chapter 21
DEBORAH STOPPED by her mother-in-law’s farm on the way into town. Ruth had baked dozens of small, single-serve-sized cakes during the past two days. The kitchen smelled of cinnamon, lemon, apple, even blueberry. Deborah wanted to sink into a chair, accept her offer of coffee, and forget the troubles waiting in Shipshewana.
But she had offered to drive the desserts to the festival. They would be sold in the family booth and the money would be put into Ruth’s jar, which she kept for the grandchildren’s gifts. Ruth and Abe had been blessed with eight children, all married — except for Stephen, who was only twenty years old — and Ruth’s number of grandchildren had quickly grown until she found herself with a total of forty-two.
On the Sundays when they had no church meeting, the family met at Ruth and Abe’s for lunch. After the meal, Deborah would often find Ruth in the barn or down at the picnic table Jonas’ father had set up years ago. She would be surrounded by her grandchildren, young and old, telling them a story from the Bible. The way she told the Scripture, Deborah barely recognized it — there was always so much adventure and romance.
The Bible was full of such things though, and Ruth had helped Deborah see that over the years.
When she’d walked into the house and smelled the baking, Deborah thought of the stories, of the grandchildren, and of the jar her mother-in-law kept. Ruth had explained that birthdays and Christmas tended to take its toll on the family budget.
She’d helped Deborah start her own jar the first year she married Jonas — though her money didn’t go toward grandkinner yet. Still, Deborah loved knowing that doing small things like making cakes or knitting blankets for strangers could bless her own family as well as the strangers themselves.
Ruth had heard about the murder of Mrs. Knepp, and she knew Callie was involved. She didn’t look surprised to hear the situation now included Deborah.
“How do you find yourself in these messes?” Ruth asked as she helped carry the cakes to Deborah’s buggy.
“I was wondering the same thing at five this morning.”
“When you and Jonas were young and going through your rumspringa —”
“We didn’t go through rumspringa. I was always an obedient child and so was Jonas.”
Ruth didn’t bother to contradict her. Instead she continued her story as if Deborah hadn’t interrupted. “I prayed and comforted myself by knowing there would come a day when your life would settle down.”
She pushed the box of cakes into the buggy, then stood back and straightened her apron. “I suppose I thought that day had come already, but maybe it hasn’t.”
Deborah cocked her head, studying Ruth and trying to decide if she was being scolded or not. All she saw in the woman she’d come to think of as her own mother was love and a healthy dose of concern, probably the same expression Deborah had worn questioning Martha on the way over.
The questioning had been brief since it had produced nothing.
Martha had stared at her hands and answered in single syllables. The girl was embarrassed and remorseful but tight lipped.
Kissing Ruth’s cheek, Deborah said, “Danki.” Then she walked around to her side of the buggy and called out to Martha, who was in the barn visiting with Abe.
“For what?” Ruth asked.
“For always caring about us. For stepping in when my mamm passed away. And for not trying to talk me out of helping my freinden.”
“Would it do any good?”
“No.”
“Wouldn’t be the right thing to do either, though there’s always a temptation to protect one’s own.”
Martha walked out of the barn, holding her grandfather’s hand. “She favors you.”
“I worry about her. She’s still a child.”
“Eleven years old. Sixth grade now?”
“Ya, but —”
“Two more years, and she’ll begin to decide what type of work she’d like to do. Her quilting is gut like yours.”
Deborah shook her head. “Seems yesterday she was building blocks on that first quilt you gave me.”
Martha and Abe had stopped halfway between the barn and the buggy. They were leaning over the pasture fence, feeding an apple to one of Abe’s horses. Ruth moved closer and put her hand on Deborah’s arm.
“It’s natural to want to protect them while you can. I wouldn’t tell you not to, but you can also trust Martha. When I said she favors you, I meant more than in how she looks. She has a gut head under her prayer kapp.”
Deborah was tempted to leave Martha at her in-laws’, but then her daughter started telling Ruth and Abe all the things she planned to see while in town at the festival. Suddenly Deborah was eleven again, with all of her life still in front of her, and she couldn’t disappoint Martha in this.
Surely it was safe or Shane would have told them.
Surely it was safe or she’d know in her heart it wasn’t.
Deborah worried less as she directed Cinnamon toward the festival. The roads were busy, but with the smell of the cakes in the seat behind them, both she and Martha were smiling by the time they delivered them to Jonas’ sister Kate.
Kate thanked them, then asked if Martha could stay awhile and help in the booth, as Deborah knew she would.
“Can’t see why not.” Deborah wasn’t sure how much Kate had heard about the murder, but she knew her sister-in-law would keep a good eye on Martha. And like Ruth had reminded her, Martha was almost grown.
They talked for a few more minutes, and Deborah felt the tension leaving her shoulders as she watched the tourists, musicians, artists, and vendors. Fall Festival had always been one of her favorite times of year. Maybe this weekend would end on a good note after all.
Maybe they had blown the danger out of proportion.
Deborah walked through to the back of the booth, exited out the flap in the canvas, and climbed into her buggy. Martha was standing near Kate’s oldest daughter, Sharon. Perhaps that’s what Martha needed.
A little time to visit.
A little time without any responsibilities.
As she turned Cinnamon to go, she looked back and saw Martha and Sharon dip their heads closer together, as if they were sharing a secret. Sharon was a sweet girl, if a little wild. At sixteen, she was definitely in her rumspringa.
As she watched, though she couldn’t be sure, Deborah thought she saw Sharon hand Martha something. Whatever it was, it looked like Martha slipped it into the pocket of her dress.
Aaron reached down for the chicken closest to his chair and received a sharp peck on his hand.
What had he expected? It wasn’t a chick. Grown chickens pecked. His daed had warned him as much.
His daed had warned him about a lot of things.
Aaron looked around the chicken coop. Funny how nothing had changed. Looked the same as it had yesterday morning and the day before that. Same as it had last week in fact, before Creeper had come into their lives.
Aaron was the one who felt different — like those boys who had changed on the long cattle drive with John Wayne, maybe he was changing too. Maybe something inside of him had shifted when he’d seen the murder.
Scattering more feed on the ground, he rolled his chair away from the gate so the fowl would follow, then spread the rest of the feed.
His mamm had caught them. Didn’t matter how. She had a sixth sense about such things. One thing Aaron knew — he and Matt wouldn’t be going to town today unless they were with their dat, and that prospect didn’t seem likely.
His mamm’s words to his dat still rang in his ears. “Seems the boys told you one thing and me another.”
“We didn’t say—” He’d stopped there, the sentence half out of his mouth. The look from his daed had silenced him quickly enough, and the expression on Matt’s face told him it would be wiser to stay quiet.
His daed hadn’t asked any questions at all. But his mamm sure had. She’d questioned them for a full ten minutes before they’d left Reuben’s. Finally she’d allowed Matt to drive the cart, but insisted Aaron ride in the buggy with her and Hannah. He’d been afraid she was going to question him more, but she hadn’t. The hurt look on her face had been even worse than her questions.
He’d almost broken down then, told her they meant to help. And they would help too, because they had to. But he remembered what Matt had whispered to him as she’d stood between the barn and the porch with Deborah and Esther. Matt had said, “Don’t tell them our plan. No matter how badly you want to. If you tell them, you’ll feel better, but we won’t be able to help. Helping is more important than feeling better.”
So in the end he’d sat beside Mamm in the buggy and felt worse than during his toughest coughing spells.
“Sounds as if they should spend the day with me,” his dat had said.
“I’ll take Hannah to your mamm’s. I was planning on going to the shop this afternoon.”
“Ya. Figured you might.” Then he’d kissed Hannah and squeezed Melinda’s arm — Aaron noticed he was always doing little things like that, as if his parents had this unspoken language between them. “Come with me, boys. There’s always plenty of work.”
And there had been. Aaron had never considered himself pampered, but he couldn’t remember a day when he’d worked as hard as this morning. He’d actually been happy when his daed had pointed to the chicken feed. “Not sure that I fed them well enough this morning. Why don’t you go and check on them.”
It was probably an excuse to give him a rest, but Aaron wasn’t about to call him on it. The day had grown warmer, and the chicken coop had a few areas of shade.
But when he was done feeding the chickens, he had to move out of the coop and to the barn. His next chore was to wash three pair of work boots — two were his dat’s and one was his bruder’s. Aaron found them sitting near the barn door next to a large bucket of water and a brush. Great. Maybe he could fall into the water and cool himself off.
If this was the price of rebellion, a single act would suit him fine. Settle this one situation with Mrs. Knepp’s killer, and he’d walk the line for the rest of his years.
He picked up a boot and a brush, wondering what would happen if he soaked the boot in the water. When Matt touched his shoulder he almost threw the boot in the air instead.
“Little jumpy, aren’t you?”
“Make some noise instead of sneaking up on a guy.”
“Guess you were pretty focused on that mud.”
“There’s plenty of it to focus on. Think you could manage to walk around it next time?”
“Be glad you’re working with boots and not horses. At least a boot will stand still for you.” Matt leaned against the barn wall and studied him. “Having second thoughts?”
“No. Are you?”
“‘Course not, but we’re going to have to change our plans. They’re not going to let us out of their sights today.”
“I figured as much.”
They both considered the implications of that for a few minutes. Almost against his will, Aaron’s mind went back to John Wayne.
Justin called him The Duke.
He’d watched two movies starring The Duke. In both of them The Duke had been in a lot worse fixes. He’d certainly had to do worse things than feed chickens and clean muddy boots.
The Duke had fought terrible weather, fought bears, even fought bad outlaws.
“Whatcha thinking about?” Matt asked.
“Thinking this is nothing. We need to find a way to take care of the Creeper before he hurts someone else.”
Matt smiled and plucked a tall weed, began chewing on it. “We’ll get our chance, long as we keep our eyes open. That’s why I told Martha to go ahead and pick up the cell phone. We need to be ready. If we do our work and keep our heads down, everyone will think we’ve forgotten whatever we had in mind. That’s when we’ll go after him.”
As Matt turned and walked back into the barn, Aaron continued scrubbing the boot. He didn’t want to leave the job half done if their chance to square things with the killer did pop up. Anything could happen in the next few hours.
One thing seemed certain.
Creeper’s minutes were numbered.
Aaron could feel it.