A Perfect Square

Chapter 36




DEBORAH RAN FIRST TO THE HOUSE, ran to check on Faith.

“We’re fine. What’s going on out there?” Five heads popped out from behind Faith, all girls. Best as Deborah could tell, they varied in age from three to twelve — all equally young and vulnerable.

“Can we talk alone?”

“Ya.”

Faith convinced the girls to fetch paper and crayons to distract them.

After Deborah explained what had happened and what she’d heard, Faith glanced back into the room where the girls were sitting at the table. “I’ll stay with them. You’re sure their mamm’s all right?”

“She seemed better when I left. Callie’s still with her, and Shane was to have called the emergency medical people. I don’t know whether he reached Callie’s phone though.”

“I never heard or saw him.” Faith peered past her, through the pouring rain, at the two cars parked between the house and the barn.

It occurred to Deborah there might as well be a giant red X painted on the top of the automobile, and suddenly she was grateful it was a car and not her buggy hitched to her mare, Cinnamon. At least this way, if the boy started shooting, he’d only hurt a machine.

“Callie’s purse is sitting on the front seat. I could run and — “

“No!” Deborah reached out an arm to stop her as Faith stepped forward. “I know I heard a gunshot, but I don’t know what direction it came from or who was doing the shooting.”

Faith stepped back, sighed, and worried her hand over the front of her dress. “I was hoping that was thunder, but it sounded to me as if it came from the direction of the silos.”

“I’m going over there now to make sure Shane wasn’t hurt.”

“You? Why you? Shouldn’t you stay here with me?”

Deborah shook her head. “One of us should go, and you’ve done enough already — bringing us out here. Stay with the kinner. I’ll be careful.” She hugged her new friend once, then turned and fled back out into the storm.

Deborah spied Shane crouched down behind a feeding trough. His back to the barn, the roof overhang provided a little protection, but she could see even as she ran toward him how thoroughly soaked and miserable he was.

His shirt was plastered to his shoulders, and his hair, which he wore a bit on the long side, stuck to his forehead and neck. Water dripped down his face, but he didn’t bother wiping it away. Instead his eyes stayed trained in front of him, barely flicking her direction.

She could also see the gun he had pulled out and rested against the top of the trough.

“Go back inside, Deborah.” Shane still didn’t bother to look at her, as she crouched beside him. Instead he continued to scan the tops of the buildings surrounding the barn — the house, the silos, the outbuildings, even the trees.

“No.”

“I don’t have time for this.” He briefly turned toward her, his eyes searching hers. “Think of what Jonas would want you to do.”

“He’d want me to help that boy.”

“That boy is shooting at us.”

“Amish use hunting rifles, perhaps fitted with a long-range scope for deer hunting. You’d already be dead if he wanted to hit you, Shane.”

Shane shook his head once, sending water droplets in every direction, then he turned back to scanning the buildings. “I realize that, but he’s already made several mistakes, and I don’t want you — or myself — to be the next one. Now go back inside and stay beneath the roof overhang as you go.”

“Why do you think he shot at us?”

“He saw me heading toward the cars. Spooked him I guess. Kids — they react more than they think, which is why I hate calls involving teenagers. Give me anything else, but don’t give me a teenager with a weapon.”

“If he’s guilty of something, why didn’t he just run?” Deborah shivered as water splattered down her back and thunder rolled across the skies. “Why fire the weapon and give away that he’s still here?”

“Same reason he’s shooting at an officer. Same reason he’d lie about talking to a girl who has been dead for two weeks. There is no explaining what a teen backed into a corner will do.”

Deborah didn’t bother answering that. She didn’t have an answer any more than Shane did.

“You’re going to catch pneumonia, and Jonas is going to kick my Englisch backside all the way into the next county. Now I appreciate the conversation, and thanks for checking on me, but I want you to go inside and get dry — “

At that moment the door to the barn opened once again and Timothy Lapp stepped outside. He didn’t pause for the rain, didn’t act as if he noticed it.

Instead he walked out into the middle of the clearing, his shoulders bowed as if he were carrying a weight heavier than five sacks of feed. When he reached the middle, he turned back toward the barn area, straightened his shoulders, and cupped his hands around his mouth, making a megaphone of sorts.

“Samuel, I want you to come inside. Come back, son.”

Deborah wondered at the use of the last word. It was the last piece of the puzzle that clicked into place for her.

Timothy considered Samuel his son, the boy he’d never had.

The look on the boy’s face when he stormed into Timothy’s office suddenly made sense — it was the look of agony wrapped in guilt.

It was the look of a child who’d taken away the most precious thing a father has: his dochder.

“Samuel killed her.” Deborah grabbed Shane’s arm, digging her short nails into the skin beneath his shirt.

“Deborah, we’ve been through this. I don’t know what’s going on with the boy, but I do know all the evidence points to Reuben’s guilt. I don’t want to believe it any more than you do.”

“No. You don’t. And maybe the evidence doesn’t prove what you think it does. All you know is that Reuben knew Katie.”

“He cleaned up the blood in the house. He hid the rags.”

Deborah hesitated, not having heard this part before, then pushed on. “You know that Reuben spoke with her and she stayed in his old house for a few days. You don’t know that he killed her. I’m telling you, Reuben couldn’t kill anyone.”

“Deborah …” Shane finally wiped at the rain running down his face, careful to hold his gun steady with his other hand.

“Look at Timothy and stop staring at me that way. Timothy knows it too. Samuel did it.”

“You haven’t seen all our evidence, Deborah.”

“And I don’t need to.”

“Evidence doesn’t lie.” Though his voice wavered, he continued to scan the barn’s rooftop.

“All right. It doesn’t lie, but perhaps he’s only guilty of something else.”

“Don’t think I haven’t considered that. He could be covering for the boy. Could be covering for someone other than the boy. But as long as the evidence we have points to Reuben, then Reuben stands trial.”

“And Samuel?”

“Samuel’s coming in as well. Samuel’s going to explain what’s going on.”

Samuel looked down from his perch near the top of the barn. He looked down and thought that he would fall, though not from the height. He’d been walking Timothy’s barns and silos for over a year.

No, the reason Samuel was sure he’d slip and fall was because of the scene below him.

When Katie had first died, when he’d first killed her — time to admit to what had happened — he’d thought he could make it up to Timothy and Rachel. He’d come back, created the story of Katie going to the city, even lied about the phone call, because he couldn’t bear the pain in their eyes, and then he’d worked harder than he’d ever worked in his life.

Samuel had set out to be the son that Timothy never had.

Looking down at Katie’s father now, he knew it would never be enough. The man standing in the middle of the clearing was broken.

Timothy could never forgive him for what had happened.

So how could Samuel end this?

Scanning left, he looked over at the Englisch cop and Amish woman. He nearly rolled his eyes. They looked like two ducks in a barrel at the county fair. Shooting them would be easy.

But then he’d have two more deaths to answer for when he faced God, and Samuel knew he would face God — perhaps sooner rather than later.

So what were his options?

The photos of Katie played through his mind, making it hard to think clearly. She hadn’t looked like that when he’d carried her to the flowers she’d loved so much, intending to leave her there, but even that last act of love hadn’t gone as he’d intended. The blood from her head wound had soaked through the quilt, soaked on to his sleeve and he’d set her down, suddenly frightened by her still form. Then he couldn’t force himself to pick her up again.

A big strong man — afraid of a dead girl. Afraid of his wife.

So he’d dragged her on the quilt, dragged her the final distance through the flowers.

And when he’d reached the banks of the pond, it had occurred to him that perhaps she wouldn’t rest there, perhaps some wild animals would come and find her. So he’d cried — sat and wept like a little child — before rolling her into the water and praying that at least there she would be safe until someone found her.

She had still looked like his Katie then, floating face down in the early morning sun.

He’d gathered the quilt and run into the woods, hoping Reuben would find the body and think of a way to give her a proper burial. He couldn’t stay and do it. If he’d stayed, Reuben would have to hide him or turn him in, and Reuben didn’t deserve that type of trouble.

He hid knowing no one would ever suspect Reuben. He was a well-respected man in the Shipshewana community — Samuel had been able to tell that from his short time there. Plus Reuben had never so much as touched Katie. The Englisch police would simply meet a dead end and let things be. The responsible thing for Samuel to do was go back to Timothy and Rachel. He had to find a way to make things right for their family.

But nothing had worked out the way it was supposed to.

His hand began to shake on the rifle’s stock, and he gripped it more firmly. Wouldn’t do to drop it. Not now.

He could make his way down, and he could run.

Samuel knew he could disappear into the Englisch world.

But suddenly he was tired, too tired.

“Samuel, whatever happened we can talk about it. Come back inside.” Even across the distance between them, Samuel could make out the tears mixing with rain streaming down Timothy’s face.

He’d caused this family enough pain.

He shifted the rifle to his back, adjusted the strap, then began to make his way down and toward the ladder of the tallest silo. Once there, he began to climb.