Linda Castillo - Sworn to Silence

As I drive by the children, a deep ache of loneliness assails me. A longing for what is lost. My parents. My siblings. A part of myself I cannot reclaim. I wave to the kids. Their smiles bolster me. I glance in my rearview mirror as they resume their game, and a powerful need to protect them rises up inside me.

My sister Sarah and her husband live in the last house on a dead-end road. William has cleared the lane of snow, probably with his horse-drawn plow. He’s considered a conservative amongst the Amish community. While my brother Jacob uses a tractor, William adheres to traditional horsepower. More than once it has been a point of contention between the two men.

A neat row of blue spruce trees, their boughs laden with snow, runs alongside the lane. The massive barn stands two stories high. Built on a slope, it sits on an angled stone foundation. Half a dozen windows dot the façade. Four cupolas jut from the apex of the tin roof. No one knows for certain, but it’s rumored the house and barn date back two hundred years. A time when barns were the center of rural life and architectural works of art. My parents brought Sarah and Jacob and me here many times when we were kids. I chased chickens, played hide-and-seek and bottle-fed newborn calves. Once, on a dare, I jumped from a hay chute and sprained my ankle.

I park behind a sleigh, my headlights reflecting off the slow moving vehicle sign mounted at the rear. Beyond, the windows of the house glow yellow with lantern light. It’s a cozy and inviting scene. But as with my brother’s home, my welcome will not be warm.

I take the sidewalk to the front door and knock. I barely have time to gather my thoughts when the door swings open. I find myself looking at my older sister. “Katie.” She whispers my name as if it’s a bad word. Her gaze flicks sideways and I know William is inside. “Come in out of the cold.”

The aromas of cooked cabbage and baking yeast bread titillate my appetite as I enter. But I won’t be asked for dinner. A kerosene lamp illuminates the living room. I see a large homemade table and bench. On the opposite wall, a framed needlepoint sampler that had belonged to Mamm hangs front and center. The initials of our great-grandparents are sewn into the fabric next to locks of their hair. I remember running my fingers over those locks and wondering about the people they came from.

“Come into the kitchen,” Sarah says.

I follow her to the kitchen to find her husband at the table, hunched over a bowl of steaming soup.

“Hello, William,” I say.

He stands when I enter and bows his head slightly. “Good evening, Katie.”

“I’m sorry to interrupt your dinner.”

“You are welcome to hot soup.”

The invitation surprises me, since I’m under the bann, but I shake my head. “I’ve only got a few minutes.” I look at my sister and force a smile. “I wanted to check on you. See how you’re feeling.”

She places a hand over her distended abdomen, but her gaze slides from mine. “I feel good,” she says. “Better than last time.”

“You look great.”

William smiles. “She eats like a horse.”

“She ate us out of house and home when we were kids.” I smile, hoping it looks real. “It’s good for the baby.”

“Bad for my bulging middle!” she exclaims with a little too much enthusiasm.

An uncomfortable silence ensues. I touch her shoulder and make eye contact. “Are you still working on the baby quilt?”

“I’m almost finished.”

“Could I see it?”

My request surprises her, but her eyes light up. “Of course.” Touching my shoulder, she starts toward the living room. “Come.”

The stairs creak beneath our feet as we climb to the second level. I follow her to the bedroom she and William share. It’s a large room with two tall windows and an angled ceiling. The furniture is heavy and plain. A dresser that had once belonged to our parents. A chest with steel pulls. And a sleigh bed covered with one of Sarah’s quilts.

She crosses to the dresser and lights a glass lamp. Golden light casts shadows on the ceiling and walls. “You look tired, Katie.”

“I’ve been working a lot.”

Nodding, she pulls out a partially completed quilt. Curved patches of seafoam green and lavender form a complex pattern. I see the required seven stitches per inch and as always, I’m awed. Quilting is extremely labor intensive; a good quilt will contain over fifty thousand stitches. Most Amish women learn to sew early in life. Most can make a decent quilt. But very few ever become good enough to design a piece of art like this.

Thinking of the baby my sister carries, I touch the soft fabric. I think of the babies she’s lost in the past; I think of my own losses and for a moment I have to blink back tears. “It’s beautiful.”

“Yes.” Her smile is real this time. “It is lovely.”

I drop my hand and ask the question that’s been eating at me since Tomasetti waylaid me in the bar with his riddle about Pete the cop. “Sarah, have you told anyone about Daniel Lapp?”

She brushes a speck of thread off the quilt. “I do not wish to speak of that, Katie.”

“Did you tell someone about Lapp?”

Lowering the quilt, she stares at me as if I’ve just pulled out my pistol and shot her dead-center. “I did what I had to do.”

“What does that mean?”

“I prayed to God for guidance. When I woke yesterday morning, I knew I would find peace, that you would find peace, in the truth.”

A keen sense of betrayal cuts me. “Who did you tell?”

“I sent a note to Bishop Troyer.”

“What did the note say?”

“The truth.” She looks down at the quilt. “That you know who the killer is.” The words send a flood of panic through me. The scene at the bar with Tomasetti flashes in my mind’s eye. For an instant, I’m so stricken, I can’t catch my breath.

“I am sorry if this hurts you, Katie. But I felt very strongly that telling the truth was the right thing to do.”

“You don’t know the truth!” Turning away from her, I begin to pace. “Sarah, how could you?”

“Your police friends can help you find Daniel now,” she offered.

Heart pounding, I rub my hands over my face and try to calm down. “Did you sign the note? Do they know it came from you?”

“I did not sign my name.”

I try to think through the ramifications, but my brain is so muddled by exhaustion, I can’t think past the panic clenching my chest.

“Katie, what happened?”

I stop pacing and look at her. “Bishop Troyer took the note to the town council. Maybe the mayor. Now, they’re suspicious of me. Are you happy now?”

“I am not happy to see you hurting. All I want is for Daniel Lapp to be caught.”

“We don’t know that he’s the killer!” I shout.

She glances nervously toward the door. “Please do not shout.”

Trying hard to fend off the fingers of panic crawling all over me, I draw a deep breath. “Sarah, I need to talk to you about what happened that day.”

She starts to turn away, but I set my hands on her shoulders and force her to face me. “I need you to remember. Think back to that day. Is it really possible Daniel Lapp survived?”

“If he’s back, then he must have survived.” Her fingers flutter at the neckline of her plain dress. “You saw him, too.”

The human mind is a powerful thing. Like the body, it possesses protective mechanisms to safeguard it against trauma. The abject horror of what happened that day was branded into my brain and will remain there forever. But I remember few details of the rape, even less of the shooting. The one thing I do recall with vivid clarity is the blood. On the curtains. On my hands. An ocean of it glistening on the floor.