Shunned and Dangerous (An Amish Mystery) (22 page)
Read Shunned and Dangerous (An Amish Mystery) Online
Authors: Laura Bradford
“Nah. Harley would just say it didn’t matter. That this guy lost someone special to him, too, and was acting out the way I used to before Harley came along.”
She knew she really didn’t need the confirmation. Harley’s description to Patrick virtually filled in the answer all on its own. But, still, she hoped she was wrong. Hoped she could spare Jakob the added pain of locking his father up behind bars.
“Would you know this Amish man if you saw him?”
“You bet I would.”
C
laire glanced across the center console and tried to imagine what was going through Patrick’s head now that they were in her aunt’s car and headed toward the main road.
“It’s hard to imagine this place actually being something one day,” he finally said as they bounced along with the car on the way out of Serenity Falls.
“Have you seen the brochures? It’s going to be a really
nice
something by the time this Trey Sampson fellow is done with it.” She winced as the left side of the car dropped lower than the right only to recover as they reached the development’s exit. “One of the guests staying at the inn right now is getting ready to build in here. She’s got two little boys and she’s beside herself over the playground and walking trails that will be part of the community when it’s finally done.”
“Think it’ll bother them living so close to the Amish?”
“That’s one of the reasons Megan wanted to build here in the first place. She envies their peaceful lifestyle.”
When Patrick said nothing, she peeked in his direction once again. “Are you okay?”
Pressing his forehead to the passenger side window, he shrugged ever so slightly. “I guess I’m just thinking what it would be like to be one of those kids.”
“One of Megan’s kids?”
Again, his shoulders lurched upward. “Yeah, the one you were just talking about. Sounds like she’s more open-minded than what I come from.”
She heard the hurt in his voice and wished there was something she could do to make it better. Unfortunately, short of having a time machine with redo capabilities, all she had to offer was a listening ear. “It’s been rough being without your dad all these years, hasn’t it?”
“For the past sixteen years, I thought that, too.” He shifted his head from the window to the headrest and released a long, weighted sigh. “But then I met Harley and I started to realize the part before my dad went to jail wasn’t much of a picnic, either.”
“How so?” She slowed the car in an effort to buy them a little more time to talk. Somehow, the conversation unfolding between them was preferable to watching him point to Jakob’s father as the man behind the incidents at Harley’s farm.
“Little kids are supposed to be curious. It’s how they learn, ain’t it? But I didn’t get to be curious. I just had to take what was told to me and accept it as some sort of gospel truth even though it wasn’t.” Patrick’s jaw tightened noticeably. “Can’t really understand why people with so much hatred are given a kid to raise while a man who lived his life with an open mind had cows. Seems kinda backward, you know?”
How could she argue? It was something she’d pondered on her own many times over the years, especially when she considered her childless aunt Diane. But there were reasons for everything, even if they weren’t always obvious at first. She said as much to Patrick.
“If Harley had his own children, he might not have had time to reach out to you.” She let her gaze wander toward the Fisher farm, her worry about what Patrick might say when he finally saw Mose making it difficult to stay in the moment. Still, she tried, even going so far as to pivot her upper body toward the young man in the passenger seat. “And maybe you needed him more.”
Patrick studied her closely, his eyes taking on a misty quality that hinted at the tears he was trying valiantly not to shed. “I still do. But they can’t take away the things he taught me. Those things are inside me now.”
She reached across the console and squeezed his forearm. “You’re right. They are. And those things he taught you were his gift to you. It’s up to you what you do with them from here on out.”
For the first time since they’d met, a smile played at the corners of Patrick’s mouth just before a lone tear escaped down his cheek. “Making things with his hands made Harley awfully happy, and I think I’d like to do the same thing. For him.”
She pulled to the side to allow an approaching horse and buggy to pass then turned to look at Patrick once more. “I think Harley would be the first person to tell you to do what makes
you
happy. Life is too short to follow someone else’s dream.”
“Are you following yours?”
It was her turn to blink back tears as she gave the only answer she could. “Right now, I am. And it’s made me happier than I’ve ever been. But trying to keep your head afloat with a shop on Lighted Way isn’t always easy. Especially when you can’t pay the rent.”
He considered her words then peered out the windshield toward some distant point. “I liked
painting
the things Harley made.”
“Then maybe that’s your thing. Either way, you’ll figure it out.” She looked again toward the Fisher farm and knew the time had come to see what Patrick remembered. “So? Are you ready to take a walk?”
His answer came by way of a nod and the sound of his door unlocking. When they met up on her side of the car, he pointed toward the white farmhouse at the end of the next driveway. “Is that the place?”
“I don’t know. I guess that’ll depend on whether you recognize anyone you see as the man from Harley’s farm.”
Hooking her thumb in the direction they needed to go, she set off, Patrick falling into step in rapid fashion. Together they walked, the fine gravel of the main road making a soft crunching sound beneath their feet.
“You know the people who live here?”
“I do. And so do you.”
Patrick stopped mid-step. “I do?”
“You met Isaac, right? The other man Harley was bringing on to work with the two of you?”
“Oh. That guy.” Patrick resumed his previous pace with his hands jammed into his front pockets. “I never met him. He just started working with Harley about a week or so before the murder. Harley sent him out on different jobs than the ones we did.”
“Did he tell you much about Isaac?” They rounded the corner of the driveway and headed toward the barn and the tapping sound that drifted through its open door.
“Not really. ’Cept one time, when we drove out to fetch Mary, or maybe it was Molly . . . I can’t really remember. But I do know that Harley was saying something about Isaac’s dad wasting his life on anger.” Patrick’s feet slowed as they neared the barn. “Looking back, I guess he was trying to warn me not to do the same thing, but I can’t be sure. Next thing I knew, we got busy coaxing that cow back to the barn.”
They stopped and peeked inside, the last of the day’s natural light making it difficult to gauge the identity of the shadowy figures on the other side. “Hello?” she called. “Isaac? Mose? Are you in there? It’s Claire Weatherly.”
The taller of the two figures straightened just before a hand shot into the air in greeting. “Hello, Claire.” Isaac crossed the barn and stepped outside. “Is there something I can do for you?” Then, seeing Patrick, he nodded quickly. “I am Isaac. Isaac Fisher.”
Patrick shot out his hand and waited for Isaac to shake it. “I’m Patrick Duggan, Harley Zook’s apprentice.”
“Harley Zook has passed on!”
Claire held her breath as the second figure strode toward them with purpose if not anger, each step he took in their direction increasing the dread she felt growing in her heart. Somehow she knew Isaac’s suspicions about Mose were about to be confirmed by Patrick. Yet still, she hoped.
She hoped that Isaac was wrong about his father.
She hoped Patrick wouldn’t know Mose.
And she hoped with everything she had that Jakob would be able to cross his father off the suspect list once and for all.
“There is no need to speak of that man again.” Mose pushed past his youngest son to stand beside Claire with folded arms. “The Lord has called him home and he has been laid to rest—”
With one distinct gasp, Patrick ripped every last bit of hope from Claire while simultaneously confirming what she already knew in her heart to be true. “That’s him . . . I mean, you!” Patrick’s arm shot into the air guided by the finger he pointed at Mose. “You’re the one who fought with Harley! You’re the one who nearly got Molly killed by a car two weeks ago! You’re the one who wrote those awful things in Harley’s barn!”
With each accusation that passed through his lips, Patrick’s voice got angrier and angrier, the pain he felt over the loss of his mentor unleashing itself with a frightening furor. She tried to calm him with a quiet touch, but it was no use; the accusations kept coming fast and furiously.
“You might put on that black hat every day and fool everyone around you into thinking you’re different, but you’re not! I know you’re not! I’ve seen the things you’ve done to Harley, and you’re going to pay, just like my father did!”
A
t first glance, the Heavenly Police Department looked like any other building along Lighted Way. It boasted the same clapboard siding, the same wide front porch, and the same tastefully written sign above the front door. In fact, the only noticeable difference that set it apart from the shops and restaurants that surrounded it on three sides was the lack of Amish coming and going through its doors.
Here there were no black hats and aproned dresses, no suspenders and head caps. Instead, police uniforms mixed only with English attire as the door leading inside opened and shut throughout the course of a day.
Taking advantage of Esther’s Saturday morning shift, Claire crossed Lighted Way and headed down the block to the station, her heart heavy. She’d felt awful calling Jakob the previous night, Patrick’s words finding their way through her mouth in a series of starts and stops that, in hindsight, had probably made the retelling harder for Jakob to digest.
All night she’d tossed and turned as she’d recalled Patrick’s accusations again and again and again, Isaac’s failure to defend his father making the whole thing even more surreal. But it was the unmistakable sadness in Jakob’s voice when she called that had driven her from bed before dawn with a feeling of unease she’d been unable to shake ever since.
She stopped outside the station to catch her breath, then pulled the door open and stepped inside, her destination, if not her reason for being there, crystal clear.
“Is Detective Fisher in?”
The weekend dispatcher—a fifty-something balding man—nodded and added a slight smile for good measure. “Ms. Weatherly, right?”
“Claire,” she corrected, not unkindly. “I’d love to have a minute of his time if he’s available.”
“I’ll check.”
Five minutes later, she was making her way down the locked hallway toward Jakob’s office, the sight of his sleep-deprived face peering at her from his doorway stirring up a potpourri of emotions best left unanalyzed in the present. “You look like you got as much sleep as I did,” he said by way of a greeting. He touched his hand to the small of her back and guided her into his office, shutting his door to the prying ears of his fellow officers the second she crossed the threshold. “I’m glad you stopped by. It’s been a long night.”
She took the chair he indicated as he perched on the corner of his desk closest to her. “Did you have to bring your father in last night?”
“I thought about it. Even had a few of our officers at the ready to do just that, but then I decided to have them hold off. Mose isn’t going anywhere. He’s far too bullheaded to even think about leaving. Besides, the Amish don’t run.”
It was on the tip of her tongue to say they didn’t murder, either, but she let that go. Jakob, of all people, knew there were exceptions to every rule. After all, he himself was one of them. Instead, she allowed herself a moment to take in the dark circles beneath his eyes, the beleaguered bent to his shoulders, and the unfamiliar lines that accompanied his equally unfamiliar frown. “So were you just up all night thinking, then?” she finally asked in lieu of the instinct that made her want to smooth his hand-tousled hair from his forehead.
“I was walking around Zook’s farm with a flashlight.”
“The cows have been moved to the Hochstetler farm for now. Though, as of late yesterday afternoon, Molly was still there.”
“She’s gone now, too.” He palmed his mouth only to let his hand slip back down to the top of the desk. “I saw the message on the side of the house.”
“You hadn’t seen it yet?”
“I sent my officers out to take a peek and check the surrounding area for any clues the same night you reported it, but with the funeral and everything else going on with the investigation, I hadn’t made it out there to see it myself until last night.”
“Chilling, isn’t it?”
“More like eye-opening.”
There was something about the way he replied that caught her attention and made her sit up tall. “Did you find something?”
He pushed off the edge of the desk and wandered around his office, the room’s relatively small dimensions making him turn almost as much as he actually walked. “When I saw the words with my own two eyes, it took me all of about two seconds to know my father didn’t write them.”
She followed him with her eyes as he paced his way back and forth between the door and his as-yet empty whiteboard. “How can you be so sure?”
“The use of a contraction. Most Amish don’t use them in speech and certainly wouldn’t use them in something they’ve written. That alone screams English to me.” She, too, stood, the potential elimination of Mose from the list of murder suspects making her wonder why Jakob still looked so sad.
“That’s great news, right?”
He leaned against the whiteboard and tapped its clean surface with his knuckles. “The problem is that with the exception of the graffiti, Mose still looks good for the crime.”
She looked from Jakob to the clean board and back again before reclaiming the same chair she’d just vacated. “When Walter Snow was murdered, you had all sorts of things written on that board. And it was the same thing with Rob Karble. So what’s different this time?”
“Because I couldn’t stand looking at my father’s name with a big red circle around it any longer. It’s in my head nearly twenty-four/seven all on its own. Seeing it there just made it worse somehow.”
“The motive you had for him was revenge, right?” At his nod, she stood again and crossed to the whiteboard and its metal sill of dry-erase markers. She plucked a purple one from the lineup and pointed. “May I?”
He parted company with the board, a flash of amusement adding a much-needed spark to his hazel eyes. “By all means.”
“So how do you break it out again? Suspect? Motive? Means? Is that right?”
“That works.”
She rose up on tiptoe and carefully wrote each of the three categories across the top of the board. When she was done, she capped the purple marker and retrieved a green one, instead. Then, with a quick glance over her shoulder, she stepped to the left and the suspect column. “So other than the graffiti, you still sort of have your father, right?”
“Yes.”
She wrote Mose’s name then moved to the motive column and wrote, Revenge/Anger. “Which leaves us with means . . .”
“Harley’s body was found propped against a shovel in the middle of my father’s corn maze. You don’t get any better
means
than that.”
With corn maze in the means column, she stepped all the way to the left once again. “I suppose we could keep Patrick on the list for a while, too.”
“You suppose?”
“He cared for Harley way too much to be the one who killed him.”
She turned in time to see Jakob studying her with an odd look on his face. “You sound so certain.”
“After talking to him yesterday and listening to everything he had to say, I kind of am.”
“And his sneaking around the inn the other night? That doesn’t shake your resolve a little?”
“Diane called you about the hammer, right?”
“She did.”
“Well, then, you know that alone backs up the reason he gave us for being there.” Still, she wrote his name under Mose’s. “I’ll put him up here anyway, because there’s always a chance he’s a gifted actor.” Under the motive column she put ditto marks, and under means she named his role as Harley’s apprentice.
Slowly, she stepped away to study her work, her shoulders drooping almost instantly. “Two suspects—each of whom is beginning to fall apart under closer scrutiny. That’s not really much to go on, is it?”
He settled back against the desk, crossing his arms against his chest in contemplation as he did. “That’s the problem with a crime against the Amish. They’re quiet people. If they have any dirty laundry to speak of, they keep it to themselves.”
She looked again at the motive column and thought of Carl Duggan and the crime he committed against Harley’s brother sixteen years earlier. “What about hatred as a motive? Not the kind of personal hatred your father may have had for Harley, or even any lingering hatred Patrick may have had toward the man he saw as helping to put his father away . . . I’m talking about the bigger, broader hatred toward the Amish in general.”
“Other than the stuff going on at Harley’s farm, we’ve not been seeing any acts of aggression toward the Amish in our area for quite a while. And other than the graffiti, we can pretty much tie the loose cows to my father.”
“Did he admit to that?”
“He said Harley needed to be tending his cows, not driving past his house in his buggy talking about me or fixing things with Isaac.”
“I see.” She turned her back to the board and met Jakob’s eyes. “So what other kinds of motives might propel a person to kill?”
“Betrayal, robbery, jealousy, a crime of passion, obsession, money—those are the most common reasons we come across in murders.”
She began running through his list in her head, stopping every once in a while to ask questions along the way. “Any chance Harley betrayed someone other than your father?”
“Knowing what I know about Harley Zook, I’d have to say no, but I can’t be entirely sure unless someone steps up and tells me otherwise.”
“Nothing was missing from his home?”
“Again, hard to know, but his possessions seemed to be in keeping with the Amish, and we found his money in his boot—not a difficult hiding place for a would-be robber to discover.” Sensing her next question, he headed her off at the pass. “Jealousy isn’t really an emotion we see with the Amish because everyone lives the same way. And as for a crime of passion, Harley was a widower. He didn’t have any womenfolk he was courting from what Isaac told my officers. All the women his age in these parts have husbands, and he was happy living in his brother’s house and caring for the offspring of his brother’s herd.”
“Which leaves us with what?” She pulled the cap from the end of the green marker and snapped it into place. “The money you already found in his boot, right?”
“Well, money isn’t always about the actual bills. Sometimes it’s about gain, too. Though that doesn’t fit with Harley any more than a wad of cash would.” He threw his hands up in the air and shook his head. “It’s like it was sixteen years ago when John died. Nothing is jumping up and down as a motive. But I’ll find it just like the detective on that case finally did.”
She stared at the board as Jakob continued to talk, her active mind swirling around his definition of money.
Gain . . .
Gain . . .
“Claire? You still with me?”
“You said gain could be a motive, right?” she whispered against a mental backdrop that was at first fuzzy but was growing increasingly more clear.
“Absolutely. But other than Mose possibly gaining Isaac back from Harley, I don’t really see who else might have stood to gain from Harley’s death. I mean, what did the guy have? A run-down farmhouse? A relatively new mobile carpentry business? A herd of aging dairy cows? What?”
Dairy cows . . .
Somehow she managed to stifle the gasp that rose in her throat and cover it with a convincing enough coughing fit, each cough buying her more time to come up with a plan that would get her out of Jakob’s office without raising suspicion. If and when she discovered there were actual legs to her theory, she’d let him know. Until then, though, there was no sense in getting the detective’s hopes up prematurely.
