Fall from Pride

by Karen Harper

  From the darkened room, Nate glanced out the upstairs bedroom window toward the Kauffman barn. Sarah had a good start on her quilt square. He hoped, if that “beast” of an arsonist was targeting this barn next, he or she wouldn’t wait until the painting was completely done. If the arsonist wanted to burn a completed one, then Stan and the Hostetlers would have to be the ones to react.

  Though it was barely dusk, Nate had stationed himself at the back window of the big bedroom he had learned Lizzie, Sarah and Martha had shared when they were younger. Now that Lizzie lived nearby, it belonged to the two younger Kauffman daughters, though they usually alternated nights with their grossmamm in the grossdaadi haus. It felt strange to be setting up a stakeout in Sarah’s bedroom, and, if he took a break for a catnap, that it could be in her bed.

  “Ray-Lynn’s really mad at me for mentioning her visit to the Esh barn to you,” he told Jack.

  “At you? Wouldn’t be real surprised if she starts seasoning my food with arsenic.”

  Nate arranged his gear on the floor around his chair while they talked. He had borrowed Ben Kauffman’s binoculars and would soon don his own night goggles. Ben was stationed in the grossdaadi haus tonight, since it would be better for him than for Nate to be seen traversing the yard between there and the farmhouse if necessary. Gabe and Sarah would take short shifts here at this window to give him some breaks, and Martha was out with her father. Mrs. Kauffman was in the master bedroom with her mother-in-law.

  “I just talked to Stan Comstock,” Jack went on, “so his satellite phone’s working, too. First hint of trouble, you call me.”

  “Copy that. But we need to be sure we have the arsonist here before the Jack Freeman cavalry comes charging in. We don’t want to spook him.”

  “He is like a spook, isn’t he—or she? Like a specter that comes and goes at will, but we’re gonna nail the bastard. Listen, I’ll be moving around some tonight, not just sitting in this office, not going home right away, but I’ll keep this phone with me. I’m gonna check out the ruins of the Miller barn, be sure no one’s around there admiring his or her fine work.”

  “Jack, one more thing—and I’m trusting you with this, trusting you to understand why I did it and to keep it quiet, especially from Peter Clawson.”

  “I don’t like the sound of that. You did what?”

  “Kept something secret, with the agreement of the Amish leadership. The Miller barn was an arson fire, but not by the arsonist.”

  “Say again.”

  “The Amish are going to handle this just the way you handled Jacob Yoder at first, in an understanding and humanitarian way.”

  “What? Besides, that blew up in my face.”

  “Noah Miller lit that fire hoping to get his dad a new barn and show us his old buddy Jacob wasn’t the arsonist. He’s confessed, and the Amish are going to deal with him.”

  The curse out of Jack’s mouth did the ex-marine proud. Nate realized he’d given up swearing since he’d been here. In Amish country, a yes or a no were emphatic answers that didn’t need any kind of dramatic emphasis. He steeled himself for an argument or attack from the sheriff.

  “So you got the idea from the way I handled Jacob at first?” Jack asked. He sounded touched, almost wistful. “I agonized over that, but it was worth a try to help a kid and the Amish. Living here for a while, when guys like us are used to hardened criminals, is a real revelation, isn’t it?” The word revelation jolted Nate more than Jack’s surprising reaction did. It was, no doubt, just chance that he said it that way, but could he be behind those threatening notes? He didn’t sound or act as if he had some serious grudge against the Amish. Although they tolerated professional soldiers and government law enforcement, their mistrust of officers was well-known, so did he secretly resent that? Jack had freedom of movement, access to information, probably knew who was away from their homes and barns….

  No, there he went again, acting paranoid, Nate scolded himself. Pretty soon he’d be thinking Martha or Gabe was the arsonist.

  “Are you managing to stay awake?” Sarah asked Nate as she came quietly into the room around midnight. “I’m going to take the first watch for you, then Gabe will be in about 3:00 a.m.”

  “I’m drinking a lot of coffee, but that means trips to the bathroom, so I’m glad you’re here. You remember how to put these night goggles on?”

  “I remember how strange everything looks through them, like swimming underwater.”

  “They’re invaluable here,” he said as he got out of his chair and she sat in it. He helped her adjust the goggles. “In the first place,” he told her, “to us worldly moderns, it’s strange to see an area so dark at night. No interior glowing electrical or digital gadgets, no exterior house lights, streetlights, city lights.”

  “Moonlight isn’t much tonight, but at least we have the stars outside.”

  “I haven’t been star-gazing in years. Be right back.”

  He hurried to use the toilet and wash his hands. A shower would feel really good right now, but then it might make him sleepier, too. He was usually good with just several hours of sleep, but, despite chasing an arsonist here, it seemed as if his interior clock had slowed down in Amish country. Besides, he hadn’t done an all-night sting operation in a long time. He wiped his hands and face with one of the fluffy towels Mrs. Kauffman had laid out for him. He was still amazed by the modern look of the bathroom with all the amenities and had scolded himself for thinking it would be primitive. Even the kerosene lantern hissing gently on a small table gave enough light to see everything and probably had a calming effect—but not tonight.

  He should have splashed his face with cold water, but he went back and stood behind Sarah’s chair in the dark room instead of stretching out on the bed.

  “So,” he said, “do you miss this room, staying out in the grossdaadi haus so much?”

  “Strangely, except for the comfort of the bed, which you’d better try out,” she said, without turning her face away from the window, “I don’t. I guess when a woman gets to a certain age, she’s ready to move out, move on, have her own home.”

  “I can understand that. So you’ve considered that, too. Ever thought of living with Hannah for a while?”

  “Not that. No goth friends who talk music all day long for me. I’d have a place with a room to paint, one sunlit in the morning.”

  “Sarah, can’t you have that here? If everyone could see some of your sketches—new ones, so vibrant with Amish life—”

  “You’re starting to sound like Ray-Lynn.”

  “On that, I agree with Ray-Lynn. Surely, your family and your people care about you enough to give you a chance to try painting more than birdhouses and barns.”

  “It’s a different world here, Nate. You’ve seen that. I’d have to leave them, leave the church, move away to the modern world. It would be too individual, too prideful, considered too ‘just for pretty.’ I’d be painting images of people and that’s verboten. Yes, they love me and that’s why they’d shun me. That’s the real decision I would need to make, if it’s worth leaving what I know and dearly love to follow my dreams at the cost of being shunned. Individual dreams aren’t important here, community, sharing—that’s reality.”

  “Jack Freeman and I were talking about Noah possibly being shunned. Can you explain it to me? I can sit back down there with the goggles while you talk if they bother you.”

  “All right,” she said. “Then, I’ll take them back while you get some rest.”

  He helped her take them off. The strap snagged in her prayer cap and pulled it off, freeing the heavy pinned-up braid that fell across his arm and down her back. The fact she didn’t try to fix either was strangely moving. He sat down and put the goggles on, wishing he could see her instead, though she’d just given him a glimpse into her heart.

  “Okay,” she said, sitting on the floor beside his chair with her back to the wall, “our words for what is commonly known as shunning are the meidung or the bann. Believ
e it or not, it usually works to bring the erring or sinning person back into fellowship.”

  Nate heard the bedroom door creak. Maybe Sarah’s mother was bringing more coffee or Gabe was here already. He turned away from the window for a quick look.

  A woman screamed. Sarah scrambled up beside him.

  “That’s him! That’s him!” Sarah’s grandmother shrilled, pointing at Nate in the goggles. “The barn and people burner, the man in black with the big eyes!”

  “Am I formally under arrest this time?” Ray-Lynn asked as she answered her front door and saw Jack standing there, hat in hand.

  “I just wanted to talk, and I was afraid if I called ahead you’d tell me not to come.”

  “Very astute. Talk about what?”

  “I’d like to step in just for a few minutes, as I’m making rounds. I want to apologize.”

  Not knowing what to say and feeling she was all out of sass, she moved aside and let him in. She wished she hadn’t changed her clothes after work. She’d washed off her makeup and thrown on a comfy pair of jeans and a sweatshirt. Her hair was a tousled mess. And the way he was looking at her right now, half whipped puppy and half hungry wolf, really sapped what strength she had left.

  “Please sit down,” she said, leading him into the living room and gesturing toward the couch. He sat on its far end, turned toward her as she settled on the other end, tucking one leg up under herself. When he dropped his hat on the coffee table, he just missed her bobblehead Scarlett O’Hara who nodded at him. “Go ahead,” Ray-Lynn said. “This is your party.”

  “Wish it was. I just want to say I know I overreacted to you not telling me you were at the Esh place the night of the first fire. But you should have told me, told me why and that would have been fine. Topic number two, I know you’re gung ho about helping Sarah Kauffman paint more than geometric designs on old barn wood, but you better lay off. Not only because you’ll upset the Amish community, but because she seems to be the focus of our arsonist.”

  “You want the truth? So far, this sounds like true confessions, so here goes. Yes, I want to help Sarah. And on a practical level, she’d be able to pour money into this economically hurting community, hurting at least until this big bump in visitors we’ve had from the arsons. But I want to help her for myself, too, partly because it would give me great satisfaction to bring her talent to others, partly because if I could act as her agent, maybe I could dig my way out from under my partnership with Peter Clawson. He owns seventy percent of my business, not fifty, like most people think.”

  He turned more toward her. “That right? Maybe you could get some local investors, buy out his share.”

  “No one I know has that kind of money, especially in these tough times, and he’d refuse unless I took him to court—where he’d defend himself brilliantly. I just don’t like him telling me what to do, thinking he can control me in other ways.”

  “What other ways?” Jack demanded, leaning forward and frowning. “He been coming on to you in ways he shouldn’t? Making passes?”

  “Not for a while. Not since I told him off. You know, like in the old days, ‘Unhand me, you cad!’ and ‘I’m not that kind of girl’?”

  Jack threw one arm on the back of the couch and leaned toward her. “Ray-Lynn, you just say the word, and I’ll see he never so much as orders anything at the restaurant again, let alone orders you around.”

  “And then you’ll do what when he fires me? Technically, he can. Besides, he already resents you because you’re the other big man on campus around here, not counting our fire marshal boy wonder.”

  “Nate’s a good man for this job.”

  “I know he is, and I think he’s a sort of silent partner on my side about Sarah daring to take control of her life and talent. Now, please, don’t you go roughing up Peter, either verbally or physically, because it will all come back on me. I don’t want to get you involved, but, I swear, I’d do about anything to get that man off my back!”

  “So how much money’s involved for you to buy him out?”

  “I don’t think he’d let me buy him out. Jack, I’m sorry I’ve been so rude and inhospitable,” she rushed on. “Every proper Southern lady I ever knew is spinning in her grave because I haven’t offered you something to drink or eat and here we are in food-for-all Amish country.”

  She got up and started toward the kitchen, but he snagged her wrist in his big hand and pulled her down, close to him on the couch. “Ray-Lynn, listen. I meant to say this the minute I stepped through the door, but I figured you might brain me with one of those painted china plates if I didn’t work up to it. I’m not real good at soft or sweet words, but since you’re a Southern girl—lady—let me put it this way, then you can toss me out on my tail if you want.”

  Her eyes widened and her lower lip dropped. She forgot to breathe.

  “I’d like—I want,” he stammered, “well, to court you, date you, see you, if you could just put up with a guy who’s loved only once, ended up with a wife divorcing me. I’ve lived alone too long, married to my job, and I’m so upset about these arsons I can’t see straight.”

  For the first time in her life, Ray-Lynn Logan could not find her voice. So she nodded, kept nodding, until she realized she must look like her Scarlett O’Hara bobblehead doll. She gave him a hard hug.

  Sarah tried to calm Grossmamm. Her mamm ran into the room. Since it was so dark with only wan hall light reflecting here, Sarah’s first instinct was to get a lamp so the distraught woman could see it was just Nate. But they didn’t want light here so that someone outside could see in.

  Nate had turned back toward the window obviously not wanting to stop looking out or else to help calm Grossmamm.

  “She was just sitting in the rocking chair,” Mamm told them. “I just stepped out for a second. Come with me,” she crooned in German to Grossmamm, taking the old woman’s arm. She didn’t budge. “Sarah, help me,” Mamm said.

  They tried to move the old woman out into the hall, but she kept shouting, “Burner! Burner! Leave my people alone!”

  “Those are just special glasses so Nate can see in the dark,” Sarah said, though she should have known it was foolish to try to reason with her. She turned Grossmamm toward her and held her cold, fragile hands between her own. “That’s our friend you met downstairs, remember?”

  “But he’s been sneaking around in the dark. Have you been meeting him secretly outside?”

  Finally, Sarah and Mamm managed to get Grossmamm back in the front bedroom and settled. Mamm kept talking to her quietly, got her going in the rocking chair, which usually calmed her, while Sarah waited a moment in the doorway, hastily pinning up her braid and putting her kapp back on.

  “I’m surprised all that shouting didn’t bring your father or Gabe running,” Mamm said over her shoulder, “but the window was closed.”

  “Don’t you believe me?” Grossmamm said. “That is the man I saw from my window at the grossdaadi haus.”

  Sarah hurried to her and knelt by the rocking chair. “I believe that you saw someone in night goggles like Nate is wearing,” Sarah said. “But it surely wasn’t Nate. He’s our friend.”

  “That is how they used to arrest us, send a spy, someone trusted who told them where we were hiding. Then the torment, the ax and the fire.”

  “Go tell Nate we’re sorry, Sarah,” Mamm said, putting her hand on her shoulder. “You and Martha—I didn’t really know how much you do out there at night. Go tell him. I’ll be fine.”

  Sarah closed the door behind her and hurried across the hall and into her bedroom. How unreal it felt to have Nate sitting there in the window. After this was all over and he went home, she would always picture him there, not looking out but in.

  He turned his head as she sat down on the floor again, her legs stretched out next to his chair, her back to the wall near the window. “Mamm says to tell you she’s sorry that happened.”

  “It’s all right, except I regret your grossmamm is haunted by a past sh
e didn’t even live through. But she gave us a piece of information I should have figured out on my own when she said the person in black had eyes like a grasshopper. She saw someone sneaking around the barn with night goggles, probably the same person who left that first note on the grossdaadi haus door. Probably the beast of an arsonist.”

  “But who would have access to night goggles? Didn’t you say they are for soldiers and law officers? What about someone like the sheriff?”

  “Anyone could buy them if they knew the right place, including online.”

  “Ya, it seems everything’s online, from Grandma Moses paintings to the entire Bible. Being online is verboten to my people without permission, and yet those things are good. You—you still want to hear about shunning? I’m afraid you’re not getting enough sleep.”

  “Now you sound like my foster mother, M.E.”

  “Is her real name Emma and you just call her Emmy?”

  “It’s an M and an E, my nickname for Mary Ellen. I know she would have loved for me to call her Mom, but after losing mine—and so close to where the Bosleys took me in—I just couldn’t. That’s what I mean about hauntings, like your grandmother suffers from. It was years ago, and I’m a grown man who’s seen too many other arson scenes, but I can’t bear to see that one.”

  “I understand. I’m sure M.E. will be glad to see you’ve put a little flesh on your bones here,” she said, hoping that wasn’t an obvious attempt to change the subject. The man suddenly looked shaky.

  “Yeah, she’s always asking me if I’m eating enough. The thing is, I’m not getting my jogging in here, where it would be a great place to run. But I am getting too much exercise lifting fork or spoon to mouth.” He yawned. “Okay, tell me about the meidung, then I’ll take a little nap while you keep watch.”

  “Shunning is a fearsome thing among our people, because it removes us from the community that is the bedrock of our being,” she told him. “It means the one under the bann cannot eat with loved ones, or sleep with them, if it’s a marriage partner. The Amish may do favors for the shunned one, but he or she cannot do acts of kindness or favors in return—and giving as well as receiving is also the foundation of our church and beliefs.”