom and she gave me the key. She told me not to lose it. She said it belonged to a little boy and he needed it. I didn’t know what she was talking about, Tobe. She doesn’t make sense most of the time. I just thought it was a key she had found.”

  Allen Turner looked like he was about to jump out of his skin. “So where is the key?”

  “It’s up in my room,” Bethany said, already at the stairs. “I’ll go get it.”

  “Oh no,” Mammi Vera said, touching her chest again. “Oh no.”

  Rose blew out a puff of air. “Paisley . . . she stayed in Bethany’s room.”

  Bethany came back down the stairs, her face white. “It’s gone.”

  Allen Turner didn’t seem at all surprised.

  Tobe was practically out of his chair. “What if he’s already gotten to the safety deposit box? What if he’s emptied it?”

  “It’s possible. I’ll get someone to check on that. But if he hasn’t connected with Paisley to get the key, then there’s time to set a trap.”

  “Why wouldn’t he have connected with her already? They were working together.”

  “Calm down, Tobe. My guess is that Paisley is smart enough and shrewd enough to make him have to find her. She’s got something he wants, and she knows it. If my hunch is right, then we need to flush him out.” Allen Turner bit on his lip, thinking, tapping a pencil on a paper. Then a light came into his eyes. “I’m going to put a notice in the local papers that the York County Savings & Loan Bank is going to drill into all inactive safety deposit boxes and seize the contents.”

  “Do they do that?” Tobe asked.

  “Banks do it frequently,” Allen Turner said. “The contents get auctioned off and the money goes to the state.”

  “Can you do that?” Tobe said.

  “Oh yeah.” Allen Turner smiled, a first. “If I can force Jake Hertzler to make his move, I’ll be waiting for him.” Then his smile faded. “But this part is my job. Not yours. Your job is to wait.” He looked right at Tobe as he said it. “To wait.”

  19

  Mim kept bouncing the baby up and down to stop her from crying, but the decibel level was getting higher. The noise was starting to grate on her. She didn’t like babies and they didn’t like her.

  She had agreed to go with Tobe to the doctor for baby Sarah’s one-month checkup, but she didn’t realize that meant Sarah would be getting a shot. Mim nearly passed out when the nurse brought in that long needle, but she held the baby snugly in her lap and squeezed her eyes shut and wished she had earplugs.

  She also didn’t realize that Tobe was getting a paternity test. “It’s just a swab of the cheek that gets sent off to the laboratory,” he told Mim. “No big deal.”

  “And if it turns out that you are Sarah’s father?” Mim had asked. “That seems like a very big deal.” Even though she didn’t like babies, she did think Sarah was a nice baby, as babies went. Mostly, she had an uncommonly good smell about her. And sometimes the tip of her tongue peeked through her little pink lips. Mim was amazed at the smallness of it, just as she was at her tiny starfish-like hands.

  “I’m not.”

  “But what if you are, Tobe? What then?”

  He frowned at her. “I have to know for sure, Mim.”

  Afterward, as Tobe was paying the receptionist for the paternity test—cash borrowed from Mim with a promise of a high-interest return—and asking how long the results would take, she tried to calm the baby down. She jiggled her, she paced the room, she sang to her, she hummed to her, she bounced her. Nothing worked. Sarah flailed and began to cry loud, unstoppable sobs. Little tears rolled down her cheeks, making Mim feel even more terrible, if that was possible. She wanted to cry herself. Tobe kept glancing back at both, a worried look on his face. Finally, he came over and got the bottle of formula out of the baby’s diaper bag and sat down to feed Sarah.

  As Tobe fed the baby, almost magically, the crying stopped, the baby calmed down, and peace was restored.

  “It’s like she knows, Tobe.”

  “Knows what?” The baby looked up at him solemnly, as though committing his face to memory.

  Mim bent down to kiss the baby’s forehead. “Sarah knows you are the one she can count on. She trusts you.”

  “Babies are too little to know about trust.”

  “I’m not so sure about that. Trust is a big part of life. If Sarah already trusts you, you’re halfway there.”

  As usual, just like Sammy and Luke, Tobe wasn’t listening to Mim. His eyes were fixed on a distant wall, lost in his private thoughts, as if something was weighing heavily on his mind.

  Having Brooke Snyder stay in the guest flat for a steady few weeks certainly helped Rose pay some basic bills, but there were always unexpected expenses. A lamb that had to be treated for colic, Sammy needed to go to the dentist for an aching tooth, Mim needed new glasses, Sarah needed her newborn checkups. Rose still hadn’t brought up Paisley’s hospital bills to the deacon. Soon, though.

  Rose looked over the vegetable garden, now planted for summer’s bounty. She felt a deep satisfaction in watching things grow. As a child, she had worked alongside her mother to prepare seedbeds, till the garden, plant and tend crops, and harvest fruit and vegetables at the optimal time. They harvested more fruit than they could haul to market, and nearly everything on her table came from her family’s farm: cheese and sausage, bread and eggs and jam, apples and peaches and corn.

  She scooped up a handful of dirt. This was how her mother had started. Year after year, her mother had added to the garden plot, until her father finally gave up on wheat and corn and became a full-time fruit and vegetable farmer. There was always a need for lettuce and carrots and onions and zucchini and pumpkins and strawberries.

  She walked past the garden, past the barn, to a neglected section that once housed a pigpen. Perhaps . . . she could do what her mother did. Perhaps . . . this might be a potential source of additional income.

  If she could turn the pigpen into a garden, she could double the size of her output and start to sell produce at a roadside stand. Or maybe even at the Stoney Ridge Farmers’ Market where Bethany used to work.

  She should get the pigpen plowed under before spring was too far gone. Tobe could do it, but she wanted him to focus on the baby and not have an excuse to leave her care to others. She thought about asking Galen, but that wouldn’t be right. Then she saw David Stoltzfus’s buggy drive along the road. “Any time you need any help, just ask,” he had told her at church on Sunday. Anytime.

  She dropped her handful of dirt and watched it scatter in the wind. Why, now was a time she needed a little extra man’s help. She tucked a lock of loose hair back under her prayer cap, straightened her apron, pinched her cheeks, and headed over to David Stoltzfus’s.

  Jimmy stopped by the Kings’ every day to check on Lodestar. When he first saw the horse, the day Bethany had given him the good news, he had been shocked at his weakened appearance. If Jimmy had happened across Jake Hertzler that day, he didn’t know what he might have done to him—so severe was Lodestar’s neglect. The thought disturbed him, knowing he could harm another man. And yet to see Lodestar’s condition was even more disturbing. Another week alone, hobbled, without food or water, and that beautiful animal might have suffered a lonely, painful death.

  Galen thought it would be best to keep Lodestar at his barn in a big box stall and Jimmy heartily agreed. Galen’s barn was more secure than the small Fisher barn. Though Lodestar di
dn’t seem at all interested in escaping. Just the opposite. He stayed at the back of the stall and only seemed interested in food, not in people. But he was making progress. His ribs were already starting to fill out, his eyes looked brighter, he held his head up again. The vet said it might take months to fully recover, that stress can have a very negative effect on an animal, but he was cautiously optimistic. “He was rescued in the nick of time,” the vet told Jimmy, who told Bethany, who said it was meant to be, and that it proved everything happened for a reason. She had a gleam in her eye when she said it too, which made his throat tighten and his palms sweat.

  “First things first,” he had told her. “Lodestar needs time and attention to mend properly.”

  At that, she gave him a probing look, one he couldn’t read. It set off that panicky feeling deep within him again.

  After Jimmy spent time grooming Lodestar, he led him into an outdoor paddock for a little fresh air and sunshine. He stayed nearby, leaning his back against the paddock, boot heel resting on the lowest rung, so he could observe Galen working in the round training pen. Galen was constantly improvising and trying new things, customizing training to the individual needs of the horses. Jimmy didn’t want to miss a trick. He was that eager for Tobe and Naomi to hurry up and marry so he could retire as a chicken boss and resume his position as Galen’s partner in horse training.

  On this breezy May afternoon, Galen was in the pen with a newly purchased bay Thoroughbred, a gelding with intelligent eyes. Jimmy walked over to the pen, keeping one eye peeled on Lodestar.

  “Want to see my new business card?” He pulled one from his pocket and handed it to Galen.

  Galen peered at it. “You’re calling yourself a stallion manager?”

  “That’s what I am. I manage a stallion.” He glanced at Lodestar, who was stretching his neck to crop new grass near the paddock gate.

  “That title usually indicates a knowledgeable, experienced horseman.”

  “Exactly.”

  “Is that so?” Galen handed him back the business card. “So do you have better odds pasture-breeding or with artificial help?”

  “Artificial help.”

  “Wrong.” He raised an eyebrow. “A healthy mare can call the shots a lot better than a human can.” He flicked the whip to keep the horse loping. “Can you keep stallions together in a pasture?”

  Jimmy sneered. “Of course not.”

  “Wrong again. Horses aren’t territorial. As long as there aren’t any mares or foals nearby, they don’t fight over real estate—only females.” He gave Jimmy the look—the one that made him feel like he was a dense child. “Maybe you want to hold on to those cards a little longer.”

  Jimmy tucked the business card into his pocket. “Speaking of being territorial, have you noticed David Stoltzfus hanging around Eagle Hill like a summer cold? Something happen between you and Rose?”

  “None of your business.”

  “He’s over there right now, plowing up the old pigpen. Folks say he’s got Rose marked off with a red flag.”

  Galen’s whole body drew taut and he eyed Jimmy askance. “I suppose you believe everything you hear?”

  Jimmy shrugged. “Pretty much.”

  Galen had already set his mind on the next task: shaking a plastic milk jug partially filled with gravel at the horse to accustom him to unexpected sounds. Jimmy had always been impressed with Galen’s ability to focus. He had never been good at getting his mind to consider two facts at once, much less two big facts. He saw Lodestar mouthing the paddock latch and then unhook it. He ran over to stop him, a big grin on his face. He’d been looking for some sign of bluster from Lodestar, some hint of his uppity nature. His horse was on the way back. Truly back.

  Jimmy noticed Bethany across the top of the privet at Eagle Hill, smiled to himself, and reflected that she was a remarkable girl. Against impossible odds, she had found Lodestar. She had thought up a plan to help him get out of the chicken business, which he hated, and back to the horse business, which he loved. He owed a great deal to Bethany.

  Yes, she was a truly remarkable girl. She was beautiful, sweet one minute, strong and fiery the next. A fellow would never get bored with a girl like Bethany at his side.

  What was he waiting for? He knew she was impatient, eager for him to propose. He decided to bring up the subject soon, maybe the next time he took her for a buggy ride to Blue Lake Pond. He exhaled, a matter decided.

  Then he spotted Peter Stoltzfus, cousin to the town menace Jesse Stoltzfus, walk toward the Eagle Hill farmhouse. Bethany met him at the bottom porch step and she laughed at something he said. The sight and sound of it disturbed him, and he was annoyed at himself for being disturbed.

  Mim was walking home from the Sisters’ House, past the nearly-falling-down barn, when she heard some loud whoops and shouts coming from the barn. She saw three boys climbing on the roof, trying to reach the peak, egging each other on. Boys she recognized. Luke, Mose Blank . . . led by Jesse Stoltzfus.

  “First one to the top wins!” Jesse shouted.

  One loud crack filled the air, then another sound of creaking timber, and another. Seconds passed. Suddenly the boys disappeared in a blur of motion as the barn roof collapsed. The moment lasted forever. Too scared to move, Mim gave a piercing shriek that rent the afternoon air.

  She raced like the wind to get to Eagle Hill, sprinting past the schoolhouse and through Amos Lapp’s cornfield and jumping across the creek to reach the shortcut to the farm. The first person she spotted was David Stoltzfus, starting to plow one row of the old pigpen.

  “They’re dead!” she shouted to him, waving her arms. “Luke and Mose and Jesse! They’re all dead!”

  David dropped the plow behind the mule and ran to her. “Calm down, Mim, and tell me what happened.”

  “The nearly-falling-down barn fell down! The boys were trying to climb to the top and it collapsed on them.”

  Together they ran toward the accident, expecting the worst.

  As they arrived at the now-fallen-down barn, Jesse and Luke were climbing out of the debris, dusting off their clothes, grinning and laughing like they were at a Sunday picnic. Mose sat on a rock, holding up his elbow with one hand. His other hand dangled at an odd angle.

  It was a fine day for the turning of the sod. Bethany smiled to herself as she saw Amos Lapp and Galen King put their hands together on the shovel and dig into the ground of one of the small garden plots at the Second Chance Gardens behind the Grange Hall. Geena Spencer asked Bishop Elmo if he wanted to say a few words about the results that came from a caring community.

  Oh, big mistake! The bishop ended up saying a great many words. He had a habit, when he spoke, of clasping his hands at his spine and rocking back on his heels. When he did, his black shoes would squeak. They squeaked now as he rocked repeatedly, lifting his face to the sky while composing his words.

  When Elmo finally wrapped it up, Geena took command, dividing Amish and wayward girls from the Group Home into groups to work together, giving them lists of chores. It was remarkable how much authority a relatively small woman like her could possess, and Bethany admired her tremendously.

  All throughout the day, Bethany and Jimmy worked companionably on the garden plots. Toward the end of the day, when normally she might have lingered and ended up going home in Jimmy’s buggy—via a stop at Blue Lake Pond—she pondered what to do. Should she stay or leave early? Hard though it was to do, she excused herself and said goodbye.

  “You’re leaving now?” Jimmy said, surprised and bothered. His disappointment was honey to her soul.

  “I have a few things to take care of,” she said. And she was gone.

  The next day, he was thoroughly put out. “Are you going to keep running away all the time? I was hoping we could plan a picnic.”

  Big eyes wide, she said that honestly she was sorry . . . she just had a lot of things to do lately. But, of course, she would be delighted to have a meal with him sometime . . .

  Th
ere was a silence. Jimmy went on to fill it.

  “I thought you might arrange it,” he said.

  In the old days, like every day up to this minute, Bethany would have immediately made plans and offered to prepare a picnic and tell Jimmy what time to pick her up. This time she made no such offer. He reached for her hands, but she pulled them away.

  “Oh no, I wouldn’t dream of it. If you are asking me to have a picnic, then you must, of course, choose when and where.” He was inviting her—he must remember that.

  Jimmy had, of course, expected Bethany to make the picnic. She realized that the next day as they were sitting on the banks of Blue Lake Pond, eating peanut butter and sardine sandwiches on day-old bread. She nibbled on the corners of the unappetizing sandwich, smiling, pretending it was delicious.

  From far away came a faint sound like old nails being pulled from new wood. Over the treetops flew a wedge of Canada geese, squawking and honking, heading toward the pond. They landed on the surface of the pond with such grace that it moved Bethany to a silent reverence.

  Jimmy seemed slightly distracted as he took a bruised apple out of the basket and looked for a spot to bite into. His mind was somewhere else. Eventually he got around to what he wanted to say. “Are you seeing Jesse Stoltzfus’s cousin?”

  “Who? Oh, Peter?”

  “He’s been hanging around Eagle Hill.”

  “He’s a very nice fellow.”

  “Bethany, have I annoyed you lately? In a different way than usual?”

  “No, of course not.” The warm wind kissed her face, fluttered the ends of her capstrings.

  “Are you sure?”

  “Nothing I can recall. Why do you think you did?”

  “I don’t know. You’re different. You don’t stop by Galen’s when I’m over there with Lodestar. You didn’t make a picnic today. You don’t shoot sparks at me like you usually do. I wondered if you were trying to say something to me . . .”

  Her eyes widened innocently. “Like what?”