A Perfect Square Read online

  Perhaps it had been important that they pass over this road together. Just as they’d traveled down the other road earlier this year. That road had also been touched by death, but in the end, it had led to Callie’s life here.

  Deborah glanced around the shop.

  Could the clue she’d been missing lie here?

  In the quilt shop?

  That made no sense, but the more she considered the idea, the more certain she felt that it did. They’d looked everywhere else. Scoured Reuben’s farm, dredged the pond, even advertised in the Amish newspaper The Budget.

  How could the missing answer be here?

  “I suppose I should go,” Faith said. “My driver will arrive any minute. We’re both staying at a local bed and breakfast so I can see Ira again tomorrow, but then I head back to Goshen in the afternoon. It’s gut that we don’t have church this week. I would hate to miss worship with the children, but I want to spend time with my dat.”

  She stood, pulled her scarf off the back of the chair, and wrapped it around her neck. The wind outside had picked up a bit, rattling the windows, causing Deborah to look toward the front. She saw the “Information Wanted” poster, thought again of the young Amish girl.

  The wind reminded Deborah that fall was practically gone and winter nearly upon them.

  Max whined once, met her gaze, then dropped his head to his paws.

  “Don’t forget your coat,” Callie said, jumping up and pulling Faith’s coat off the rack by the door.

  As she held it for Faith to stick her right arm in, Faith turned, shuffling the package of items she’d apparently bought from the store into her left hand. Deborah forgot for a moment about Reuben and the tragedy of the dead girl and Esther and Tobias. She forgot about feeling responsible for others’ happiness, and she forgot to concentrate on solving anything. Instead her mind relaxed, unclenched almost, and did what it naturally wanted to do.

  It noticed the style and seam of Faith’s dress.

  The way the seam of the sleeve was cut into the bodice of the dress. The unique style of the plain garment.

  Deborah saw what she’d been missing.

  A shiver started a slow, cold crawl from the base of her neck and crept out in both directions — toward her hairline and in the direction of her toes.

  She felt paralyzed.

  Faith tugged on her coat, pulled her kapp strings free where they had caught in the collar, then reached down to say good-bye to Max.

  Deborah realized Faith was leaving and that she had to stop her. Her mind’s eye, though, remained fixated on the cut of the sleeve, wanting to be certain that it exactly matched the sleeve of the girl in the pond.

  Deborah heard Callie walk Faith to the door, saw the sweep of headlights as a car pulled into the parking lot, and she finally, finally managed to call out. “Wait. Please don’t go yet.”

  Both women turned back to look at her, surprise marking their features.

  Deborah carefully set her cup on the square table, which sat in the middle of the chairs. Then she stood and faced this woman she didn’t know. “Your dress, the way the sleeves are cut into the bodice. It’s a bit unusual, ya?”

  The puzzled look on Faith’s face fell away, and she smiled — her first relaxed and genuine smile since Deborah had walked into the store. “You have a good eye for sewing. Ya, the Amish in Goshen have some strict rules regarding dress, and all of the sleeves must be cut and tucked the same. The bishop thought it would help to set us apart.”

  “Only Goshen?” Callie said.

  “I believe so. At least I haven’t noticed it anywhere else. I’ve been sewing dresses this way all my life, and I don’t even think about it anymore.” Faith swiped again at her hair, her fingers brushing at the kapp pinned to the top of her gray curls. “What made you ask about the dress? It’s an interesting style, but I’m not sure it’s one you’d care to copy.”

  “I don’t think her interests were in the sewing.” Callie stepped toward Deborah, put her hand out, and touched her arm. “Are you okay?”

  “I’m fine. You’re right though.” Deborah chose her words carefully, feeling she was close now and not wanting to scare this woman — her only lead — away. She was keenly aware that Reuben’s future might hang in the balance of what occurred in the next few moments inside Callie’s shop. “The girl who was found in Reuben’s pond, the girl who died here in Shipshewana, was wearing such a dress.”

  Faith didn’t move, didn’t blink for the space of several seconds. Her calm blue eyes met Deborah’s. In that time, Deborah sensed that Faith was absorbing the full weight of her words, the implications of both what she said and what was to come.

  “Callie,” Faith said, “I believe we might need another cup of tea, and I need to go and tell my driver that I’ll be staying a bit longer.”

  Chapter 32

  AN HOUR LATER, Shane had joined them in the back room and the sky outside had turned completely dark.

  “I called your Englisch neighbors,” Callie reported. “They’ll get word to Jonas that you’re going to be a little late. Would you like more tea?”

  Deborah shook her head and pushed away her mug. “Danki, Callie. But if you put any more tea in front of me, I’ll float away like Jonas’ bobbers when he’s fishing.”

  “All right, ladies. This is the one lead we have, and I think it’s worth following.” Shane sat with his forearms propped on his knees. He’d rolled up his shirtsleeves thirty minutes ago, and he had the “Information Wanted” poster, crime scene pictures, and witness reports spread out across the table.

  The pictures should have bothered Deborah, but they didn’t. They confirmed what she suspected. The girl was from Goshen. The dress patterns were identical.

  “I wish I could say for certain who she is.” Faith shook her head. “There are so many young Amish girls, and I don’t see them as often as I did since our district has grown and split into smaller churches.”

  “But you think she could be the daughter of this Mr. Lapp?”

  “I’m fairly sure. There are a lot of Lapps in Goshen, but Timothy Lapp on Old Branch Road …” Faith’s voice faded away as she reached forward and picked up the picture of the girl in the pond. Finally she shook her head and dropped the photo on the table. “He’s a gut man, and this will break his heart. Timothy Lapp … well maybe you have men like him here, in Shipshewana. He has not changed at all. He doesn’t abide with the idea that rumspringa is a part of a child’s passage into adulthood.”

  She took a last sip of her tea, which had long since grown cold, grimaced, and set the mug carefully down on the table, next to the girl’s photo. “There are no cars hidden in his barn, and his older children have no cell phones in their belongings that they charge when they go into town. At least if they did, they would never let their dat know about it. He follows the old ways.”

  “We have families like that here too,” Deborah said gently. “They want what is best for their children, and they worry that any type of change is bad.”

  “Exactly. Don’t misunderstand me. He loves his family. It’s only that he’s a bit strict.”

  A dozen unanswered questions swirled in the air around them, made the room seem close and crowded. Deborah thought Shane would begin questioning Faith then, about whether the father might have killed the girl or at least caused her to flee her home, but instead he sat back and waited.

  She’d watched him work for many years now, and his ways always surprised her. She had once thought it was because he was an Englischer, but tonight she thought it was because he had the instincts of a panther. Her father had once described watching a big, black cat on a far ridge, stalking its prey, not moving closer until it was sure of its attack. Shane was like that elusive animal.

  Faith reached out and turned the photo, so she was looking again at the girl. “When his oldest dochder wanted to marry the Eby boy, Timothy agreed, but there was some scuttle about where they would live. This was a little while back — before the marry
ing season. I’d say four or six weeks ago.”

  Deborah noticed that though Shane was listening intently to every word that Faith said, occasionally he’d glance up at Callie, as if he were waiting for her to jump in and add something. The two seemed different tonight, as if something had changed between them. Deborah was going to have a talk with Callie about the men in her life. She was tired of guessing!

  For her part, Callie was silently following the exchange as if it were one of the Agatha Christie novels she always had on the counter of the shop.

  In the back of her mind, Deborah had to wonder if this would help Reuben’s case at all. What if it incriminated him further?

  But she realized she needed to tamp down that fear.

  The important thing at this moment was to find the girl’s family, to give them a last bit of peace.

  “You know a lot about the family, given that you can’t positively identify the girl.” Shane spoke quietly, in a matter-of-fact tone.

  “Ya. I suppose it seems that way.” Faith smiled sadly. “But even in Goshen where we have several districts there is a …”

  She looked to Deborah and Callie for help, unable to find the expression she wanted.

  “Grapevine?” Callie asked.

  “Ya. Grapevine of sorts. It’s not so much that we gossip, as it is that we share one another’s burdens. The word in Goshen was that Timothy’s daughter had run away. At first with the boy, but then, a week ago, Samuel Eby came back. He said Katie stayed among the Englischers. We all believed she would return in time. Most Amish kids do. No one was really worried, and it hasn’t been that long.”

  Everyone considered her words, even as they looked at the pictures the crime techs had shot of the body at the pond. Callie didn’t reach for any of those though. She reached for a shot Trent had taken — one that did not appear in the Gazette. A shot of the girl before the medical examiner had pulled a sheet up and over her face.

  The young girl looked almost as if she’d been sleeping, the skin of her face remarkably un-deteriorated — which was part of the evidence the lawyers had used against Reuben, stating the body had only been in the water a short time when Esther had found it.

  “Whoever she was, you can tell she was a beautiful young lady.” Callie fingered the picture carefully, her voice full of the loss they all felt each time they considered the tragedy of such a young life cut short.

  “Ya. It’s heartbreaking for sure,” Faith agreed. “And the cause of death was some sort of blow to the back of her head?”

  Instead of answering her question, Shane looked down at his notes, flipped to a new page, and picked up his pen. He sat back in the chair and began drawing circles in the margin of the paper. “Wouldn’t Mr. Lapp have seen the notices we put out? The ones that stated we found a girl? We advertised in The Budget and all the local papers.”

  Faith stared across the room a full minute before answering. “It’s possible he might have seen them, but then again, their farm is in a remote area. If I remember correctly, they don’t come into town often. He’s busy running the acreage, with only girls and not wanting to hire out the work when he doesn’t have to. The mother has her hands full raising all the girls.”

  “But wouldn’t their bishop have brought it up?” Deborah asked. Her mind was spinning, wondering how it would feel to open a paper and see your child’s face staring back at you. Her stomach clenched, and she wished she’d had less of the tea.

  “Of course the bishop would have spoken to them, if their dochder had been missing. But remember, they think the girl is with freinden.”

  Everyone considered the possibilities.

  Finally, Shane stood and began gathering up his photos and papers, touching Callie’s arm as he scooted by her. “There’s one way to know for certain. I’ll go down to Goshen tomorrow, show Mr. Lapp the pictures, see if he can identify the girl as his daughter.”

  “I’ll go with you if that would help.” Faith stood as well. “It’s been a while since I’ve spoken with the Lapps, but I believe it would be gut to have a familiar face there.”

  “I’ll go too,” Callie said.

  “And so will I,” Deborah added.

  Shane stopped and gave them his most serious officer-on-duty look. “That’s hardly necessary, ladies. I believe I can handle this alone.”

  “If I know Timothy Lapp, and I do, things might go better if someone he knows is there when you first show up.” Faith didn’t look as though she would take no for an answer. “The man doesn’t have a temper, but he doesn’t take kindly to Englischers. He’s likely to ask you to leave his land and walk away.”

  “Ask a police officer to leave?” Shane’s eyebrows rose.

  Faith shrugged. “If he’s done nothing wrong — and I’m sure he hasn’t — then, ya. You’d never have a chance to show him your pictures, because he’d never listen to you in the first place. Timothy Lapp lives very strictly by the law, but as I said, he prefers to keep to himself. He won’t abide outsiders. It’s part of the reason no one was surprised when the girl ran away.”

  Before Shane could respond to her reasoning, Deborah began gathering her things.

  “I want to be there also,” Deborah said. “It matters to me, Shane. This might not help Reuben at all, but I’m sure he’d like to know that the girl’s family has peace at least. And I do still believe he’s innocent. If he has to suffer for a crime he didn’t commit, at least let me be able to tell him I was there and able to ease someone’s pain. At least let me be a part of closing this case.”

  Shane shook his head, even as he continued gathering the papers and photos and picked up the worn leather work bag that held his investigation folders.

  Deborah realized she hadn’t changed his mind at all. She hadn’t really expected to. Of course, she could hire a driver or she could possibly ride along with Faith’s driver, but she barely knew the woman.

  “I’m the reason Faith is here.”

  Callie’s statement was the one that stopped Shane cold. Deborah wasn’t sure if the look on his face was one of exasperation or admiration. She could not figure out the relationship between Shane and Callie. There was something going on between them, some energy in the air like before a big storm, but was it hostility or passion?

  “What?” Shane asked.

  “I’m the reason she’s here. When everyone told me that Ira Bontrager was babbling and I should ignore him, I didn’t.” Callie walked around the table, took the folder out of his hand, and opened it. She shuffled through the pictures as if they were a deck of cards, not stopping until she came to the one of the girl on the ambulance gurney. The one taken before the medical examiner had covered her face.

  “Are you trying to say that I owe you?”

  “No.” Her voice grew softer now. Max stood and walked between her and Shane. “I’m saying there’s something else at work here, and we shouldn’t ignore it. I tried to forget Ira’s ramblings, tried not to look for Faith, but the thought of her out there not knowing about her dat haunted me.”

  Faith’s eyes met Deborah’s, and Deborah suddenly realized she did know this woman. She knew her because they shared a friend, and that counted for more than years or distance.

  “If I hadn’t found Faith … if she hadn’t come here today … and if Deborah hadn’t stopped by before Faith was about to leave …” Callie looked at the photo one last time, then snapped the folder shut and handed it to Shane, “I would never have told Faith about the intricacies of the case. It never would have occurred to me to tell her. There’s a reason we’re all involved in this, and we all need to go to Goshen tomorrow.”

  Shane started to reach out and touch Callie’s face, but stopped himself when he realized they weren’t alone in the room. Instead he nodded slowly, then stuffed the folder in his bag. “All right, but you’re not a part of the investigation. Your role is completely unofficial. You can follow in your own car.”

  “Fine. I’ll drive. Deborah and Faith can ride with me.”


  “I’ll leave at seven.” Shane said, as he walked out the door, not bothering to say good-bye.

  Deborah rode with Callie as she dropped Faith off at the bed and breakfast. Then Callie turned to take her home.

  “Want to explain to me all those looks and touches between you and Shane?”

  “We touched?” Callie’s voice squeaked, though Deborah couldn’t make out her expression in the darkness of the car.

  “Nearly, several times. I’m your closest freind here in Shipshe — “

  “You’re my closest friend anywhere.”

  “And you don’t want to talk to me about being in lieb?”

  A truck passed them, its headlights brightening the interior of their car for a moment, long enough for Deborah to see the confusion on Callie’s face.

  “I don’t think I’m in lieb.”

  Deborah reached over and patted her hand. “But you like him, ya?”

  “When I’m not angry with him.” Callie laughed, but it was uneasy, as if she wasn’t sure whether she should laugh or cry.

  “I feel that way when I’m pregnant,” Deborah admitted. “Never knowing if I’m happy or sad. Jonas says it’s because the baby is pushing on my heart, causing my feelings to run together.”

  “But I’m not pregnant!”

  “I think it’s the same though.” When Callie didn’t add anything, Deborah confessed, “I had wondered if you had feelings for Andrew or even Trent.”

  “That’s part of what confuses me.” Callie pulled into the Yoder’s lane. “Andrew is such a sweetheart. He’s very important to me.”

  “And Trent?”

  “At first — yes. But the more I know him, the more I think of him as a charming college kid who hasn’t grown up yet.”

  Callie brought the car to a stop, and Deborah waited for the sound of the engine to die away. “I wouldn’t worry about it,” she said.

  “Because God will show me?”

  “Oh, ya. He will show you, but I was thinking that time has a way of sorting such things out. And there’s no rush.”