Marta Perry - Danger In Amish Country

But they couldn’t stand here wondering about him. “It doesn’t seem right to leave the poor man alone. If I stay with him, can you see to calling the police?” Amish usually tried to steer clear of entanglement with the law, but their duty was clear in this case.

“Ya.” Sara took a step back, away from the support of his hand. “There’s an Englisch house not far. They’ll have a phone. And then I’ll stay with the kinner.”

“My Rachel.” His gaze met Sara’s. “You don’t think she could have seen this?” He gestured toward the body, his mind rebelling at the thought of his little girl viewing anything so gruesome.

“No.” Sara seemed to push the idea away with both hands. “I don’t think... Surely he hasn’t been lying there since yesterday.”

“It’s possible.” He looked up at the cliff face above them. From this angle it just looked like a jumble of rocks. “If she was standing where we stood...” He stopped, looking at Teacher Sara accusingly. “You shouldn’t let the kinner go so far from the school.”

“It is the edge of the playground,” she said, a touch of anger like lightning in her green eyes. “The scholars are never out of my sight when they have recess.”

“Sorry,” he muttered.

He shouldn’t blame Teacher Sara, when the thing that troubled him was his own inability to get his child to confide in him. Rachel had been so distant and solemn since her mother’s death, as if all Rachel’s laughter had been buried with Barbara.

“I’ll go now,” Teacher Sara said, turning away stiffly.

He let his gaze linger on her slender figure until the undergrowth hid her from sight. No matter how long this took, he knew instinctively that she would stay with Rachel. She’d attempt to comfort his little girl.

But if Rachel really had seen this man lying dead... His thoughts stuttered to a halt as something even worse occurred to him. What if his little girl had seen the man fall?

TWO

“I’m not sure what else we can tell you, Chief O’Brian.” Sara tried not to think how odd it was to see the bulky, gray-haired township police chief sitting behind the teacher’s desk in the Amish schoolhouse. “Neither of us knows who the man was.”

She and Caleb were perched atop the first graders’ desks, which were, of course, the row closest to her desk. It was not exactly comfortable, but she kept her hands folded in her lap and her feet, in their sedate black shoes, together on the wide planks of the wooden floor.

Chief O’Brian, benevolent and grandfatherly, had guided the small police presence that covered both the village of Beaver Creek and the rural township since before Sara was born. He consulted the notes he’d been making and then looked up at her.

A girlish giggle floated in from the porch, distracting him. Lily and Lovina were teaching Rachel how to play jacks under the observant gaze of a young officer. Sara felt sure that the giggle, coming from Lily, was for the benefit of the policeman.

She’d chide the girl, but she was too relieved that they were well screened from the efforts under way across the creek, where the emergency crew was removing the body.

“Well, now.” Chief O’Brian returned to the subject at hand. “I think there’s just one thing that’s not quite clear to me, Teacher Sara. Why exactly were you and Mr. King out there looking at the ridge to begin with?”

She opened her mouth to answer, but Caleb beat her to it.

“My little girl was telling me something I couldn’t make heads or tails of about an old man,” he said. “When I picked her up after school today, I asked Teacher Sara about it. She showed me the way the rock outcropping looks like a face in profile.”

“Caleb and his daughter are new to Beaver Creek,” Sara said, although she suspected that the police chief, like the Amish bishop, knew all there was to know about newcomers. “You know how the kinner talk about that face they think they see in the rocks.” She turned to Caleb. “Chief O’Brian visits our school several times a year. He teaches the scholars how to be safe when they’re walking along the roads. And brings them candy canes at Christmas, ain’t so?”

Chief O’Brian’s lined face relaxed in a smile. “Visiting the schools is my favorite part of my job. Not like this situation.” He jerked his thumb in the direction of the ridge.

Caleb’s explanation had made it sound as if Rachel’s questions about the old man were mere curiosity. No doubt he was relieved that the chief had moved away from the topic.

“I’m sorry for the man’s family to be getting news like this,” she said. “Do you know who he was?”

“Not yet,” Chief O’Brian said. “So you folks were just looking over that way out of idle curiosity, is that it?”

Apparently he wasn’t ready to move away from the topic after all. Sara glanced at the poster above the chalkboard, which proclaimed Visitors are the sunshine in our day in cursive letters.

She could practically feel the intensity of Caleb’s will directed toward her. For whatever reason, he didn’t want her to say anything more about Rachel.

“I...I suppose so.” Sara tried to sound confident, but it went against her nature even to imply something that wasn’t true. She could feel her cheeks growing warm.

“I see.” Chief O’Brian looked from her to Caleb, and her flush deepened. Now he was thinking exactly the wrong thing, supposing she’d made an excuse to walk with Caleb. But to say anything more would just make things worse.

Fortunately, Chief O’Brian was distracted by a gesture from the officer on the porch. He rose, very authoritative in his gray uniform.

“Well, I guess I won’t be bothering you good folks any longer. Mr. King, I’m sure you want to be getting your little girl home. Sara, sorry for the disruption.”

Sara murmured something, she wasn’t sure what, just glad for the moment to see him leaving her classroom. He paused for a second on the porch to say something that made the girls giggle again, and then he and the young officer headed off toward the police car.

Sara swung to face Caleb. “Why didn’t you tell Chief O’Brian the truth about Rachel?”

Caleb’s strong-featured face tightened. “I didn’t lie to the man.”

“You told him only part of the truth,” she snapped, keeping her voice low so that the children on the porch couldn’t hear. “And you involved me in saying less than the truth, as well.”

Caleb had a remarkably stubborn jaw. “My child’s nightmares are not his business.”

“It might be important that Rachel was so upset last night about the Old Man. It might mean...” Sara let that thought trickle to a stop, afraid of where it was going.

“Ya.” His face was bleak. “It might mean that my Rachel saw something bad. And if so, it’s for me to deal with. Not you. And I’m certain sure not the police.”

He stalked out of the schoolhouse, leaving Sara with nothing at all to say.

* * *

The gentle clink of plates accompanied the evening routine of helping her mamm with the dishes. Sara, her hands in the warm, soapy water, found the chore comforting after the stresses of the day.

“I can finish up, Mamm, if you want.” Her mother looked a bit tired, but she wouldn’t want to hear Sara say so.

“No need.” Her mother polished a plate with her usual vigor. “I don’t mind. I remember when you girls used to make so much noise with washing dishes I had to get away.”

Sara smiled. True enough. When she and Trudy and Ruthie did the dishes, they’d chattered and laughed and argued the whole time. But now Trudy and Ruthie were married, as well as her two oldest brothers, and Trudy had twins on the way.

Funny. Sara, the oldest, had been the first one to plan a wedding, but Tommy Brand had managed to postpone it for one reason or another for nearly five years. And when he did get married, it was to someone else.