A Home for Lydia (The Pebble Creek Amish Series) (35 page)

Chapter 29

L
ydia knew, positively knew, what she would find when she ran up the steps of the office. Her heart was thundering in her chest, and her palms were sweaty. It never occurred to her that whoever had done this thing might still be there.

When she first saw the chaos and emptiness, she wanted to sit down and weep. Shock, followed quickly by anger, surged through her heart. As her gaze swept the room, she longed to pick up the few items that were left and hurl them through the window. But she didn’t. Instead she walked back out the door and moved slowly toward the Plain Shop, which had been open less than a week.

Clara caught up to her before she’d covered half the distance.

“Lydia, what is it? Why was the door open? What did you see?”

Instead of answering, Lydia kept walking. Like the pulling off of a Band-Aid, she wanted to be done with it. When they stepped inside, they were holding hands the way they had done as small girls, for somewhere along those last few yards Clara had gripped her hand tightly and apparently had no intention of letting go.

Clara cried out, and in that moment, Lydia saw that nearly all the things they had stocked in the shop were gone…taken.

Just like in the office.

“Why did they leave the rocking chairs?” Clara whispered.

“Probably too heavy or too bulky to steal.” Lydia pulled her hand from her sister’s and walked over to the shelves of canned food, which also remained. “And I suppose there isn’t a quick market for vegetables or fruit.”

She sat down in one of the rockers, cradling a jar of preserved peaches in her lap. Suddenly she was tired, extremely tired. Through the window of the little shop she could see that the morning’s light had reached Pebble Creek, but it didn’t bring her the hope it usually did.

Too much was wrong. Too much work had been stripped away from them.

“This is not right,” Clara declared, her hands on her hips. “We can’t…can’t stand here and do nothing!”

She turned and stormed out of the shop.

When Lydia saw her sister stomp off, heading down the path toward the creek, she realized Clara’s temper might have the upper hand over her good sense. She set the jar of peaches on the floor next to the chair and took off after her.

“Clara, where are you going? What are you doing?”

“I’m looking for the culprit. What do you think I’m doing?”

“You can’t go stomping through the woods—”

Clara disappeared around the bend down by the water, and Lydia had to jog to keep up with her. “Come back here!”

Running down the path, she made the curve and nearly bumped into her sister. Clara had stopped where the river turned, stopped and was standing frozen with her hand at her neck. Lydia practically plowed right over her like the children running bases when they played baseball behind the schoolhouse. She reached out to stop herself, put both hands in front of her, and stumbled into Clara. They managed to stay standing as they watched the everyday miracle in front of them.

A doe and two spotted fawns stood lapping at the clear running water of the creek. The doe eyed them as she drank, but she
didn’t run. One of the fawns stepped closer to the doe, nudged her, and began nursing. The doe allowed it for a moment, and then she walked away, slowly at first, before loping into the woods. The fawns followed closely behind, running in a lopsided fashion.

“They were beautiful.” Clara’s voice filled with wonder. She didn’t move but stared after the deer, as if they might reappear.

“
Ya
, they were.”

Clara shook her head as she turned and allowed her sister to place her arms around her. How long had it been since they had hugged? They spent all of their time arguing and struggling against each other.

“Why would anyone steal all of our things, Lydia? I don’t understand.”

“I don’t either, but there’s one thing I know for sure.”

Clara glanced up at her, wiping at the tears that had escaped down her cheeks.

“In the next thirty minutes we’re going to have twelve hungry families, regardless of the burglary. We need to head over and start breakfast.”

“
Ya
. I suppose you’re right.”

They walked back toward the cabins at a more measured pace.

“I wonder if whoever did this knew Aaron was gone last night.”

“Maybe.” Lydia had been thinking the same thing. “They must have worked quietly for the guests not to have heard them.”

“The office and the shop are set to the side a little. They’re not exactly located in the middle of the cabins.”

“True.”

“If whoever did this came in the middle of the night, while everyone was sleeping—”

Lydia stopped in the path and tugged on her sister’s sleeve. “What were you going to do if you found the burglar in the woods?”

“I don’t know. Demand he gives us our stuff back?”

“Just walk up to him and—”

“I might. Walk up and say, ‘Hand it over. That isn’t yours!’”

“Okay. Well, promise me you won’t go alone to confront burglars anymore.”

Clara straightened her apron before looking up with a smile. “I promise.”

By the time Clara had taken care of Tin Star, Lydia had used the phone in the office to call the police and report the burglary. After that she started preparing breakfast. The police dispatcher had told her Officer Tate would be out along with a crime tech, who would need to dust for fingerprints, so she prepared breakfast outside.

Not counting the break-in, it was a beautiful May morning. The picnic tables Aaron and Seth had made provided plenty of eating space under the trees. All that was left was to make
kaffi
and pour it into thermoses, which she kept for emergencies. The three cinnamon cakes she’d made the night before were fine served unheated. It was a good thing Aaron was paying her for the baked goods she brought—soon she’d need her sisters Martha and Amanda to help with the extra baking. She had plenty of fruit to put out. They also had milk, juice, and cold cereal. It would have to do for an impromptu breakfast picnic.

Her heart ached over the work Aaron had done, over his loss—after all, the success or failure of the cabins was ultimately most important to him and his
aenti
Elizabeth. Lydia realized she was only an employee, and one part of her knew she could find a job someplace else. But for Aaron—success here meant he could return home.

She focused on making customers happy and assuring them all was well as they came to breakfast under the trees.

And that’s where Aaron found her when he arrived half an hour later with Seth. By then he’d already heard about the break-in. The Amish grapevine was alive and well in Pebble Creek. The police had called a neighbor, who had stopped by David’s and alerted Aaron.

And Aaron’s response surprised Lydia. He made her smile for the first time all day. Even though she was surrounded by
Englisch
moms and dads and children, she felt some of the heaviness in her
heart lift. In spite of the fact that two police officers were traipsing dirt through her office, she forgot the extra work.

Aaron’s response the moment he arrived wiped all of those concerns away.

His first matter of business made her heart sing like the birds in the trees.

He didn’t go to the office.

He didn’t hurry to the shop to see how much merchandise was missing.

He walked through the growing crowd of guests, walked past Clara, and walked straight up to her. Putting his hands on her shoulders, he focused completely on her.

“Are you okay, Lydia?”

“
Ya
, of course.”

“You weren’t here when—”

“No.”

“I was worried that maybe…” He never finished the sentence, but he did touch her face, look deeply in her eyes, and it seemed as though everyone else disappeared and it was only the two of them standing near the banks of Pebble Creek.

It didn’t last long.

Soon one of the children began crying, and a guest asked for more juice. Lydia heard Clara complaining that she couldn’t possibly work if she had to write her postcards outside where the bugs kept landing on her supplies. Seth was grumbling as he pulled the mower from the shed and moved to cut the grass that had begun growing out by the road. He had to stop when the officers told him he could be destroying evidence. Either way that boy was unhappy.

Every single one of those sounds joined together like the voices singing a hymn at church meeting—they blended together almost in harmony.

All of it gave her the impression that somehow things would return to normal, but the memory of Aaron’s concern, that gave her hope that perhaps her dreams could come true.

Aaron had risen early at David’s house. It would have been difficult not to, what with the five children and the arguing that continued between David and Seth. He thought it might have eased some with the boy working at the cabins, but apparently it hadn’t.

Anna, David’s wife, was in her last month of pregnancy and had her hands full with the other children and maintaining the house. When the arguing carried into the kitchen, she glanced at Aaron, shrugged, and asked him if he wanted cream with his
kaffi
.

David and Seth had carried their disagreement back outside.

While Anna was reaching for the cream out of the ice box, she’d stopped to rub at her lower back, closing her eyes and blowing out slowly.

Aaron had thanked Anna and told her he’d help with the chores in the barn. The three of them—Aaron, David, and Seth were walking back toward the house when David’s neighbor hurried over across the field. He’d heard from his
Englisch
neighbor that there had been a break-in at the cabins. Apparently, the
Englisch
neighbor’s wife was the dispatcher at the police station. She’d taken the call from Lydia. A slight adjustment to the Amish grapevine, but it worked nonetheless.

It wasn’t the fact that there had been a burglary that caused Aaron’s stomach to clench tighter than a man’s hand around a hammer. Nor was it the thought of all the merchandise they might have lost. David’s neighbor was very clear about who had made the call. It had been Lydia. She had been the first on the scene—the one to make the discovery.

No one had been arrested, but had she been hurt?

Had the burglar or burglars seen her?