Fall from Pride

by Karen Harper

  In the rearview mirror, he saw her run back to the house. He turned right on the road, heading toward town, toward what he knew in his bones was going to be another arson. It was exactly what he’d sensed and feared—a serial arsonist working under cover of night in an isolated area. Another Amish barn owned by another church leader. Another of Sarah’s painted patterns—oh, yeah, he knew he’d find a pattern now.

  “Nate, be careful,” Sarah said as he looked both ways, then went through the single Homestead stoplight—which was red. The place looked dark and dead, but for lights in Ray-Lynn’s restaurant and the little newspaper office. And, he noted as he accelerated again, in the two fast-food restaurants and what must be security night-lights in the Citizens Bank. The self-serve gas station was open, one of the few in the state, he figured, where you didn’t have to pay before you pumped. According to his research, the town claimed about four hundred residents, but that had to include some outlying areas.

  “The fire truck’s still in the firehouse,” Sarah reported, “but two cars are there already. We’re going to beat them to the fire.”

  “Where do we turn?” he asked as he accelerated.

  “About a mile yet, left on Fish Creek Road, but I can’t remember if there’s a sign. Nate, Mike Getz is a neighbor of the Schrocks.”

  “Bingo,” he muttered.

  Gabe, wedged between him and Sarah, was wide-eyed and mute either with fear or excitement. When Nate had questioned him about kids being in the Esh barn, he’d had a gut feeling Gabe had seen something the night of that fire.

  “There!” Sarah cried, pointing. “On the horizon at about eleven o’clock. It looks like the sun’s setting there—see?”

  “The barn’s not fully engulfed yet, so someone spotted it early. And it’s not burning top to bottom but low. So much for that pattern.”

  “It’s also a different kind of barn, not like ours or the Eshes’. Only two floors, a real sharp slanted roof to shed the snow, second-floor haymow doors that look like they’re open.”

  “That will fan the fire—suck it upward, too. Okay, we beat the fire truck here,” he shouted as he roared up the lane past the Schrocks’ house and outbuildings. “No lights on in their place.”

  “Maybe they’re not home, either. That’s a pattern.”

  “Gabe, you go pound on the back and front doors of their house,” Nate ordered. “Sarah’s going to help me suit up.”

  “Suit up?” she cried. “You’re not going into that inferno?”

  “I’m not some amateur, volunteer firefighter!” Nate shouted, for the roar of the flames was enough to muffle their words. “Just to take a look. Gabe, go!”

  The moment Nate got out, the boy slid over and sprinted toward the house. “Sarah!” Nate yelled. “I can do it myself, but you can help get me in there faster!”

  He dragged his equipment out of the back of VERA and threw it on the ground. The Schrock barn was gray with black trim and a high-gabled roof, shingles over planks. He couldn’t stay inside long because Sarah’s ruined quilt pattern called Tumbling Blocks was probably going to be the fate of this proud structure. And then he saw her running toward him.

  Sarah saw the fire truck, its red-and-white lights pulsing, but without the siren, streaking down the dark road toward them. She wanted to stall. No way she wanted Nate going into a flaming barn. Look what had happened to Mike Getz and Levi Miller. With a quick glance at her still-intact painted square, she realized her entire world might be falling apart. And then she rushed to the back of VERA to help him pull on the protective gear he’d showed her about a half hour ago.

  She tried to remember how it all went. Nate had it laid out on the ground, and was already into the thick pants and suspenders. She helped him jam his feet into his oversize, steel-toed boots. Then she held his bulky, beige jacket so he could get into it. He yanked on the fire protection hood that had arrived in the package she’d delivered before supper. It encased his head and neck but not his face. Her fingers weren’t used to the oxygen mask he pointed toward, so he ended up pulling it on and tightening the straps himself. She helped him put on the heavy fire gloves and handed him his hat. It looked scorched and smelled of smoke.

  Meanwhile, all around her, volunteer firemen were hauling lengths of hose out of their truck. Sarah knew Nate wanted to beat them inside. She wondered if Mike Getz was among them, but surely not with a broken arm. Then she saw him off to the side with Cindee Kramer. Their faces, lit by orange flames, seemed to glow with excitement.

  Nate nodded to her and headed toward the barn door. The firemen were still dragging out two hoses, one from their truck and one to draw water from the pond, as Nate walked toward the flaming hell.

  Talk about VERA being claustrophobic when he slept inside, Nate thought as he lumbered into the burning barn. Until the oxygen started flowing through his mask, he always felt a moment of drowning panic. If he breathed in before the flow was good, his eardrums seemed to suck right into his head, but he was fine now. Somehow, it was always otherworldly. He couldn’t hear anything but his own breathing, couldn’t talk, could hardly see, plodding under seventy-five pounds of gear.

  At least he had hopes no one was trapped inside. He’d seen burned bodies, curled in a fetal position—black, unrecognizable, flesh and fat gone right down to the bone, smelling like charred meat on the grill. Thank God, it seemed no one was home at the farm again. The arsonist was clever and careful. But Nate couldn’t afford to be careful right now. He had to look in the guts of this structure to see if he could pin anything down. Already, even with two internal points of combustion observable from outside, he saw it was a different M.O. But it had to be the same person setting these, didn’t it? A copycat arsonist was rare, no doubt especially in a rural area where harmony apparently ruled.

  He didn’t mind that this blaze brought back his fire training—it was the other memories he tried to fight. That night when he was eight and the roaring inferno of their home engulfed him. His mother screaming his name, coughing, gasping, crawling on the floor through the pall of choking smoke to where he huddled near his bed. The last time he saw her, her nightgown was ablaze. And then his father rushing in—too late….

  This barn—again, the horses were in the field—had a large central bay and two side bays, one with stalls, one with stored grain. The flames were so fierce, he figured he could almost hear some of the corn popping, when he actually couldn’t hear a thing. Popcorn—that’s what Sarah had said while she helped him get suited up. The Schrocks had harvested a huge crop of popcorn last year, sold most of it to the Orville Redenbacher’s company.

  Just about six feet inside the barn, he was dazzled by a burst of flames and sparks—a small explosion in amazing hues, violet, magenta, chartreuse. Was he hallucinating? Chemicals this time?

  When the flare-up spread away from him, licking at the wooden beams that supported the inner bay and stall walls, he shuffled toward the source of the colors, prettier than the sunrise had been that morning as he watched Sarah hitch her horse to her buggy. It almost mesmerized him. And it must be something incendiary, because it was at the tip of one of the V-burn patterns the firemen were trying to douse.

  A stream of water from a hose bounced before his eyes, throwing something against his boots. Grunting, he stooped to picked up a remnant. He had a hunch what it was and it wasn’t kerosene this time.

  Sarah and Gabe stood off to the side, beyond the reach of the heat belching from the blazing barn. Once again, observers gathered as they saw the flames or the word spread. Nate was still inside, but then several of the firemen were, too, so they must figure the structure was sound enough right now. The flames were consuming her bright pink, green and brown tumbling blocks on the stark-white background. She imagined she could hear it crackling in protest. The Schrocks had picked the design because it looked like it was moving both up and down, depending on your point of view. She watched the paint curl and blur, making blocks seem to tumble like the barn beams and roof
would if they couldn’t get the fire out soon.

  Sarah tried to stem the tears that prickled her eyelids, but she couldn’t keep from crying. Her vision blurred to make the barn fire seem like Armageddon with the entire world aflame. Her quilt squares, now the barns of two families who had trusted her to paint them there, were under attack. Who hated the Home Valley Amish? Did someone blame her for something? Sure, there had been hate crimes against her people from time to time. Some Englische blamed the Plain People for being pacifists, for their slow buggies, for just being different. No way it was smooth sailing in this life she’d been born into and then had chosen.

  She wiped tears from her cheeks with both hands. And then she saw something glint from the darkness beyond the barn.

  She couldn’t tell what—who—because it was as if she’d been looking into the sun, but she was suddenly sure someone was there watching, standing back a ways, not joining the others. Despite drifting smoke, had it been eyeglasses or sunglasses or binoculars that had reflected the flames? Surely not just a distortion from her own tears. A big meadow stretched into the darkness, so why would someone stand in the middle of it?

  Sarah hurried back to VERA, climbed inside and took down Nate’s night goggles. She got back out and moved into the shadow of the big vehicle. She fumbled to get them on, had to end up holding them over her eyes. But her view was so blurry, just a sea of eerie green flecked by shifting, speckled grays, kind of like swimming underwater.

  Yet she glimpsed a figure, someone moving away, apparently from watching the barn burn. Man or woman? Grossmamm’s man in black? Should she race across the meadow in pursuit, at least to see up closer?

  But at that moment Nate emerged from the inferno, stumbling, unsteady, and she ran toward him instead.

  8

  SARAH COULDN’T TELL WHAT NATE WAS CRADLING so carefully in his gloved hands. He walked around her and deposited something on VERA’s wide, back metal bumper. Embers? The small mass, looking like a smashed piece of wood, was glowing as if it had a life of its own. It suddenly sparked pink and purple.

  He pulled off his helmet and mask, sucking in air, out of breath.

  “Stay back from that!” he told her.

  “What is it?”

  “Not positive yet. What are you doing with my goggles?”

  “I saw someone in the back meadow but it was blurry. Someone hurrying away.”

  He pulled off one of his gloves and wiped his sweaty face with his free hand. “Amish?” he asked.

  “I couldn’t tell.”

  “Male or female?”

  “Not sure. I noticed at first because of a glint from the fire, on glasses or binoculars, I think.”

  He shrugged out of his jacket and, still wearing his protective pants held up by suspenders, took the goggles from her and put them on. He walked away and peered into the distant darkness for several minutes, then returned and handed her the goggles.

  “Is there a road or another farm back that way?” he asked.

  “A road and a farm, but way over the hill. Levi Miller’s place, the Amish man who had his ribs broken when he and Mike Getz went into the first fire. He’s the church deacon who has one of my painted squares on his barn. Other than Bishop Esh’s barn and those of the two church elders you’ve met, Levi Miller’s is the only other one I painted—so far, now that I’m going to do one on our family barn.”

  He frowned. “I need to run a test on that material,” he told her, nodding toward the remnant on his bumper. “I’m going to smother it so it doesn’t burn further.” She watched as he put the glove he’d removed over it, pressing it down.

  “But won’t that hurt it, if you need to find out what it is?”

  “I’ll be testing the ashy residue, the chemical contents. I’m betting on oil-treated sawdust from cedar with a copper-based coloring compound. In other words, what’s left when you break open and ignite an artificial fireplace log.”

  “I’ve seen those!”

  “In town?”

  “It must have been in the hardware store. I’m going there tomorrow.”

  “Don’t you be asking who bought some. I’ll take care of that.”

  They both jumped as a white light nearly blinded them, but it wasn’t from Nate’s evidence. Peter Clawson had arrived and was taking pictures of the scene with a strobe. At least Sarah could tell, if he’d shot a picture their way, she had her back turned to the camera. He probably wanted ones of Nate and VERA.

  “Can you stay here with this—not touch it, guard it—until I see how the guys are doing with the fire?” Nate asked, peering closer at his prize.

  “Ya—yes, sure.”

  “Where’s Gabe?”

  “Over there with some friends,” she said, pointing.

  “I’ll be right back.”

  She watched him talk to the two firemen who were holding the hose that was drawing water from the pond. It actually looked as if they could keep this barn from tumbling down, although her tumbling blocks pattern was a goner. Peter Clawson approached Nate, and they spoke for a minute. Sarah saw Ray-Lynn, who had just driven in, and was standing near the sheriff’s cruiser. Ray-Lynn didn’t see her standing beside Nate’s truck or she would have come over. Nate made a beeline toward Gabe and his friends, bending toward them in earnest conversation. Next, he huddled in private with Sheriff Freeman, who had arrived while Nate was still in the barn and had been keeping the growing crowd back.

  To her dismay, Peter Clawson came over to her, but at least he kept his camera at his side.

  “Another of your pretty paintings gone, Sarah.”

  “The barn is what matters.”

  “Of course. It’s starting to look as if someone’s holding a grudge—a big one—against Amish church leaders, doesn’t it?”

  “I pray that’s not the case.”

  “Right. God’s will.”

  “Do you doubt that, Mr. Clawson?”

  “The thing is, the devil’s loose on the earth, evidently with God’s tolerance or permission. So, I see you’re helping Nate MacKenzie.”

  “Not exactly. He had dinner with my family, then Gabe and I came along to show him where the Schrock barn was when the call came in.”

  “So what’s that stuff on the bumper of his truck?”

  The man wasn’t taking notes as he had when he interviewed her about her quilt squares, but she didn’t want him quoting her and she didn’t want to give anything away that Nate wanted kept quiet for now. Yet she totally shocked herself when she looked straight into the man’s eyes and told a lie. “I’ve decided to keep a burned piece of each barn where I had a painting, just to remember how kind the families were to let me do it.”

  “A quaint idea,” he said. He squinted at her, then rubbed his eyes, probably stinging from the pall of smoke. The breeze wasn’t blowing this way, but the entire area—including her clothes and hair—hung heavy with the smell. He started to say something else, then, to her relief, thought better of it and hurried away, taking pictures again.

  She stayed right where she was, guarding Nate’s evidence as she saw him leave Sheriff Freeman to walk over to Mike Getz and Cindee Kramer. To Sarah’s surprise, Nate slapped Mike on the back as if they were old pals. Right then her parents buggied in and got out with Bishop and Mattie Esh.

  Nate spoke to the four of them, pointing her out to her parents before he walked back to her and stared at his ashy evidence again.

  “Peter Clawson asked what that was, but I told him it was mine,” she blurted.

  “I appreciate that or he’d be after me with more questions. I don’t want those or my answers in his paper. And to keep that from being a lie, I’ll give you a bit for a dirty souvenir. But guess who phoned this fire in?”

  “Not Mike Getz?”

  “I knew I should hire you as my assistant. We’ve got another arson here but between you, VERA and me, one way or the other, we’re going to nail someone soon. We have to before this happens again.”

  The next
morning, after delivering her half-moon pies, Sarah had breakfast in a booth at the restaurant, waiting for the hardware store to open at nine so she could buy paint. While she ate, Ray-Lynn came and went to greet or cash folks out, but she sat across the table from Sarah when she could.

  “So you’re going to go ahead and paint a quilt square on your barn?” Ray-Lynn asked as Sarah finished her blueberry pancakes and sausage patties. “After two of them just went up in flames with their barns?”

  “Shh. I discussed that with my parents and Nate last night, and we decided yes.”

  “Easy for him to say—and it’s Nate now, is it?” she added with a wink. “Well, if he’s camped out back of your barn like you said, maybe he wants to set a trap for the arsonist—or for someone else.”

  “Now, Ray-Lynn, no teasing. It’s not that way and it’s impossible.”

  “I thought all things were possible with God. But, okay, okay. Still, aren’t you scared for your own barn?”

  “The point is, we mustn’t give in to fear. ‘Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I shall fear no evil.’ Barns and quilts are part of our way of life, and we have to stand up for that. What’s happening here is hardly the valley of death.”

  “Not yet, anyway. I’m not a good ole Southern Baptist for nothing, my girl, so I reckon I could quote a thing or two from the Good Book myself. But the thing that keeps coming to mind right now is something my daddy used to say. ‘Are we still ahead of the hounds?’ And I’m not sure we are. But never you mind my rambling. You’re a strong woman, Sarah—talented, too. Even if this attack on your people has something to do with your paintings, my offer for you to do a big mural here still stands. So I’m standing with you all no matter what.”

  “I’m grateful, my friend. Oh, by the way, I saw you at the fire last night, too.”

  For a moment Ray-Lynn looked upset. “Oh—yeah, when I heard the sirens, I let the girls take care of the restaurant and drove over, following the light in the sky. I didn’t see you there. I didn’t stay long. I decided it was time for me to get back here, fire or not, so I could close up.”