Shamed

by Linda Castillo

“Where’s his wife?” I ask.

  “Inside,” Rasmussen says. “I talked to her. She didn’t see anything.”

  Outrage thrashes inside me, expands in my chest. I think about Sadie Stutzman and Noah Schwartz. I think about Mary Yoder and now David Troyer. I think about Elsie Helmuth, terrified and alone and in terrible danger—if she’s still alive. And now the bishop’s wife, a woman who likely knows more than she’s letting on, has nothing to say.

  “Mike, did you question her?” I ask.

  “Of course I did.”

  “I want a go at her.”

  The sheriff’s eyes narrow. “You think she’s not being forthcoming?”

  I lay out my theory, hating the quaver in my voice. That I’m angry and upset. As implausible as all of it seems, I know I’m right. “I think Bishop Troyer was involved with this … adoption.”

  “If there was a newborn stolen, why wasn’t it reported to the authorities?” he asks, incredulity thick in his voice.

  “Because they wanted to handle it on their own. Because they didn’t want to involve Children Services. They knew someone would try to stop them. All of the above.”

  “Look, Kate, we’ll certainly take a hard look into all that, but—”

  “The bishop in Crooked Creek was killed in a hit-and-run buggy accident two weeks ago, Mike. The midwife who was part of this was murdered in her home early this morning.” I motion toward the buggy. “Now Bishop Troyer has been shot. I believe they were targeted. I believe the person who abducted Elsie Helmuth is responsible. And I don’t think he’s finished.”

  “Let’s not get ahead of ourselves here. That determination will be made after we look at all the facts.”

  I like Mike Rasmussen. He’s a good cop and a friend. He’s a decent sheriff who knows how to run his department. He’s not overly political, but he’s not opposed to scratching the occasional back to get what he wants. He knows how to get things done. He’s easygoing. Reasonable. I never have to wonder if he has my back; I know he does. None of those things come close to convincing me I’m getting ahead of myself.

  I turn away from him and start toward the house.

  “Where are you going?” he asks.

  “I’m going to talk to Freda Troyer.”

  “She’s already been interviewed, Kate. That poor woman is trying to get to the hospital to be with her husband.”

  “I’ll take her,” I say without breaking stride.

  “Damn it, Kate.”

  I turn so abruptly, the sheriff nearly runs into me. He sets his hand on my arm, but I shake it off. “You need to trust me on this, Mike.”

  “That works both ways.”

  “I’m right about this, so back off.”

  “This is my jurisdiction.”

  It was the one thing that didn’t need to be said. In the years I’ve been chief, Mike and I have never argued about turf. We’ve never had to. We work together well. My department covers county as much as it does Painters Mill. The certainty that I’m right won’t let me back down.

  “Freda Troyer knows more than she’s letting on,” I tell him. “I’m going to talk to her because I want answers and I damn well want them now.”

  * * *

  I walk into the Troyer home to find Freda pacing the kitchen. She’s wearing a charcoal-colored dress, a black cardigan, practical shoes. She’s put a black winter bonnet over her prayer kapp. Dinner plates and flatware have been set out on the table. A cast-iron skillet sits atop the stove, filled with fried chicken in grease that’s gone white. Evidently, she’d been holding dinner for her husband.

  “Freda?” I say as I enter.

  She startles and turns to me. “Kate.” I see anguish in her face. Worry etched into her every feature. Dried blood on hands she didn’t think to wash. “How is he?” she asks.

  “I don’t know. Ambulance took him to the hospital.” I approach her, trying to read her frame of mind. Calm on the outside, coming apart on the inside. Struggling for strength. Hanging on by a thread.

  “Get your things,” I say. “I’ll take you.”

  “Our neighbor is going to take me. He’s harnessing the buggy horse now.”

  “I’ll ask one of my deputies to let him know you got a ride.” When she hesitates, I add, “I’m going anyway; you may as well ride with me. I’ll get you there a lot faster.”

  While Freda gathers her things—a canvas bag filled with what looks like knitting supplies, a small devotional book—I radio Glock and ask him to tell the neighbor that I’ll be driving the bishop’s wife to the hospital.

  “You guys figure out where the shooting took place?” I ask him.

  “Deputy followed the blood trail,” he tells me. “Looks like it happened where County Road 150 intersects with Township Road 104.”

  I know the area. It’s rural, not many houses. The perfect place for an ambush. “Anyone see anything?”

  “We’re canvassing now.”

  “Tire marks? Anything like that?”

  “Still looking around, Chief.”

  “I’ll be there as soon as I can.”

  I drop the cell into my pocket, turn to see the bishop’s wife standing in the doorway, clutching her bag, staring at me. “Let’s go,” I say.

  She follows me outside. I feel the stares track us as I make my way to the Explorer, but I don’t make eye contact with anyone. I open the passenger door for her, and then I round the front of the vehicle and get in. I don’t see Tomasetti anywhere. I put the vehicle in gear and we start down the lane.

  I raise my hand to the deputy at the road, then make a right and head toward Millersburg. I only have a few minutes to ask the questions that need to be asked. I have no idea what we’ll find when we arrive at Pomerene Hospital. Glock had said it’s bad. The one thing I am certain of is that this woman may hold the key.

  “I know Bishop Schwartz from Scioto County brought a newborn baby to Bishop Troyer seven years ago,” I say as I pull onto the highway. “I know the baby was taken to Miriam and Ivan Helmuth.”

  She looks over at me, anguish churning in her eyes. “I don’t know what that has to do with what’s happened to my husband.”

  “It has everything to do with it, Freda, and if you know anything at all that will help me get to the bottom of it, you need to speak up right now.”

  I tell her about the eyeglasses, my trip to Crooked Creek. “Freda, look at my face. I was ambushed and beaten. Bishop Schwartz is dead. The midwife who helped bring that child up here was murdered this morning. Now your husband has been shot. If you care one iota about that little girl, you need to start talking.”

  The Amish woman stares straight forward, frozen, except for the occasional tremor that runs through her. For the first time I see tears on her cheeks. But she doesn’t make a sound.

  I push harder. “What if he kills little Elsie Helmuth?” I shout. “What if he goes after Miriam and Ivan or their children? Is all that holier-than-thou-art silence of yours worth it if someone else is killed?”

  “Don’t you dare speak to me in that manner, Kate Burkholder. You of all people. Backslider. Maulgrischt,” she hisses. Pretend Christian. “Your mother didn’t know what to do with you and you broke her heart.”

  She’s getting herself worked up. Maybe because it’s easier to be angry with me than it is to be terrified for the life of her husband.

  I keep my voice level. “This isn’t about me.”

  She’s not finished. “Mer sott em sei eegne net verlosse; Gott verlosst die seine nicht.” One should not abandon one’s own; God does not abandon his own. “You did just that, Katie. And now look at you, talking to me as if I’m somehow to blame.”

  I’ve heard the words a hundred times since I came back to Painters Mill. I want to believe they no longer affect me. That I’m immune. Above it. But even after all this time, the small part of me that is Amish—that will always be Amish—recoils from the sting.

  “That’s enough,” I snap. “I know you’re hurting and afraid, bu
t I need your help and I need it right now. I’m trying to do the right thing. Do my job. Do you understand?”

  Turning her head, she looks out the window, shutting me out.

  I hit her with the coup de grâce. “If Elsie Helmuth is killed, it’s on your shoulders, Freda. You got that?”

  Silence reigns for the span of several minutes. I make the turn onto US 62 and head north. Neither of us speaks until I’m stopped at the traffic light at Jackson Street in Millersburg. The courthouse is to my right, the old Hotel Millersburg to my left.

  “You have to understand,” she says in a strangled voice. “Being the bishop’s wife … I see things. I hear things. That doesn’t mean I’m told what’s going on.”

  “Tell me what you know.”

  “I was there the night they brought her,” she whispers. “David told me I was to never speak of it. I took those words to heart.”

  “Who brought her?”

  “Bishop Schwartz and a midwife. They brought her here to the house. A tiny little girl. Hours old. She was desperately hungry. I fed her, held her in my arms…”

  “Do you know who the parents are?” I ask. “I need names.”

  “No.” She shakes her head adamantly. “They did not say, and I did not ask. It was a night filled with worry and tears and many things left unsaid.”

  “Why did they do it?”

  “There is a saying among the Amish.” She looks at me. “Die besht vayk zu flucht eevil is zu verfolgen goot,” she whispers. The best way to escape evil is to pursue good.

  “The bishop, my husband, and that midwife were pursuing good, Katie. All they wanted was to place that innocent baby in a loving home, where she would be safe, and so she would be raised Amish.”

  “The baby came from an Amish family?”

  She shrugs. “I assumed so. Why else would they do such a thing?”

  “Freda, why did they take her?”

  “I don’t know, Katie. They were … secretive about all that.” The woman shrugs. “I suspected there was something wrong in the home. Some … problem.”

  “What kind of problem?”

  “Something bad, or they never would have done what they did. I know my husband. He is a good man, a godly man, and a good bishop. He does not overstep. If there is something I need to know, he will tell me.” She shakes her head. “Katie, it would have been unseemly for me to ask questions at such a time. Some of the things the bishop does are … delicate. You know, private.”

  “Was the baby brought here with the blessing of the family?”

  “I do not know.”

  Everything she’s told me grinds in my head like shards of glass in a kaleidoscope. I already knew or suspected most of it. What I need more than anything is a name. That’s when it occurs to me that Crooked Creek is four hours away by car. There’s no way they would have transported a baby in a buggy.

  “Freda, did they use a driver?”

  She nods. “They came in a van.”

  “Did you see the driver?”

  “No. He stayed outside.”

  As I make the turn into the hospital parking lot, the Amish woman tosses me a knowing look. “You believe the parents or some relative of the baby are responsible for the bad things that have been done?”

  “I do.”

  She thinks about that a moment. “I’m glad I told you, Katie. It was the right thing to do. God willing, David will give you the name you need when we talk to him.”

  * * *

  According to the emergency room physician, Bishop Troyer was rushed to surgery upon arrival. He sustained a single gunshot wound to his abdomen; it’s a life-threatening injury, the seriousness exacerbated by his age. All the doctor can tell us at this point is that the bishop is in extremely critical condition and not yet stable.

  I walk with Freda to the surgical intensive care waiting area, where a family with small children stares at the television tuned to some mindless sitcom. I leave Freda there, find a vending machine down the hall, and buy two coffees. When I return, she’s sitting in the same place, her head bowed in prayer, tears streaming.

  I’ve known Freda since I was six years old and she smacked my behind with her horse crop when I clobbered one of the other Amish kids. She has always been a strong woman, is much respected by the community, and nearly as formidable as her husband. Tonight, seeing her like this, touches a place inside me I don’t want prodded.

  Steeling myself against the sight of her broken and weeping, I approach and hand her the steaming cup. “Fortification,” I say, offering a smile.

  She takes the paper cup and sips. “Good Lord, that’s the worst coffee I ever had.”

  “That’s only because you haven’t been to the police station.”

  We exchange a look and then we fall silent. I’m not happy with Freda Troyer or the bishop. They were involved in something malapropos seven years ago. Even after the murder of Mary Yoder, and the abduction of Elsie Helmuth, they didn’t come forward. Even after I asked, they held their silence—and possibly information that might have prevented this most recent tragedy. With the bishop’s life hanging by a thread, I’m hard-pressed to castigate her.

  “I can’t stay,” I tell her. “I have to get back out there and try to find the person responsible.”

  The Amish woman nods. “Thank you for bringing me to be with my husband.”

  She may be alone at the moment, but I know she won’t be for long. Word of the shooting and the bishop’s condition will spread through the Amish community like wildfire. I know that even as we speak, half a dozen buggies are already en route.

  “Freda, is there anything else you can tell me that might help me find the person who did this?”

  She shakes her head. “I’ve told you everything I know.”

  I walk away, leaving her with her anguish, her fear, and the knowledge that the shooting of her husband isn’t the only tragedy that must be dealt with.

  CHAPTER 19

  Seventy-eight hours missing

  I arrive at the intersection of County Road 150 and Township Road 104 to find Glock’s cruiser blocking traffic, his emergency lights flashing. He’s set out flares, but he’s nowhere in sight. A quarter mile ahead, a Holmes County cruiser is parked in the same fashion. The deputy is setting up a reflective wooden horse.

  I tug my cell from the console and call Skid. Last I heard, he’d gone home to get some sleep. I’m loath to call him back to work, but I can’t spare him.

  He answers with a groggy “Yeah.”

  “Sorry to wake you.”

  “I wasn’t asleep.” We laugh because we both know it’s not true.

  I tell him about Bishop Troyer.

  “Damn, Chief, the bishop? Is he—”

  “He’s alive, but critical. The problem is I don’t know if the son of a bitch who shot him is finished. I need you to go out to the Helmuth place and keep an eye on things. Keep your radio handy. Wear your vest.”

  A thoughtful silence and then, “You got it.”

  I end the call and I’m reminded that I’ll need to pick up another sidearm when I get back to the station. Around me, the area is heavily treed, except to the south where yellow cornstalks shiver in a brisk north wind. The temperature is falling fast and I suspect it’ll dip into the twenties by morning.

  Hitting my emergency lights, I park behind Glock’s cruiser, grab my Maglite, and go in search of him. I spot the cone of a flashlight just inside the tree line and start that way.

  I call out to him. “Find anything?”

  Glock motions toward the road where there’s a smattering of tiny orange cones. “Got blood on the road there, Chief. Starts right there where I’m parked. I’m pretty sure this is where the shooting took place.”

  “Brass?”

  “Nada.”

  “Anyone else on scene?”

  He motions toward the deputy at the end of the road. “County arrived a few minutes ago. Pickles and T.J. started a canvass.”

  We both know with
so many trees and the neighboring houses set back from the road and separated by miles of fields, the chances of finding a witness are slim.

  We reach the cones. Glock shifts his Maglite. The yellow beam reveals the red-black gleam of blood on the asphalt; additional spatters the size of half-dollars stand out against the yellow line. A few larger pools. Too much, I think, and I pull the mini Maglite from my pocket and kneel. Our beams merge.

  “A lot of blood,” he mutters. “How’s the old guy?”

  “They just took him into surgery.”

  “He able to tell you anything?”

  I shake my head. “I don’t think he’s going to be talking any time soon.”

  We study the blood for a moment, our beams sweeping left and right, from puddle to puddle, trying to figure out exactly where the shooting took place.

  “According to his wife,” I say, “the bishop was on his way home from the Helmuth place.” I set my beam on the ground, find a spot of blood that’s been run over by a buggy wheel. Glock drops a cone next to it.

  “He would have been traveling north,” I tell him.

  “That helps.” Setting his hands on his hips, Glock pauses, looks around, motions with his eyes to the woods where the trees are thick. “If I wanted to ambush someone and I thought they might be coming this way, I’d take cover in those trees over there.”

  I follow his gaze to the place where I’d found him when I arrived. “He would have had decent cover.”

  “And a clean shot,” he adds.

  We traverse the ditch and reenter the woods. Though most of the trees have lost their leaves, the trunks are close together and the underbrush is thick, making it difficult to maneuver. The ground is spongy beneath my boots, layered with fallen leaves and rotting foliage. We reach a clearing and split up, moving slowly, our beams sweeping left and right as we make our way more deeply into the forest.

  It’s so cold I can see my breaths puff out in front of me. I take my time, keeping my eyes on the ground, looking for the gleam of a cartridge or ground that’s been disturbed. I check the trees and brush I pass by for broken branches or threads from clothing. Any sign that someone has been here recently. My beam illuminates wet leaves, fallen branches, dozens of naked saplings. I don’t venture too far from the road. Chances are, whoever shot Bishop Troyer stood just inside the tree line or possibly a clearing. Well covered, but not seen …