Jodie Picoult - Plain Truth

He settled in with a smile, happy to be back at work after two weeks out of town, assisting a professor emeritus on a summer lecture circuit. At a knock on his door, he glanced up from the anthology he was highlighting. “Come in.”

The unfamiliar face of a woman peeked around the edge of the door. “I’m looking for Jacob Fisher.”

“You found him.”

Too old to be one of his students; plus, students didn’t tend to dress in business suits. The woman brandished a small wallet, flashing ID. “I’m Detective-Sergeant Lizzie Munro. East Paradise Township police.”

Jacob gripped the arms of his chair, thinking of all the buggy accidents he’d seen growing up in Lancaster County, all the farm machinery that had accidentally caused death. “My family,” he managed, his mouth gone dry as the desert. “Did something happen?”

The detective eyed him. “Your family is healthy,” she said after a moment. “Mind if I ask you a few questions?”

Jacob nodded and gestured to the other grad student’s desk chair. He hadn’t had news of his family in nearly three months, what with summer being so busy and Katie unable to come. He’d been meaning to call his Aunt Leda, just to keep in touch, but then he got wrapped up in his work and dragged off on the lecture tour. “I understand you grew up Amish, in East Paradise?” the detective asked.

Jacob felt the first prick of unease on his spine. Being English for so long had made him wary. “Do you mind if I ask what this is in reference to?”

“A felony was allegedly committed in your former hometown.”

Jacob closed the anthology he’d been reading. “Look, you guys came to talk to me after the cocaine incident too. I may not be Amish anymore, but that doesn’t mean I’m supplying drugs to my old friends.”

“Actually, this has nothing to do with the narcotics cases. Your sister has been charged with murder in the first degree.”

“What?” Gathering his composure, he added, “Clearly, there’s been a mistake.”

Munro shrugged. “Don’t shoot the messenger. Were you aware of your sister’s pregnancy?”

Jacob could not keep the shock from his face. “She . . . had a baby?”

“Apparently. And then she allegedly killed it.”

He shook his head. “That’s the craziest thing I’ve ever heard.”

“Yeah? You ought to try my line of work. How long since you last saw your sister?”

Calculating quickly, he said, “Three, four months.”

“Before that did she visit you on a regular basis?”

“I wouldn’t say regular,” Jacob hedged.

“I see. Mr. Fisher, did she develop any friendships or romantic interests when she was visiting you?”

“She didn’t meet people here,” Jacob said.

“Come on.” The detective grinned. “You didn’t introduce her to your girlfriend? To the guy whose chair I’m sitting on?”

“She was very shy, and she spent all her time with me.”

“You were never apart from her? Never let her go to the library, or shopping, or to the video store by herself?”

Jacob’s mind raced. He was thinking of all the times, last fall, that he’d left Katie in the house while he went off to class. Left her in the house that he was subletting from a guy who delayed his research expedition not once, but three times. He looked impassively at the detective. “You have to understand, my sister and I are two different animals. She’s Amish, through and through-she lives, sleeps, and breathes it. Visiting here for her-it was a trial. Even when she did come in contact with outsiders here, they had about as much effect on her as oil on water.”

The detective flipped to a blank page in her notebook. “Why aren’t you Amish anymore?”

This, at least, was safe ground. “I wanted to continue my studies. That goes against the Plain way. I was working as a carpentry apprentice when I met a high school English teacher who sent me off with a stack of books that might as well have been gold, for all I thought they were worth. And when I made the decision to go to college, I knew that I would be excommunicated from the church.”

“I understand this caused some strain in the relationship between you and your parents.”

“You could say that,” Jacob conceded.

“I was told that to your father, you’re as good as dead.”

Tightly, he answered, “We don’t see eye to eye.”

“If your father banished you from the household for wanting a diploma, what do you think he would have done if your sister had a baby out of wedlock?”

He had been part of this world long enough to understand the legal system. Leaning forward, he asked softly, “Which one of my family members are you accusing?”

“Katie,” Munro said flatly. “If she’s as Amish as you say she is, then it’s possible she was willing to do anything-including commit murder-to stay Amish and to keep your father from finding out about that baby. Which includes hiding the pregnancy, and then getting rid of the baby when it was born.”

“If she’s as Amish as I say she is, then that would never happen.” Jacob stood abruptly and opened the door. “If you’ll excuse me, Detective, I have work to do.”

He closed the door and stood behind it, listening to the detective’s retreating footsteps. Then he sat down at his desk and picked up the telephone. “Aunt Leda,” he said a moment later. “What in the world is going on?”

By the time the church service drew to a close that Sunday, Katie was light-headed, and not just from the pressing summer heat, intensified by so many bodies packed into one small home. The bishop called a members’ meeting, and as those who hadn’t been baptized yet filed out to play in the barn, Ellie leaned close to her. “What are they doing?”

“They have to leave. So do you.” She saw Ellie staring at her trembling hands, and she hid them under her thighs.

“I’m not budging.”

“You must,” Katie urged. “It will be easier that way.”

Ellie stared at her in that wide-eyed owl way that sometimes made Katie smile, and shook her head. “Tough beans. Tell them to take it up with me.”

In the end, though, Bishop Ephram seemed to accept that Ellie was going to sit in on the members’ meeting. “Katie Fisher,” one of the ministers said, calling her forward.

She didn’t think she was going to be able to stand, her knees were knocking so hard. She could feel eyes on her: Ellie’s, Mary Esch’s, her mother’s, even Samuel’s. These people, who would bear witness to her shame.

It didn’t matter whether or not she’d had a baby, when you got right down to it. She had no intention of discussing her private matters in front of the congregation, in spite of what Ellie had tried to explain to her about a Bill of Rights and kangaroo courts. Katie had been brought up to believe that rather than defend yourself, you’d best step up and take the medicine. With a deep breath, she walked to the spot where the ministers were sitting.

When she knelt on the floor, she could feel the ridge of the oak boards pressing into her skin and she gloried in this pain, because it kept her mind off what was about to happen. As she bowed her head, Bishop Ephram began to speak. “It has come to our attention that the young sister has found herself in a sin of the flesh.”

Every part of Katie was on fire, from her face to her chest to the very palms of her hands. The bishop’s gaze was on her. “Is this offense true?”

“Yes,” she whispered, and she might have imagined it, but she could have sworn that in the silence she heard Ellie’s defeated sigh.

The bishop turned to the congregation. “Do you agree to place Katie under the bann for a time as she considers her sin and comes to repentance?”