The Search (32 page)

But Lainey’s determination to become Amish felt tangled up after her friends’ visit. It was the seeds of doubt about Jonah they had planted that ate at her. They were shocked that he had never said he loved her nor hinted at a life together. Ever since, it had bothered her too.

She knew it was silly to think that words alone would reveal if a man loved a woman. How many times had she mopped up her friends’ messes after they had their hearts broken by a man who had professed love? Too many times to count. Words were cheap, she knew that.

But there was a part of her that longed to know how Jonah truly felt about her. Did he care about her the way she cared for him? She knew he had a lot to do to sort out Rose Hill Farm, but she wondered if he was planning to return to Ohio soon. What about his business there?

Would he ever tell her he loved her?

Did he need to?

She felt as if she was staring at a fork in a road. One way of thinking was the English way: that words expressed how a person felt.

The other road was the Amish way: that action took the place of words.

It was her friends’ visit that showed her how truly English she was. Becoming Amish was so much more than learning their language and their ways. It was changing how she perceived things, even small things. Things like terms of endearment.

If she felt this way about hearing the words “I love you,” how many more things were there that she didn’t even understand yet? Like being submissive to a husband. What if a husband made wrong decisions? And Robin was right about one thing: Amish women always served the men first. She’d seen Amish women out in the fields, working side by side with their husbands, but she’d never seen an Amish man in the kitchen. Why did Amish men seem to have a complete pass on domestic duties? And what about her little pie business? She loved to bake. How could she keep her business if she had a dozen babies?

She kept these internal musings to herself, but whenever she was alone, the doubts slipped back, as persistent as a buzzing fly that needed shooing away.

Maybe this path wasn’t right for her, after all. Maybe becoming Amish was really impossible for an English person. Maybe it wasn’t too late for her to leave and return to her original plan—to attend culinary school.

And have a life of independence. Unencumbered.

Alone.

After Sallie had left for Ohio, Jonah told Bess that they needed to stay for a while to clean out Rose Hill Farm and straighten out Mammi’s affairs. Bess was thrilled. She loved Stoney Ridge. She adored Lainey. She was hopelessly in love with Billy. And, to add icing to the cake, it meant she could avoid repeating algebra. But it also meant they had a big job to tackle. Mammi never threw anything away. Each day, Bess and Jonah tried to clean something out—a closet, a desk, a bureau. Bess felt as if she was having an opportunity to peek in on her grandparents’ lives. Especially Mammi’s. She cherished anything that helped explain her grandmother to her. Mammi seemed the sort who’d never really been young, yet here Bess was, finding letters and notes Mammi had written and received years and years ago.

She missed Mammi more than she could have ever imagined. She hated waking up to the shock of remembering that she was gone. Tears would come to her eyes at unexpected moments during the day, then they would disappear just as quickly. But always, like a shadow, there remained a sharp tug of loss.

Her deepest regret was that she was just starting to understand her grandmother and her unexpected ways . . . and then she was gone. Bess had never lost anyone close to her in such a sudden death. This must have been what her father felt after her mother died in that accident. Like a fresh wound that was slow to heal.

But God’s ways were always best. She knew that to be true.

One evening, Jonah had already gone to bed but Bess was wide awake. She decided to brew herself a pot of chamomile tea. Once the kettle boiled, she went out into the garden, mug in hand. There would be a hard frost tonight, the first one of autumn. She drew the cold air into her lungs, and when she breathed out again, her breath hung in the air for a moment in a thin white cloud, quickly gone. The air had a touch of wood smoke in it from somebody’s fire. She shivered and turned to go back inside.

Bess decided to finish cleaning one last desk drawer before going to bed. She found an unmarked large envelope and opened it. In it were yellowed newspaper clippings. That struck Bess as strange, because her grandmother didn’t read anything but the Amish newspaper,
The Budget
, and these were clippings from the
Stoney Ridge Times
. She picked up the lantern and went to the kitchen table. She laid the clippings out on the table. As she realized what she was reading, she started to tremble. The articles were about the buggy accident that killed her mother. There was even a grainy but gruesome black-and-white picture. She saw the mangled buggy and the horse lying still in the background. She held it up to the light. She could hardly make it out in the background, but an ambulance had its back doors wide open. She touched the picture gently. Was that her mother on the stretcher?

There were other clippings too. Ongoing ones of the trial her father had to testify in against the driver who rammed into the buggy. It touched her deeply to see the quotes her father had made. He was just a young man, only twenty-one years old, newly widowed, with a child to raise. Yet he was quoted with such clarity and rightness. And then there were other clippings—ones that described how stunned the nation was to learn of a man who turned down an insurance settlement. There were pictures of her dad in the article. She could tell he was trying to keep his head down, away from the cameras. No wonder her father had felt the need to leave Stoney Ridge. He was such a private man.

She gathered up the clippings to slip back in the envelope. One small clipping dropped on the floor. She stooped to pick it up and held it by the light. It was a death notice, only one paragraph long, of a newborn baby that had died of sudden infant death syndrome.
Parents: Elaine O’Toole Troyer (deceased) and Simon Troyer. Surviving sibling: Lainey O’Toole.

She read it again and again, confused. Lainey had never mentioned having a sister. She wondered why Mammi would have kept that clipping. Was it because it was Simon’s only child? But why in this envelope? Then she noticed the date. Lainey’s baby sister had died the same day as the buggy accident. She slipped the clipping back into the envelope. Tomorrow, she would ask Lainey about it.

______

Lainey heard the rumble of thunder in the distance and hurried outside to take the laundry down before the rain began. The air had grown thick and heavy this afternoon, signs of a storm coming. Lightning cracked again, this time much closer. So close her ears hurt. She knew this rainstorm would hit with a fury. She looked up to see Bess hopping over the fence to join her. Under Bess’s arm was a large manila envelope.

“What are you doing here in this weather?” Lainey asked her, folding a stiff towel. When Bess didn’t answer, she tossed the towel in the laundry basket and turned to face her.

Bess had an odd look on her face. “I was cleaning out Mammi’s desk and I found this.” She handed Lainey the manila envelope. “Open it.”

Lainey sat down on the back steps to the kitchen and opened the envelope. She drew in a quick breath when she read the headlines on the yellowed newspaper clippings. She flipped through the clippings and stopped when she saw the obituary about Colleen. She glanced up in alarm.

Bess pointed to that clipping. “Why would my grandmother have kept that? Why . . . in that very envelope?”

Lainey’s heart felt fierce with panic. It was time for Bess to know the truth, she was sure of it. Bertha Riehl had felt the same way. Jonah should have told her long ago. It was time.

But it should be Jonah telling her this truth.

She patted the seat beside her, but Bess shook her head. Lainey bowed her head and was silent for a moment, offered up a silent prayer for God to give her the right words, then she lifted her chin and met Bess with a level gaze. “There’s a story I need to tell you. It’s about you and me. About Jonah and Rebecca.” She told Bess everything, every detail. She kept looking up to see how Bess was taking the news. Bess stood with her arms crossed tightly against her chest, an inscrutable expression of calm on her face. Lainey rose to her feet and reached a hand out to touch her. “Bess, can you tell me what’s running through your mind?”

Bess kept her gaze on the fluttering sheets, as if concentrating on how the gusts of the wind lifted them.

“Bess?” Then Lainey heard Simon shouting for her from inside the house. She tried to ignore it, but the calls grew louder and louder. She sighed. “Let me just check on Simon and I’ll be right back.”

She went inside to discover Simon ranting about a window left open. The wind was giving him a chill, he complained. She slammed the window shut, rolled her eyes at Simon, and went back outside to finish her conversation with Bess.

But when she went back outside, Bess was gone.

Lainey hurried to Rose Hill Farm to tell Jonah that she had told Bess the truth: that Simon was actually Bess’s father. She found him feeding hay to Frieda in the barn.

Jonah was stunned. For a long time he said nothing, seeming unable to take it in. The rain was coming down harder now and pounded the metal roof like a drum. Then, as the truth of it dawned on him, he looked bewildered. “You told her about Simon?” he asked her.

“She asked me, Jonah. She had a bundle of newspaper clippings that your mother had saved. In it was one about the death of Simon’s baby. She asked me specifically if I had any idea why Bertha had saved that clipping.”

His face had gone all white and taut. “But why? Why would you tell her?”

Lainey waited a heartbeat before she said, “I wasn’t going to lie to her.”

“You could have waited.”

“For how long, Jonah? When were you ever going to tell her? You’ve been avoiding this conversation for months!”

“Maybe she didn’t
need
to know. Maybe some things are best left alone.”

He looked so anguished. She wanted to put her arm around his wide shoulders, to try to console him with her touch. But he seemed suddenly brittle, as if he might break if she were to touch him. She was desperate to give him some kind of comfort, but she didn’t know how. What could she say to him in these circumstances? Every phrase that came to mind seemed inadequate.

He turned to face her. “Where did she go? She must be upset.”

“I don’t know where she went, but she wasn’t upset,” Lainey said, her voice surprisingly soft. “She really wasn’t.”

He glared at her. “How could she
not
be upset?”

She folded her arms against her chest. “You underestimate her, Jonah.”

“Oh? You think you know Bess so well after just a few months?” Now he was clearly livid. “Then where
is
she?”

That, Lainey couldn’t answer.

“In this pouring rain, why isn’t she home? Where is my daughter?” He grabbed a bridle and went to Frieda’s stall, quickly slipping the bit into the horse’s mouth and buckling the buckles. He led her by the reins out of the stall and toward the door. Just as he was about to leave the barn, he turned to Lainey and looked at her with anger in his eyes.

“If something happens to her, Lainey . . . if anything . . .” He shook his head as if to stop himself from saying more, then left.

The rain hit with a fury. It was cold and sharp and falling sideways in the fierce wind. Jonah barely noticed it. When he heard what Lainey had done, he felt such panic grip his chest that for a moment he couldn’t breathe. He was furious with Lainey. She had no right!

“Bess is
my
child!” he said aloud. The words tore out of him, from some deep place, some old, long-buried hurt. He had to find Bess and explain. But where could she possibly be? He felt as if the world had become very fragile. Very dangerous.

As he rode the horse past the Lapp farm, it occurred to him that Billy might have an idea where Bess might be. The two had spent hours together this summer and it had given Jonah cause for concern. Bess was too young to be thinking seriously about boys. Then, suddenly, a well of hope bubbled up. Maybe Bess went to Billy to find comfort.

He turned the horse around and galloped toward the Lapp farmhouse.

As soon as Billy saw the frantic look on Jonah’s face and heard that Bess had gone missing—that she was upset about something—he had a pretty good idea of where she would have gone.

“Give me an hour,” he told Jonah. “If I’m not back in an hour—no, give me an hour and a half—then you can go looking. But there’s no sense in both of us getting soaked to the skin. I think I know where she is.” He grabbed a slicker and went to the barn.

Jonah followed behind him. “Then tell me and I’ll go find her.”

“It’s too hard to find. Trust me, Jonah.” Billy saddled up his pony. “You go home in case she returns there.” He rode away before Jonah could object.

About a month ago, he and Bess had found an abandoned crow’s nest at Blue Lake Pond, high on a ledge but protected from the rain by the branches of a sheltering tree. He knew she was there, as sure as if he could see her. When he got to the lake, he tied the pony’s reins to a tree trunk. The wind was lashing through the trees, and the pony shifted its weight from foot to foot, uneasy, but the fury of the rain had eased up. Billy hiked up to the ledge, slipping a few times. There on the ledge, shivering and drenched, was Bess, hugging her knees to her chest. When he called her name, she looked up, startled, and put her fingers to her lips. She pointed to the nest. There was a black crow, staring down at both of them.

“I’ve been watching her land in that tree. She thinks she owns it, that it’s her tree. She takes off and lands again, watching me watching her. That’s what crows do. She’s living her crow life,” she said softly, eyes fixed on the bird.

Billy sat down next to her. “Your dad is steaming like a kettle. Said something has upset you.”

“I’m not upset.”

With a measured glance, he realized she was speaking the truth. She didn’t seem at all upset. Wet, cold, and shivering, but she was calm. She had a look on her face that seemed peaceful. Andy always said she looked like an angel, and right now, he was right.

She turned her face to the sky, like a flower, and smiled softly. “Billy, isn’t it a wonder? That the crow is here? God made nature so things can get fixed again.” She turned to him. “Blue Lake Pond will have birds and fish again.”

He’d been so relieved that Bess was where he thought she’d be, he hadn’t even given the appearance of the crow a second thought. “Why, you’re right.” He scanned the lake and heard a woodpecker somewhere, hard at work, hammering a tree. He smiled.

“God does it with people too. Makes it so that they can find their way back to him.” She rested her chin on her knees. “You know what I love about looking up at the sky? It helps me to remember that I am so incredibly small and God is so immense.” She lifted her face to the sky. “Behind those clouds is an ocean of stars, limitless in its infinity, so large, so large, that any of our problems, even the greatest of them, is a small thing.”

Billy wasn’t really sure what she was talking about, but the day was dying and they were wet and cold. He knew Jonah was out of his mind with worry. He stood and gave her his hand. “Maybe you can save your philosophizing for home, by a warm fire, in dry clothes.”

Jonah had given Billy an hour, like he agreed, but now that hour was up and he was going to find his Bess. He was putting on a rainproof cloak and his black hat when he saw a pony heading up the drive with two figures on its back. He ran out the door and down the porch steps. He could see them now, Billy in front with Bess holding on to him from behind. A powerful wave of relief flooded over him, like the relief that follows the first rainstorm after a long summer drought—swift, complete, overwhelming.