Plain Truth

by Jodi Picoult

  Judge Gorman nodded thoughtfully. "Would you like to share those conditions with us?"

  Ellie took a deep breath. She'd love to; she just hadn't thought of them yet. She looked swiftly toward Leda and Frank and the Amish woman sitting between them, and suddenly it all came clear. "We respectfully request bail, Judge, with the following stipulations: that Katie Fisher not be allowed to leave East Paradise Township, but that she be allowed to live at home on her parents' farm. In return, she must be under the supervision of a family member at all times. As for bail--I would think that twenty thousand dollars is a fair amount to ask."

  The prosecutor laughed. "Your Honor, that's ludicrous. A bail statute is a bail statute; and Murder One is Murder One. It's like that in fancy felony cases in Philadelphia, too, so Ms. Hathaway can't plead ignorance. If the proof wasn't evident we wouldn't be charging it this way. Clearly Katie Fisher should not be released on any bail."

  The judge let his gaze touch upon the prosecutor, the defense attorney, and then Katie. "You know, coming in here this morning, I had no intention of doing what I'm about to do. But if I'm even going to consider your conditions, Ms. Hathaway, I need to know that someone agrees to be responsible for Katie Fisher. I want her father's word that she'll be supervised twenty-four/seven." He turned to the gallery. "Mr. Fisher, would you make yourself known?"

  Leda stood up and cleared her throat. "He's not here, Your Honor." She pulled hard at her sister's arm, dragging her to a standing position as well. "This is Katie's mother."

  "All right, Mrs. Fisher. Are you willing to accept total legal responsibility for your daughter?"

  Sarah looked down at her feet, her words so soft the judge had to strain to hear them. "No," she admitted.

  Judge Gorman blinked. "I beg your pardon?"

  Sarah raised her face, tears in her eyes. "I cannot."

  "I can, Your Honor," Leda said.

  "You live with the family?"

  She hesitated. "I could move in."

  Sarah shook her head again, whispering furiously. "Aaron won't let you!"

  The judge impatiently rapped his fingers on the desk. "Is there any relative of Ms. Fisher's here today willing to take responsibility for her round the clock, who doesn't have a problem with the church or her father?"

  "I'll do it."

  Judge Gorman turned to Ellie, who seemed just as surprised to have uttered the words as he had been to hear them. "That's certainly devoted of you, Counsel, but we're looking for a family member."

  "I know," Ellie said, swallowing hard. "I'm her cousin."

  FOUR

  Ellie

  When George Callahan stood up and roared his objection, I had to stop myself from seconding his motion. God, what on earth was I thinking? I came to East Paradise burned out; taking on this girl's case was the last thing I wanted to do--and now I had volunteered myself to be Katie Fisher's warden. Through a haze of disbelief I heard the judge rule against the prosecutor; set bail at $20,000 with provisions, and put me into a prison I'd created for myself.

  Suddenly Frank and Leda were standing in front of me, Leda smiling through her tears and Frank staring at me with his solemn dark eyes. "You sure you're all right with this, Ellie?" he asked.

  Leda answered for me. "Of course she is. Why, she's saving Katie for us."

  I glanced down at the girl beside me, still huddled in her chair. Since our brief interlude in the supply room, she hadn't said a word. She flicked her gaze at me--I saw the bright blaze of resentment. Immediately, my hackles rose. Did she think I was doing this for my own health?

  I narrowed my eyes, prepared to give a piece of my mind, but was stopped by a soft touch on my arm. An older, worn version of Katie decked out in full Amish costume waited for my attention. "My daughter thanks you," she said haltingly. "I thank you. But my husband will not want an Englischer staying with us."

  Leda turned on her. "If Bishop Ephram said it's all right to talk to an English lawyer, he's going to say it's all right for that same lawyer to meet the bail conditions. And if the whole community is willing to bend the rules for Katie's welfare, Sarah, couldn't you just once stand with them instead of by your stubborn husband's side?"

  In my whole life, I'd never heard Leda raise her voice. Yet here she was, practically yelling at her sister, until the other woman was cowering beneath the words. Leda slipped her arm through mine. "Come along, Ellie," she said. "You'll want to be packing up your things." She started out of the courthouse, stopping once to look over her shoulder at Sarah and her daughter. "You heard the judge. Katie must be with Ellie at all times. So let's go."

  I let Leda drag me out of the district court, and felt the heat of Katie Fisher's stare burning into my back.

  The road to the Fisher farm ran parallel to a creek, which then cut behind their land to form the rear edge of their hundred acres. This world was a kaleidoscope of color: kelly green corn, red silos, and above it all, a sky as wide and as blue as a robin's egg. But what struck me the most was the smell, a mixture of notes as distinctive as any city perfume: the sweat of horses, honeysuckle, the rich tang of overturned earth. If I closed my eyes and breathed deeply, magic happened: I was eleven again and here to spend the summer.

  We had dropped off Frank and picked up my suitcases, and now, an hour later, Leda was turning up the long driveway that led to the Fishers' home. Staring out the window, I saw a pair of men driving a team of mules across a field. The animals hauled a tremendous, old-fashioned piece of equipment--God only knew what it was. It seemed to be tossing up tufts of hay that were already lying on the ground. At the sound of the car on the gravel, the bigger man looked up, hauled on the reins, and then took off his hat to wipe the sweat from his forehead. He shaded his eyes and glanced toward Leda's car, then handed the reins to the smaller fellow beside him and took off at a dead run for the farmhouse.

  He got there ten seconds after the car rolled to a stop. Leda and I stepped out first, then let Katie and Sarah out of the backseat. The man, broad and blond, began speaking words that made no sense to me--the first time I considered that the English Katie had so carefully put before the judge was not her first language, nor that of the people I was going to be moving in with. Sarah answered back, equally unintelligible.

  My high heels wobbled on the gravel. I stripped off my suit jacket, uncomfortable in the heat, and studied the man who had come to greet us.

  He was too young to be the Father from Hell who had been introduced in absentia in the courtroom. A brother, maybe. But then I caught him staring at Katie with a look that was anything but brotherly. I glanced at Katie, and noticed she was not looking at him the same way.

  All of a sudden, in the run of language, there came a word I knew--my own name. Sarah gestured to me, smiled uncomfortably, and then nodded to the blond man. He took my suitcase from the trunk and set it down beside him, then offered me his hand to shake. "I am Samuel Stoltzfus," he said. "Thank you for taking care of my Katie."

  Did he notice the way Katie stiffened at the possessive claim? Did anyone but me?

  Hearing the metallic clop of hooves and harness behind me, I turned to see someone leading a horse into the barn. Wiry and muscular, the man had a thick red beard just beginning to sport streaks of gray. Beneath his black trousers he wore a pale blue shirt, the sleeves rolled up to the elbows. He glanced at us, briefly frowning at the sight of Leda's car. Then he continued into the barn, only to reappear a moment later.

  Ignoring everyone else, he went straight to Sarah and began to speak quietly but firmly to her in their language. Sarah bowed her head, a willow branch under a wind. But Leda took a step forward and began talking back to him. She pointed to Katie, and to me, and shook her fists. Her eyes snapping with frustration, she set her hands on my shoulders and shoved me forward, into Aaron Fisher's scrutiny.

  I had watched men step apart from themselves at the moment they were sentenced to life in prison; I had seen the blankness in a witness's eyes when she recounted the night she was atta
cked; but never had I seen a detachment like I saw on that man's face. He held himself in check, as if admitting to his pain might crack him into a thousand pieces; as if we were age-old adversaries; as if he knew, deep down, that he'd already been beaten.

  I held out my hand. "It is a pleasure."

  Aaron turned away without touching me. He approached his daughter, and the world fell away, so that when he tipped his forehead against Katie's and whispered to her with tears in his eyes, I ducked my head to offer them privacy. Katie nodded, starting for the house with her father's arm locked around her shoulders.

  In a tight knot, Samuel, Sarah, and Leda followed, talking heatedly in their dialect. I stood alone in the driveway, the breeze blowing my silk shell against my back, the sun sugaring new freckles on my shoulders. From the barn came the stamp and whinny of a horse.

  I sat down on one suitcase and stared in the direction of the house. "Yeah," I said softly. "It's nice to meet you too."

  To my amazement, the Fisher home was not that much different from the one I'd grown up in. Braided rag rugs were scattered across the hardwood floors, a bright quilt sat folded over the back of a rocking chair, an intricately carved hutch held an assortment of delft china bowls and teacups. I think, in a way, I'd been expecting to step back into Little House on the Prairie -- these were people, after all, who willingly set aside modern conveniences. But there was an oven, a refrigerator, even a washing machine that looked like one my grandmother had had in the 1950s. My confusion must have shown, because Leda materialized by my elbow. "They all run on gas. It's not the appliances they don't want; it's the electricity. Getting power from public utility lines--well, it means you're linked to the outside world." She pointed to a lamp, showing me the thin tubing that piped in the propane from a tank hidden beneath its base. "Aaron will let you stay here. He doesn't like it, but he's going to do it."

  I grimaced. "Marvelous."

  "It will be," Leda said, smiling. "I think you're going to be surprised."

  The others had remained in the kitchen, leaving me alone with Leda in a living room of sorts. Bookshelves were filled with titles I could not make out--German, I assumed, from the lettering. On the wall was a carefully printed family tree, Leda's name listed just above Sarah's.

  No television, no phone, no VCR. No Wall Street Journal sprawled across the couch, no jazz CD humming in the background. The house smelled of lemon wax and was warm to the point of suffocation. My heart began to pound in my chest. What had I gotten myself into?

  "Leda," I said firmly, "I can't do this."

  Without responding, she sat down on the couch, a nondescript brown corduroy with lace antimacassars. When had I last seen those?

  "You have to take me back with you. We'll figure something out. I can come here from your place every morning. Or I can have an ex parte meeting with the judge to find an alternative."

  Leda folded her hands in her lap. "Are you really so afraid of them," she asked, "or is it just that you're afraid of yourself?"

  "Don't be ridiculous."

  "Am I? Ellie, you're a perfectionist. You're used to taking charge and turning things to your own advantage. But all of a sudden you're stuck in a place that's as foreign to you as a Calcutta bazaar."

  I sank down beside her and buried my face in my hands. "At least I've read about Calcutta."

  Leda patted my back. "Honey, you've dealt with Mafia bosses, even though you aren't part of the Mob."

  "I didn't move in with Jimmy 'the Boar' Pisano while I was defending him, Leda."

  Well, she had nothing to say to that. After a moment she sighed. "It's just a case, Ellie. And you've always been willing to do anything to win a case."

  We both looked into the kitchen, where Katie and Sarah-- relatives of mine, once removed--stood side by side at the sink. "If it was just a case, I wouldn't be here."

  Leda nodded, conceding that I'd gone out of my way--and realizing that she should go out of hers. "All right. I'll give you some ground rules. Help without being asked; Plain folks put lots of store in what you do, and less in what you say. It won't matter to them that you don't know anything about farming or dairying--what counts is that you're trying to lend a hand."

  "Forget farming--I know nothing about being Amish."

  "They won't expect you to. And there's nothing you need to know. They're folks like you and me. Good ones and bad ones, easygoing ones and ones with tempers, some quick to help you out and others who'll turn the other way when they see you coming. Tourists, they see the Amish as saints or as a sideshow. If you want this family to accept you, you just treat them like regular people."

  As if the recollection had hurt her, she stood suddenly. "I'm going to go," Leda said. "As much as Aaron Fisher dislikes having you here, he dislikes having me here even more."

  "You can't leave yet!"

  "Ellie," Leda said gently, "you'll be fine. I survived, didn't I?"

  I narrowed my eyes. "You left."

  "Well, one day you will too. Just keep remembering that, and the day will be here sooner than you think." She tugged me into the kitchen, where the conversation abruptly stopped. Everyone glanced up, slightly puzzled, it seemed, to find me still there. "I'm going to take off now," Leda said. "Katie, maybe you could show Ellie your room?"

  It struck me: this is what children do. When relatives come to visit, when friends of their own arrive, they take them into their own territory. Show off the dollhouse, the baseball card collection. Reluctantly, Katie forced a smile. "This way," she said, starting for the stairs.

  I gave Leda a quick, tight hug, and then turned toward Katie. I squared my shoulders and followed her. And no matter how much I wanted to, I did not let myself look back.

  66

  *

  As I walked behind Katie, I noticed how heavily she leaned on the banister. She'd just had a baby, after all--most women were still hospitalized, yet here Katie was playing hostess. At the top of the landing, I touched her shoulder. "Are you ... feeling okay?"

  She stared at me blankly. "I am fine, thank you." Turning, she led me to her bedroom. It was clean and neat, but hardly the room of a teenager. No Leonardo posters, no Beanie Babies scattered about, no collection of lip gloss jars littering the dresser. There was nothing, in fact, on the walls; the only individuality in the room came from the rainbow of quilts that covered the two twin beds.

  "You can have that bed," Katie said, and I went to sit down on it before her words registered. She expected me to stay in this room, her room, while I was living on the farm.

  Hell, no. It was bad enough that I had to be here at all; if I couldn't even have my privacy at night, all bets were off. I took a deep breath, fighting for a polite way to tell Katie that I would not, under any circumstances, be sharing a bedroom with her. But Katie was wandering around the room, touching the tall neck of the ladderback chair and smoothing her quilt, and then getting down on her hands and knees to look underneath the bed. Finally, she sat back on her heels. "They took my things," she said, her voice small.

  "Who did?"

  "I don't know. Someone came in here and took my things. My nightgown. My shoes."

  "I'm sure that--"

  She turned on me. "You're sure of nothing," she challenged.

  Suddenly I realized that if I stayed in this room, sleeping beside Katie, I wouldn't be the only one incapable of keeping secrets. "I was going to say that I'm sure the police searched your room. They must have found something to make them feel confident enough to charge you." Katie sat down on her own bed, her shoulders slumped. "Look. Why don't we start by having you tell me what happened yesterday morning?"

  "I didn't kill any baby. I didn't even have a baby."

  "So you've said." I sighed. "Okay. You may not like me being here, and I certainly could find a thousand other things I'd rather be doing, but thanks to Judge Gorman, you and I are going to be stuck with each other for some time. I have a deal with my clients: I won't ask you if you committed the crime, not ever. And in r
eturn, you tell me the truth whenever I ask you anything else." Leaning forward, I caught her gaze. "You want to tell me you didn't kill that baby? Go right ahead. I couldn't care less if you did or didn't, because I'll still stand up for you in court no matter what and not make a personal judgment. But lying about having the baby--something that's been proven a fact--well, Katie, that just makes me angry."

  "I'm not lying."

  "I can count at least three medical experts who've already gone on record saying that your body shows signs of recent delivery. I can wave a blood test in your face that proves the same thing. So how can you sit here and tell me you didn't have the baby?"

  As a defense attorney, I already knew the answer--she could sit there and tell me because she believed it, one hundred percent. But before I even contemplated running with an insanity defense, I needed to make sure Katie Fisher wasn't taking me for a ride. Katie didn't act crazy, and she functioned normally. If this kid was insane, then I was Marcia Clark.

  "How can you sit there," Katie said, "and tell me you're not judging me?"

  Her words slapped me with surprise. I, the suave defense attorney, the one with a winning record and a list of credentials as long as my arm, had made the cardinal mistake of mentally convicting a client before the right to a fair trial. A fair trial in which I was supposed to represent her. She had lied about having the baby, and I couldn't push that aside without wondering what else she might be lying about--a mindset that placed me more in line with a prosecutor than a defense attorney.

  I had coolly defended the rights of rapists, murderers, and pedophiles. But because this girl had killed her own newborn, an act I simply could not get my head around, I wanted her to be locked away.