by C.P. Murphy
Chapter Twenty-Four
The church was filled with people mourning the loss of one of Millersport’s finest citizens. Anna looked the overcrowded room. She knew that everyone, old and young, had come to lay Amelia in her final resting place and a tear rolled down her face. Her sister would have been proud to know that so many people cared enough to attend. Anna continued to look around and realized that she didn’t know everyone in the room; she would later find out that people from nearby villages had also come to pay their respects.
The Van Martins sat in the front row on the other side of the room. As far as Anna was concerned, they didn’t have that right and should have saved those seats for others who loved Amelia more. She knew how her sister felt about marrying Thomas and had faith that her sister would’ve talked her way out of that marriage if she had lived. To see them sit there as if they were the victims, made her stomach fill with disgust. Behind them she saw Emma and Jacob and seated by them were their families. She made eye contact with Emma and could feel how her sister’s best friend felt. Lonely. Then Anna scanned the room and searched for Patrick but she hadn’t seen him. She didn’t know that he was the suspect in Amelia’s death so she spent the entire service wondering where he was and if he was okay.
The service started and everyone held their eyes onto the closed casket laid before the churches alter. This was it, the time that the Samuels family had been waiting for. In a short time they could heal their broken hearts and return their lives to normalcy. Reverend Mayer stood in front of the congregation and said the traditional prayers and spoke of the deceased. The attendants sang a religious hymn in unison and that was finished with a final prayer. For Anna and the rest of her family, the service itself went by too fast for them to remember much about it. At the end of the service, six young men, led by Jacob Miller, stood and took a hold of handles along the casket and carried Amelia’s body towards her final resting place. The Reverend and the Samuels family followed close behind with the rest of the mourners behind them. They walked her casket through the small village and entered the cemetery where her grave waited for her and the six young men lowered the casket into the ground. Amelia would now lie with her mother to the right of her and her uncle just a few feet away to the left.
The Reverend faced the crowd and spoke more personable than he did at the church. “Amelia Samuels was a friend to all of us. She helped others and rarely accepted help for herself. I ask all of you now; did we ever hear her ask for help? Perhaps we took for granted that she didn’t need it. Is it possible she called out for help in her final hours but were we ignorant to the sound? Was it the wind we heard so harsh on Wednesday night or was it our loved one begging us to come to her rescue? We’ll never know for sure but if your heart breaks at the thought of not being there for her, fret not because she has gone home to a place where no harm will ever happen to her again. I knew her well and know that Amelia Samuels wouldn’t want anyone to feel guilty for not hearing her cries for help. We aren’t to blame for losing our dear one. A monster has come and taken her precious life away from her. The devil disguised as a friend perhaps is the one who has taken the last breath from her. I know in my heart of hearts that the monster will have to come face to face with our Lord on his judgment day and will pay for what he has done.”
Friends and family embraced each other looking for comfort. Anna looked around once more. She thought maybe Patrick had been there somewhere but she couldn’t see his face among the crowd. She turned her head towards David and whispered, “Where is Patrick Buchanan?”
David lowered his head in sadness for the death of one sister and pity for the innocence of yet another sister. Nobody had bothered to tell her about Buchanan’s involvement in the murder and he had hoped that she wouldn’t even ask. He glanced at her questioning eyes and wondered why she seemed to care so much about the monster that Reverend Mayer had just described. It tore him to be so blunt but she would have to learn the truth sooner or later. “He is locked up, Anna. Patrick Buchanan is the reason we are here today.”
Anna was in disbelief. The cemetery spun around her and she felt her older brother wrap his arms around her to keep her from falling. She knew that Patrick was a stranger in the village but she didn’t think that they would assume that he was the one responsible for Amelia’s death. There had to a mistake, she insisted but David held onto her as tight as he could in hopes to calm her down. Anna looked around again and realized that everyone there had known who the Reverend was talking about. They’re wrong, she told herself, they had to be. After the service was over, she would get to the bottom of what was going on, she determined.
At last the Reverend announced that the funeral was over and that the congregation should leave the family to say their final goodbyes. The villagers lined up and walked slow past the hole in the ground and each said a farewell to Amelia. Some tossed flowers on top of the casket as they passed, some put the sign of the cross over their chests in private prayers for the deceased, but all of them shed a tear as they walked past one last time. As they left, they each embraced the family and then went on their way. The Samuels were the last to leave. They stood hand in hand along the side of the grave and cried as they said goodbye to their loved one. The emotional scene broke up, and they turned to leave themselves. Henry couldn’t find it in himself to go and he fell to his knees where he swore he would stay forever until they buried him right next to her. Ruth came over and wrapped her arms around Henry. “Come now,” she told him.
“No,” he answered in a cracked voice. “How can I? I let her down and I have to stay with her.”
“But you can’t dwell on that anymore. It’s time to go home.” Ruth understood what he was going through but wasn’t sure if she would be successful enough to get him away from the grave. She looked around for David or Phillip but both of the younger men had gone to comfort the others.
Henry cleared his throat and wiped his eyes. He decided that there was no point in continuing to cry but still he didn’t want to leave his daughter’s side. “I won’t leave her. I can’t go on anymore. I will stay here until I die myself.”
Ruth swallowed the lump she had felt in her throat. She couldn’t let Henry wilt away to nothing. She had been holding onto a secret, waiting for the right time to tell Henry, and as much as she hated just blurting it out right then, she knew it might be the one thing to keep him from falling into the grave with Amelia. “You have to go on, Henry. For the sake of our child,” she exclaimed as she ran a hand over her stomach.
Henry looked up to Ruth with surprise on his face. He couldn’t say he was happy to hear her news, but it didn’t anger him either. She stood in front of him, asking him to let Amelia rest, and for the first time he realized that she was right. He stood and faced Ruth, grabbed a hold of her and let out his sorrows. She was, after all, the only one who could ever get through to him. They walked away, but he had only taken a few steps before he turned around and looked again at the new tombstone that said ‘Murdered,’ above Amelia’s name. Then Henry shed his final tear and turned once more and continued walking away with Ruth in his arm.
“I want to see him now,” Anna insisted when she went to the jail to visit Patrick. There was a man there who had been asked by the constable to keep an eye on the suspect while he was away gathering information on the upcoming trial. He stood tall with his arms crossed over his chest and demanded that Anna should go home where she was safe. “I know him and he would never hurt me or my sister, please.” She brought herself to tears and won the sympathy of the man.
He took the key off of the constable’s desk and opened the door for Anna to enter. “Only for a few minutes though,” he instructed. “He doesn’t deserve visitors as kind as you.”
She was sick to her stomach as soon as she walked into his small holding area. Patrick had lain sleeping on a worn thin cot that had no blankets or pillows. The room smelt stale from the lack of air. It had one small window but it was locked tight. Anna tried to open it but something fro
m the outside was blocking it. She shrugged her shoulders as she looked around again. One pail stuck half way out from under the cot, full of urine. She covered her nose and mouth with one hand to avoid smelling the stench and picked it up with her other. After demanding that the man outside to empty it, she returned to her new friend. His boots were thrown into the corner and his belt had been removed. She couldn’t locate it and wondered why they would take such a thing from him. Patrick himself was nothing but a mess. His hair that was usually pulled nice behind his neck was stringy and sticking up in many places. He’d grown facial hair that was in dire need of a trimming. Anna leaned closer to him to make sure he was still breathing. “Patrick,” she called out to him.
The familiar sound awoke him to see the bright light shining in from the window. He could see a feminine figure standing before him; an angel sent to comfort him, he thought. “Amelia?” He questioned.
Anna shed a tear. “Patrick no, it’s me, Anna. I’m her sister, do you remember me?”
Patrick sat up and rubbed his eyes. He’d been spending as much time as he could a sleep because in his dreams his love was still with him. Seeing Anna had forced him to remember everything that had happened to her and was happening to him. “Of course,” he mumbled.
She sat next to him and pushed his hair out of his face. She wanted him to clean himself up and take care of himself. “Why aren’t you taking care while you’re in here?”
“What’s the point?” He quizzed. He knew in his heart he hadn’t touched Amelia in any wrong way and that the real killer was still out there but he was too depressed to fight for his freedom. As far as he was concerned the sooner they executed him, the sooner he would be with Amelia again.
Anna was getting disappointed in his attitude. “You need to clean yourself up for the trial. Patrick, you have to make them believe that you had nothing to do with this.”
Patrick stood and looked out the window. He realized what kind of position he was in, being a strange man in a small village, the citizens wanted him away from them. He was a threat to their community, and he wasn’t about to stand in their way. “Did you know that she and I argued the last time we saw each other?”
“No I didn’t,” Anna answered but didn’t understand why he was talking about it. “Just because you argued doesn’t make you a killer.”
Patrick continued to stare into the sun as he responded, “No I’m not but if she told anyone about that argument before she went missing, they’ll use it against me. There is nothing I can do.”
“What about my father?” Anna tried to come up with solutions.
Patrick laughed, “Ha,” and then sat back down on the cot. “You’re father wants nothing more than to see me hung. I saw the hatred in his eyes when we were searching for her. I know he couldn’t have changed his mind about me now she’s gone.” He looked at the young girl and could see the hurt in her eyes. “It’s best we let Millersport do what they please.”
Anna jumped to her feet and faced him. He was giving up, and she didn’t want him to. “Patrick Buchanan, if you give up then we’ll never know who did those horrible things to my sister. Please come to your senses.” She waited for him to say something back but he’d just lied back across the cot, closing his eyes to sleep again. “You can’t give up.” Tears filled Anna’s eyes once more, and she wondered where they all came from. She must have run out of tears, she thought. “I came to see how you are doing but now I worry about you. My sister wouldn’t want you acting this way. Please snap out of it, Patrick.” He remained silent and turned to his side. Anna had tried to get him to say something, but he ignored her. The man outside the door had yelled to her and told her she had to leave. She walked towards the door but before leaving she spoke one last time to him, “Then I guess I’ll see you on Monday. I hope you’ve come to your senses by then.”