Darcy spotted Amos helping some of the girls to the benches. She hastened toward him and asked for his help. Within a minute, they had passed through the great door and into the main aisle of the stable.
The horses that were still inside their stalls twitched their ears and showed the white in their eyes. They paced to and fro at the doors of their stalls. Their anxious calls of distress reverberated through the hollow barn.
A large whip had been thrown in the center of the aisle. Amos stopped and picked it up.
“I suppose this is how the intruder herded those horses through a closed door. It is a good thing the door lifts as well as slides, or it would have come down completely,” said Amos. “That would have hurt even more people.”
A clippity-clop sounded behind them. Darcy jumped, thinking someone had let out another horse. But when she turned to look back, she relaxed. Some of the teens were bringing in the horses that had escaped. The animals were restless and fearful, but the Amish teens were experienced and patient as they soothed them back into their proper homes.
“Everything looks fine,” said Amos. “I think someone played a prank on us.”
Darcy didn’t believe that for a second. This was all because of the artwork and her and Jesse... Clearly, someone thought he still had them and was willing to do anything to get their hands on them.
Darcy shook her thoughts away. “There’s two more rooms at the other end. I want to check those, too.”
Amos followed her down the long aisle to the stable office. She was surprised to find the feed room door wide open and the lids off of all the food bins. The floor, too, had a thin layer of grains spread all over the floor.
“I’ll clean this up,” Amos said.
“Thank you, Amos. Do you think there’s anything stolen from in here?”
“Sometimes people steal tack but I never heard of stealing horse feed,” Amos said. “But I guess people are always surprising us.”
Darcy nodded. “Do people play pranks like this often?”
“No, ma’am. But you know how Englischer kids can be.”
Darcy forced a smile. She hadn’t lied about being Amish, but she felt like she was lying by wearing their clothing. “I’m going to check the office. Be right back.”
Darcy walked the remaining steps to Thomas’s office. That was where he had told her he kept his tack and anything else of value. The office door was also open and clearly it had been forced as the bolt had ripped through the frame of the door and splintered the wood. Darcy peered inside just as someone dressed in all black came flying through the office doorway. He plowed her down and made his escape through the far doors.
TWENTY
“Just give her the artwork,” the man said to Thomas. “Or she’s liable to dig up your whole community and she won’t care who’s in her way. And she especially won’t care about Finlay’s daughter. She knows the daughter has the key. And she knows you know where the daughter is.”
Thomas squared up his shoulders. His mind was reeling. His leg was bleeding. His brain was trying to make sense of what this man was telling him. “You’re Wissenberg’s son?”
“I’m nobody,” the man said. “A friend.”
“You’re on our side? Then why were you running away if you’re here to warn us? Why should I trust you?”
“You should trust no one.” With a sudden motion, the man pulled his arms together and took advantage of Thomas’s momentary surprise to break free. He pushed Thomas backward. Thomas caught his heel on a root and fell back to the snowy ground.
Before Thomas could recover, the man raised his knee high to his chest and with a look of pure evil on his face rammed his boot down into Thomas’s wound. Agony ripped through Thomas’s whole body, crippling him for a good few seconds. By the time he stood again, the man was in his car on the other side of the road. The wheels spun and he revved his engine until the car sped away across the new fallen snow.
Thomas tried to read the license plate. But he could only make out that it was Canadian and started with the number six. Thomas looked back to the stable. He didn’t know how much to believe of what the man had told him. He clearly had gotten Thomas to let his guard down so that he could get away. He hardly seemed trustworthy. On the other hand, Thomas didn’t want to completely dismiss the possibility of there being a second intruder still threatening the safety of the folks at the stable. If the man was telling even a bit of the truth, it meant that Darcy’s life was endangered over the key they had found. The key that wasn’t even in the stables. But, of course, the intruders didn’t know that.
Thomas looked for his horse. The animal had jogged several yards away from the scuffle, but now stood like a steed of war waiting for his rider to march back to battle. Thomas found a felled tree near the creek and used it to help him remount. It hurt to move his leg in any direction, but riding on a horse with four good legs would be a lot faster than a man walking on one with a gash in the side of it.
He clamped his teeth down and fought the pain. He should have listened to Darcy and gone back to the stable. He only hoped he wasn’t too late and that his mistake wouldn’t be the cause of injury to anyone else. Especially Darcy.
* * *
Darcy squealed as she went down flat on her back into the middle of the stable aisle. Amos raced out of the nearby feed room and saw the fleeing man in black.
“Are you hurt, miss?” he asked.
“I’m fine,” she said.
“I’m going to get that kid,” Amos said running after the man in black.
“Wait! No,” Darcy grunted, trying to refill her lungs with air. But Amos leaped over her and chased after the intruder.
Darcy pulled herself up off the ground and followed behind. Amos was stopped at the large front doors to the barn. “He disappeared. I chased him out of the stable, but when I got here...nothing.”
Darcy searched the ground. There should be footprints in the snow, right? But the ground revealed nothing but a confusion of boot prints going in every direction. There was nothing to glean from the snow.
“It’s okay,” Darcy said. “It probably wasn’t wise to run after him anyway. But thank you for helping. You’re a brave kid.”
“You think we were in actual danger?” He turned to her with a look of surprise.
“The stampede was a massive diversion so that they could search Thomas’s office,” she said. “They didn’t seem to care too much about hurting any of us. Yes, I would call that dangerous.”
“But what could Thomas have in his office worth all of that?” Amos asked.
A key to a pile of stolen art worth ten million dollars, Darcy thought to herself.
“Nothing,” she answered. “There is nothing in the world that could be worth that.”
And it was the whole reason she knew what she had to do next...
* * *
Darcy and Nana sat on one side of the kitchen table, each having a cup of herbal tea as they hoped to calm their nerves. Elijah and Chief McClendon sat on the opposite side of the table sipping coffee. Thomas was back on his stool with his wounded leg propped up high. Abigail had cleaned the wound again and redressed it. This time she told him that he was confined to the house and should sit or lie down for at least the next twenty-four hours. She had given him a shot of antibiotics in the hip, which had hurt almost as bad as the cleansing. She’d tried to talk him in to a mild painkiller, but he had refused. He needed to keep his head clear.
He did, however, ask Amos to take care of his horses and the stable for the rest of the week.
McClendon took notes in his little electronic pad. He wrote down descriptions of the intruders and he took multiple accounts of the activities from various community members before all of the guests had scattered.
Most of them had left believing the whole affair had bee
n the work of some rotten and thoughtless teens. But a few of the visitors had started connecting Jesse’s beating, the fire and now the stampede with the possibility that something much more sinister was taking place. Thomas didn’t know what the bishop had told those few inquisitive folks, but at this point everyone had gone home and Thomas knew that meant the others were away and safe.
“I should have canceled the singing after the fire,” he said. “I didn’t think the trouble would follow us here.”
“What’s done is done,” said Nana as she pushed away from the table. “And Gott doesn’t want us to go around living our lives in fear and regret. No one was seriously hurt. No broken bones. No trips to the hospital. That’s all that matters. Now, I’m going to bed. I don’t think I’ll sleep a wink but I’m going to try. If you will all excuse me.”
“Yes, ma’am,” everyone said.
“Did you catch the model and color of the car?” McClendon asked.
“No, I didn’t catch the make,” Thomas said. “But it was a dark color. Maybe gray or blue. It had four doors. Looked new. Canadian plates—Ontario, I think. I only caught the first number. It was a six.”
Thomas shifted his weight on the stool. McClendon typed in a few more notes. Everyone looked exhausted and weighed down.
“Can anyone think of anything else?” McClendon asked.
They all shook their heads. They’d been over everything. Every detail of his encounter in the woods and the escape of the intruder in his office.
“Then I will take Eli and Miss Simmons back to the Millers’. Let’s call it a night,” McClendon said. He looked at Elijah. “We can phone Agent Ross from the car and get him up to speed. I’m going to post a car here, Thomas. From the sounds of your conversation in the woods, these people will be back looking for the key since they didn’t get it tonight.”
Thomas had the strangest sinking feeling as the three of them said goodbye. He dismissed it as emotions born out of exhaustion and confusion and the pain ramming through his leg. He wanted to say a private good-night to Darcy. He wanted to finish the conversation they’d had under the stars. He wanted to go back to that moment when he’d held her hand on the reins and she’d shared her heart with him.
But he knew he couldn’t. She wouldn’t even look back at him as she left the house.
Thomas knew it was better that way. But that didn’t matter. Knowing something is right doesn’t always make it feel better. Sometimes knowing what is right was just sad. Thomas made his way slowly up the stairs and into his bedroom. He lay across the quilted covers, too lost in his thoughts to draw them back. He turned out his lantern and closed his eyes. But, like Nana, he knew he wouldn’t be able to sleep.
* * *
Darcy sat quietly in the back of the chief’s car, knowing exactly what she needed to do. She listened to Elijah speak to Agent Ross over the phone. She knew they were all doing everything they could to help. But it wasn’t enough to stop the danger.
Her presence and this mess of her father’s were putting others in harm’s way. And Darcy was determined to put a stop to it.
Whether or not the attackers on her trail knew she was there dressed in Amish clothing was unclear. But it wasn’t something she was going to bank others’ lives on. If she left Willow Trace and made it obvious that she was back at her town house, then the focus of the hunt would resume there and she could know that these people were safe—that Thomas was safe. As they pulled into the Millers’ drive, she realized she needed to make her move now.
“I’m going to leave,” Darcy announced to Elijah and McClendon. “Please call a taxi for me.”
“What?” McClendon said. “I don’t think that’s going to help anything. Where are you going to go?”
“Home.”
“Alone? That’s not safe.”
“Am I free to go?” she asked.
“Well, of course you are,” the chief said. “I just don’t think it’s advisable. You are safer here.”
“Maybe I am. Maybe I’m not. But for sure everyone else is safer without me here.”
Neither of them argued with that reasoning.
“I just need to go inside and change back into my own clothing. If you could call a taxi for me, I’d really appreciate it.”
“Sure,” McClendon said. “I’ll call one now.”
Darcy headed into the Millers’ house to get her things. Elijah raced after her.
“Why are you doing this?” he asked.
She didn’t answer. He knew why she was doing it. “Does Agent Ross have the letter and the key and the Bible that we found yesterday? And the box of photos?”
“Yes, he took all of it,” Elijah said. “Well, except for the box the photos were in. Why?”
“I just want to keep with me something that belonged to my father,” she said. “Could I have it?”
He nodded.
Darcy changed into her own things. She spread the frock she’d worn over the quilt-covered bed. She ran her fingers over the plain cotton fabric. She placed the black apron over the front and the prayer kapp at the collar. Heavy emotions welled inside her.
Her own clothing felt tight and restrictive against her limbs. She said a quick goodbye to Hannah and to Bishop and Mrs. Miller. Elijah waited for her outside. McClendon had already left and the taxi had arrived. In his hands, Elijah was holding the beautiful wooden box that Jesse had made. He handed it to her. As she grasped it in her hands, she felt peace. She was doing the right thing by leaving.
She smiled at Elijah. “Take care of Thomas,” she said.
“You’re not coming back, are you?” he asked.
Darcy put her hand on his shoulder. Emotions swelled in her, rising so high that all her thoughts and words swam in them. She couldn’t answer him except with her eyes. She climbed in the taxi and closed the door. She had one more goodbye to make. This one at the Lancaster General Hospital.
Then Darcy knew she would never be back to Willow Trace.
TWENTY-ONE
Darcy sat next to Jesse in the ICU. She held his limp, cold hand in hers. The poor old man clung on to his life by a thread. She spoke softly to him. She doubted he could hear, but there were things to be said all the same.
“I don’t know why you kept those paintings, Jesse. Dad. But I do know you must have had a reason. Thomas believes in you and, well, so do I.
“It’s been a crazy few days finding out about the truth. About you and Mom. I understand why you and Grandma and Granddad made the decisions that you did after Mom was killed. And there’s nothing to forgive. So you don’t ever have to ask. You should know that I always loved you. Even when Grandma wanted me to be angry with you the way she was. I didn’t know enough to understand what had happened, but now that I do, I know that you loved Mom. You did the right thing by testifying. And you did the right thing by writing to me.”
Her eyes filled with tears. She wiped them away with her free hand. “I can’t stay long. But I had to say goodbye. And don’t worry. I’m going to make sure that Wissenberg knows I’ve been to my house so that none of your friends will be in danger anymore. I will make Wissenberg think that I have the key and everything else he wants, even if that’s not true, and then—then I’m going to disappear. They will know that I’m lost to them forever and with me, the hopes of ever finding the paintings. But I love you. I’m so, so glad you wrote to me. Wake up, Jesse. And know I love you.”
Darcy wasn’t sure but she thought she felt Jesse’s hand tighten just ever so slightly around her fingers. “Thank you, Jesse. I’ll be thinking of you.”
Darcy stood. She bent over and kissed her father on the forehead. She had so much to thank him for. She would never forget her time here in Willow Trace. She would never forget the people and their kindness and their love for God. She would never forget her friendship with Th
omas and how his quiet strength and faith had helped lead her to a budding search for her own peace. She knew she didn’t fully understand God’s love yet, but she had felt the power of its force in brief waves around her and she wanted more. Her heart was open and ready.
Wiping away one last straggling tear, Darcy headed for the door. She wasn’t two steps outside Jesse’s room when she came toe-to-toe with a familiar face.
“Agent Danvers.” Darcy stopped fast as tall agent was blocking the way. “What are you doing here?”
“I figured you’d be back to see him sooner or later,” the woman said. She ran a hand over her blond spikes.
Darcy wasn’t sure if she wanted to trust the US Marshals office. After all, they had completely failed Jesse. But Danvers was there and...well, she knew she didn’t want to be alone in her town house. “I guess you read my mind.”
“So you’ve finally come to your senses and decided to relocate?”
Darcy nodded.
“That is a wise, wise decision.” A wide smile stretched across the agent’s face, which seemed more filled with triumph than compassion.
Darcy looked back toward Jesse’s room. Already, some of her newfound peace felt as if it were eroding. She didn’t want to give him up, but she knew that she had to. She was doing the right thing for everyone. But if that were so, why did she feel so unsure?
* * *
Sleep would not come. Thomas sat up in his bed. His leg was throbbing and his mind raced with thoughts of Jesse and Darcy and the fire and everything else. He might as well get up and focus on something constructive.
He relit the lantern and grabbed his Bible. He looked up the two verses that Jesse had put in the letter. Exodus 38:9—Next they made the courtyard. The south side was a hundred cubits long and had curtains of finely twisted linen.
Thomas reached again to his side table. He picked up his journal and pencil. He turned to a clean page and started scribbling. Three, eight, nine. The reference numbers. But there was a number in the verse, as well.
Lancaster County Reckoning Page 15