Material Witness

by Vannetta Chapman

  “I was on the way into town to stop at the shop to see if Callie could use my help.”

  “I suppose you heard about yesterday.”

  “Ya. Aaron’s okay?”

  Melinda sighed and adjusted Simon in the crook of her arms as she sat back on the couch. “Aaron appears to be fine. Don’t ask me how. I would probably be having nightmares if I saw a woman killed.” She shook her head, causing her kapp strings to brush against Simon’s baby blanket.

  “Last night Aaron was able to relay facts to Shane, and for the most part he didn’t become upset — not until the very end. He did seem more tired than usual, falling asleep in his chair before I could put him in the buggy. I can’t remember the last time he did that. But otherwise, it’s as if he can put the events he witnessed behind him.”

  Esther barely flinched at the mention of Shane’s name — another sign God was still in the business of changing hearts. But then, without Shane, her marriage to Tobias would be an entirely different thing. His cousin Reuben might be serving a life sentence in jail right now. Shane had solved the case of Katie’s death. He was the reason her family was whole.

  Esther pushed away the memories of last fall’s tragedy.

  “Tell me what happened. I want to hear it from you. My mamm wasn’t very clear.”

  After Melinda had related the night’s events, Esther stared at her in disbelief. “How can this be happening to us again?”

  “I know. It doesn’t seem possible.”

  “At least none of us are wanted for this murder. I suppose that’s a blessing.”

  “Ya.” Simon began to stir and root around, so Melinda handed him back, a grin spreading across her face. “I believe he’s looking for you. I’ll go and grab us two mugs of tea while you allow him to nurse.”

  “Tea would be great. Do you have something herbal?”

  “Ya. Of course.”

  By the time Melinda returned with the drinks, Esther remembered the other reason she’d stopped by. “I wanted to talk to you about these quilts that we’re restoring. The work’s more challenging than I expected.”

  “Yours too? I can see why they’re valuable — the stitching is exquisite, but I can’t figure out the pattern on the border.”

  “I agree. That’s why I brought mine over. I’ve never seen a quilt pieced together like this before. I asked my mamm about it, and she said it looks like a storybook quilt to her.”

  Melinda pushed up her glasses and cocked her head at the same time. “Hadn’t thought of that. I’ve never seen an actual storybook quilt, though I have heard of them. Hang on a minute.”

  When Melinda returned with her quilt, Simon was done nursing. He burped, then smiled at them both.

  “That boy is as charming as his father.” Esther spread Simon’s quilt on the floor and placed him on it, then stacked pillows around him.

  “Here’s the quilt I’m supposed to restore. I’ve gotten as far as reinforcing the stitching on the first few panels.”

  “But the border makes no sense on yours either.”

  Melinda frowned. “The top and bottom do. I had no problem there.”

  “Which is odd in and of itself. When was the last time you saw a quilt that had a border change on two sides? I don’t even know what I’m sewing on my quilt.” Esther bent over the tiny stitches that constituted the side borders. “At first I thought it was a type of pattern work, but it doesn’t repeat in any way that makes sense. Look at mine. It’s the same.”

  Esther went to her sewing bag and pulled out the quilt top of the piece she’d agreed to restore. “Now the workmanship is excellent, as you pointed out. I’d say it’s better than what even you or I or Deborah are able to do.”

  “Ya, some of the older women had a real gift. My mamm said that Mrs. Hochstetler was the finest quilter she had ever known — that she taught many of her generation how to quilt and that plain women from several counties once came to learn stitching from her.”

  Esther frowned. “Why don’t I remember any of this?”

  “I believe she stopped quilting before we started. You know I visited with her more than you did because my mamm’s aenti and Mrs. Hochstetler’s schweschder were freinden. I was never clear on how they knew each other. But she would show up at our family gatherings, and she’d always comment on my quilts or offer to show me how to improve my stitching. She couldn’t sew very much herself at that point because of the arthritis in her hands. It was quite crippling.”

  Melinda’s expression grew distant, a look Esther had seen far too often on her friend’s face.

  “What is it? What did you remember just then?”

  Smiling, Melinda stared down at the quilt again. “Mrs. Hochstetler had a special way with Aaron. Where other people would ask about him in general or maybe shy away from the topic, she would want to know specifics — like whether he’d managed to pull himself up yet, or if he could put on his own clothes. She wasn’t being nosy either. She took a real interest. She was a sweet lady, and I’m going to miss her.”

  Esther reached out and patted her friend on the arm, but then she remembered the problem facing them. “I wish she’d thought to tell you more about these quilts before she passed. I have no idea what to do with this border. Honestly, mine is as big a mess as yours, and it’s going to have to be redone before we can sell them. Look at this —”

  As she was talking, she’d laid her quilt top down beside Melinda’s on the floor, laid it down so that they could see how one quilt was in as bad a shape as the other.

  Instead, what they saw was that, when laid together, the two quilts looked like two pieces taken from the same puzzle — except they didn’t quite fit together.

  “It still doesn’t make any sense.” Esther stood and frowned at the two quilts. “It almost looks like —”

  “I’ll tell you what it almost looks like.” Melinda’s voice filled with wonder, sounded exactly like Tobias’ when he spoke to his newborn son. Melinda stayed on the floor, kneeling beside the two quilts, but she reached for Esther’s quilt and turned it so that the top borders were now side by side and the side borders — the borders that were indecipherable — now touched.

  “It almost looks like the borders we couldn’t figure out form an old German script.” Melinda glanced up, a smile tugging at the corners of her lips.

  “Script that is divided between two quilts.”

  “So you can’t read it, unless you put the two quilts side by side.” Melinda’s smile widened.

  They stared at each other in surprise.

  “Your quilt has the top half of the words,” Esther whispered.

  “And your quilt has the bottom.”

  “Exactly like a puzzle.”

  Chapter 9

  DEBORAH DIRECTED HER BROWN MARE, Cinnamon, into the parking lot of Daisy’s Quilt Shop just as the downtown clock was striking noon. As she pulled in, she remembered she was supposed to have called first. Well, obviously the shop was open, so no harm done. She’d hoped to arrive an hour earlier, but Joshua had put her behind schedule. Her two-and-a-half-year-old had decided to pull off his diaper and run around the house naked, which had resulted in not one but two accidents. It was definitely time to potty train her youngest, and she intended to — soon. But festival weekend wasn’t the ideal time.

  Joshua smiled and put two chubby hands on her face as she lifted him out of the buggy.

  “We see Callie?”

  “Yes, sweetie. We’re going to see Callie.”

  “We see Max?”

  “Yes, we’ll see Max, but you be gut. Keep your pants on, young man.”

  Joshua patted her cheeks. “Pants on.”

  “Exactly.” She wondered again if she should have accepted Martha’s offer to come along, but Deborah knew her oldest had actually wanted to play with her cousins. The Fall Festival was an exciting weekend in Shipshewana. It didn’t seem fair to stick Martha with babysitting instead.

  Jonas had assured her he would see that the children
finished the day’s chores before noon, before Miriam, Deborah’s closest sister, arrived to take the children into town. His last words to her before she left had been, “Help your freinden, but be careful in the crowds, Deb.” A soft touch, and then he was gone to work in the fields. He’d join them in town later that afternoon.

  So though she could have used Martha’s help, she knew her daughter would have more fun playing and attending the festival with her cousins.

  She placed Joshua on the ground, pulled his wool cap down so he wouldn’t lose it, then reached for his hand as he toddled toward the front door of Callie’s shop. The parking lot was full in spite of last night’s excitement. A ribbon of yellow crime-scene tape at the far side of the lot was the single telltale sign of Mrs. Knepp’s murder.

  Deborah guided Joshua down the crowded sidewalk, under the berry-colored canopy that shaded the windows, and up to the front door of the shop. She had barely reached for the handle of the door when Callie pulled it open, causing the bell to ring merrily.

  “You can’t come in,” she said.

  “What?”

  “I’m sorry. Read the sign. Things are crazy, and I had to make some new guidelines. You understand.”

  “Understand —”

  “It’s on the sign.” Callie pointed at a handwritten sheet of paper taped to the front door, as she emphasized the word sign, like it held some special meaning. Then she began to push the door shut.

  “What … Wait. What are you doing?”

  Joshua reached forward and tugged on Callie’s jean skirt. “Max? Joshua see Max.”

  “I’m sorry, Deb. It’s just for this weekend.” Something like regret and a steely stubbornness shot through Callie’s eyes, then she nudged Joshua out of the way, back into Deborah’s dress, before slamming the door shut, rattling the glass.

  Deborah was left standing on the stoop, gazing at the sheet of paper that read, “No children under three years of age permitted in store during Fall Crafters’ Fair.”

  She read it again, but the words didn’t change.

  What in the world?

  Why was this sign on Callie’s door?

  Why had her friend shut the door in her face?

  Two Englisch women murmured apologies and brushed past Deborah, into Callie’s shop.

  Deborah wanted to stamp her foot. She wanted to march inside and demand to know what was going on. Instead she reached down, picked up Joshua, and made her way back to her buggy, to Cinnamon, and — she supposed — to home.

  Except she didn’t want to go home.

  The festival was in full swing around her. So she found herself on the sidewalk, in the growing crowd of people, moving toward downtown.

  What could have come over Callie?

  Deborah had never seen her act rudely before.

  Her mind raced back over the previous night. Joshua hadn’t even been with her. He’d been home with Jonas and the twins. Martha had been at the shop with Aaron and Matthew. Had that been the problem? Too many children in the store?

  But the sign had specifically said “No children under three years of age.” And only for this weekend!

  Deborah was so deep in thought, so busy trying to puzzle out the abrupt change in Callie’s behavior, and at the same time so busy trying to weave her way through the crowd while holding onto Joshua, that she practically ran into a chain-saw carver walking straight toward her.

  Wearing an unbuttoned plaid shirt, the T-shirt underneath read “Will carve for food.” He was carrying a small chain saw and wore a ball cap that boasted a handsaw and covered badly kept hair that fell to his shoulders. Unshaven stubble added to his already unkempt look and sideburns stretched down to his jawline.

  “Excuse me,” she murmured, stepping around him.

  But instead of allowing her to pass, he reversed direction and fell into step beside her. “Mind if I walk with you?”

  The voice was familiar, but it didn’t match —

  “Don’t stare,” Shane murmured. “Keep walking until we reach my booth.”

  “Your booth?” Deborah’s voice squeaked, causing a few people to turn and stare.

  “I’m a chain-saw carver. Can’t you tell?”

  “You know how to chainsaw?”

  “I live in Indiana. I’m a man. I can chainsaw.”

  “But why —”

  “Just keep walking.”

  “I think I’ve fallen down the rabbit hole Martha read about in school.” Deborah hugged Joshua to her, stopping in the middle of the sidewalk so the pedestrian traffic streamed around her like water in a river flowed around a large boulder.

  “Don’t stop, Deborah. We need to act normal. It’s just a little farther.”

  She looked into his eyes then, and when she did, the times they’d depended on each other surged forward in her memory. His disguise fell away, and she was no longer in the midst of a crowd, confused and jostled up against a person she didn’t recognize. Instead she was standing next to someone she could trust — she was standing beside her friend.

  “Ya, okay. I can do that.”

  Five minutes later they were at his booth. Joshua was seated in the corner, playing with a toy truck someone had carved, and she was listening to Shane explain what had happened to Callie, how they were going to help her, and what they needed to do to catch Mrs. Knepp’s killer.

  The entire story sounded insane.

  “You believe me. Don’t you?” Shane’s voice was urgent, and his eyes pinned Deborah to the stool she was perched on.

  “I suppose. Yes. But Shane, why can’t you simply call in more help? Take Callie out of the shop if they’re watching her. Take her somewhere she’ll be safe. Then catch this terrible person some other way.” She ran her hand up and down one of the strings of her prayer kapp, knowing she wasn’t going to like his answer.

  “I almost did.” Shane scratched the sideburns that must have been fake but certainly looked real. He hadn’t shaved either, that much was evident. It occurred to her that he probably hadn’t rested at all since the 9-1-1 call she’d placed the night before. “I almost insisted she close the shop and come into protective custody. She didn’t want to, but I could have found a way to force her. And I still would, except for Aaron.”

  When a couple stopped to watch him carve, he held up his chain saw and smiled at them. “Booth will open in another hour, folks.”

  They nodded and moved on.

  “Whose booth is this?”

  “Don’t worry about it. I paid him to rent it to me when I need it. He’ll show back up when I text him.”

  Deborah closed her eyes, trying to make Shane’s words come together in some pattern, trying to make them make sense. Opening her eyes, she checked once more on Joshua, then scooted her stool closer to Shane, lowering her voice. “What is your worry about Aaron? That he’s a witness?”

  “Yes. And the person who killed Mrs. Knepp, tranq’d Max, and called Callie last night also directly threatened Aaron. It wouldn’t take him fifteen minutes in this town to figure out where Aaron lives.”

  “You could hide Aaron too, at least until you catch this man …” Deborah’s voice wavered as she realized what she was suggesting.

  “Do you think Melinda and Noah would allow that? Would they hide as well? You understand the Amish mind-set better than I do, Deborah, but as much as I’ve worked with them, I’d guess no. I don’t think they would. I believe they’d say —”

  “They’d say it’s Gotte’s wille, that they’re under Gotte’s protection.” Deborah stared at her son, rolling a wooden truck back and forth. “They’d say that they’re safer where they are than trusting Englischers.”

  “So you agree my plan is the best way?”

  Deborah studied Shane closely then. His disguise couldn’t hide his piercing black eyes, haggard expression, and the intensity that he didn’t know he possessed. His plan was rather crazy, but it might work.

  Except for one thing.

  One thing he didn’t realize, bu
t she did. It was as clear as the feeling of excitement going through the crowd that passed his wood-carving booth. Shane Black had fallen in love with Callie Harper.

  When had it happened?

  Her mind sifted back through the months since Callie had arrived in town, flipped through them like so many pages in a book. She supposed it didn’t matter when he had crossed the line from dealing with her as a detective to being her friend to hoping their relationship would grow more intimate. What mattered was that this man cared about one of her best friends. He cared about her deeply.

  He’d do his job, and he’d do it professionally.

  He’d find a way to protect both Callie and Aaron.

  And she had no doubt he’d find a way to bring the man and woman who were responsible for this awful situation to justice.

  But would he understand that the weight he was carrying was his love for the woman working in the shop a half-mile down the road?

  That was something Deborah wasn’t so sure about. As she gathered Joshua and hurried back to Cinnamon, hurried to carry out her portion of Shane’s plan, she also realized it was something that would have to wait.

  “You want to go, don’t you?” Matt’s voice didn’t leave much room for arguing. It was more a statement than a question.

  They were making their way back from the pond. Aaron held the fishing rods out in front of him, as if he were still planning on reeling one in. He studied the rods and took his time answering.

  “Well?”

  “I’m thinking.”

  “What’s there to think about? It’s the biggest day of the year. Chain-saw carvers, musicians, more food booths than last night, cloggers, painters —”

  “I remember what’s all there.”

  “Not to mention everyone from school.”

  “Ya.” Truthfully Aaron did want to go. At least he didn’t want to stay home, which was the same as wanting to go. Wasn’t it?