Moriah is dead, and Angie is a friend. She wondered why the two thoughts kept bumping around together in her mind.
And people in town were saying that Gideon might have been the one to end Moriah’s life. That is crazy. Gideon wouldn’t kill. Gideon is kind. Sure, he fought with Moriah. But I fight with Mari, too. She’d never harm her sister, just as she was sure that Gideon would never do anything bad to Moriah.
Sheriff Kingston had arrived immediately when Ormond called his office. He and Tomlin took turns standing on the ladder to look into the Dumpster. An ambulance blared through town, its tires shrieking to a stop in the parking lot. Kiki expected men with a stretcher to immediately lift Moriah’s body from the Dumpster into the vehicle. But they didn’t. Instead, other vehicles followed, even a fire truck. Soon a bunch of people Kiki had never seen before filled the lot. Ormond said that some of them were here to investigate the scene. Rolls of yellow tape were stretched across orange cones just like Kiki had seen on TV shows, keeping those that were just nosy out of the way. Mari arrived, and Mr. Kingston allowed her to slip under the tape. When she saw Kiki, she squeezed her tightly, but after a moment, Kiki pushed away. She didn’t want to be coddled; she wanted to watch everything that was happening.
The owner of Benson’s Laundromat said he’d overheard Moriah yelling at Gideon over the fence that separated the auto shop from the Laundromat. “I heard Gideon say he’d kill Moriah,” Mr. Benson said to the sheriff. “I heard it one afternoon about three weeks ago, plain as day.”
Others were now suspicious, and even though they’d been closed for three days, business had been slow at the shop ever since. Seemed people weren’t sure whether having a car serviced at Russell Brothers was safe since a corpse had been pulled out of the Dumpster. Sheesh, thought Kiki. Doesn’t everyone know that Gideon is like a big teddy bear underneath his John Deere cap?
She knew she had to get out. This house was too stuffy, too cramped. Although it was dark, she got her bike from the garage and hopped on. She would ride and ride. She would ride until she got blisters on her feet from pedaling and until her back was sore. She would ride to Heaven if she could and ask God to please bring Moriah back to earth.
Gideon rubbed his eyes and then tried to ease the tension in his neck. If his desk phone rang now, he wouldn’t answer. He’d let Ormond or the answering machine take the call. What if the caller was another Amish, wanting to leave home? Here he’d been the Getaway Savior and now, the most important person he’d ever wanted to help was dead. What kind of savior does that? I couldn’t even keep my own brother alive. This is it, never again. As much as he enjoyed helping dissatisfied people from his community and others around the country find fulfillment in the Western side of life, he could do it no more. I’m a farce; I am no savior.
Mechanically, he walked outside, leaving the shop, calling out that he was heading to the tearoom. He wasn’t sure if anyone heard him, and he didn’t care. What mattered now? Who cared about life and morals and all of those other things I once held dear? He cringed at how determined he’d been on keeping the auto shop clean, on making sure everyone came to work on time and left when they were supposed to. What a crock it all was. Where was the meaning in any of it?
Mari filled a customer’s water glass quickly when she saw Gideon enter Another Cup. Without a word, she poured green tea into a large mug and handed it to Gideon.
He thanked her, took a sip, burned his tongue.
“It’s hot.”
“I know. Guess I’m not thinking today.”
She reached over the counter and took his empty hand.
He tried to smile, but his mouth wouldn’t move. He took another taste of tea. It seemed bland this afternoon.
Customers came and went, and he tried not to notice those who spent too much time glancing at him. He purposely ignored the whispers from a table behind him. Seated at it were three elderly women sharing a plate of club sandwiches. Was it all hearsay or had the Twin Star printed a story about the incident? He didn’t want to know if there was a news story. He would avoid the newspaper and every other form of media connected to this town. Gideon drank the tea, now cool against his tongue, as his mind hosted a mass of noisy thoughts.
Who killed his brother? Did Henry have a list of suspects? The autopsy report revealed that Moriah was shot in the chest with a handgun, the point of penetration just half an inch from his right ventricle.
Suddenly Kiki was at his side at the counter. She must have slipped in without him noticing her footsteps. “We have to take his body to be buried,” she announced.
“What?” Gideon ran a hand over his face.
“He asked you.” Kiki climbed onto the barstool beside him.
“He asked me what?”
“If he died, to take his body to the weeping willow tree by the apple orchard. Don’t you remember anything?”
Gideon felt the weariness ache behind his eyes. He would bury his brother here. There was no way he was going to take a body to Carlisle. Besides, Moriah would never know where he was or wasn’t buried.
But Kiki’s eyes were pleading, and when Gideon looked at Mari for some sort of help in explaining to the child that driving all the way to Pennsylvania was not necessary, he got none. Mari’s eyes were hopeful.
“I can’t go.” His words sounded hollow and hoarse.
“You can,” said Mari.
“We will be with you,” said Kiki.
“Yes,” whispered Mari. “We will help you.” Gently, she put her hand over Gideon’s.
Gideon would rather have Angie’s family’s funeral home take care of the arrangements. He told the two this, knowing that it was his last attempt to get them to see that a trip to the homeland would not be necessary. Moriah could be buried in the plot beside the wooded lot he passed on his walks to work. He’d come up with a eulogy; Angie’s family could take care of everything else. Moriah would never know that his body didn’t lie under the weeping willow.
“You can get the funeral home to give you a coffin, but then you need to take it to your parents’ house.” Kiki’s hand was firm on his sleeve.
What was it about this child? Even when he stretched his arms onto the countertop and lowered his head on them, Kiki’s fingers were still attached to his sleeve.
“You have to live up to expectations,” she said. “Sheesh, didn’t they teach you that in school?”
“No.”
“You say no too much,” said Kiki. “You should go home, Gideon.”
“Yes,” agreed Mari. “Go get some sleep. Kiki and I will take care of what needs to be done.”
Even though he thought he’d made clear his refusal to take Moriah’s body to Pennsylvania, no one seemed to hear him. Kiki and Mari were determined to assist him with what was expected of him.
28
But Gideon didn’t go home. When his cell rang minutes later, he was summoned to the sheriff’s department. He walked there, even though it was over a mile. He didn’t trust himself behind the wheel of a car right now. Besides, he still had no idea where his truck was, but even with that excuse, he was not about to ask Ormond if he could borrow the Buick.
The air was crisp, typical January weather in the mountains. The stark tree limbs housed a few bird nests. Smoke curled from stout chimneys as he passed three homes adjacent to the local playground. He wondered what the residents were doing this afternoon and what was on the stove for dinner. He wished he felt hungry, but he didn’t seem to have that luxury. His stomach knotted like a ball of yarn he’d seen Mebane knit a scarf from at Thanksgiving. He wondered if it was too late to pray.
“God …” He recalled the bedtime prayers he’d offered to God as a child, back when his parents taught him that he should talk to God every night before sleep. He wondered where the concept of prayers before bed evolved. Was it biblical? “God.” He sighed. “Help.”
The steps up to the station were covered in salt to compensate for the patches of ice that shone on their bricks. Gid
eon felt the soles of his shoes slick against the moisture of the ice. He recalled the frozen pond on the farm, at the corner of the apple orchard, visible when you turned down Pike Level Road. That pond was a marker for telling his friends which orchard belonged to his family. “Our house is right across the road,” he always said and pretty soon the kids were saying, “I know where you live. By that pond on Pike Level, right?” He wondered how many times ice had crusted over its surface this winter. Once he and Moriah had tried their hand at ice fishing until their father told them to get back to work.
Inside the warm building, he caught a whiff of beef soup, and the distinct aroma reminded him he hadn’t eaten today. There was no sign of any food at the station though; he supposed that the soup had long been consumed. Tomlin greeted him and offered a chair. Gideon took it and sat waiting for Sheriff Henry. Before excusing himself, Tomlin said he’d be right along.
As Gideon stared at the plaques on the walls, his eyes blurred. He recalled the last time he’d been here … when Moriah had been picked up for disorderly conduct.
The door sprang open and in walked Henry. “I just need to ask you some questions.” He held a clipboard with papers attached.
His tone made Gideon stiffen. If it was just questions, why had he needed to come all the way down to the station? Why couldn’t they have discussed this over the phone? The first series of questions had taken place when Moriah’s body had been found in the Dumpster. Later there had been questions asked of Luke, Ormond, and Gideon, as well as the store owners who shared the street with the auto shop. Gideon needed to be at work now. He’d already taken too much time off over the last couple of days. What kind of example was he setting for Luke and Kiki? What if Ormond changed his mind and reneged on his previous desire to have Gideon take over the shop once he retired?
Henry placed the clipboard on his desk and rubbed the buckle on his belt. Without making eye contact, he said, “I just have to ask these questions as a matter of protocol. Just need to know where you were the night of January seventeenth.”
“Where I was? I told you.”
“We have to cover all our bases.”
Nausea coated Gideon’s stomach. “You think I—I did it?” He couldn’t bring himself to use the word killed. It was one thing to hear rumors at Another Cup but to now have Henry even consider that Gideon could have … murdered … his own brother…. It was incomprehensible.
Henry looked like he might throw up, himself. “I have to question you, Gideon. I’m sorry, but I have to…. Procedures, you know how it is …”
Gideon found his voice. “Am I guilty?”
“I didn’t say that.” The sheriff avoided eye contact, causing Gideon to squirm in his seat.
“Do you think I am?” He wondered why he asked. Right now he didn’t care to know if the answer was yes.
Henry adjusted his glasses. “You said you were at home?” His focus was now on his desk with its many piles of paper. Lifting one stack that sat by his elbow, crowding the framed photo of Mebane, he found a pen.
Gideon tried to remain calm, but the blood was pulsating throughout his head. We’ve eaten meals together, he thought. We’ve even watched the Super Bowl together for the past ten years. Is this what their friendship had come to? A session of accusations? Gideon tried to remember the question.
“Yes,” he said, “I was home all night long.”
“Alone?” Henry scribbled, his eyes on the sheet of paper.
“I don’t have any pets.”
Henry’s confusion cleared to understanding after a moment. He cleared his throat. “What I mean is, is there anyone who can vouch for the fact that you were at home all night?”
“Me.”
“What?” Henry’s face showed puzzlement.
“My word, Henry. I said I was at home all night from the time I got off work, and that’s all I got.”
Henry looked like he might cry. Scratching his bald head, he said, “I want to believe you, Gideon.” For a moment silence passed between them. Then Henry lowered his voice. “I do believe you. Of course I do. You have always been an honest man.”
With that out in the air, Gideon stood to leave.
Henry cleared his throat again. “The fact is, I need more than that.”
“More than my word?”
“Yes. Folks around here are a little antsy.”
“Antsy?”
Solemnly, he said, “Worried. We’ve always been a peaceful town.”
With Reginald and his boisterous antics? With those rednecks from Gatlinburg who came into town to harass waitresses at Another Cup just because they could? Gideon wanted to argue but decided now was not the right time to disagree with the sheriff.
“The body was found at your shop. Who found it?”
“I told you before. I found it.” Technically, Kiki had discovered it first, but Gideon wanted to keep the child out of this.
Henry wrote a few lines and, as his pen skittered across the paper, Gideon felt the clickety-clack of his own heart in his ears.
“And your truck? Where is it?”
What does my truck have to do with my brother’s death? Gideon had seen a few episodes of The Twilight Zone, and now he was certain he’d been cast in one of them. “What do you mean?”
“Your truck isn’t parked at the auto shop or at your apartment. Where is it?”
Gideon felt it was odd that he was being watched and someone had come up with the fact that his truck was missing. “Moriah took it on Christmas Day.”
Henry made a note of that and then without raising his eyes from his paper said, “We’ll get back to you, Gideon. Just stick around.”
“Where would I go?” asked Gideon. “I hope those antsy people realize that Twin Branches is my home.”
“They do.”
Gideon knew that some in this small town recognized him as one of their own, but others would never feel that way about him. He was one of those Amish; his roots were not Scots-Irish. He was a transplant; his parents did not believe in electricity to light a home or in telling children stories of Santa Claus. Like those foreign men who had come into the tearoom the other week, he was an outsider.
Gideon could not remember a time he had felt more alone. As he left the station, his mind spun back to when he was seven. Some English boys at the little grocery store in town had teased him about his suspenders and straw hat. They’d called him a freak. At home, he’d cried. His mother had cuddled him for a minute, and then she’d pushed him off her lap.
“You are a strong lad,” she’d said, “and this will only make you stronger. The Millers are God-fearing, and those boys will get their justice. Nothing goes unnoticed from God’s eyes.”
At the time, Gideon had felt reassured, plotting ways that God could borrow from him to show vengeance to those boys. God could zap them with a bolt of lightning in the next storm; he could infest their bedrooms with termites. Mother was right; those boys were going to suffer for what they did. At last, Gideon dried his eyes and was glad that nothing escaped God’s vision.
On this evening, he couldn’t gauge how he felt. The word outsider raced across his brain and lodged in it like the nagging yelp of a dog. He’d always been good at diagnosing his emotions. But now he wasn’t sure if he was tired or just sad or hungry or restless. To think that folks here could even think that he’d be the type to pull a gun on his own flesh and blood made his chest constrict. Reaching for the bottle of Tums, he took two. Chewing, he closed his eyes, only to see Moriah … Moriah, tall and broad-shouldered, handsome and healthy. How could he have let his brother waste away into a wispy shadow of that creature? Why couldn’t he have made him go to rehab, forced him to stop his antics and get clean?
Opening his eyes, he expected to see Moriah seated before him. But there was only an empty chair.
When his cell phone rang, he grabbed it like it was a lifeline, a respite from his heavy thoughts. “Hello.” His own voice scared him, sounding dull, foreign.
�
��Hello,” said the female voice on the other end. “I’ve been thinking about you.”
“Mari.” Her voice was a soothing lullaby, familiar and serene. He took in a breath and before any other words could form, he let out a sob. And then another.
“I’m on my way over.”
“No … no …” He tried to stop, but his chest was like a heaving wave, pounding out of control.
“Gideon, stay there. I’ll be right over.” The phone clicked, and he listened to a voluminous wailing that filled all of the spaces in his apartment. Covering his ears, he hoped to block it out until he realized the loud noise was from his very throat.
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