A Prayer for the Night (8 page)

“My cousin is dead, and they’re gonna put him in a box.”

“And?”

“And die Memme says good people go to heaven when they’re dead.”

Ricky said, “So heaven’s in a box.”

“In the ground.”

Niell let a moment pass and then said, “Maybe they just put the body in the ground.”

“Only place I’ve ever seen dead people is in a box.”

“You ask your mom, but I’ll bet she says the body goes in the ground, and the spirit goes to heaven.”

“Then what’s the spirit?”

“It’s who you really are.”

“The real me that’s here is what I can touch. I’ll go in a box someday, too.”

“Can you touch your thoughts? Your dreams?”

“No.”

“Aren’t they the most important part of who you are?”

“I suppose. But, what I can touch is gonna go in a box. So, heaven’s in a box.”

“Is that what’s going to happen to John Schlabaugh?”

“My daddy is making his box, now.”

Ricky nodded, smiled. “Can all your memories fit in a box?”

“No.”

“Can you think of anything else that won’t fit in a box?”

After a spell, “Prayers.”

“That’s good. I like that.”

“These things go to heaven?”

“They’re called your spirit. It’s all made up of who you really are. Your spirit.”

“Is John Schlabaugh’s spirit in heaven?”

“I believe so.”

“Die Memme says he was bad.”

“Maybe your mom didn’t know everything about John Schlabaugh that God knows.”

“My sister says he was fun.”

“What’s your sister’s name?”

“Mary.”

“What’s your name?”

“Lester A. Troyer.”

“Nice to meet you, Lester. I’m Ricky Niell.”

Lester gave a satisfied nod of his head. “My sister knew John Schlabaugh very well.”

“I’d like to talk to her.”

“You should. She can tell you all about him.”

“Is she home, today?”

“Naw.”

“Do you know where she is?”

“My parents won’t tell me. They say she’s got a life of her own for a spell.”

“If I came back later, would she be here?”

Lester popped off the fence, and turned to look at Niell. He shrugged, said, “I don’t know,” and added, “I’m not supposed to talk to strangers.”

Friday, July 23
12:35 P.M.

 

 

IN Bruce Robertson’s pine-paneled office, on the first floor of the red brick jail, Professor Branden sprawled in a low leather chair beside the sheriff ’s massive cherry desk. The comfort Branden usually felt in that soft chair eluded him, as he wrestled with the grim details of the case. With his head propped on the back of the chair, he gazed up at the ornate, hand-hammered tin ceiling tiles and brooded. It simply had never happened before. An Amish lad murdered this way.

Robertson sat upright, with his elbows propped on the desk. He had a pencil in his fingers, and had been drubbing the eraser impatiently against the resonant wood, trying, like Branden, to phrase the right questions. A pizza box lay open on the desk, the few remaining slices growing cold.

“It’s not going to be a coincidence,” Robertson said, “that Spits Wallace has old blood in his kitchen and we later find an Amish kid who’s been dead a while.”

“I don’t think Spits is smart enough to make up such a good lie about that,” Branden said. “About Abe and John being out there with English guys.”

“He was smart enough to run us off his place,” Robertson said.

“You going back after him?”

“He owes us another conversation, at the least. But I’m not going back out there until I know more about these Amish kids.”

“He’d be hard to arrest under any circumstances,” Branden observed.

“Yeah, but if he’s not telling the truth, if he’s involved in a drug deal with John Schlabaugh, for instance, then I’ll need to coordinate with DEA before I try to take him down.”

“And what if he is telling the truth?” Branden asked.

“I don’t know. It’s possible,” Robertson said. “Dan would have known if Wallace’s name is on the DEA list like Schlabaugh’s is. So I’m not inclined to think Spits is involved with drugs.”

“To me, he just doesn’t seem like the type,” Branden said. “Too much of a loner.”

“I know. Wallace called them ‘city slickers.’” Robertson said. “That doesn’t sound like a hooked-up guy to me.”

“No,” Branden frowned. “But you’re gonna have to devise a way to question him further without getting shot.” He rubbed a paper napkin at his beard and said, “And if he’s not involved, then it might mean that Abe and John had a falling out themselves. Argued over their drugs.”

“And what?” Robertson asked. “Abe shot John?”

“Not likely,” Branden conceded. “But something might have gone wrong when one or both of them hooked up with the wholesalers.”

“And those wholesalers are the ones who grabbed up Sara Yoder?” Robertson offered.

“Cal definitely said Sara was abducted?”

“Yes. He was clear about that when he called. He said Miriam Yoder hadn’t translated precisely when he and Ricky talked to her and some kids. He said the boys described some strangers forcing Sara into their car.”

“So maybe those are the same people who were out at Spits Wallace’s place with Yoder and Schlabaugh,” Branden said, and shifted to a vertical position in his chair. He tossed the wadded napkin onto the lid of the pizza box. “Maybe that’s the bunch from Columbus that Sara mentioned to Cal and me,” he said.

“You buy the notion that Amish kids are that involved in hard drugs? More than just marijuana, I mean.”

“Perhaps. She didn’t elaborate,” Branden said. “But she intimated that her gang of kids was into using drugs, though I can’t say which ones. Could be anything, I suppose.”

“Then try this,” Robertson said. “Abe Yoder and John Schlabaugh were leading those ‘city slickers’ to Spits Wallace’s gold.”

Branden shrugged, got out of his chair, and paced in front of the large windows, looking west onto Clay Street at slow traffic making the turn onto Jackson. While he was there, Ellie came into the spacious office and said, “I’m going to start a fresh pot of coffee.”

To the right of the office door, she worked at a credenza, emptying out the old grounds into a wastebasket, and said, “Ricky’s coming in. There’s nothing yet on Sara Yoder. Cal Troyer is taking a ride with the bishop to try to get some cooperation. Ricky doubled back, trying to get more of the details from the Amish kids who saw her taken away.”

Ellie carried the carafe into the hall. She came in with fresh water in the pot, set up the drip basket, and switched the machine on. To the sheriff, she commented, “I know she’s already eighteen or so, but maybe you ought to consider an Amber Alert.”

Robertson eyed his dispatcher-secretary and nodded. He tossed his pencil into a can on his desk and said, “I know. But I’d like to wait until I’ve heard from the DEA people. Don’t want to foul their nest.”

Ellie countered, “Amish kids aren’t ever drug dealers, Bruce. You’re wasting time worrying about the DEA.”

Robertson studied Ellie’s determined expression and tapped out a drumbeat on his desk with his knuckles. “Look, Ellie,” he said. “We’ve got one Amish kid shot through the head, and we’ve got another one grabbed by strangers in a white SUV. Sara herself told the professor, here, that Abe Yoder and John Schlabaugh had drug connections in Columbus. That’s going to fall under a DEA taskforce concern. They’ve got a Mobile Enforcement Team working down there, and they’ve started an investigation up here. So I can’t jump the gun on this one.”

Ellie planted her fists on her hips and squared up to the sheriff’s desk.

Branden smiled at her determination and said, “Maybe she’s right, Bruce.” He’d seen Ellie take on the big sheriff before.

She was in the habit of speaking more directly to the sheriff than most of the deputies did, especially when she disagreed with him, and she knew from long experience that he used his great bulk and gruff personality mainly as command tools. She also knew he listened to her when she took a stand on an issue. Calmly, she said, “Are you gonna make the call, or do I have to?”

The first genuine smile of the day appeared on Robertson’s face. He rapped his knuckles on the desk again and said, “I’ll have you do it, Ellie. Set it up ahead of time, and then I’ll tell you when to release it to the press.”

“That’s better,” Ellie said, and turned and walked out to her front desk down the hall.

Branden said, “She’s right, Bruce.”

Robertson faked ire, and couldn’t hold the stern expression. Smiling, he shook his head and said, “One day I’m going to win an argument with that woman.”

“You might as well just give her a raise, and get it over with,” Branden said.

Cal Troyer came in from the outer hall and asked, “What’s Ellie smiling about?”

Robertson grunted, and Branden said, “She won a face-off with our ponderous sheriff, here.”

Cal looked back and forth between the two men. “Something I’d enjoy?” he asked.

“We’re going to put out an Amber Alert on Sara Yoder,” Robertson said.

“Good,” Cal said, and took a seat in a straight-backed chair in front of Robertson’s desk. “Irvin Raber just dropped me off. He’s going to put his whole district at our disposal.”

Branden asked, “Can he round up the other kids in Schlabaugh’s group?”

“Says they’ll all be in this afternoon.”

“They’re coming here?” Robertson asked.

“That’s the plan.”

Branden said, “Can he get us into Schlabaugh’s place, Cal?”

“We can meet him out there today,” Cal said. “Two o’clock. He told me where the place is.”

The intercom buzzed and Ellie said over the crackle of the old system, “Ricky’s here. He’s been asking around out by Saltillo.”

Robertson punched his intercom button and said, “Send him back, Ellie.”

Ellie said, “You’ve also got Missy Taggert on line one.”

Robertson picked up his phone, punched line one, and said, “What have you got, Missy?” and then listened to his wife, saying, “Right. Right. OK.”

As he hung up, Niell came in and took a seat next to Cal in front of the cherry desk. Branden returned to his leather chair beside the desk.

Robertson said, “Missy’s got Schlabaugh cleaned up. Says he was beat up pretty badly before he was shot. Also, he’s got cocaine residue in his nostrils.”

Niell whispered sarcastically, “Great.”

Surprised, Cal asked, “She’s sure?”

Robertson said, “It’s Missy! Of course she’s sure.”

Cal tented his fingers in front of his lips and blew out tension with a slow whistle of air.

Ricky said to Cal, “What do you know about that 14/7 something with Abe Yoder?”

Cal took his tented fingers away from his lips and took a minute to clear his mind. “14/7,” he repeated. “That’s the financial arrangement some of the Amish families set up for older children who work away from the farm.”

Robertson asked, “Does that have a bearing on this case?”

Ricky said, “The youngsters I talked to said old man Yoder had a 14/7 going with his son Abe Yoder, and Abe had gone sour on the deal.”

Cal said, “It’s not the best arrangement for the kids, if you only look at the financial side of the matter.”

Branden said, “They work for room and board, right?”

“Something like that,” Cal said. “A boy is considered old enough to hold a job at fourteen, sometimes younger. And he quits school at sixteen. Then, if he doesn’t start a family after school, the father will get an agreement that says something like: ‘You have lived in my house for fourteen years scot-free. Now, for half of that, the next seven years, if you stay on with us, then you go get a job, and whatever you make is rightfully mine.’ The kid can stay on until age twenty-one or so, but everything he makes goes to the father, and by implication, to the family as a whole.”

“You’re kidding,” Niell said. “I’ve lived here all my life and never heard about that before.”

“Amish don’t advertise it,” Cal said. “But the way they see it, it’s fourteen years free living as a kid. Seven years to pay it back as an adult. It builds family wealth.”

Robertson said, “It makes you wonder how a young fella is supposed to get a start in life if everything he earns from fourteen to twenty-one goes to the father.”

“Sometimes it’s only half of what they earn,” Cal qualified.

“Still,” Niell said, “that stinks.”

“When an Amish boy seeks to marry and join the church, everyone helps him out,” Cal said. “Building a house. Arranging land. Wedding gifts. Everything he’ll need to make a good start. The implied promise is that if you put all your worth into the family, the family in turn will stand by you when you need help. Any kind of help.”

Branden asked Niell, “Abe Yoder didn’t like his arrangement?”

Niell said, “Apparently not. I asked some of the neighbors out there. About a month ago, Abe quit his job at a print shop in Walnut Creek. Stayed away from the house a lot.”

Branden asked, “Then where’s he been staying? Out at John Schlabaugh’s?”

Niell said, “Not from what the youngsters I talked to said. They think he’s got a separate place somewhere.”

Dan Wilsher knocked, entered the office, and said, “We’ve tracked down the owners of that barn. A retired couple up in Ashtabula, and they didn’t know that Amish kids had been using it. Didn’t even know that the barn was unlocked.”

“What’s the name of the owners?” Cal asked.

“Peterborough,” Wilsher said. “A Jim and Nancy Peterborough.”

“Remember those cabins?” Cal said.

“Cabins?” Wilsher asked.

Robertson said, “Jim Peterborough’s dad deeded land over by those old strip mines to Mansfield for a summer camp for at-risk kids from the city. They built some cabins a while back, and ran a summer program for close to a dozen years there.”