Assaulted Pretzel (9 page)

“Was it hard for him to adjust? Losing his mom like that?”

“Mary Schrock was a strong woman.” Jakob leaned his forearms atop the counter next to the camera. “She prepared Isaac for the change as she was dying. He accepted it as God’s will. As we all did.”

She tried to take it all in, to process it as the factual account it was, but the part of her that felt people’s pain found it difficult to let go, especially as it pertained to a four-year-old boy. “I can’t imagine what that would be like
at that age—not having pictures to look at to remind you of your loved one.”

“The picture is in here,” Jakob said, touching his heart as he did. “And Mary gave my mother letters to share with Isaac as he reached different stages—his baptism, courting, marriage, fatherhood, et cetera. Knowing he had those to look forward to was enough for him.”

She opened her mouth to speak but closed it as Jakob continued, his words veering off and taking them down a very different path. “One way or the other, Isaac will have to be a part of my investigation. His work with Daniel Lapp alone sets up a connection between him and Karble. And now, with what Benjamin said about the picture of Isaac’s roller track plans, it’s even stronger.”

“So you ask the questions you need to ask and you move on.” But even as she uttered the thought aloud, she knew it wasn’t that simple. Because for Jakob to ask the questions, it meant he had to have verbal contact with his brother—something Jakob longed for, yet lost the right to have the day he walked away from his Amish life.

“Talking to the police is not something the Amish relish. Talking to
me
is even worse,” Jakob shared from behind the relative protection of the hand that he’d draped across his eyes. “When I came back here to take this job, I saw it as a way to be close to my family even if I knew the dynamic could never be the same. Yet since I’ve been back, all my presence has done is put my family in a really bad position. First, with having to question my niece when Walter Snow was murdered. And second—”

“If you could see the look on Esther’s face whenever you walk down the street, you’d know that she respects you,” she blurted out, anxious to put an end to at least a smidgen of Jakob’s self-inflicted browbeating. “And when you stop
outside the shop and wave to her, she looks like a kid on Christmas morning.”

Jakob’s hand slid down his face to reveal a raw pain that made Claire ache from head to toe for the man standing mere inches away. “But she can never know me, not without risk of being shunned. My coming here, my desire to be in her life if even from a distance, has put her in that position.”

“You’re wrong, Jakob.”

“What is wrong is my being here. My presence puts Martha, and Esther, and, now, Isaac in an awkward position. It was selfish of me to do that to them.” He pushed off the counter and gathered the items he’d brought. “I think it’s best for everyone if I look at taking this job as the mistake it was and resign.”

Claire drew back. “Resign? No! You can’t just give up and walk away…”

Her sentence trailed off as the telltale jingle above the shop’s front door alerted them to the arrival of a customer—the normally welcome sound instantly setting her on edge. Exhaling in frustration, she walked around the counter and Jakob only to freeze in place as she cleared both. For there, standing just inside the door, was Esther’s virtual carbon copy save for the two decades that separated them in birth and gave Jakob both a sister and a niece.

Martha King was dressed in a dark burgundy dress with a black apron, her hair pulled into a tight bun and secured beneath the white head cap that failed to shield the worry in the woman’s face. “Claire. I need help. I need to find my brother. I need to find Jakob.”

She heard the gasp from just over her shoulder and knew it was an echo of her own. “Y-you want to talk to Jakob?”

Martha’s hazel eyes—so like her eldest daughter’s—remained trained on Claire’s face without so much as missing a beat. “I must. He is the only one who can help.”

And, just like that, the moment she’d been praying for since meeting Jakob was at her hands for the taking.

Jakob’s
taking.

Noiselessly, Claire stepped to the side to reveal Jakob, who was already placing the gloves and camera back on the counter. Slowly, he crossed to his sister, his voice a moving mixture of uncertainty, surprise, and hope, juxtaposed against a woman who wore the same emotions on her rounded face. “I am here, Martha. Just tell me what it is you need.”

Martha took a half step forward only to negate it with a half step back. “I know Mamm and Dat would not approve of me being here. Nor would my husband, Abram. But, Jakob, you are a good man. And a good man protects his brother.”

Claire watched as Jakob took the same half step forward followed by an immediate half step backward at Martha’s obvious discomfort. It was a dance that was hard to watch, yet one both partners bowed to in recognition of an institution they both understood and respected.

“You mean
Isaac
?” Jakob asked, his focus never straying from his sister.

“Yes, Isaac. I am worried what the English man’s murder might mean for him. But I am also worried for Daniel. He and Sarah have been through much the past few weeks. Sarah tries to be strong but it is weighing on her. Such stress is not good for her at this time.”

“At this time?” Jakob inquired. “I don’t know what you mean.”

Claire began nodding even before her mouth became engaged in the conversation playing out in her shop. “Remember? Keith Watson mentioned it yesterday when we saw him on the way to the festival. Sarah Lapp is expecting again. Her fifth, I believe…”

“Her
sixth
,” Martha corrected, not unkindly. “She lost her fifth in the spring. I am afraid she will lose this one as well if she does not stop worrying about things that are not true. But she was in town this morning. She heard whispers. She saw pointing. And she is frightened for Daniel just as I am for Isaac.”

“Why are you frightened for Isaac?”

For the first time since their eyes met, Martha looked down, clearly uncomfortable with Jakob’s question. Or, perhaps, the answer she seemed reluctant to put into words.

Claire touched Jakob’s back ever so gently and then hooked her thumb in the direction of the counter. “I have a stool behind the counter. Maybe Martha would like a place to sit.”

Seemingly unwilling to blink, let alone move, Jakob kept his focus on Martha as if he was afraid any movement or unexpected change of venue would relegate the verbal exchange he was having with his sister to a dream. “Uhhh, okay. Okay, yeah. That would be fine. I—Martha? Would you like to sit?”

At Martha’s quick yet definitive nod, Jakob waved his sister over to the stool. When she settled herself onto the cushioned top, he squatted beside her and peered up at her with such awe and such gentleness that Claire had to look away and swallow.

“Now tell me. Why are you so afraid for Isaac?”

“Do you not know?” Martha asked. “Do you not know
that toy man was going to make Isaac’s toys without Isaac’s help?”

Jakob rubbed at the clean-shaven skin along his jawline. “I know. I saw the copy of the memo that everyone was looking at during the festival yesterday. I’m sure it was a shock to Isaac and Daniel if they’d both been led to believe they’d have a hand in actually
making
the toys for the Karble Corporation.”

“Shock, yes. For both. But for Isaac it is sadness, too.”

Stilling his hand against his face, Jakob looked from Martha to Claire and back again, his sister’s words bringing him up short. “Because of the lost work?”

Martha nodded as she filled in the details of her statement. “It was
Isaac
who told him of the toys he and Daniel make.”

Unable to hold her tongue any longer, Claire jumped into the conversation, her head desperate to make sense of what she was hearing. “Are you saying Isaac is responsible for bringing Rob Karble to Heavenly in the first place?”

“That is what I am saying.” Martha glanced down at her hands intertwined in her lap, struggling to find a way to explain what she knew. “He was excited to bring work here. He was excited to be able to help Daniel in that way. He liked everyone being happy with him for that. But then it all changed.”

“Changed how?” Jakob prompted.

“It is hard to get excited about jobs and then know you will not get them. But because Isaac brought that man here, the jobs they already had were to be affected by his decision, too.”

In the absence of Esther and her protective streak where her mother was concerned, Claire found herself stepping
into the role and trying to make things right. “I’m sure Daniel and Isaac have built a loyal client base over the years…people who will continue to order toys through their catalogues.”

“Children and grandchildren only play with toys for so long before they outgrow them. That loyal client base, as you call them, will eventually move on to another stage in gift buying,” Jakob explained. “And when that happens, a move like Karble’s will make their catalogue business dry up.”

“An Amish-inspired toy that is made by a machine is very different than an Amish toy made by Amish hands,” Claire protested out of hope as much as anything else. To say it out of anything else was simply ludicrous. She was a businesswoman. She knew the cold hard facts behind a move like Karble’s.

“For someone like you, Claire, who might notice and care about such things, sure. But for the vast majority of people out there, the two are close enough,” Jakob mused. “Toss in the price differential, and you can bet any hemming and hawing over which toy to choose is virtually gone.” Then, turning back to his sister, Jakob’s matter-of-fact tone softened somewhat. “So was Daniel angry at Isaac?”

“I would not say angry. Daniel Lapp is a good man. Kind.” Martha slid off the stool and wandered across the room, her brother’s gaze tracking her every step as he, too, rose to his feet. “But he built his toy shop business to what it is now. He brought Isaac in to help him and, now, his business is to be affected by something he did not seek.”

“So you’re worried that Daniel will be angry at Isaac?” Jakob asked.

Martha stopped beside the collection of painted milk cans she, herself, had sent in to the shop on consignment and slowly turned, her unadorned hands fiddling with the sides of her dress. “No. I worry that you will look to Isaac for what has happened. Just as Sarah worries you will look to Daniel.”

Claire shifted her stance beside the counter to gain a better view of Jakob’s face. It didn’t take much deducing to know Martha’s concern for Isaac and Daniel in the wake of Rob Karble’s murder was justified. How Jakob was going to handle that fact with a sister he desperately wanted to reconnect with, though, was the million-dollar question.

A heavy silence weighed in the air as Jakob seemed to mull over Martha’s suspicion before eventually giving the only answer he knew how to give. “To tell you Isaac and Daniel will not be questioned in Mr. Karble’s death would be a lie, Martha. So I will not say that. But I want you to know that I don’t believe either man is responsible. And I promise you that with your help I will not rest until I have proven that to be the case.”

Claire held her breath as she stood back and waited for Martha’s response. Had Jakob left off the part about his sister’s help, Claire suspected a smile would have been immediate on the woman’s face. But since he hadn’t, her reaction was more difficult to read.

“Can you do that, Martha? Can you help me eliminate Isaac and Daniel as viable suspects?” Jakob prodded.

One hesitant step at a time, Martha made her way back over to the counter, her soft black ankle boots barely audible against the shop’s carpeting. When she reached the stool on which she’d sat only moments earlier, she stopped, raising her gaze to meet her brother’s. “I will help. But I do not want anyone to know of this talk, or any talks.”

The smile Jakob had been afraid to show at the realization his sister had come to Heavenly Treasures specifically to find him finally spread across his face, undaunted. “I will not tell a soul, Martha. You have my word on that.”

Without taking her focus off Jakob, Martha addressed Claire. “Esther is not to know of this conversation.”

“But, Martha, she’d be happy to know you talked to Jakob. Thrilled, even. It’s all she ever—”

Jakob cleared his throat loudly, successfully cutting Claire off midplea. “Esther will not know. Of this or any other talks we may have.”

Visibly satisfied with his response, Martha crossed to the door only to stop mere inches from her destination. “I will bring books to the children’s school shortly before lunch. I will walk home past the pond.”

And then, just like that, the woman was gone, disappearing down the steps of Heavenly Treasures. Claire gestured toward the front window. “What was that about walking to school and the pond?”

“That is where I am to meet my sister tomorrow morning,” Jakob whispered, dumbfounded. “So we can…talk.”

It was everything she’d been praying for since she’d learned of Jakob’s past, yet nothing her aunt Diane ever believed would happen. Bobbing up on the toes of her boots, Claire let loose a little squeal. “Jakob! You did it! You’ve made a connection with Martha that’s going to have the two of you talking again!” She clapped her hands together just as Esther emerged from the back room with a lunch sack in one hand and a copy of the
Heavenly Times
in the other.

“Claire?” Esther peeled her focus from the newspaper and flashed it upward at Claire, an odd expression lighting her tired eyes. “Did I hear Mamm’s voice through the window just now?”

She opened her mouth to answer only to close it as Jakob shook her response away. “I…I…”

“Esther.” Jakob stepped into his niece’s field of vision and stopped, his usual joy over catching a peek at his niece offset by his obvious need to keep a promise to Martha. “I’m so sorry you had to find Mr. Karble’s body the way that you did.”

Shocked at seeing her uncle standing mere inches away, Esther quickly smoothed down the edges of her apron and checked to make sure the strings of her head cap were secured. “I did not see who did it.”