Disappearances (7 page)

He looked at her, and she saw the wavering in his eyes, the doubt, a certain dipping of his eyelids.

“Because I’m getting a bunch of money if we get that horse. I mean, a lot. And … I thought if I have so much money, maybe Adele will come back to me. See, she needs money to keep her happy, and I just couldn’t make enough for her. I mean, to keep her with me, happy— you know?”

He looked up. “Adele’s a terrific cook. She cooks the best sausage and eggs with salsa, fried tomatoes with chilies, it’s unreal. I loved her. Did anything I could to keep her. The kids though, that’s what really broke my heart.”

Sadie nodded. “Must be hard, losing your wife.”

“You could live with me. Just disappear. Can you cook? We could go across the border. I don’t want to go to jail.”

Suddenly, he appeared to Sadie as his true self, undisguised. A fat, lonely man, afraid, who had only been trying to make enough money to keep his spoiled wife at his side. Perhaps he was as afraid as she was, only in a different way. Was he capable of harming her? She doubted it.

Quickly, she weighed her options, measured them on the scale of pros and cons. To go with him, out of this room. To refuse, stay here, with no promise of escape. It was the confinement that was hardest. She would go. She would risk it. What did she have to lose?

“You take me, I’ll go.”

He looked at her, then shook his head. “Can’t do it. I have to wait. Surely I’ll get the money.”

Sadie felt the desperation assail her, became fueled by it, burst out, “But if you don’t even know if your … your boss is trying to contact the men who have Paris … the horse, then how is this thing ever going to come to an end?”

She was crying, then sniveling, pleading, groveling at his feet.

“Just please take me home. Get me out of here. I’ve done nothing wrong except own a palomino horse. Supposing I was your daughter? Your son?”

In the end, the fat man hardened his heart, became harsh, adamant, refusing to budge or listen to her cries. She knew without looking at him when she heard him heave himself from the chair, open the door, turn the key in the lock, and leave.

It was the large sum of money. Her despair felt like a heavy backpack that wore down her resolve, her hope, her courage. There was truly nothing left. They would let her die in this room.

Well, she wasn’t going to die. She had too much to live for. Mark. She pictured him. Tall, dark hair tumbling over his forehead, a new line of dark hair appearing along his jawbone, growing the beard in the Amish style of the married man, so handsome, so gentle. How she loved him! And she had Mam, Dat, Reuben, her sisters, Dorothy. No, she would not give up.

Eyeing the bedspread, the towels, estimating a sheet’s length, she sat on the beige sofa and planned. As her thoughts were fueled by a shot of adrenaline, she formed a plan. It was absolutely doable. Yes, it was. The hardest part was determining how to secure the end of the rope of sheets firmly enough to hold her weight. The door? The bed? The doorknob? Would it hold? Oh, dear God, help me.

As night fell, she knew it was this night or never. To pass time, she took a long hot bath, shampooed her hair, hung up the towels, rinsed the tub and bowl of the vanity. She straightened the cushions on the beige sofa, then found extra sheets, towels, whatever she could knot together to form a rope of sorts.

With her teeth, she gnawed at the sheet’s end, beginning a small tear. Sometimes with fabric you could pull with all your strength and you’d be unable to tear it apart. But if you put just a tiny cut in it, you could rip it easily. Even if her teeth hurt, she kept chewing, until she had a delicate beginning.

Would he be back? He never came to check on her after her evening meal was delivered, but you never know. To stay safe, she worked on the floor on the opposite side of the bed, so if anyone did appear, she could quickly stuff it all beneath the opulent bed skirt. What a wonderful sound! That ripping, tearing sound of a sheet being torn—the sound of freedom!

She worked steadily, her ears tuned to the slightest sound from the hallway. When there was none, she continued tearing, then knotting. She knotted the sheets with the same knot she used to tie Paris or Truman to a hitching rail. The
gaul’s gnipp
. The horse’s knot. Over and under and around. If the knot was done properly, the harder it was pulled, the tighter it became. Sometimes, a horse could pull until it became dangerously tight, and still there was no way it would loosen.

She planned her escape route, considered the distance to the road, the crisscross of fencing, and where the fence rows and the trees were. She wondered whether she might trigger alarms and lights as she scurried across the property. There was a row of square bales and a place she hoped was a ravine.

She had never seen her coat or her bonnet after they had brought her to this room. Her only hope to keep from freezing was the white terrycloth robe that hung on the ornate hook on the oak bathroom door. It would work as a coat of sorts.

The red numbers on the clock were 10:22.

S
ADIE LAY IN BED
, her eyes wide open, planning her getaway. How strong was she? Powerful enough to cling to a rope of sheets and lower herself to the ground? Reuben would be. So would Mark.

She tied the end of the sheet around the leg of the bed, having determined that it was made of heavy steel. She secured it to the hinge on the door as well, just to be sure, sliding a length of sheet carefully into the crack of the door when it stood ajar. Surely, secured in two places, it would hold.

Better to wait till close to the morning hours. Hadn’t she heard, somewhere, that people slept most securely at four o’clock in the morning? Four o’clock, then; that was her goal.

She didn’t sleep a wink. Every shadow of the room imprinted on her mind. She pictured every knot, every length of sheet. At midnight, she got up, sat on the sofa shivering. She shivered with a case of nervous energy coupled with fear. She shook out the heavy bathrobe, put it on, secured it around her waist with the belt on top of her blue dress.

She wore no covering since they had taken it with her black bonnet. She had been taught to pray with her head covered, so she laid a washcloth as a makeshift covering. She caught sight of herself in the mirror, and looking so silly, she decided surely God would hear her prayer since these men had taken her covering away and she was in such dire need of help.

What about that Magdalene, or whatever her name was, in the Bible? Hadn’t she wiped Jesus’ feet with her long hair? She didn’t wear a covering, and Jesus said she had done him a far greater service than anyone else. Or maybe she did wear a covering, one of those long biblical cloths they wore thousands of years ago. Who could tell?

Sadie prayed reverently, tearfully, begging God to keep her safe. I’ll take pain, fear, whatever, but just give me strength to do this, she prayed.

Her mind raced, her nerves jangled. She wished she had something to put in the deep pockets of her bathrobe. A package of crackers. Some pretzels. A bottle of water. It couldn’t be too far to a house. A car would pass.

What about dogs? The great rangy creatures flew like agile wolves at the heels of the cattle scattered all over cattle country to protect the livestock from predators. She’d just have to deal with them. She surely did not want to die like Jezebel in the Old Testament either. That was such a tale of warning, the way Jezebel had held her own spiritual meaning far above her husband’s, and he was likely closer to God than she was. Women could be such misled creatures, being the weaker vessels the way they were.

Boy, she got herself in trouble saying that to Dorothy. Sadie had finally conceded, saying all right, Dorothy, we Amish are sort of old-fashioned in our views about women knowing their place, being submissive to their husbands. Dorothy did not go along with that. Where would her Jim be if she didn’t keep him on his toes? Huh? Answer me that.

One thirty-six. Soon now. Soon she would know. The wind moaned around the corner of the house. Hmm. It hadn’t been windy. She hoped there wasn’t a storm coming. There was no snow, only cold.

Would a car come along before the dogs, or the fat man, or the hired hands, or whoever else was in the wealthy man’s employ? She must have dozed off. Not really slept, just entered the gray zone, the way she had done while they traveled to this house.

Three forty. She jerked, her whole body froze. Twenty more minutes. Oh, dear God. What difference will these 20 minutes make? I must go. She felt a numbness, a maddening listlessness steal over her legs, her arms. You can’t do this. You are weak. Tears rose from the hard lump in her throat. Yes, she was weak. No, she couldn’t do this. She couldn’t.

The Apostle Paul had said the same thing. He was weak, but in Christ Jesus he could do anything with his power. A warmth stole over her body, an assurance of strength. Adrenaline followed it.

She sat up, swung her legs over, secured the belt of the white bathrobe, checked the security of the knots one last time, then slowly loosened the crack of the window. In one turn, she was rewarded by a loosening scrape. She turned steadily, until the long, narrow window was propelled out, allowing enough room for the rope of sheets to be thrown over. Leaning out, she peered desperately into the semi-darkness.

Oh, no. It did not reach the ground. Well, it had to be close. The sheets passed both windows of the second and third stories, went to the first story. She had to go.

With a deep breath, she climbed up on the windowsill, grasping the sheet. It was so thin. The actual taking hold of the sheet was much harder than she had imagined. How to do this? She finally realized she’d have to sit on the windowsill, with her legs dangling down the side while keeping her hold on the sheets. She’d have to sit forward, then take the plunge, twisting her body to keep her feet against the wall.

She looked back. Three fifty-eight. A good omen. A little before the set time. Grasping the rope of sheets in both hands, she pushed herself off the windowsill, her teeth clenched in the desperate effort to keep a firm grip.

She swung out too far. There was a tearing at her shoulders. Her hands slipped. Oh, no. She couldn’t do it. She would fall. Such thoughts tumbled through her mind, but only for a moment. Then her arms rippled with strength. She propelled her body sideways, then in a turn, her feet slid against the stone wall.

Slowly, hand over hand, she lowered herself. The air was so cold. Should have thrown this bathrobe down, the way it billowed out. The first knot. On down. Ouch.

She was going too fast. The sheets burned the palm of her hand. Grasping them more firmly, she slowed her descent. Better to take her time. She didn’t want bleeding palms on her hands. The last knot.

She looked down but could not determine the distance to the ground. Was that a shrub? A low tree? She had to stop or let herself fall to the ground. It couldn’t be too far.

She dropped. A gasp tore from her throat as she felt nothing at all, only the air rushing past her face as she fell.

She suddenly landed on her feet, one twisting sideways with the impact of her weight.

A red hot, searing pain shot up her leg from her ankle. She lay on the ground, her hands propping her upper body, her eyes squeezed shut, her lower lip caught firmly in her teeth, as she struggled to keep from screaming out a high cry of pain and weakness.

She spun her head. A light went on. No! Oh, please, God, no. She never knew how she got up and started running, but she did. She ran with pain her constant companion. She lowered her back, pumped her arms, her knees raised and lowered, propelling her toward the ravine she projected as her destination. She didn’t look back, afraid of what she might see.

Her breath was coming quickly now. She imagined herself in school, running with that effortless, little-girl gait. The time when you could run and run and run, and still you could breathe all right and keep running. She had always been good at it. She would’ve won every fast race if it hadn’t been for that long-legged Henry Mast. They should have let the girls and boys race separately.

Still she ran. Why stop at the ravine? She ran along fences, across water-filled ditches. They would be ice at home. Headlights? A car! A blessed car. A real vehicle. She ran toward it, waving her arms. The vehicle slowed, but then accelerated.

Sadie would never know how the employee at the Quick-Mart, heading to work on the early morning shift, his face now drained of color, said he had seen a real ghost, white, flapping its arms. It didn’t take him a second to step on the gas and get out of there. When his co-worker eyed him coolly and said that’s how those stupid Bigfoot rumors get started, he got hopping mad and told her off, pouted the rest of the day, and wouldn’t speak to her till she brought him a homemade Boston cream pie.

When the second vehicle zoomed by in all its disregarding splendor, Sadie thought of the bathrobe. She took it off and rolled it up, carrying it under her arm.

Dogs! Barking in the distance. Who knew though, if they came from the house she had just escaped from? She walked now, backward, holding out her thumb, a hitchhiker. In desperation she kept her arm out. Her breath was coming in quick succession, her fear a palpable thing. The dogs. Coming closer? Yes. They most definitely were. Were the dogs merely herding cattle? Bringing home milk cows?