A Plain Malice: An Appleseed Creek Mystery (Appleseed Creek Mystery Series Book 4) (34 page)

Pearl’s words brought tears to my eyes. For too many years, I was the daughter my father did not want. That was changing, but rejection does not heal overnight. To hear Pearl say she wished her daughter was like
me
meant more to me than she would ever know. “What was her name?”

“I never picked one. I couldn’t bear to.”
She closed eyes.

I kissed her on the top of her head, careful to avoi
d the bandage, and left the hospital.

Chapter Thirty-Eight

In front of the Dutch Inn, Timothy helped the passengers onto the bus. When the last person climbed on, he said, “I think we should have a new rule.”

I folded the day’s itinerary and stuck it into the back pocket of my jeans
. “What’s that?”

“When there is
a crazed killer on the loose, text messages are not sufficient means of communication.” He gave me a pointed look.

“
I’m sorry, but the idea to visit Pearl didn’t strike me until after I dropped Becky off. If I drove all the way back here first, there wouldn’t have been time to see her before the bus left.”

He folded his arms. “You could have called.”

“You would have argued against my idea,” I said.

“
I’m going with you today. You didn’t think I would let you go with this group again without me, did you?”

“
Nope,” I said. I was glad for the company.”

“Where are we going first
?” Timothy asked.

“It’s the Sutter farm.”
I made a face.

“
The deacon won’t say anything to you in front the tourists,” Timothy said.

I
gave him an Are-You-Kidding-Me look. The deacon had never been shy about sharing his opinion about the Troyers or me before, so how would a group from Mississippi stop him?

“Stop standing around talking
, and get on the bus,” Hudson bellowed.

I gripped the railing and pulled myself up the first large step. “Timothy
’s coming too.” Hudson rubbed his bald head. “You need more muscle?”

Officer Nottingham was already aboard under Chief Rose’s orders.

“Yep,” I replied.

“Whatever,”
Hudson said. “Just get on the bus. The sooner this day is over the better.”

I couldn’t agree more.

On the drive to the Sutters, we passed the Troyer farm. A white van from the State Department of Health idled in the Troyer’s driveway. Timothy and I leaned close to the window for a better look. It was yet another time I wished the Troyers had a phone in their farmhouse so that we could call them and ask what was going on. That answer would have to wait until the tour ended for the day.

The Sutter farm was three miles down the road pas
t the Lambright farm where Ruth’s closest friend Anna lived. The Sutters’ ran a small vegetable farm. Most of the deacon’s income came from the storefronts he rented to Amish businesses in tow.

The deacon, Aaron, and a half
dozen other Amish men, including Bishop Hooley, waited for the bus as it rolled up the Sutters’ long driveway. Aaron, the men, and the bishop waved. The deacon did not.

“What a beautiful farm,”
Bitty said.

Charles snapped photographs.

Bitty poked her husband in the ribs. “Charles, put the camera away. You don’t want to offend our hosts, do you?”

Charles replaced his camera in its case with an all-suffering sigh.

I needed to see those pictures.

Outside the bus, t
he guests milled around the bus, and Deacon Sutter’s flashed a phony smile at the group. If he was surprised to see Officer Nottingham and Timothy with us, he did not show it. “
Wilkim.
We’re so happy you are here with us today. We will begin with a short demonstration on thrashing wheat.”

“Oh, I always wondered how flour is made,”
Bobbi Jo said. “Won’t this be exciting, Jimbo?”

The large elderly man narrowed his eyes. “Will there be free samples of Amish bread too?”

The deacon held his gaze. “
Nee.
After what happened a few days ago, the district decided that we would not be able to give you any food from any of our farms. It is for your own safety.”

Jimbo’s
mouth fell open. “So we’re going to starve?”

“
Jimbo,” I interrupted. “There will be plenty to eat back at the inn.”

He grunted.

Finally, the deacon led the group to the barn. I fell to the back of the pack with Bitty and Charles. “Charles, can I see your camera?” I asked.

He gripped his camera bag tightly in his hand and stopped walking. “Why? I’m not taking any photographs.
I can’t leave it on the bus where it could walk off. It’s an expensive piece of equipment.”

“I know that,” I said quickly. “I would like to look at the photographs you’ve taken, especially those from Saturday morning
.”

Bitty placed her hand over her heart. “Do you think Charles may have
taken a picture of whoever hurt Ruby and Dudley?”

I shrugged.
“It’s worth a look.”

Charles’s jowls shook. “You can take a peek, but
Chief Rose already looked through my pictures and made copies of every photo I took on Saturday. She didn’t seem to think they were of much help.”

Here I was thinking I was a detecting genius and the police chief was two steps
ahead of me. “Can I still have a look? Maybe I will pick up on something she didn’t.”

He nodded.
“All right.” He handed me the camera bag. “Do you know how to use it?”

“I do.”

“Because if you break it, you buy it. Come on, Bitty, I don’t want to miss the wheat.”

They continued on their way to the barn. I
searched the farm from a shady spot where I could view the photographs on the camera’s screen without glare. A toolshed with a small porch in front was a few yards from the barn. I perched on the cement step and opened the camera case.

I whistled. It was the first time I had been able to see Charles
’ camera up close. It was a Nikon with three interchangeable lenses, easily worth two grand. Carefully, I removed the camera from the case because I knew Charles would hold me to “you break it, you buy it.”

I switched it on and changed the setting to view pictures. I groaned. There were over four thousand
photos stored on the camera.
This is going to take forever.

I scrolled back to
the beginning of Saturday. It started with images of the group climbing on the bus at the Dutch Inn. It was a shocking to see Dudley and Ruby among those pictured. Ruby smiled brightly at the camera as she stood next to Pearl. Dudley was in the background of a second photograph, making notes on a clipboard. I wondered if those notes were about the tour or about his side gambling business. The camera captured Earl in the same picture. In the image he anxiously watched Dudley. I knew now he was trying to deal with his gambling addiction, but I wondered what Chief Rose thought when she saw the image the first time.

The next
fifty frames were shots of the countryside from the bus. I paid closer attention when I recognized Troyer’s farm. Five shots of Naomi and Thomas playing with Mabel. Because of the angle, I could tell Charles was above the children when he took these. He must have still been on the bus. More pictures of buggies, cows, the tourists exploring the farm. There were some Amish in the shots, but mostly in the background. It appeared Charles at least tried to be respectful of the culture’s aversion to cameras.

Surprisingly, there were only three interior shots of the Troyer dairy barn. The third shot showed a scowling Mr. Troyer. I was sure he told Charles to put his camera away. I concentrate
d on the two other pictures. The first was of Mr. Troyer milking the cow. Several of the tourists were in the picture, including Bobbi Jo, Jimbo, Fred, and Nadine. The second shot was of the snack table. Clearly when he took the picture it was before anything happened. The muffins sat in the baskets, and the small plastic cups of milk waited in straight, symmetrical lines. Seeing those milk cups, I couldn’t help but wonder if Ruby and Dudley had been poisoned by chance. There was nothing to indicate that one cup was different from the next.

I sighed. If Chief Rose didn’t find anything of interest, why did I think I would?

I turned off the camera and repacked it.
Why did I feel like I was back to square one?

Charles waited for me outside of the barn.
I handed over his camera. “You were careful with it, weren’t you? You didn’t drop it?”

“I was careful,” I reassured him. “You have some great pictures there, Charles. You have a great eye.”

His jowls wiggled. “Oh, well, I dabble is all.” He smiled.

Bitty poked her head out of the barn. “Charles, you
’re missing the wheat smacking.”

Wheat smacking?

Charles and I stepped into the dim barn with the rest of the bus passengers.

Aaron’s brother-in-law
Amos stood in the middle of the room, holding shafts of wheat bound together by twine. A white sheet lay on the barn’s dirt floor. “We do almost all of our threshing with a steam-powered thresher out in the field, but for this demonstration, we’ll show you how it is done by hand.” Amos hit the wheat over and over again onto the sheet, and the wheat fell away from the shaft.

Across the barn,
I studied Aaron’s face as he watched his brother-in-law. His lips compressed into a thin line. How much did he wish he was the one giving the demonstration? How much did he wish he wasn’t confined to his wheelchair and could do the heavy labor expected of an Amish man?

Aaron caught me staring
. His jaw twitched, and he turned away.

Amos collected the wheat from the ground and passed around a handful of the freshly threshed wheat. “At this point,” Amos said, “We take it to the lo
cal mill to be ground into flour, but we have a small hand crank mill to show you as well.” He walked over to a table with the small metal mill clamped to it. A cylinder comprised the third of the mill. He dropped the grain into the cylinder and began to crank. A light tan-colored flour fell into a waiting bowl on the table. The tourists asked dozens of questions. The stop at the Sutter farm went better than I ever suspected it would. I felt myself relax against the barn’s door frame.

I let my guard down a moment too soon
. A shadow passed over my shoulder, blocking the light from the doorway. I turned and found myself face to face with the deacon. I took a big step back into the barn.

“Deacon.”
I nodded. The bishop stood a few paces behind the deacon. “Bishop Hooley,” I added.

The bishop
gave me a half smile. “T-thank you again for what you have done to keep the tour going.”

I smiled. “You’re welcome.” I glanced at the deacon. “Do you still plan to cancel any other tours coming into the district?”

He nodded. “I have realized my error in bring tourists into our community.”

With the deacon’s help, I thought.

“I c-can’t say that I will be sorry to them go.” The bishop thanked me again and joined the English tourists in the barn.

The deacon did not
join him. Instead Deacon Sutter took a step closer to me. “Whatever the bishop may say, you are still unwelcome in our district.”

I stared him in the eye.
“Duly noted.”

“
Daed
, don’t you want to show the guests the drying barn next?” Aaron asked from behind me inside the barn.

“
Ya
,” the deacons said, but didn’t take his eyes off of me.

“You had better
tell them as soon as Amos is finished or they might wander off.”

The deacon nodded and
pushed his way into the barn.

“Thanks,” I said to Aaron.

“Don’t mention it.” He rolled down the slight ramp onto the lawn. “I saw you give one of the
Englischers
his camera back. I hope you weren’t taking photographs of our farm. That’s not the way to get my
daed
’s good side.”

“I wasn’t taking photographs. I was looking at photographs Charles took on Saturday
to see if he caught something with his camera, which may hint to what happened to those people.”

Over the Southern-twanged chatter of the traveler
s, the deacon said, “We will go to the drying barn next. That’s where we hand our fruits and vegetables to be dried for the winter. Please follow Amos out the back door.”

Aaron rolled backwards onto the ramp. “His can’t be the only camera on the trip. Maybe someone else snapped an incriminating picture.”

True. But hadn’t Chief Rose told Officer Riley to check all the tourists’ cameras for clues? It was worth a shot. I was running out of ideas.