The Amish Nanny (50 page)

“You've got to be kidding,” he whispered, dumbstruck.

Then he looked straight me. “Where do you think the letter could be?”

I shrugged. Perhaps at
Mammi
's. Maybe in Indiana. But most likely it was long gone. “We should try the other box,” I said, pushing away from the table. “I'll go get it.”

I hurried through the entryway and down the front steps to the pathway, and then to the cottage. Rushing to my things, I opened my suitcase and dug out the carved box, quickly lifting Christy's schoolwork from it.

“Ada?” Will called my name. “Do you need some help?”

I went quickly from the room, the box in my hand. He was standing in the open doorway.

My fingernails were long enough to pry up the false bottom. As I lifted it, Will reached in and took the thin piece of wood from me. There was no agreement inside, but there was a letter, safe and sound. I snatched it, wondering if it could possibly have the clue we needed.

Will smiled and took the box, slipping the bottom piece back into place. As we hurried up the pathway he said, his voice flat, “Your Daniel will be so pleased.”

I winced at the word “your.” What had Will observed?

I must have given him a confused look because he continued, “Daniel told me last night that you two are thinking about courting when you come back to Switzerland.”

“He said that?”

Will nodded toward Amielbach. I shifted my gaze. Daniel was coming toward us.

We all settled back down at the table. In no time Daniel spread out the letter, but Herr Lauten nudged in beside him, saying, “Would you allow me? I may be an old man, but I believe I might be a tad faster at translating.”

Daniel agreed, but I suspected it was with reluctance.

After a few minutes, Herr Lauten's face broke into a broad grin. Pulling the glasses from his nose, he looked up at us and said that while we would be very interested in the entire letter, for right now the ending was the most important part.

Sliding his glasses back on his nose, he translated as he read:

Herr Lauten looked up in triumph, taking off his glasses. Alice gasped, Morgan began to clap, and Christy put her fingers in her mouth and whistled, a skill I had no idea she possessed.

“Finally!” George exclaimed.

“The waterfall is on the Kesslers' property.” Daniel's voice was full of enthusiasm. “And we know for sure that goats did graze there.”

“Abraham must have hidden the contract there, in the house,” Morgan said.

“The house that was torn down?” I asked, unable to keep the dismay from my voice. If anything of importance had been hidden somewhere inside, it no doubt would have gone unnoticed amid the rubble when it came down. I said as much to everyone now.

We were all silent for a moment, lost in thought.

“Perhaps a man who was fond of false bottoms and such would have created a way to hide it in the foundation itself,” Herr Lauten finally offered.

It sounded like a stretch to me, but the others were more optimistic.

“There are shovels in the shed,” Oskar said. “I'll get the key.” I was surprised at his interest but pleased just the same.

Will stayed with Giselle and Alice while the rest of us hurried to the shed, then crossed the creek, and marched up to the foundation. It was much easier traveling than it had been the night before. The sun was shining. The snow had all melted. The Bernese Alps range glistened in the afternoon light.

Daniel and Oskar started by digging up the corner stones, while Morgan, Christy, and I turned over river rock that had been part of the foundation. I couldn't comprehend why Abraham Sommers would leave it here, not when he seemed to be so exact about other things.

“Past where the goats graze, below the waterfall and mountain peak,” I recited.

“You can't even see a peak from here,” Morgan said. “Just the range. I think it's somewhere else.”

Soon, the sun slipped behind a cloud and the afternoon grew chilly. Christy hadn't worn her coat and said she was going back. I didn't want her to cross the creek by herself and said I'd go with her.

When we reached the dining room, Alice was telling Will about the ballroom on the third floor, saying that Christy had shared how much fun she'd had up there a few afternoons ago.

“Do you want to see it?” Christy asked her
daed
.

“Sure,” Will ventured, and Christy took his hand, pulling him to his feet.

I sat down as they left the dining room, imagining the two of them sliding across the wood floor. After a while there was the sound of footsteps in the great room.

“It's worth checking out.” It was Morgan's voice.

Giselle hobbled out of the dining room and Alice, Herr Lauten, and I followed.

Morgan was standing in front of the floor-to-ceiling carving. “Look. There are goats. The waterfall. And a mountain peak.” She was right. The mountain looked like the one above Frutigen, not like any near here.

Daniel got down on the floor and ran his hand along the base of the carving. “I don't feel anything,” he said.

Past where goats graze, beneath the waterfall and mountain peak
.

Heart suddenly pounding in my chest, I turned on my heel and hurried toward the open staircase, racing up it and then down the hall to the third-floor stairs. By the time I reached the carved door, with the goats and shepherdess, to the ballroom, I was certain I was right. When I opened the door, Will and Christy were sliding in their socks across the floor.

Will froze when he saw me. “What's wrong?”

“I have a wild idea.” I fixed my eyes on the waterfall out the window and then to the carving of the mountain.

Will followed my eyes and then started to laugh. “I bet you're right,” he said.

He motioned me to the carving, and I began running my hand along the bottom of it. Sure enough, there was a latch. I opened it quickly and I reached inside, pulling out a packet. “Let's take it down to Alice.”

C
hristy held the packet high as she sashayed through the great room on the way to the dining room.

“What do you have?” Morgan asked.

“What Daniel's looking for,” Christy teased.

He was still on the floor, and he jerked his head up, bumping it on the carving.

“Come on,” Christy said. “
Grossmammi
gets to open it.”

Alice's eyes filled with tears as she took it. “Could it be?” she whispered. She carefully slid her finger under the seal and pulled out a document, handing it to Herr Lauten.

He read it quickly and then kissed the paper.

“Ladies and gentlemen,” he said with a grand sweep of his hands, “I present to you the original signed agreement between Abraham Sommers and Ulrich Kessler.”

We all cheered, clapping and whistling and praising the Lord.

But the clock was still ticking, and we knew it. Now that we were in possession of the one thing that would save the day, we had less than an hour to get it to the judge, have the title cleared, and present it to the land and property commission. I wasn't sure we could pull it off.

Our cheering turned into a frenzy as Daniel and Morgan and Oskar tried to figure out who would ride with whom and what was the quickest way to get there. Then Herr Lauten quieted them with a loud whistle and a wave of his hand, saying, “Please, folks, settle down. I've got it all worked out.” Once the noise died down, he went on to explain that he'd contacted the lawyer the moment we found the clue about the agreement, and that she'd rounded up the judge and the notary and they were all on standby, ready to come out here to Amielbach the moment we gave them the word.

“But why?” Oskar asked. “I can't imagine that those people make a habit of paying house calls.”

Herr Lauten smiled. “That is true, Oskar. This is not exactly the norm. But given the frail state of Alice's health,” he said, giving her a wink, “compounded by poor Giselle's injury, it was not hard to convince them that these were special circumstances indeed. As I told Betsy Holt on the phone, our Amish friends came thousands of miles to clear this title. Surely she could convince the judge to drive ten miles up here from Langnau to see it through.”

As we waited nervously for everyone to arrive, Herr Lauten asked if we'd like to hear the rest of Abraham's message, the letter from the hidden bottom of the box that had given us our final clue. I felt bad that in our mad search for the agreement we had forgotten all about that. We settled in around Herr Lauten now as he pulled it out and carefully unfolded it. Then he slipped a pair of glasses onto his nose, cleared his throat, and began reading, translating for us as he went.