by Judy Clemens
“So you already volunteered me?”
“Well, they don’t have a truck.”
Okaaaay. “Thanks for checking with me first, Ma.”
“Oh, what do you have that’s better to do? You can handle a bit of Christian charity now and again.”
I supposed she was right. And I certainly wasn’t brave enough to tell her no.
So I guessed I knew what I’d be doing after milking the next day, whether I wanted to or not.
Chapter Nineteen
After eating Lucy’s delicious supper, sharing the table once again with Lenny and Tess and avoiding all conversation of murder and car-jackings, I decided I’d waited long enough to take on the project of showering. So when the house was my own again, I got a clean garbage bag, taped it to within an inch of its life, and stepped into the shower. There were a couple of close calls, and I’m not sure I got all the shampoo rinsed out of my hair, but I felt a hundred percent better. Or at least eighty.
I pulled on an extra large T-shirt and climbed into bed, exhausted from the effort of becoming clean. Once I’d gotten back my breath and stopped sweating from all the exertion, I picked up the phone and dialed Nick’s number.
Busy. Crap.
Carla hadn’t called, and I wondered if she’d gotten my note on the door. I dialed her number, but got only her machine. I left a short message for her to call, and hung up.
I lay down, and tried Nick again five minutes later. Still busy.
This time when I lay down, I fell asleep until something jerked me awake. I lay still, heart pounding. Did I have a nightmare? Was there wind? Had Queenie been barking? A glance at the clock said it was almost ten. Not late, but dark. I lay frozen, breathing as quietly as I could. Something creaked downstairs, and I heard the stairway door open, rasping on its hinges. I reached over to grab one of my crutches, and eased off the side of the mattress onto my good leg, keeping the bed in-between me and the door.
Quiet footsteps came up the stairs, the wood creaking, and a man-sized shape filled my bedroom door. I raised the crutch.
“Stella?”
I froze. “Nick?”
He stepped forward, and I fell into his arms.
***
I woke before my alarm, lying on my side, Nick behind me, still in the clothes he’d been wearing the night before. It had taken a while for my shaking to stop after the scare he’d given me, but once my heartbeat had returned to normal I’d told him to stop apologizing, and I’d slept through the night without dreaming.
But now a wave of nausea hit me as I remembered the events of the day before, and I swallowed. When the sick feeling had passed I turned off my alarm and eased out of bed. I needed to get my mind on something other than Dr. Peterson’s death, and work would be the best thing, if I could handle it.
I grabbed some shorts and was able to get out of the room without waking Nick. My trip down the stairs was much better than the day before, and once I’d eaten a little breakfast and popped some ibuprofen I went out to the barn, beating both Lucy and Zach. With a little hitch in my breathing I put on the little shoe Dr. Peterson had given me, tied a bag around my cast, and found a place to put my crutches. Then I started down the rows, clipping in the cows who had already found their spots. By the time Queenie had herded the rest of them in Zach had been dropped off by his dad and was in the aisle, ready to start. He didn’t say anything, but grunted twice, so I thought that was pretty good.
Lucy arrived after Zach had attached the first milkers, and I was filling feed cups.
I looked up at her. “Well, look who decided to show up.”
She glanced at the clock, hands on her hips. “I’m not late.”
“Nope. Just not as early as me.”
She narrowed her eyes. “So I got up for nothing?”
“Sorry. Didn’t know I’d feel up to it.” I gestured toward the house. “You can go back to sleep if you want. Your old bed’s still there.”
She thought about it, but apparently decided sleep was now a lost cause. “Nick’s here? I saw his truck.”
“Yeah. Arrived last night.”
“I didn’t know he was coming.”
“I didn’t, either.”
She took a deep breath and pushed her hair back from her face. “I’ll go feed the calves.”
“Thanks. Sorry again, Luce.”
She waved me off. “No biggie.”
With three of us around the work got done in good time, even with me being gimpy. By the time we were finished it was close to eight.
“Anybody know what time the Hilltown Nursery opens?”
Zach looked at me blankly.
Lucy smiled, cocking an eyebrow. “Planning some gardening?”
“No. Ma volunteered me to pick up some mulch for the Hershbergers.”
Zach looked at me some more. “You want help?” It was a grudging question.
“Thanks, but Alan and David are supposed to be there to take it off the truck. And I can drag Nick along, if he’s awake.”
I could almost hear the “Good” Zach didn’t say.
Leaving them to repair some boards in the paddock, I went into the house and found Nick still sleeping. I eased the door back shut, left Nick a note on the kitchen table, and went outside, where I found a shovel in the heifer barn that Lucy and Zach wouldn’t need after milking. It was covered with filth of the kind the Hershbegers probably wouldn’t want in their mulch, so I wiped it down with a rag before heaving it into the truck bed. I whistled Queenie into the back seat, and took off for Hilltown.
The nursery manager loaded us up with the beautiful dark brown mulch the Hershbergers had pre-ordered, and sent us on our way toward Kulpsville. A half hour later I found their house on a winding “country” road behind the church. “Country” meaning there were houses only every fifty feet instead of every twenty.
David met my truck in the drive, looking a little more awake than he had the other morning at my farm. “Morning.”
I nodded. “Where do you want this?”
“How ‘bout you back up to the front of the house? The ground’s hard enough these days it shouldn’t matter. Just don’t run over the guys.”
Another look showed Alan and Trevor hunched down between two bushes, messing with something in the dirt. I maneuvered the truck so the open tailgate hovered over the middle of the flower bed, and hopped down from the truck. Queenie jumped down, too, and immediately began running circles with a terrier that shot out of the shrubbery, yapping to high heaven.
Alan, who had clambered up from his knees, winced. “How they can have so much energy at this time of the morning is beyond me.” He reached for a coffee cup balanced on the porch railing.
Trevor looked up, but didn’t say anything.
“Early?” I said. “I’ve been up four hours already.”
Alan groaned, putting his mug to his forehead. “You and the Incredible Hulk over there.”
I glanced at David, who grinned. “Can’t help it I’m a morning person. At least I do you the favor of going out for a run and not making noise in the house.”
“Can you imagine?” Alan said. “Getting up early just to exercise?”
I looked toward the road, where cars passed every few seconds. “Where do you go so you don’t get run over?”
David pointed west. “If I go that way, there’s a little road that misses a lot of this traffic. And that early in the morning, I even beat most of the commuters.”
“Crazy,” Alan said, with feeling.
I laughed. “You’re not an exerciser?”
“Give me an air-conditioned gym at a decent hour, and I might consider it.”
I remembered the gift certificate Carla wanted me to use, and fought down a wave of anxiety at the thought of sweating on purpose, in front of people.
Trevor stood up and brushed dirt off his knees.
“You in any sports?” I asked him.
He shrugged. “
I like soccer.”
“Well, that’s good around here. Big soccer area, isn’t it?”
“I guess. The school’s team won State a few times.”
Mallory had talked about that. “You going out this fall?”
He looked away. “I’m not that good.”
“Sure you are,” David said. Then to me, “I told him he could come running with me. Wouldn’t take that much to get him in shape.”
Alan groaned, and I took a look at his son. David was probably right—Trevor looked pretty fit, from what I could see under his baggy shirt and shorts. But knowing most teen-agers and their sleep patterns, I couldn’t imagine David was going to have much luck getting this one up at dawn to pound the pavement. I was surprised he was up now, and it was closing in on nine-o’clock.
“So should we get this mulch unloaded?” I asked.
“Oh,” Alan said. “Right.”
I grabbed my shovel from the corner of the truck bed and swung onto the tailgate while Alan set his mug back on the porch.
David gestured to my foot. “You sure you should be working?”
I stood up, towering over him. “I’m fine. Doctor said I could start work after a day or two.”
“He know what he’s doing?”
“She does. Or, she did.”
“Oh. She. Sorry.”
Alan looked up. “What’s her name? We need to line up a doctor, and Katherine would prefer a woman.”
I took a breath, wondering how to say what I needed to say. They obviously hadn’t caught it when I’d changed tenses. “Her name was Rachel Peterson.”
Alan looked at me. “Was?”
“Yeah. She…she died yesterday.”
“Oh my God,” David said. “She’s that doctor that was on the news. Someone broke into her office to steal drugs, and she was there. They killed her.”
Alan blinked. “Are you serious?”
I sat on the side of the truck bed, the nausea of the morning returning.
“You okay?” David stood beside me, his hand on my elbow.
“Yeah. Yeah, I’m fine.” I took a deep breath and stood back up, getting a shovelful of mulch.
Alan stood to the side, thinking. “You know, I’m pretty sure she was on the list one of the church members made up for us. Doctors and dentists and stuff.”
David dumped a shovelful of mulch around a plant. “Wasn’t she the one taking over her father’s practice?”
Alan snapped his fingers. “That’s right. Over in Souderton? The one Sarah was urging you to check out.”
Trevor’s shovel banged the tailgate, and I jumped. A look at his face reminded me of what Zach had said about Trevor and women. Having Dr. Peterson as his doctor would’ve given the kid yet one more woman to tell him what to do. He didn’t have to worry about that now. Unless there was another female doctor on the list.
We left the topic and finished unloading the mulch in silence, Alan bringing a broom from the garage to sweep the last chunks out of the truck’s nooks and crannies. “Thanks so much for bringing the mulch. I wasn’t sure how to get it here before Mrs. Granger mentioned your truck.”
“No problem. I’m glad to help out.” And I was, now that I’d done it.
He finished sweeping before taking off his gloves and banging them together over the flowerbed, spraying tiny mulch pieces. I held out my shovel and he took it and gave it to Trevor to hold while he helped me climb down from the truck. “Katherine’s over at the church. I’m sure she’d be glad if you’d stop by and say hello.”
“Well—”
“In fact, when I mentioned you were bringing the mulch she said to be sure to tell you to come on over and see her office.”
Oh, great. More people volunteering my time. “Thanks.”
He took my shovel from Trevor and set it in the truck bed. “The church is just around the corner. Less than a mile.”
“Sure. I know.” I closed the tailgate, and little mulch pieces fell to the ground from the back bumper. I swept the rest off with my hand.
Trevor was giving me the eye, so I whistled for Queenie. “Come on, girl! Time to go!”
After a few more rounds of the yard, and an entirely mismatched wrestling bout—Queenie was bigger, but the terrier ten times feistier—my disheveled collie escaped the clutches of the little bugger and jumped into the truck. I closed her window halfway and pulled slowly out of the yard, finding a space in the traffic to drive away. It was busy enough I didn’t feel comfortable looking back to wave.
When I got to the red light at the intersection to Allentown Road, I paused. Left to my house, or right to the church?
“What do you think?” I asked Queenie. “Should we do what we want or try to act neighborly?”
She smeared her nose on the window.
“Oh, if you insist.”
I turned right.
Chapter Twenty
I pulled into the parking lot of Kulpsville Mennonite Church and studied the building. An old stone structure, it was probably at least a hundred and fifty years old. A modern addition was tacked on to the west end—probably a wing for classrooms, the way it looked. Thick, mature oaks and maples competed with the church’s height, casting shadows across the tall, white-paned windows.
Several cars were parked close to the front door, and I recognized the Odyssey the Hershbergers had driven to our house the day before. Neither of the other two cars were familiar.
I parked next to the minivan, by the front walk, and left the windows partially open, promising Queenie I wouldn’t be long. “Really,” I said. “This is just a drive-by visit, and I doubt the church folks would welcome a dog running around the property. Even one as good as you.”
She flopped onto the seat, very put out.
Stepping into the foyer of the church, I was pleasantly surprised by the coolness of the interior. The stone and trees were doing their job to keep the summer sun from heating up the church.
“May I help you?” A woman peered at me suspiciously from a doorway, where she stood, a stack of papers in her hands. Her eyes traveled from the tips of my cast to my head, lingering on the points of the steerhead on my neck.
“Yeah. Is Katherine around?”
“The pastor?”
Um, yeah. “I came by to say hello.”
She looked at me for a few more seconds before stepping back and waving me inside the room. “Her office is in here.”
I clomped toward her, making her step back even further, and stepped into the room. It looked like any church office—at least the few that I’ve seen—with a computer, desk, phones, and a watercolor painting with the words “Come, ye that love the Lord” inked in with fancy script. It reminded me of a piece Lucy had owned before the tornado had destroyed her apartment over my garage last summer. What had she called it? A fraktur. Mennonite folk art done by a local artist.
The woman bustled ahead of me, sticking her head through a doorway in the corner. “Pastor Katherine? There’s a…lady here to see you.”
I heard the rise and fall of Katherine’s voice, and the sound of her footsteps.
“Stella!” She smiled and walked up to me, hands out. I picked one of them and shook it.
“What brings you by?”
I leaned against the desk to rest my foot. “Delivered some mulch to your house and helped to shovel it out. Alan suggested I come over to see your office.”
“Well, that’s great. This is Dorie. The church’s secretary.” She gestured to the woman who’d greeted me. She looked a little more enthusiastic now that Katherine had accepted me.
“Dorie, this is Stella Crown. The one with the dairy farm I was telling you about.”
Dorie smiled and nodded, and I was amazed she hadn’t recognized me, seeing how I’d obviously been a topic of conversation. Could it be that Katherine hadn’t mentioned my tattoos? Unheard of.
The sound of hammering came from Katherine’s office, and I blinked.<
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“Here. Come into my office,” Katherine said.
I walked past smiling Dorie and stepped toward Katherine’s room, pausing in the doorway. “Oh, hi, Tricia.”
Katherine’s sister turned briefly from the wall, where she had just pounded in a nail. “Stella.” She picked up a framed picture, which I expected to be the usual picture of Jesus. This painting, however, was different. Much better than that one with him looking all washed out and simpering. This one gave him some color—a darker skin than most portraits show—and some fire in his eyes. The kind of Jesus I’d prefer, any day.
I looked around the room for obvious signs of the vandalism, but didn’t see anything. Another glance at the wall told me it was freshly painted, and I could only imagine the offensive words that had been slashed across it only a couple of days before. I wanted to say something about them, try to make a connection with Dr. Peterson’s murder, but Willard wanted me to keep quiet about the sign.
I forced a smile at Katherine. “Looks like you’re getting settled in.”
“I’ve had good help. Tricia’s much better at this stuff than I am.”
I gestured toward the Jesus painting. “I thought your artwork had all been destroyed.”
“Most of it was. This one, thank goodness, I’d been planning to hang at home, so it wasn’t over here.” Her face was tight. “But I lost a lot of special things.”
I looked around the room, seeing small, unharmed pieces of pottery and a hanging tapestry.
Katherine followed my gaze. “Tricia made a trip to the Kulpsville Flea Market this morning, over in the old elementary school. She found a few things to start my collection back up. It will take a while to replace everything. And some things can’t be replaced, of course. But it’s a start.”
A photo sat on a shelf at eye-level, and I stepped closer. It was obviously the extended family, with Katherine’s and Tricia’s broods, and a woman who must have been their mother. Everyone wore red and green, and a wreath hung on the wall behind them. “Christmas photo?”
Katherine smiled. “From a few years back.”
“That’s your mother?”
Katherine glanced at Tricia, whose focus was on the painting she was hanging. “Before she got sick. You can tell just by looking at her face that she was happy that Christmas.”