Stars for Lydia

by P. L. Gaus

  Out on 606, the sheriff had the ATV up to thirty. He pushed down harder, but that was the fastest speed he could get out of the machine. They passed the farm lane leading down to the farmhouse, and then quickly they had passed the other end of the U-shaped lane, where Robertson was supposed to have turned in. He braked to a safe speed, spun the wheel, and brought the little machine around in a tight circle on the blacktop, to enter the dirt lane.

  The lane was rutted where Monday’s rain had soaked the ground, and Robertson was forced to drop to a crawl as the wheels dipped in and out of the deep tracks in the hard-dried mud. He stopped where he figured that Captain Newell had told him to, and he said to Branden, “This about right?”

  Branden said, “Good enough,” and the two men climbed out of their seats.

  Robertson led into the corn. After twenty to twenty-five yards, they found Newell and Lance. Lance was still holding the remote controller for her drone, and Newell was holding an empty beer bottle. As Robertson and Branden approached by crossing one row north into the corn, Newell pointed at the litter on the ground and said, “Beer, cigarettes and marijuana, Sheriff. The kids come here to party.”

  “Teenagers,” Robertson said. “Anything buried here?”

  Newell kicked at one of the low-cut stalks of corn. “Nothing. No holes. No loose dirt.”

  To Lance, the sheriff said, “Where’s your drone?”

  “I landed it back at the house, Sheriff. On a flat roof extension of the horse barn.”

  “Can you put it back up again?”

  “Sure.”

  “Then search over the woods beside the house. We’re digging out a bone pit, there.”

  “Sheriff?”

  “To see if there are any other burial spots in the woods. To see if there’s another clearing, I mean.”

  “We’ve been over that, Sheriff,” Lance said.

  Robertson nodded. “Let’s go over everything a second time.”

  “Yes, but first, we’re going to need to charge the batteries,” Lance replied.

  “How long will that take?”

  “Maybe an hour, if we just take it back to Mt. Hope. For the electricity, I mean.”

  “OK, do that,” Robertson said, and he took the professor back to the barnyard on the ATV.

  Daniels was off in the woods again on his dirt bike, continuing to search the rest of the forest lands. Johnson and Wilson had gone back to Mt. Hope, to get food and water for the whole team. And Ryan Baker, standing beside one of the dirt bikes, was waiting to report to the sheriff.

  “There are two small headstones,” Baker said. “Small ones, with brief inscriptions, up on the top of the hill.”

  “Small graves?” Robertson asked.

  “Can’t tell, Sheriff. The surrounding area grew over with tall grass, but the graves are clear. The headstones weren’t any larger then they needed to be.”

  “What inscriptions?” Newell asked Baker.

  “One said, ‘baby girl Yost, three weeks,’ and the other said, ‘baby girl Yost, four months.’”

  “The graves of children?” Robertson asked.

  Baker nodded. “Infants, Sheriff.”

  With a measure of tired frustration, Robertson asked weakly, “Do we need to dig them up?”

  “We could just wait to ask John Yost about it,” Baker suggested. “And ask Mary Yost, if we ever find her.”

  “Or,” Robertson said, “we could ask Mose and Ida Schwartzentruber, across the street. They’d know if young children died here.”

  “That’s the best idea,” Branden said.

  Robertson kicked at dirt and rolled his gaze up toward the sky. He closed his eyes, muttered an invective and said, “We’ve been over most of it, Mike. We’re not going to find anything.”

  “She was talking to the babies,” Branden whispered, not really hearing the sheriff. “Lydia was just up there on the hill, talking to the babies.”

  Chapter 33

  Sunday, September 3

  2:30 PM

  “Sheriff,” Ricky Niell said. “I don’t know if this is good news or not. I’ve been on the phone with Dr. Carson. Two things.”

  The sheriff was standing with Professor Branden beside the Crown Vic. Search efforts at the Yost farm were finished. Many of the sheriff’s people had already loaded equipment and left for Millersburg. Gray clouds lingered, a vestige of yesterday’s drizzle, and equally gray was the sheriff’s mood. When Ricky had spoken, the bulky sheriff had been ruminating on the question of Mary and Esther Yost.

  “What, Niell?” Robertson grumbled, scratching distractedly at the gray flat-top bristles on his head.

  Niell hesitated, and the sheriff sighed and said, “Sorry, Ricky. What have you got?”

  “This afternoon, Sheriff, Dr. Carson is going to bring John Yost back to Bishop Alva Yost’s house over west of here.”

  “And the second thing?”

  “Bishop Yost is waiting for you in his buggy, Sheriff. He’s down at the end of this lane.”

  Robertson drew in a cleansing breath and blew it out as a long, perplexed whistle. “Let’s go, Mike,” he said to the professor, and the two walked out to where the bishop was waiting on the blacktop.

  Alva was standing beside his black rig. His horse was restless, and the muscles and tendons in its legs were jumping and flexing. Accordingly, Alva was holding tightly to the ends of the reins, which he had looped around the brake lever in order to keep the rig immobile.

  Directly on walking up, the sheriff said, “Why is John going to your house, Mr. Yost? Why not send him home, to be here with his kids?”

  “We are going to try the medicine for depression,” Alva declared. “I’m not sure about it, and it’s not our way of doing things, but the gibbering that John has been doing in the hospital about graves? Well, your Dr. Carson convinced me to try the medicine.”

  “That is very good,” Branden said, smiling.

  Yost shrugged his massive shoulders. “I didn’t realize how bad he had gotten. I understand better why Mary left him. He was dangerous like that, with his shotgun and this depression. And I didn’t realize how neglected his family has been. The condition of his farm is an embarrassment to us. He’ll stay with me for three weeks, while the congregation works to clean the place up. And we’ll try the antidepressant. If it works, then he can bring his children home to his farm. In the meantime, the children will stay with their grandparents.”

  Robertson asked, “What made you change your mind?”

  Yost pulled a weak smile that linked into an arched brow. “Dr. Carson explained his depression to me. She explained the chemical things that are missing from his brain. She said that the antidepressant medicines will restore the brain chemicals that he is supposed to have.”

  “He’ll get better with the medicine,” Branden offered. “It will ease his burdens.”

  Yost nodded. “Dr. Carson said that ‘he’ll pray better,’ and that’s more important to me than his burdens. We all carry burdens.”

  “But John’s are excessive,” Robertson said.

  “I agree,” Yost said. “He’ll pray better, and his family needs his prayers. And right now, I don’t think he could manage a simple, ‘Thank You, Lord’ at dinner time. So, we’ll all keep his farm going for him, and he can rest at my house while he gets started on the medicine. We’re going to give it three weeks to see if the medicine works.”

  Branden asked, “Would you consider letting Alice Shewmon visit the children?”

  “Is this the Social Services lady?”

  “Yes. Alice Shewmon.”

  Alva shook his head with determined sadness. “She’ll be just as bad as those Schells.”

  “Why do you say that?” Branden asked.

  “We know how they preach division. Your Social Services lady will be no different.”

  “Alice isn’t interested in that sort of thing,” Branden said. “She’ll just want to make sure that the children are safe and healthy.”

  Yost bri
stled. “That is my job, Professor. We do not want the government pestering us about our families. Maybe you could tell that to your Miss Shewmon. Tell it to those Schells, too. If it weren’t for them, don’t you think Mary would still be home with her family where she belongs?”

  Robertson pushed in closer to Yost. “Do you know where she is, Bishop Yost?”

  Yost answered calmly so far as his tone was concerned. But there was intensity flashing in his eyes and conviction set in his jaw. “Everyone we know has been contacted, Sheriff,” he declared. “We’ve been mailing letters since the day they disappeared. The whole Amish world knows about Mary and Esther Yost. If they were anywhere to be found, we would have found them by now. Unless she’s with you English somewhere. So, no. The Schells are not welcome here. Dithy Silver used to be a friend, too, but she should have stayed out of our business. I’ll be announcing all of this to our people next Sunday. We are not going to have anything more to do with the Schells and their ministry.”

  - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

  As the bishop’s buggy disappeared over the rise, Robertson was kicking a toe at the blacktop pavement of 606. The professor stood beside him, watching the familiar workings of the sheriff’s mind – first an unconvincing smile and then a frown – an arched brow and then a wrinkled brow – thoughts and ruminations passing across the big sheriff’s eyes. Here were the signs of a determined decision - conclusions, convictions, resolve. The sheriff had reached a pivot point in his thinking. Branden knew from the set features of the sheriff’s jaw that these new intentions would be unopposable.

  “Mike,” the sheriff said at last, “it’s the Schells. They haven’t told us the truth. I don’t think they’ve told us the truth about any of this. Mary and Ester? The Culps? Meredith Silver? We haven’t been getting the truth. It’s like the bishop said. If the Amish themselves can't find Mary, then she has to be with the English somewhere.”

  Branden nodded concurrence and said, “I tend to agree with you, Bruce. I’ve been thinking along these lines since I first saw their house.”

  “What?” Robertson said distracted. He turned to face Branden and asked again, “What house, exactly?”

  “The brown house in the country,” Branden answered. “The gingerbread house with Amish-turned-Mennonite refugees.”

  Chapter 34

  Sunday, September 3

  7:10 PM

  On Millersburg’s Courthouse Square, on the first floor inside the old red brick jail, Branden and Robertson stood in the observation room between Interview A and Interview B. Pat Lance sat talking with Donna Schell in Interview A, and Ricky Niell sat talking with Ed Schell in Interview B. Late that afternoon, and then after dinner too, each of the Schells had seemed both calm and definite about the details. They had seemed content to be talking, and to be making a true statement, finally, of what had really taken place with Mary Yost. They had each stepped away from the story that Mary had gone up to Parma to counsel with the Culps. They were no longer floating that tale. It had all been a fabrication, designed to steer the search away from Mary’s true location.

  “So far their stories match,” Robertson said to Branden in the middle observation room. With his back to the professor, he was watching Pat and Donna through the one-way glass into Interview A. Professor Branden had arrived only recently. The interrogations had been underway since five o’clock.

  The professor for his part was watching Ricky Niell through the opposite one-way glass. “Are they lying now?” Branden asked Robertson without turning. “Or were they lying before? Did they have Mary for all three weeks, or just for the one night?”

  “They’re both saying it was the whole three weeks, now, Mike. Their statements match now. Mary stayed at their halfway house for three weeks. She stayed at the brown house over south of SR 39. They say that she didn’t want Lydia to know, but they also say that they always encourage their ‘runners’ to avoid contact with their families, because they’re so often tempted to go back home after a couple of weeks. Anyway, she delivered a baby boy there. On Monday, two weeks ago. They both say that now, Ed and Donna. And they’re claiming that Mary left in a taxi on Thursday that same week. She took Esther and her infant boy with her.”

  “She was actually leaving the Amish church?”

  “Apparently.”

  “You’re handling them pretty gently,” Branden observed. “Are you going to let Pat and Ricky push on them?”

  “I don’t think so. Not yet, anyway.”

  “Why not?”

  “I’m waiting. I’ll go at them harder if their statements start to diverge. But so far, they are aligned. In every detail.”

  Branden turned around and joined Robertson, looking in on Pat Lance and Donna Schell. Robertson turned the wall dial to increase the volume on the room’s speakers.

  “We gave her all our cash,” Donna was complaining to Pat, looking genuinely and believably chagrined. She had her hands open flat on the table, with her palms facing up, as if making a plea.

  Lance stood up slowly. “We’ve contacted your church in Omaha.”

  “What?” Donna asked. She stood abruptly on the other side of the table. “I don’t want them involved in any of this!”

  “Sit down, please,” Lance said smoothly.

  Donna remained on her feet. She became suddenly agitated. Her cheeks were taking a flush, and she was shaking her hands nervously in front. “I can’t have you pestering the Omaha people about this!” she crowed out. “We’ll lose our funding!”

  “Sit down,” Lance ordered.

  Donna sat, and Lance sat across from her again.

  “You’re going to need to explain that,” Lance said, scooting her chair closer to the table, and taking up a notepad and pen.

  Donna took an old tissue from a side pocket of her dress, and she held it up to her eyes. She pulled the band-aid loose on her left hand and scratched nervously at her healing burn wound there. Upset for the first time that evening, Donna held an unfocused gaze on the tabletop and cried softly, “They don’t know about Lydia. About Meredith. We’ll lose all our funding, if they learn that people have died here. They think it was just Mary that we were involved with.”

  They had been talking for over two hours since dinner, which had consisted of nothing more than a pizza and a glass of water. Now Donna was starting to show signs of fatigue and frustration. She dabbed the wadded tissue at her eyes, tried to reaffix the band-aid on her palm, and looked up at Lance.

  “I need to call Omaha,” she insisted earnestly. “I need to explain. We can’t lose our funding. This is the worst thing that could have happened.”

  She looked intently into Pat Lance’s eyes, and her focus seemed to shift to a new thought. “When can we get our kids back?” she asked. “How do I know they’re OK? Really, Detective Lance, I think we’ve been here long enough.”

  “They’re fine. Alice Shewmon is staying with them at your house. Remember? You can get back to them when we are through here.”

  “I think we’ve been here long enough. I think we’ve answered all your questions. I don’t know what more I can tell you.”

  Her band-aid loosened again, and she pulled it off and wadded it up. She tossed it into a waste can in the corner and said, “I want to go home, now.”

  “Did you really give Mary Yost all of your money?” Lance asked in stride.

  Donna nodded solemnly, interested now in this new topic. “We cashed a check. We gave her everything we had. This is the heart of our ministry. We just couldn’t do anything else. She wanted out so badly. You wouldn’t believe how horrible it was for her. She begged us to help her get out. He was dangerous. He was completely oblivious to her pain. And you wouldn’t believe how expensive this ministry is. Really. It’s astonishing. So many people need our help. We’ve usually spent everything by the third week of the month. We were going to ask the pastors in Omaha to increase our funding. But now? What can we do now? They won’t trust us after Lydia and Meredith have died. Th
ey’re going to cut us off, and then we’ll have nothing.”

  “You’ve still got your Sunday collections,” Lance offered. “At your church.”

  Donna shook her head. “It’s not really that much. We don’t take in all that much. We can barely get by on it. I’ve just got to call Omaha.”

  “Soon,” Lance said.

  In the observation room, Robertson switched off the microphone button for Interview A. “Ed Schell says pretty much the same thing,” he said to the professor.

  They turned around to the glass into Interview B in time to see Ricky Niell leaving the room. Ed Schell was standing glumly in a corner, at the far end of the room’s rectangular table. The door into the observation room opened from the hallway, and Ricky stepped inside. To Robertson he said, “He’s not too happy that you sent deputies out to his house in the country. And he’s pleading the pauper. Says they’re out of money.”

  “Same thing from Donna,” Robertson said.

  “Do their stories really match, now?” Branden asked. “In all the particulars?”

  “They do now,” Robertson said. “Ricky?”

  Niell ran the list, holding up a new finger for each point. “Mary moved in with them four weeks ago. That was three weeks before Lydia died. She didn’t want Lydia to find out what she was doing. She had decided to leave the church. To leave her husband. She delivered a baby boy two weeks ago. On August 22nd. Smooth delivery. No complications. And she left in a taxi that Thursday, a week and four days ago. They gave her their last penny, and she left with Esther and her new baby boy. On Thursday, August 25th.”

  “Lydia died a week ago,” Branden said. “Mary had already left? Is that what they’re saying?”

  Ricky nodded. Robertson said, “Yes. They’re saying the same thing.”

  “And what about the Culps? Are you going to pursue that angle?”

  Robertson nodded. “Tomorrow morning. Plus, we’ve already interviewed this James Matt you told us about.”

  “Anything there?”

  Robertson shook his head. “Matt doesn’t too much like the Culps. He blames them for breaking up his marriage. He wants them to pay for the damage to his truck, if you can believe that.”