Sound of Fear

by Marta Perry

  Instinct warned her that any comments wouldn’t be welcomed. “I’ll tell him. Thank you.” This time she got out of the door.

  CHAPTER TEN

  “SORRY ABOUT THAT. I’d intended a quiet dinner so we could talk things over. I should have known that wouldn’t happen at Giovanni’s.” Trey backed out of the restaurant parking lot that evening.

  Amanda just smiled. “It’s okay. The lobster ravioli was wonderful. It would have been a shame to disturb eating it with an argument.”

  “Were we going to argue?” He glanced at her as he turned onto Main Street.

  “Argue might be too strong a word,” she conceded. “But I’m sure we could have found something to disagree on. Anyway, it was nice to see how popular you are. Do you always have that many people stopping at your table when you dine out?”

  “That had nothing to do with me. They all wanted to meet you. You’ve caused quite a stir in town.”

  “You’re serious?” He could feel her gaze on his face and hear the incredulity in her voice.

  “Very serious. Word has gotten around. I told you it would. You can sneeze at one o’clock in the library and have people offering you cold remedies in the post office fifteen minutes later. Don’t ask me how it happens, because I don’t know. It just does.”

  She shook her head. “You really do live in each other’s pockets here, don’t you?”

  “It’s not so bad. Just sometimes annoying, but it’s so well-meant you can’t get mad at it.”

  “Give me the anonymity of the city any day. I almost never see anyone I know when I’m eating out.”

  “Sounds boring to me.” He kept the words light, but he was reminding himself that this was a short-lived interlude. Amanda would leave before long, and he’d better be sure she wouldn’t take his heart with her when she went.

  “Since we didn’t get a chance for a private conversation in the restaurant, I still have something to tell you.” She sounded just a little smug, as if she’d accomplished something he’d envy.

  “What? What have you been up to?”

  “I had a call from your Mrs. Lindstrom this morning. It seems Elizabeth Winthrop wanted to talk to me privately.”

  “You went there?”

  At her nod, he felt a flicker of annoyance. “Why didn’t you let me know?”

  “Because I didn’t have much time to get there, and I knew you’d argue about coming with me.”

  “I’m your attorney. I should be with you.”

  “Mrs. Winthrop insisted I come alone. Sorry, Trey, but she didn’t include you in the invitation.”

  “You still shouldn’t have gone alone. If we want them to think you might take legal action, it’s important that you not talk to any of them alone.” Didn’t she understand that he had her best interests in mind?

  “But it turned out fine. Although I admit, I had my doubts once or twice.”

  Resigned, he shook his head. Might as well talk to Amos’s Percheron as a stubborn woman like Amanda. “Maybe you’d better tell me all of it from the beginning.”

  “Well, as I said, she asked for me. I honestly think she’s begun to believe I’m Melanie’s daughter, or I don’t see why she’d have said as much as she did.”

  He had to admit that made a certain amount of sense. He’d have expected Elizabeth to bar the doors to anyone she considered an interloper.

  “Did she want any information from you?” he asked.

  “She did ask a little about my adoptive mother. Almost as if she had to assure herself that I’d been well taken care of.” She shrugged. “It seems to me that if she’d cared, she’d have made some attempt to find Melanie’s baby long ago.”

  It was hardly surprising to hear a little bitterness in her voice. He found it hard to accept, too, that the family had just wiped Melanie off the map because she’d done something wrong.

  “Maybe she did,” he suggested. “We have no way of knowing whether she instituted a search or not.”

  Judging by her expression, Amanda didn’t think much of that idea. “Anyway, then she went back to saying she didn’t know anything that would help, insisting they’d never heard a thing about Melanie from the time she ran away from the institution they had her in until...well, until her death, I suppose.”

  “This institution...” he began.

  “That’s what I was going to tell you. She told me where it was. Worcester, Massachusetts. Not more than an hour’s drive from Boston.”

  She had done well, not that he intended to congratulate her on acting without him. “That narrows things down a bit. She must not have gone too far, since you ended up in Boston with Juliet as your mother. You’ll have to let Robert know.”

  “I already did,” she said. “He promised to have his investigators get on it right away.”

  “Good.” He frowned. “You know, you have to wonder how she managed to get away from that place on her own, without help, and pregnant.”

  He glanced across at Amanda. The last few streetlights in town lit her face momentarily, showing her frowning intensity, and then left it in darkness again.

  “Maybe she didn’t do it alone,” she said finally. “Maybe she had help.”

  “From whom?” He couldn’t help being skeptical, even though he was the one who’d mentioned it.

  “Maybe from Juliet. Maybe they’d known each other.”

  “Where? I can’t imagine where their lives would have crossed. Melanie hadn’t even left town for college yet. And if Juliet had some connection with Echo Falls, you’ve been holding out on me.”

  Her smile flickered. “No, I haven’t. But it’s possible. The world is smaller than we think. And they did meet somewhere, because...well, here I am.”

  “So you are. Well, so some meeting between them prior to your birth might have happened. We’ll have to mention that to the investigators. They’re better equipped than we are to look for links like that.”

  “It might not be that complicated,” Amanda said slowly. “What if it was someone here in Echo Falls who helped her?”

  He considered. “Who? I can’t imagine any of the family going against Elizabeth like that. If they did, they have more guts than I’d thought.”

  “It wouldn’t have to be a family member. It could have been a friend. Maybe I can find out who her particular friends were.”

  “How? By asking Elizabeth Winthrop? I doubt she’d be interested in helping you.”

  Amanda seemed to pay no attention. She’d turned to him with an excited expression. “Wait a minute. How dumb we are! Who’s the logical person for her to turn to?”

  “The guy who got her pregnant.” Trey smacked the steering wheel. “You’re right. But if the family never knew who he was, I don’t see how we’re going to find him.”

  “No.” That dampened her enthusiasm. “You’re right. Her friends probably knew, though, if we could identify any of them.”

  He nodded reluctantly. He foresaw a tedious search through everyone he knew who was the right age, trying to come up with someone who remembered. “Right. I’ll start looking for someone who might fit. Her close friends may have moved away from Echo Falls by now. Still, she must have confided in someone, if she was like any other teenager I’ve met.”

  “You sound discouraged,” Amanda said. “This will cheer you up. Elizabeth has agreed to the DNA testing. She said for you to set it up.”

  “That is progress. Congrats.” He reached over to grasp her hand. “How did you persuade her?”

  “I honestly don’t know. I’d made her mad by sounding critical of their actions in sending Melanie away. She got defensive, and I figured it was all over. And then she told me she’d do it. Can you set it up?”

  “Of course. In fact, I have a friend who has a friend who can expedite the process.
” This was progress. At least the DNA test would give them some solid facts, which were sadly missing in this case.

  “Somehow I’m not surprised that you know someone,” she said.

  Trey turned onto the farm lane, grinning. “That’s how things work. Sometimes I think we ought to just go back to a barter society and be done with it.”

  As they approached the lighted farmhouse, Trey spotted someone coming out the back door to the lane, carrying a lantern. The figure lifted it, and he saw that it was Amos, holding up his hand for them to stop.

  “Something must be wrong.” He could hear Amanda’s tension in her voice.

  “Maybe Amos just wants to tell me something,” he said, lowering the window. “Hi, Amos. What’s up?”

  Amos didn’t have his usual smile. Instead, his lean face was sober in the light from the battery lantern.

  “Will you both komm in for a bit? We need to talk.”

  “Sure. Let me just pull over.” Closing the window, he glanced at Amanda. “Any idea what this is about?”

  Her face was tight. “No. Not unless they’ve decided they’ve had enough of the trouble I seem to bring with me.”

  He covered her hand with his. “I doubt that. But whatever it is, we’ll deal with it.” He was committed now, and he wouldn’t back down, no matter who opposed them.

  * * *

  AMANDA HAD A bad feeling as she walked to the house. At some level, she must have been waiting for something to go wrong in her relationship with Sarah and Amos. After all, they didn’t know her. They’d taken her in on Trey’s recommendation, and they hadn’t bargained for rumors, upset and prowlers.

  Trey moved beside her, putting a hand at her waist as they went up the steps, reminding her of his presence.

  Sarah turned from the stove as they walked into the kitchen. She, at least, was smiling, although Amanda could discern strain around her eyes. “Komm, sit. I have coffee almost ready, and there’s cherry crumb pie.”

  Insensibly, she relaxed a little. It seemed news couldn’t be too bad if it was accompanied by cherry crumb pie.

  They sat at one end of the long table designed for Amos and Sarah’s large family. No one said anything while Sarah was occupied with serving them, but once she was settled, there was a sense that the business of the evening was about to begin.

  Amanda couldn’t handle waiting any longer. “If this is about my renting the cottage...”

  “Ach, no. Why would you think that?” Sarah looked honestly surprised. “No, this is about a letter I received today.” She stopped, not seeming to know how to go on.

  Amos cleared his throat. “You wanted to talk to the Amish lad who found the Winthrop girl when she died.”

  “Sarah told us it was her cousin, Jacob Miller, who’d gone out west. Sarah was going to write to him.” Trey gave Sarah an encouraging smile. “I’m guessing Sarah has heard back from him. Is that right?”

  “Yah.” Sarah seemed to relax a little, as if that had gotten her over the difficulty of discussing it. “Jacob called and talked to me about it. He...he was shaken about the idea of Melanie’s child turning up after all this time.”

  Amanda stared at her, processing the words. “But...why would that...” Even as she started to ask the question, she saw the obvious answer.

  “When Trey asked, he referred to the person who found her as a boy,” Sarah said. “But Jacob wasn’t a boy. He was seventeen. A grown man. And he was in love with Melanie.”

  So there it was...the answer to the question that hadn’t seemed so important to her while she was intent on finding her mother. If she was Melanie’s child, that would mean Jacob Miller was her father.

  “I see.” Trey seemed to realize she was still absorbing the information. “Did you know about this at the time, Sarah?”

  Sarah’s forehead wrinkled. “I was just a child, but Jacob was my favorite cousin. He made a pet of me, maybe because he didn’t have a little sister. I knew, vaguely, that something was going on with him. I even knew that he was meeting someone up by the falls, but I didn’t understand what that meant.”

  Amanda’s hands moved involuntarily. “He’s all right with you telling us about it?”

  “Yah, for sure.” Sarah put her hand warmly over Amanda’s. “You have to understand. He never knew what happened to the baby. Or even if it was alive. Now...he’s overwhelmed that he has a daughter.”

  “We don’t know for sure. When the tests come back...”

  Sarah shook her head. “I don’t need to wait for tests. You’re Jacob’s child, all right. As soon as I knew why you were here, I felt it.”

  Amanda drew in a deep breath, trying to still her whirling thoughts. Maybe it was better to stick to the facts, such as they were, and try to put the emotions aside for now.

  Trey seemed to understand that she needed time. “Did Jacob say if anyone from Melanie’s family knew about him?”

  “Oh, no.” Sarah sounded sure of herself. “He wanted to go to them. When Melanie told him she was...was going to have a child, he wanted to go straight to her family. He wanted them to be married. He’d have taken care of her and the baby. But she wouldn’t let him. She said she’d handle it herself.”

  “Did he hear from her after she was sent away?” Trey asked.

  “No. It broke his heart, knowing she was out there someplace and not where. But then, that day in April, he found a note pushed in the door, telling him to meet her at their place.”

  Amanda’s mind had started working again. “Where was their place?”

  “At the top of the falls. If you didn’t go up to the top, you wouldn’t know, but there’s a cave up there. You know the place, Trey?”

  Trey nodded. “We always called it the Indian cave, although we didn’t have the least reason for believing the Native Americans had anything to do with it.”

  “So they’d meet there,” Sarah said, “whenever they could get away, and in her note, she told Jacob to meet her there.”

  “This cave...” Amanda frowned, trying to picture the location. “Do you have to climb up beside the falls to get to it?”

  If so, that could be how Melanie came to fall. For no good reason, the story Esther had told about feeling someone or something behind you when you were climbing up came into her mind.

  But Sarah was already shaking her head. “Ach, no, there’s an easier way in at the top. That’s how Jacob went that day, cutting through the woods instead of going along the road because it was much shorter.”

  Sarah’s gaze seemed fixed on something far away, as if she were seeing the scene as it unfolded in her cousin’s voice. “He was wonderful happy to hear from her. He’d been eating his heart out with not knowing, and now, at last...”

  Her voice died away.

  With a look at his wife’s face, Amos touched her shoulder in a soothing gesture. “You want I should tell it?”

  Sarah shook her head, brushing away a tear. “I will.” She took a deep breath, as if preparing herself. “Jacob said he was still in the woods, not far from the cave, when he heard Melanie’s voice.”

  “Was she calling to him?” Amanda asked, thinking to ease her over the difficulty of telling.

  “No. Jacob said it sounded like she was talking to someone.”

  She turned to Trey. “You know how the falls is so much louder from below than when you’re above it?”

  “That’s true. You probably wouldn’t hear someone talking if you were any distance from them at the base of the falls.”

  “But...” Amanda’s mind seemed to be spinning. “Who could she have been talking to, if not to him?”

  “I don’t know. Jacob didn’t know. He couldn’t see her from where she was, not with the trees and brush in between them. He says that he slowed down, not sure whether to call to her or not since someone
else was there.”

  “He’d think it might be someone from her family,” Amos put in, “with her not wanting them to know about him.”

  “Yah. And then...” Sarah’s voice shook. “Then he heard her scream.”

  “She fell.” Amos pronounced the words with finality.

  Amanda closed her eyes, trying to block out the vision of a body tumbling down the cliff face, hitting the rocks...

  Trey’s fingers tightened on hers. “Jacob would have run toward her when he heard the scream. Did he see anything?”

  “No.” Sarah wiped her face with both hands. “He said that he ran through the woods like a wild thing, shouting. But when he got within sight of the cave, there was nobody there. He went to the edge, and then he saw her.”

  Amos took over again. “He told Sarah that he climbed down as fast as he could, tumbling the last bit, and jumped in the water to pull her out. He carried her to the bank, but it was too late.”

  Amanda gave herself a mental shake. The scene had become too vivid, almost taking away her power to reason. But she had to think. There were still questions unanswered.

  “I don’t understand. Why didn’t Chief Carmichaels tell us any of this? Why would he hide it?”

  “He didn’t know, did he?” Trey sounded sure of his ground.

  Amos shook his head. “Jacob sat there with her. Grieving. He knew he had to do something, but what? He decided he’d have to run for the nearest telephone. Maybe the person who’d been with Melanie had already gone to call for help, but he didn’t know for sure.”

  “By the time he got to the nearest farm that had a telephone, he’d had time to think,” Sarah said. “He thought if they knew he was the father of Melanie’s baby, they’d be sure he was to blame for her death. When he thought about the grief it would cause his family...well, he just decided that if they asked, he’d have to tell them, but otherwise, he’d say as little as possible.”

  “I’m guessing from the way Chief Carmichaels spoke of it, that never entered their minds,” Trey said. “I remember hearing that one of her friends said Melanie loved the falls, and they figured she wanted to go there one last time.”