Stars for Lydia

by P. L. Gaus

  “Then it’s no surprise, I guess,” the sheriff said. “Are you headed into Millersburg?”

  “No,” Alva said. “I’m going over to Mose and Ida’s. To see about getting the children settled there for the night. Three of them have school tomorrow. And Mose and Ida’s family needs careful attention, now. They are devastated that their daughter Lydia has died, and they are still worried about Mary and little Esther.”

  “They’ll all want to know about John,” Branden said. “I’m sure they’ll be surprised that he’s been taken to a hospital.”

  “He’s troubled,” Alva said. “The children know that as well as anyone.”

  ‘No,” Branden said. “Surprised, I mean, that you’ve sent him to the doctors in town. I gather that you don’t usually make use of city doctors. I know how most Schwartzentrubers think about this. But you’re the bishop, right? So, you can make that decision.”

  “Well, yes,” Alva said, stroking his chin whiskers. “The whole congregation will be surprised by this. I’ll have the deacons visit around, tonight and tomorrow, to explain this to the people. Then they will accept this as my choice. I’ll have them tell everyone about Lydia’s death, too.”

  “Then I think you made the right decision for John and his family,” the professor said. “I think it’s the right decision for the whole family. Especially since their mother has left. You haven’t had much to say about that.”

  “It’s a church matter,” Alva said, standing a bit stiffer. “We have got to convince Mary to come home. This is her place, beside her husband and with her children. I think she has gotten herself talked into something that she will regret.”

  Before Branden could respond to that, Alice Shewmon called from the driver’s window of the camper. “We’re leaving now, Sheriff. Headed across the street.”

  Robertson gave a wave.

  “Is that your Crown Vic out by the road?” Alice asked. “I can take you out to it.”

  Robertson nodded. “I had it towed out of the mud.” He turned to Alva Yost. “Can you drive us out in your buggy, Bishop Yost?”

  The bishop nodded, and Robertson turned back to Alice. “We’ll get a ride with the bishop.”

  The engine started on the camper, and soon Shewmon had it pulled in a wide circle around the water well to head back out to the road. Bishop Yost watched it leave, and he said, “I understand those have stoves and refrigerators.”

  “They do,” Branden said.

  Robertson said, “They gave the children something to eat.”

  “I heard,” Alva said. “Pizza. I was listening a bit at the side window.”

  “You are trusting a lot of English people, today,” Branden said. “That’s maybe a little bit out of the ordinary. Has it really been that bad here for your brother?”

  Alva lifted a brow. “We’ve tried everything we can think of.”

  Branden took a step forward and held out his hand. “We haven’t been introduced, Bishop Yost. I am Professor Michael Branden. I teach history at the college in Millersburg.”

  Yost took the professor’s hand. “I assumed you were a sheriff, too. A deputy.”

  “A reserve deputy,” Branden answered. “But I was also Lydia Schwartz’s teacher at the college.”

  “Then you are the one who gave Lydia that scholarship.”

  “Yes.”

  “That wasn’t very helpful, Professor. Really, I didn’t appreciate that much at all. We had hoped that Lydia would join the church. Take her vows. Marry within the congregation. Raise an Amish family.”

  “I know,” Branden said. “No disrespect, but that was never going to be enough for Lydia.”

  Alva answered somewhat resentfully. “We’ll never know, will we. She was my responsibility, Professor. She fell away, and that is my responsibility. Now it’s too late for her. She can never come home.”

  Branden said, “A lot has happened today, Bishop Yost. You can’t take responsibility for all of it.”

  “I am their Bishop,” Alva said forcefully. “It is my responsibility. They are all my responsibilities. The souls in my church. I am charged by God to safeguard the souls of my congregation, and for Lydia, I have failed. I may also have failed for Mary. We won’t know until we have found her. If we find her. So please. Don’t try to tell me what my responsibilities are. I know them well enough. They are a constant and terrifying burden for me. They would be for any Bishop – to safeguard the souls of so many people. It is the burden of a lifetime, and it is mine alone to bear. When one like Lydia falls away, it is my responsibility, and no one else’s.”

  Alva studied the professor’s eyes intently, and then as if he had exhausted himself, he turned to Robertson and spoke softly. “Sheriff, it’s time I got across the street to the children. I can give you a ride out to your car, if you still want it.”

  - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

  In Mt. Hope, the sheriff stopped behind the livestock auction barn, and Branden used a hose there to rinse mud off the tires and out of the brakes of the Crown Vic. They bought bottles of water from a machine in front of the new sporting goods store, and as Robertson was driving back to Millersburg along winding SR 241, he said to Branden, “My phone.”

  Branden answered, “What?” seeming distracted.

  Robertson pulled his cell phone. “I’ve had it on mute. Check for messages. Calls.”

  Branden took the phone and clicked in. “What’s your keycode?”

  “Sherif, with one f.”

  “You’re kidding.”

  “Just check the messages, Mike, OK?”

  Branden chuckled, touched in the passcode and said, “Four messages. Three are from Del Markely at the jail. The fourth one is from a strange number.”

  “Play that one.”

  Branden used speaker phone mode. The message came from a woman, with the considerable background noise of a collection of chattering voices.

  Sheriff Robertson? This is Mary Yost. I need to speak with you about my husband. I think he’s dangerous. And Bishops can’t be right about everything. I know that, now. I’m worried about the children, but I can’t live there anymore. I’ll call again. You have to understand. You know how John is. I just can’t live there anymore.

  The sheriff said, “Call that number back, Mike. Maybe you can still talk with her.”

  Branden took off the speaker phone mode and punched in the call. It rang twice, and a young-sounding girl said, “Applebees. Reservations?”

  “No,” Branden said. “I need to know if the woman who used this phone recently is still there. An Amish woman. I need to speak with her. She might have a little girl with her.”

  “My shift just started,” the girl said. “I’m on the night crew. There are only a few customers here, and nobody looks Amish to me. But this is the bar phone. It’s the one a customer might use, if they didn’t have their own cell phone.”

  “Can you get your manager?” Branden asked.

  “I am the manager. But I can tell you that there isn’t an Amish woman still here.”

  “Does anyone know who made the call? Someone who might have been there earlier?”

  “Wait. I’ll ask the bartender.”

  Branden heard muffled voices and then a little thump as someone picked up the bar phone receiver. A man spoke. “When? About an hour ago?”

  “Yes, an Amish woman placed a call to Sheriff Bruce Robertson, in Holmes County.”

  “Sheriff?”

  “Yes,” Branden said. “We need to speak with her. Did you see anyone like that make a call from there?”

  “I didn’t see any Amish people,” the bartender said. “Sorry, but it gets busy here at the bar.”

  “Which Applebees is this?”

  “Wooster.”

  “Well,” Branden said, “at least that’s not too far away.”

  When he handed the phone back to the sheriff, Branden said, “She called from the Applebees in Wooster. There’s nobody there who remembers her.”

  “We n
eed her to call us back,” Robertson said.

  “I hope she does,” Branden said, and he slapped the beats of an anxious rhythm onto his knees.

  “What?” Robertson asked.

  “Something the bishop said about Mary Yost. It bothers me. I think she has gotten herself talked into something that she will regret.”

  Chapter 9

  Monday, August 28

  9:55 PM

  In the observation room between Interview A and Interview B, at Millersburg’s red brick jail, Sheriff Robertson and Detective Stan Armbruster stood watching in on Louise Herbeck, through the glass of a one-way mirror. She had eaten a couple slices of pizza, and she was nursing a cup of coffee. She sat alone in her stocking feet, because Armbruster had asked for her shoes for a luminol test. She had not protested.

  Robertson asked, “The Luminol, Stan?”

  “No blood.”

  “So, she didn’t track that blood across Silver’s floor.”

  “No, Sheriff.”

  “Where are her shoes?”

  “Just out there, right in the hall. You can take them in to her.”

  “You look like your shoulder is still bothering you.”

  “It’s not, Sheriff. I can get back to detective work. I’m ready.”

  Robertson shook his head with a consoling smile. “Not until the doctors and psychiatrists clear you, Stan. Until then, you’re attached to Missy’s forensics team.”

  Stan grew heated. “Sheriff, that’s not fair. You were wounded in that hotel fight, too.”

  “Just my face, Armbruster. You’ve only just now started getting full range of motion out of your shoulder.”

  Armbruster snorted disrespectfully. “You’ve got to know that your beard doesn’t really cover the scar, Sheriff.”

  “I’ll let that pass.”

  “It’s frustrating, hanging around the labs. The morgue. Pat thinks I’m ready. And she knows me better than anyone.”

  “I’m gonna wait, Stan. Maybe in a couple of months.”

  Armbruster grumbled deep in his throat, and he turned and stepped out of the room, saying, “Please don’t start with Herbeck until I can get back here. I need a Pepsi.”

  Robertson nodded and turned to face the glass. He studied Herbeck and waited for Armbruster to return. When Armbruster entered the room again, Robertson took Herbeck’s shoes from him, and then he crossed over to Herbeck’s room, closing the door to Interview A behind him. He sat down across the table from Herbeck and set her shoes on the tabletop. She took them and slipped them on and held up her empty coffee cup. Robertson looked a glance over to the mirror, and soon Stan was coming through the door with another cup of coffee. After she had sipped at it, Robertson began his interview.

  “You see the problem, don’t you Louise?” Robertson said. “I’ve got a woman shot dead, and there is not a gun at the scene.”

  Calmly, Louise said, “I can’t explain that, Sheriff. I don’t know anything about guns.”

  “Did you bring a gun to her house?”

  “I don’t own a gun.”

  “Why did you go there at that specific time?”

  “I was just dropping by. Meredith told me this morning that she had some clothes for me to sell.”

  “Do you have them?”

  “Of course not,” Louise protested. “I found her dead!”

  “Take it easy, Mrs. Herbeck. We’re just talking.”

  “You seem to think I had something to do with this, Sheriff. How am I supposed to take it easy?”

  “I’m just trying to establish the facts, Mrs. Herbeck. Please, I have just a few questions.”

  Louise smiled thinly and gave a small nod of her head.

  Robertson said, “Thanks, now where were you standing when you called 911?”

  “In the kitchen.”

  “Next to the body?”

  “Not really. Not close, really. I never got that far in. I was at the kitchen table, I think. I had read her note.”

  “Did you touch the note, Louise?” Robertson asked.

  “No.”

  “Well, we know that there are two sets of prints on the note. If one of them is yours, we’ll know soon enough.”

  Louise stammered. “Maybe I did touch it. How can you expect me to remember? Really, Sheriff, this is too much.”

  Robertson nodded to acknowledge her point, and to dispel some of the tension. Louise appeared to relax. She sipped again at her coffee, seeming to be satisfied with herself.

  Next, Robertson asked, “How far into the house did you go, Louise?”

  “Just to the kitchen table. That was far enough. I could see her lying there. I didn’t go over to her.”

  “Well,” Robertson said, “someone tracked blood into the living room.”

  “It wasn’t me,” Louise said. “I didn’t get that close to her. I didn’t go into the living room.”

  Robertson said, “As you know, we tested your shoes. There’s no blood on the soles.”

  “Then why did you even ask me?” Louise complained.

  “Mrs. Herbeck, I have to ask these questions. You’d want me to, if I were talking to your sister’s murderer.”

  “Murder?”

  “Yes. Otherwise the gun would still be there.”

  Louise puzzled over the implications of that and sighed heavily. “Are we almost done?”

  “Not quite. What is your financial situation, Mrs. Herbeck?”

  “I was a grade school teacher, Sheriff. I’ve always needed money.”

  “And did Meredith help you with that?”

  “Yes. Like I said. She called me this morning and said she had some clothes for me to sell at a second-hand store. She would help me like that, from time to time.”

  “And that’s why you went over to her house?”

  “I’ve already told you that.”

  Robertson nodded again to acknowledge the fact. “I’m told you live in a rented trailer over on Harrison Road.”

  “So?”

  “That can’t be very pleasant. Your sister had a very nice ranch house.”

  “What? Like I’m jealous or something?”

  “Are you?”

  “No! It’s insulting. She was my sister.”

  “Maybe you’re rich, now, Louise. What do you know about Meredith’s finances?”

  “She had money. She had her husband’s trucker’s pension, and she owned her house.”

  “She was better off than you.”

  “Yes. It doesn’t mean that I killed her.”

  “What do you know about her will?”

  “What?”

  “We found Meredith’s will in a desk drawer at her house. She’s left everything to you.”

  “What? I don’t . . . . What are you saying? That I killed her for her money?”

  “Or for her house.”

  Herbeck stared back at Robertson. Her face took a pink flush. Her fingernails started tapping on the wood of the table top. Her eyes narrowed with a thought, and she asked, “Am I a suspect?”

  “Not really.”

  “Do I need a lawyer?”

  “That’s up to you, Mrs. Herbeck. But you’re not a suspect at this time, and you are free to go.”

  After Herbeck left, Robertson said to Armbruster, “I want you to try for a warrant, Stan. To test her hands for gun-shot residue, and to search her car and house for a gun.”

  Chapter 10

  Monday, August 28

  10:15 PM

  “I can’t believe she’s dead,” the professor said to Caroline. “Lydia. It was a stupid accident. I’m afraid I was a little bit out of it. At the farm, I mean. Can’t remember everything I said. Just seeing her body was a shock. John Junior is torn up. Just completely torn up. She was like a sister to him. Lydia. Dead. And the neighbor out there, Meredith Silver? Shot in the face. It’s surreal.”

  They had been sitting at the hand-crafted curly maple kitchen table that Bishop Eli Miller had given them almost twenty years ago. The professor had his
hands pressed flat against the surface, as if he wanted the beautiful, swirling grain of the blonde wood to infuse his hands. To work its beauty into the hollow spaces in his mind. To comfort him.

  He remembered old Bishop Eli, gone for several years now, once desperate to rescue his grandson Jeremiah, who was now raising his own family on the bishop’s original farm in the Doughty Valley, out near Charm.

  But the beautiful wood grain gave no comfort to the professor. He pulled his hands off the top of the table, and he reached over to take Caroline’s hands into his. “Lydia was out at her sister’s farm,” he said, shaking his head. “North of Mt. Hope. Her car is still out there. It was just an accident. I’m having trouble believing this.”

  “What about this woman who left her husband?” Caroline asked.

  “That’s Lydia’s sister. On the farm where Lydia died. Mary Yost. She left her husband and six of her seven children. Three weeks ago. Their youngest, Esther, is missing, too. I think she’s about one and a half years old. Mary’s pregnant with their eighth.”

  “Why would she do that?” Caroline asked, frowning. “Leave six children behind?”

  Before the professor answered, the front doorbell rang. Woodenly and wearily, Branden pushed up from the table, plodded down the front hallway, and opened the door. Cal Troyer was standing on the stoop. Behind Cal, at the edge of the porch light, stood Reverend Ed Schell, a tall and slender man with combed black hair. He was holding the hand of a sleepy three-year old girl, who snuggled close to him with her arms wrapped around his leg.

  Donna Schell was standing there too, a red-headed woman holding an infant in her arms. Donna had obviously been crying, and she was pressing a white hankie to her eyes. Her left hand was heavily bandaged, and the cotton gauze looked new and fresh to Branden.

  “Your lights are on,” Cal offered. “I know it’s late. Do you mind? You remember Ed and Donna Schell. From Light-Path Ministries.”

  “Of course,” Branden said, pulling the door open.

  From behind Cal Troyer, Donna Schell spoke with a nervous tone. “We’re worried about Mary Yost, Professor. And Meredith Silver. What is happening?”

  “She left for Cleveland three days ago,” Ed said, eyes cast downward.