A Perfect Square

Chapter 29




CALLIE TALKED TO GAVIN as she nervously watched out the shop’s windows. It was Andrew’s day off, and today he was dressed in a gray sweat suit. Not baggy sweats like Callie wore on her day off. No, these sweats outlined his shape, accentuated the fact that he was still in military condition — tip-top military condition. Not that she stared at him or his muscles when he walked in because that would be rude. Besides, she could have a good look when he was on his way out of the shop so as not to embarrass the poor man.

Gavin had stopped by to see if Max would like to go for a run. This had become a regular habit of his at least twice a week, and Max was becoming quite spoiled. As for Callie, she wasn’t quite sure what to think about it.

Gavin and Max had just returned from their five-mile jog, and Callie had fought off a temptation earlier to put a chip on Max so she could track them when they ran. Where could you possibly go in Shipshewana that would take you five miles? You’d have to run in circles.

“Explain to me again how you managed to find Bontrager’s daughter? I thought she was dead.”

“It’s pretty complicated, and we’re not completely sure Faith is Ira’s daughter. For one thing, his daughter’s name was Bethany. But either because of the trauma, or because of her age, Faith may have been unable to tell anyone that.”

Gavin sat down on a stool she’d pulled out from the kitchen. They were alone in the shop, which wasn’t unusual for eight o’clock on a Saturday morning, but the shoppers would start popping in soon.

“I told you Miss Morton referred me to Professor Reimer?”

“Yes. He teaches at Notre Dame.”

“Correct, and the Palm Sunday Tornadoes have been a pet project of his. You should see his office. It’s like a living memorial to what happened in the central plains that Sunday — with a particular emphasis on Indiana. He has more letters, maps, and information than you can imagine.”

“How big is his office?” Gavin asked.

“No bigger than my small work area.”

“Then how does he fit it all in?”

“That’s part of the project. He’s collected material over the years, and the more he accumulates, the more people send to him. Now his graduate students are helping him transfer it all to data files. As they do, he’ll place the originals in the university archives or local community centers — “

“Like ours.”

“Exactly.”

“All right. So you think your professor is knowledgeable, but that doesn’t mean the woman who is coming here today is who he thinks she is.” Gavin sipped the hot coffee Callie always had ready after his run, smiled when she pushed a fresh bagel his way.

There was something in his smile that picked up her day more than a cup of coffee from Margie’s. In fact, having a visit from Andrew was always a highlight of her weeks. What did that mean? Did it mean she should say yes next time he asked her out? If there was a next time?

“Are you suspicious by nature or did they teach you that in the service?”

“Actually I learned it overseas. So how did he make the connection?”

“If you remember, Ira isn’t always coherent. He suffers from dementia, so he stumbles back and forth between the present and the past.”

“Which doesn’t make for the most reliable witness.”

“But it might help recall a seemingly unimportant detail, something you or I might have forgotten. Perhaps that’s why, after all these years, Ira was convinced his daughter was still alive. Maybe part of his mind knew, but another part had dismissed it.”

Gavin frowned visibly. “Dismissed what?”

“That no Amish died in Shipshe that day. Ira and his wife had been down at Rainbow Lake that day for the Palm Sunday church services and celebrations. They’d allowed their daughter, Bethany, to stay with her aenti afterwards.”

“He said that?”

“In his way. He mentioned rainbows around the lake. I didn’t know what that meant, thought he was rambling.”

“The area around Shore and Rainbow Lake was practically devastated by twin tornadoes that day.”

“So Professor Reimer told me. The night I visited him he asked me to fill out an information form. After I told him Ira suffered from dementia, he had me write down everything that Ira focused on, everything he rambled about. Professor Reimer had a student enter the information in his database which immediately narrowed the incident down to the Rainbow Lake area.”

Gavin began pacing in front of her counter, causing Max to raise his head and watch with interest. “Let me see if I have this straight. Ira and — “

“Sharon.”

“Sharon went down to Rainbow Lake for the day with their daughter—”

“Bethany.” Callie smiled, then took a sip of her own coffee.

“Got it.” Gavin gave her a salute. When his playfulness crept in, it always surprised her. Most of the time he was so serious, but then usually she saw him when he was on the job. “Ira, Sharon, and Bethany at the lake. Ira and Sharon decide to head home, but little Bethany wants to stay with her aenti. The storm hits, devastating the area, and Bethany is never found.”

“She was found, but miles away, among the rubble, among the dead, according to Professor Reimer’s information. No one knew who she was. According to his records, she was found next to an Amish man and woman who were dead, and the people who found her assumed they were her parents.”

“But they were her aunt and uncle?”

“Apparently.”

“Didn’t Ira go looking for his family? Wouldn’t he have followed the trail and found her?”

“Yeah, he looked for his family. But I think he probably thought they’d already gone home. The Shore Mennonite community south of Shipshe was devastated. Ira didn’t realize they’d stayed at the lake. He was looking through the rubble at Shore.”

“It wasn’t that many miles apart, Callie.”

“The tallies vary from what Ira told me. The Internet says there were forty-seven tornadoes and two-hundred and seventy-one people were killed. How many more were made homeless or were injured? All in an eleven-hour period over four hundred and fifty miles.”

When Gavin continued to shake his head, she pushed on. “Think of what it was like that night. The chaos and confusion. Ira and Sharon were uninjured, but by the time they’re able to return, all that they found was destruction — a scene nothing like what they’d left, and no sign of their child. Sharon apparently went into shock and never completely recovered, though they did eventually have another child — “

“Caleb.”

“Yes.”

“Then who took Bethany?”

“Someone found her, helped her.”

“That’s kidnapping.” Gavin said, indignation rising in his voice.

“You can’t mean that.” Callie walked around the counter, intending to unlock the door, but instead she stopped and reached up to straighten the ball cap he’d placed back on his head. “Whoever found Bethany — now Faith — saw only a child in the midst of a horrible natural catastrophe whose parents were dead. From what I can tell after talking with Faith, she had a good life.”

“I don’t know.” Gavin followed her to the front door. “Seems criminal.”

“According to Professor Reimer the church districts weren’t as close then. By that I mean they didn’t communicate as well between one another. Also the Amish communities weren’t as integrated with the Englisch. There weren’t as many phone shacks and, of course, no cell phones. Also they were hesitant to work with the police. Ira and Sharon searched for their child, in the wrong community apparently, but in the end they accepted it as God’s will …” The silence between them lengthened as they both considered the tragedy. Finally, Callie shrugged. “Maybe we are wrong. Who knows? But Faith is coming to see Ira this morning.”

“Wait a minute. How did Reimer get her story to start with? How did he learn that she’d been found as a child?”

“Faith’s mother died a few years ago. Apparently she always kept a journal. When Faith was going through her mother’s things, reading the journals, she found the full description of that Palm Sunday. Faith had always known her parents weren’t her birth parents, but she didn’t know the entire story. She went to the bishop in their district then and asked him about it and what she should do with the journals. The bishop put her in touch with Professor Reimer.”

“You know, you’ve given me a headache.”

“Go work out some more, Gavin. It’ll wipe those wrinkles right off your forehead.”

An hour later Callie was feeling the beginnings of her own tension headache. Lydia had come in to work the ten to two shift, and Callie was sitting in front of the Grossdaddi House. Faith had arrived at the quilt shop thirty minutes earlier via a driver. She was now waiting beside Callie in the passenger seat, and they were both looking across the parking lot — as if answers might pop out of the pavement.

“Are you sure you’re up for this?”

“I didn’t come all the way from Goshen to wonder.” Just under fifty years old, Faith was round with a little gray hair peeking out from hunder her kapp, and she was about the sweetest thing Callie had ever met. Tiny wrinkles feathered out from her blue eyes, and it seemed that Callie saw a resemblance there of the man who had popped up in her garden eleven days ago, but maybe that was what she wanted to see.

They had talked for twenty minutes, long enough for Callie to be sure this wasn’t a woman trying to take advantage of Ira. Yes, Gavin had convinced Callie that she needed to be careful, and Callie valued Gavin’s opinion.

As if Faith’s Amish clothing and humble demeanor weren’t convincing enough.

“It’s an odd feeling to think of seeing your dat after all these years.”

“We don’t know for sure, Faith. What I mean is, I don’t want you to build your hopes up and then — “

“Dear, you needn’t worry about that. This had been in Gotte’s hands for longer than you have been alive. Since I was a wee one and those black funnels fell from the sky.” She stared out the car window, at the clouds that had begun to gather. “Even after so many years, it’s not something you forget. The particulars maybe, but not the faces — I still remember the terror, the fear, wandering about, and then …”

She stopped and the most angelic of smiles covered her face. “Then two arms wrapped around me. I never will forget that.”

She reached for the door handle. “Let’s go inside. Shall we?”

“Yes, but Faith. I haven’t told Ira who you are. I just said I was stopping by. I didn’t want … that is, I didn’t want to raise his hopes either.”

“I understand.” Faith reached across, patted Callie’s hand where it rested on the seat between them. “You’re a gut freind to him.”

Then she made her way out of the car, and Callie found she had to rush to keep up.

Erin Troyer sat in the front hall, knitting, this time with blue and yellow yarn.

“Baby blanket?”

“Yes. One of the workers here has a boppli on the way this month.” Erin finished her row, then set her knitting aside. “And who did you bring with you today, Miss Callie?”

“This is Faith from Goshen. We’ve come to see Ira.”

Erin studied them both for a moment, then nodded once. “Gut. That’s gut. Ira was hoping for company today.”

“Is he in the barn?” Callie asked.

“No. After the horse episode, doc says he’s to stay away from the barn for a week or so. Ira’s on the back patio shelling walnuts. Don’t believe he’s happy about that. Yes, he’ll be glad to have some company.” Then Erin picked up her knitting and began another row.

Callie led Faith toward the patio. Her own heart was pounding hard enough to set off a monitor alarm. She wondered how Faith was doing. When she glanced over at her though, the expression on Faith’s face seemed peaceful enough: focused, lost in thought, perhaps lost in memories of years ago.

As they stepped out into the enclosed patio area, Callie thought she saw the briefest of smiles soften her features.

Ira was sitting in the midst of several women.

He appeared to be muttering to himself, and his expression was frozen in a scowl. Then he glanced up and saw Callie. “Tell me you brought Max today. They’re forcing me to sit here with all these hens — shelling black walnuts like I’m old and feeble!”

The women around him shared a tolerant look that told Callie they’d heard it all before. They said good morning, then vacated a few chairs.

“Ira, I brought someone to meet you this morning.”

“Hmph.” Ira focused on the bowl of walnuts in his lap.

“This is Faith. She’s from Goshen.”

Ira’s hands stilled over the nuts. He glanced up, as if he was going to wave Faith away, but something in the way she stepped forward caused him to pause and look at her more closely.

As he did, he reached for his cane, which was never far from his side. Reached for it and ran his hands along the smoothness of the wood, until he found the symbols at the top, traced the cross, the hammer, and the nail.

Faith watched his fingers, her eyes glued to the cane, to the engraving. She tried to speak, swallowed once, her hand at her throat, and Callie could see that she was having a hard time maintaining her composure.

“Sit here, Faith. I’ll find you a glass of water,” Callie offered.

There was a pitcher and some glasses on a cart in the corner. When she returned with one, Faith and Ira were still staring at each other. Faith sipped the water, set it down on the patio table, and finally reached for Ira’s cane. “May I, please?”

He released it reluctantly.

She ran her hands over the three items, engraved in a row but touching at the corners, forming a ring that circled the top of the cane. Tears pooling in her eyes, she said, “I remember my dat — my real dat — had one of these. He used to let me hold it as we rode in the buggy.”

“I had that specially made by my brother-in-law back in 1940 when I hurt my knee jumping down from a wagon. He died in the twisters, died with so many others, though we were spared here in Shipshe.” Ira scooted forward in his chair. “Beth? Child? Come closer.” Ira’s hands began to shake as he reached for Faith. “Is that you?”

Faith went down on her knees beside his chair, tears falling, burying her face in his hands so that Callie barely heard when she said, “It’s been many years since anyone has called me by that name.”

There had never been a time when Callie had wished for a talent she didn’t have. Oh, she would like to be able to quilt as Deborah and Esther and Melinda did. She’d like to be able to make the perfect square and turn that square into the perfect quilt.

But at that moment, as she watched Faith kneel at her father’s side after decades of separation, as the sun poured in through the clouds that had yet to completely cover the sky, as Ira took one shaky, wrinkled hand and placed it over her head, Callie wished with all of her heart that she had the ability to paint.

If she did, if she could, she would have painted that scene.

She would have painted love.