Drizzle floats down from a glowering sky the color of charcoal. The smells of horses, wet grass and the tang of dry autumn leaves waft through the window. T.J. and I have been here since daybreak, when Bishop Troyer swung open the gate to the graabhof, or cemetery, and the gravediggers began their sad task.
I attended several Amish funerals growing up. The day before the ceremony, male friends and neighbors of the deceased build the unadorned, six-sided casket. Amish caskets are lined with fabric sewn by female friends and neighbors. Once the coroner releases the bodies, the dead are washed and dressed. Deceased males are usually garbed in white—pants, vest and shirt. The females are clothed in a white dress, apron and cape. Bonnie was probably dressed in the same clothes in which she was married.
“So you think the killer is going to show?”
I glance away from the procession and look at T.J. “I don’t know. If he’s Amish, he might.”
T.J. nods. “English guy would probably stand out.”
“A little.” I spent most of the night re-reading Mary Plank’s journal, and I can still feel the weight of her words pressing down on me this morning. I drank too much, but it’s not the fuzzy ache behind my eyes that bothers me. I’d hoped the diary would offer some clue as to the identity of the man she was seeing, but she didn’t name him. I looked for other details, too. His profession. Physical description. The make of his vehicle. The address of the places he took her. Was she being careful in case one of her parents found the journal? Or had he coached her, told her never to use his name even in her most private moments?
All that reading wasn’t totally in vain because I determined two important things. I’m convinced Mary Plank’s lover and the murders are related. And I know he’s not Amish. With nothing else to go on, it’s a starting point.
“You think the killer is Amish?” T.J. asks.
“No.” He gives me a so-why-are-we-here look, so I tell him about the journal. “She was in love with the guy.”
“Probably the source of the sperm, huh?”
“I think so.”
T.J. considers that for a moment. “What about motive?”
“She was pregnant and barely fifteen years old. The age of consent in the state of Ohio is sixteen.”
“So he could be facing statutory rape charges.”
“Even more charges if he was drugging her and taking sexually oriented photos.”
“Could be a pretty strong motive for murder.” T.J. mulls that over. “But why kill the whole family?”
“She told her parents about this guy. She told them about the baby.”
T.J. nods. “He murdered them to shut them up.”
“If they threatened to go to the police, he knew he would be facing a multitude of serious charges. Rape. Maybe child molestation. Contributing to the delinquency of a minor. Possession of a controlled substance. If he published sexually oriented photos of her, child pornography.” I shrug, disgusted by my own words. “He would have been facing years of hard time.”
“Pretty powerful motive.”
“It doesn’t explain the torture aspect, what he did to those two girls in the barn.”
“Hard to figure something like that.” He turns thoughtful. “Probably removed the, uh . . . uterus to keep the police from getting their hands on paternal DNA.”
“That makes sense in a sick sort of way. Maybe he included the sister to make the scene look like something else.” I consider the level of cruelty and shake my head. “I can see this as a crime of passion. The guy snaps, kills his girlfriend, then guns down her family. I’ve seen it happen before. But this is so . . . brutal.” My shoulder is getting damp from the drizzle, so I close my window. “We’re missing something.”
“Like what?”
“I don’t know yet.”
T.J. looks out the window at the stream of buggies turning into the gravel lot of the cemetery. “You think he’s local?”
“If he doesn’t live in Painters Mill, I’ll bet he lives nearby.”
“Right under our noses.”
He goes on to say something else, but I’m no longer listening. My attention zeroes in on a silver Toyota parked on the shoulder fifty yards away. A dark-haired young man sporting a goatee and video camera gets out. Several buggies have stopped to make the turn into the cemetery lot. Mr. Camcorder had decided this might be a good time to get some Amish video for YouTube.
He’s wrong.
While some of the more liberal-minded Amish will allow it, the majority do not like to be photographed. There are differing views as far as the origin of this aversion. Some believe it is the Bible’s second commandment: Thou shalt not make unto thyself a graven image. Some of the old order believe if you have your photo taken or even a painting rendered, you’ll die. Most Amish simply believe photographs are vain displays of pride, which goes against their basic values.