Stars for Lydia

by P. L. Gaus

  “One of the best. She was with me when little Sarah here was born.”

  “That must have been recently,” Caroline said. “I mean, your child is very young.”

  “She’s only four months old,” said Hannah. “We have several midwives in the church. Vera was one of the best.”

  “We have a list,” Caroline said. She handed the page to Hannah. “Are these your people?”

  Hannah glanced only briefly at the list. “Yes,” she said, handing the page back to Caroline. “We’re down to only these, now. But some of the younger women are helping. For training.”

  “Do you ever use doctors?”

  “Maybe if it is an emergency. But probably not.”

  “Would Mary use a hospital?”

  “Probably not.”

  “So mostly the women are traditional? With their deliveries, I mean.”

  “Yes. A child should be born at home. That is best.”

  Caroline shifted forward in her chair and leaned in closer to speak softly to Hannah. “We’re trying to find Mary Yost.”

  Again, Hannah made no reply.

  “Do you know where she is, Hannah?”

  “No.”

  “Do you think she left him?”

  “No.”

  “Well, something must have happened.”

  “We don’t know. She was in a Bible study with a neighbor lady. She was starting to pester her husband with awkward questions about scriptures. It wasn’t a proper way for an Amish wife to behave.”

  “Questions about the Scriptures?” Caroline asked.

  Hannah nodded. “And about our traditions. About the ways we choose to live.”

  “Like with using midwives?”

  “Oh, not really. That’s just common sense. She might have had questions about our traditions, but she didn’t doubt the Scriptures. Nothing like that.”

  “Then traditions?” Caroline asked. “She questioned your traditions?”

  “Some of them,” Hannah nodded. “We keep the old ways. We are the last peoples who do that. We are the remnants. We are the only ones left. It is our duty to be the remnants.”

  “That sounds like the topic of a sermon.”

  Hannah smiled as if remembering something fondly. “The preachers tell us the right ways to live.”

  “Do they tell you that you can’t use hospitals?”

  “You are a modern person?” Hannah responded.

  “Yes.”

  “Do you consider yourself to be well educated?”

  “I think so.”

  “Then tell me, Mrs. Branden. How can a disease stop itself?”

  “Are you talking about vaccines?” Caroline asked.

  “Yes. Tell me. How can a little bit of measles stop a lot of measles?”

  “That’s how vaccines work,” Caroline answered. “They are beneficial. Think about it. We don’t get the three-day or seven-day measles more than once, right? That’s because the illness causes our bodies to produce antibodies, to fight against the disease. And that’s what vaccines do. They give us the antibodies we need to prevent the disease. So, if you get measles once, that’s it. Your done with measles for the rest of your life.”

  “We think vaccines do more harm than good.”

  “What about mental imbalances? They can be alleviated with medication.”

  Hannah shook her head with confidence. As if recalling a familiar sermon, she seemed to recite a passage. “If God himself has made us, who are we to alter that with chemicals?”

  “Hannah, we alter ourselves with chemicals every day. Food. Aroma therapies. Spices. Folk remedies. Tobacco and wine. These are all chemicals.”

  Hannah shook her head again, reciting something long nurtured in her traditions. “Food is given to us by God. Medicines are made by man. And if they sometimes do some good, they also do great harm. More harm than good, we believe. Just read the side effects from any of your modern medicines. They’re worse than the maladies that they are supposed to cure.”

  “Sometimes, perhaps,” Caroline said.

  “The bishop knows best. So do the preachers.”

  “And the women who die in childbirth?” Caroline asked. “The ones who could be saved in a hospital?”

  “If it is God’s will,” Hannah asserted.

  “Mary Yost is missing, Hannah. She is due to deliver her child. We think she is in Indiana, now. Does she know how to find a midwife there?”

  Hannah shrugged her shoulders. She stood and waited for Caroline to stand beside her. “You have your list of midwives,” she said, terminating the interview. She moved toward the door. She reached out for the latch on her screened door, entered, and with her infant still in her arms, she turned back to talk to Caroline through the screen, saying, “She’ll use a midwife. Wherever she is, Mary will find a midwife to help her with her delivery.”

  Chapter 28

  Saturday, September 2

  2:10 PM

  “She really didn’t tell us where to find Mary,” Caroline complained.

  The professor shrugged and took another bite of his sandwich. They were parked at Weaver’s Marketplace again. They had bought cheese, apples, premade sandwiches, a can of cashews and bottles of water. As they ate lunch in the truck, the rain was still falling. The professor had his engine running, with his wipers swiping the windshield intermittently. “This midwife angle is not going to work out.”

  “Is that it, then?” Caroline asked. “Are we just going to quit?”

  Branden shook his head. “There’s another angle, here. The Schells. I want to show you their house over east of Millersburg.”

  “You think this is tangled up with them?”

  Branden nodded. He finished his bottle of water, and he put his truck into reverse. “Just wait until you see this house. I want your opinion. There is something there that troubles me.”

  The professor backed around on the gravel and turned south on CR 235. After crossing TR 606, he continued south through the countryside, eventually crossing 62/39 to the Schells’ gingerbread house on the hill. The professor drove past the brown house slowly, so that Caroline could get a good look at it.

  The house was framed by the tall pines behind it, and the ginger-brown structure with its white accent trim looked dark and lifeless in the gloom of the rain. And it looked outdated. A battered white passenger van, equally outdated and marred by heavy use, was parked at the top of the driveway.

  Farther along past the house, Branden turned around in the driveway of a neighbor and came back to the property to park a bit short of the long sloping field of hay in front of the house. He kept his engine running, with the wipers swiping the glass. The rain was falling more steadily now. It panged incessantly on the thin roof of the truck. It spattered with force on the windshield. The brown-green stubble of hay in the field beside them was also taking a thorough drubbing from the rain, and over the racket, the professor remarked offhand, “They must have taken it up this morning.”

  “Michael?”

  “The hay. They had just cut it the last time I was out here. Friday, at dinner time. They must have cut it Wednesday or Thursday, then let it dry yesterday. They got it up just in time. To still be dry, I mean, before the rain. You can’t stack wet hay in a barn.”

  Caroline pointed to the house at the top of the hill. “That’s the Schells’ house?”

  “Yes.”

  “Who owns the white Amish-hauler?”

  “The Schells, I think. It was parked at their boarding house yesterday.”

  The front door of the brown house opened from the inside, and Donna Schell stepped out onto the porch and popped an umbrella open. Ed Schell came out behind her, and he held her elbow as she took the steps gingerly.

  Once down to the sidewalk, Donna paused there under her umbrella, and she bent over to rub at her knees. Ed went back into the house. He came out carrying their infant Annie. The newly-turned Mennonite woman stepped out too, holding little Sophie Schell’s hand. She also opened an u
mbrella on the porch.

  Ed took Donna’s umbrella in his one free hand, and he ushered her toward the van. While on the walkway, Donna was speaking earnestly about something, as she trailed behind Ed. Annie lay asleep in her father’s arms, oblivious to the noise of the rain and the words of her mother.

  Again, Donna needed Ed’s help to manage the ascent to the passenger’s seat. All the while, as she settled on her seat, Donna kept talking to him. For his part, Ed was nodding his agreements with everything that Donna was saying.

  The companion woman got Sophie up into the side door of the van, and she helped Sophie buckle her seat belt on the bench seat. After she was buckled herself, she took little Annie from Ed, and she strapped the infant into a child seat between her and Sophie.

  Ed turned his van around in the driveway, and he drove them all down the long sloping hill. On TR 354, he turned left on 310, headed presumably back toward the village of Millersburg. Donna was still talking, but now she was frowning deeply.

  “Something’s wrong,” Caroline commented. “Donna’s not happy about something.”

  The professor wrinkled a frown and scratched at his beard. He shook his head to refocus his thoughts. “There are three more people still here,” he said. “There is this woman who just left with the Schells, and then there’s going to be her husband and two children. And this woman who left with the Schells? Did you notice that she was not dressed Old Order?”

  “Yes,” Caroline said. “So, this is some kind of halfway house?”

  “I think so. That’s what I thought you would say, once you had seen the setup here.”

  “Then where did they come from, Michael?”

  “Could be from anywhere. Iowa, Indiana, or right here from Holmes County. The point is, this is what the Schells are doing. And I don’t think this is their first time.”

  “This can’t happen very often, Michael. This is rather extreme.”

  “Right.”

  “There are still lights on in the house,” Caroline observed.

  “Then let’s just ask them about this,” Branden said. “Let’s just go up there and ask them directly.”

  - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

  Once Branden had parked his truck in front of the brown house, the lights started turning off inside. The Brandens popped out and ran in the hard rain, up onto the front porch. No one answered the door when Caroline rang the bell. She pulled the screen door open and knocked loudly on the inside wooden door. No one came to the door.

  Taking a thorough soaking for their troubles, the Brandens tried the back door. Nothing. Then the professor cupped his hands to the glass and peered into a kitchen window. He could see no one inside.

  Back in their truck, dripping rain water onto their seats, Branden said to Caroline, “We really ought to carry umbrellas.”

  “Or towels,” Caroline answered with a nervous laugh. “Why won’t they talk to us?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Who’s going to know anything about this, Michael?”

  “Cal Troyer,” the professor said, starting his engine. “We’ll ask Cal. If anyone knows about this, it’ll be Cal.”

  “Are they breaking any laws?”

  Branden considered the question. “I don’t know. But Meredith’s death? I’d bet any amount of money that this has something to do with that.”

  Countering, Caroline said, “Meredith had just caused the death of Lydia Schwartz.”

  “It was in her note, Caroline. It was a line saying, ‘we should have never started any of this.’”

  Chapter 29

  Saturday, September 2

  7:05 PM

  After dinner, the professor parked his truck in the gravel lot between Cal’s church building and the parsonage, and as soon as he and Caroline were out of the truck, they heard a woman’s voice inside the house. The rain had stopped, and the sound of her voice carried indistinctly in the humid evening air, so that her exact words were unintelligible. But the professor did recognize the voice.

  “That’s Alice Shewmon,” the professor said as he rang the bell at the kitchen’s side door.

  Rachel Ramsayer opened the door, and with her brows raised in a quiet sigh, she gave a long-suffering shrug of her shoulders. She stepped back to let the Brandens inside, where Alice Shewmon was standing with Cal, who was leaning back against his kitchen sink, looking perplexed.

  Cal seemed pleased to see the Brandens. He said, “Hello, welcome,” and he stepped out and around the taller Shewmon and pulled a Jello snack out of his refrigerator. When he turned around to his three guests, he said rather tiredly, “Can I fix you anything? Coffee? Juice? I’ve been on Jello and clear liquids all day.”

  The three declined a snack. Instead, Caroline spoke to Alice Shewmon. “Are you OK, Alice?”

  Alice turned to Caroline. “Guess I’m a little worked up.”

  “OK,” Caroline said. “Is this about the Schwartzentrubers again?” She held a chair out for Alice at Cal’s round kitchen table, and Alice sat down and scooted in. She pulled her long black pony tail around to the front of her, and she tugged on the ends, seeming distracted enough to want to pluck some of the long strands from her head.

  “These Schwartzentrubers,” Alice said with a weak and anxious smile.

  Caroline sat and asked, “Have you been back to see the Yost children again?”

  Alice nodded. “At their grandparents’ house.”

  “And?”

  Laughing, Shewmon said, “And these are not modern people.”

  “No,” Caroline said. “Not even a little bit.”

  “Well, I just want to work around that, somehow. Cal’s been telling me that it’s nearly impossible. I’m just not ready to accept that, I guess.”

  The professor took a seat at the table. Cal sat there, too, with his cup of Jello. Rachel already had a glass of apple juice poured and set out for him at the table.

  Rachel said, “Is apple juice OK, Dad?” and Cal gave a weary nod.

  Looking skeptically back at Shewmon, Rachel left the room.

  Alice took the opportunity to press her discussion with Cal. She pushed her long hair around to the back, and she seemed to have acquired some new and sharper focus. “These people talk like they’ve got the secret to life, or something,” Alice said, “but they’re just archaic. That’s all. I just need to know why. Can you tell me why?”

  Trying to smile, Cal managed only a hint at mirth. He chuckled weakly. “I have been telling you, Alice.”

  Professor Branden interjected. “They value their traditions as much as their faith, Alice. They live by the traditions of their ancestors.”

  Cal swallowed a spoonful of Jello, drank from his glass of apple juice, and shook his head. “That’s only part of it, Mike.”

  Alice made a sad smile. “I don’t understand this. It goes against everything I’ve been taught. Against everything I believe.”

  “No doubt,” Caroline said.

  Cal sighed and tried again. “Just think of it as pacifism, Alice. I’m sure you can respect that.”

  Alice stood and said, “OK, but I’m going to try to talk with them again. I’d be so much happier if I could just get the children vaccinated. I’ll go out to see the bishop, to explain the science to him.”

  - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

  Once Shewmon had left, Caroline said, “I sympathize with her, Cal. All their old ways – their traditions – do cause harm. Illness, accidents, genetic disorders. I mean, the list is endless if you really are honest about it. Everything from sanitation – their outhouses? – to John Yost in the hospital, who won’t take medicine for his depression? That’s extreme. Contagion, epidemics, accidents, childhood deaths? Really, Cal, aren’t too many of the headstones in their cemeteries the headstones for young children?”

  Cal held a tender smile. Gently, he said, “Don’t let it make you crazy, Caroline. You’ve lived in Holmes County long enough to know all of this. Don’t over-think it. It’ll take a l
ong time for any of this to change. And then the change will have to come from within the framework of their faith.”

  “Well,” said Caroline slowly, “I think Mose and Ida Schwartzentruber need some of your wisdom on that point.” She gave out a little laugh. “Probably John Yost, too. And Mary Yost, if we can find her. We think the Schells might be the key to that.”

  “Oh?” Cal asked.

  The professor scooted his chair closer to the table. He leaned over the table on his elbows, and he addressed Cal as if taking him into a conspiracy. “We think they’re running a rescue mission. An underground escape route to help the Amish who want to get out. To get out and live English. Have you ever heard of anything like that? Ever hear anything about recruiters?”

  Cal nodded. “One church, south of here. In Knox County, several years ago. But here with the Schells? Well, I guess I wouldn’t be completely surprised.”

  Branden said, “We think they have a safe house down in southwest Berlin Township. South of 39. The house is owned by a megachurch in Omaha, and they list the Schells as their missionaries.”

  “This is rare, Mike,” Cal asserted. “People like this take an extreme position. They’re zealots for evangelism. They consider their work to be sacred. It’s not really all that common. So, the Schells, you think? They’re like that? Why do you think that?”

  “I saw them,” Branden said, “taking a young Amish family out to their safe house. In a van owned by The Church of True Believers.”

  “Is this the Omaha connection?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then, if you’re right,” Cal said, “the Schells serve as feeders for the Omaha church. And there will be a network, spread around the country, to help get Amish converts safely away from their families, and to get them started living as English people.”

  “Is it legal?” Caroline asked.

  “Yes,” Cal said. “Unless evangelism has become illegal, and nobody’s told me.”

  Said Branden, “There might be underaged children involved.”

  “Like who?”

  The professor gave a glance to Caroline. She nodded. The professor answered Cal’s question. “Like Mary Yost and her little Esther.”