The Calling (7 page)

“What news is that, Jimmy Fisher?”

He tried not to get distracted by the blue-black ringlets that escaped from her tightly pinned bun and framed the nape of her neck. He diverted his eyes and noticed that she held an empty egg basket in her hands. “Hey,” he said. “If you need eggs, all you gotta do is sing out. That’s one thing I have plenty of. Fisher Hatchery at your service, ma’am.”

She glanced down at the basket. “Usually, we have plenty. But Luke and Sammy started tossing them at each other and then the day’s supply was scattered over the lawn. They’re spending the morning in their room, contemplating their actions, in case you wonder why they’re not over at Galen’s.”

Those two little brothers of hers were a passel of trouble, especially Luke. Sammy was less impulsive by nature, but Luke talked him into all kinds of mischief. Luke reminded Jimmy of himself, back in the day when he was young and immature.
Not so long ago
, echoed Galen’s voice in his head,
like last week
. Jimmy frowned. Wasn’t it enough that he worked alongside of Galen every livelong day? Did the man have to fill his head with advice and warnings? He shook off that thought and focused his attention back on Bethany. He tried not to grin at the sassy look on her heart-shaped face.

“So what news are you talking about?”

“The mystery. I solved it.”

She tipped her head to the side. “What particular mystery are
you
talking about?”

“The bones in the trunk.”

She narrowed her eyes. “What about them?”

“I’ve been back and forth to the Sisters’ House lately, asking them a few questions. More than a few. It takes quite a lot of work to keep them on task. Especially Ella. Have you noticed?”

She gave him a look that made him realize he had gone off track just like Ella. Maybe it was contagious.

“Just what are you getting at? Did you tell them about those bones, because if you did—”

Jimmy erased that in midair. “Actually, Mim and Danny Riehl had already told them.” Bethany’s eyes went wide and
her mouth became a round
O
, then settled into a tight line. Jimmy hurried to his main point. “I’d been going about it in a gentle way, asking them roundabout questions without actually saying they had a trunk full of bones in their basement. Then your sister pays a visit and just bursts out with it—telling them you think they’re murderers. Scared those sweet little ladies to the hereafter and back again.”

“Shootfire! How could Mim do such a thing!” Bethany spun around to go find Mim and give her the what for, but Jimmy grabbed her arm.

“Hold on. Before you go off half-cocked, there’s more to the story.”

Bethany gave him a suspicious look, but she did stay put.

“It occurred to me that those old bones might belong to the previous owner of the house. The sisters have only lived in the house for some sixty-odd years.” He snapped his fingers. “Bingo! As usual, I made a clever deduction.”

Bethany rolled her eyes heavenward.

“A doctor used to live there. In fact, his office was in the basement—which, by the way, the sisters want you to finish cleaning out as soon as you have recovered from your shock.”

Bethany shuddered.

“One of the sisters remembered the doctor. They said he taught anatomy over at the college in Lancaster. They think he probably used the bones for his classes and forgot all about them.” He grinned, pleased with himself. It had not been bad work, thanks to his quick thinking and even quicker logic. He believed in giving credit where credit was due, and he was due some. “Well?”

She shielded her eyes against the glare of the morning sun. “Well, what?”

“Aren’t you going to thank me for solving this mystery? Now you can go back to work and not worry about getting murdered by five frail and wobbly eighty-year-old women.” He took the hem of her sleeve and held it gently between his thumb and forefinger and didn’t let go. A quiet spun out between them. She tried to look outraged, but he could see the smile tugging at her lips.

“I’ll thank you once you get rid of that trunk with the bones in it.”

He let her sleeve slide from his fingers. “Done. Took care of it last night. The sisters want you to come back as soon as your nerves have settled, they said, so you can all have a good laugh about it.” He held her gaze until she looked away, a stain of pink rising in her cheeks, and flounced back inside the house in that unique Bethany-flouncing way. As he slipped through the privet to Galen’s, he noticed the eagle pair that nested at Eagle Hill soaring high in the sky, in tandem, and his buoyant spirits lifted even higher, if that was possible.

Bethany had stopped by Naomi’s to ask her how to fit together some tricky quilt pieces and discovered, to her dismay, Edith Fisher in the kitchen. It was a small kitchen with little in it, and Edith Fisher’s large presence made it seem far smaller.

“Naomi,” Edith said, “has a little headache and shouldn’t be disturbed.” She proceeded to show Bethany what she had done wrong with the quilt pieces.

That
woman surely needed some castor oil. There wasn’t a thing Bethany could put her hands to that she didn’t have a hard word about. It befuddled her how a sharp-tongued woman like her reared a son like Jimmy.

Despite all Jimmy Fisher’s faults, plus his bad character, he had been kind to her and to her family. Far too patient with her little brothers who buzzed around him like horseflies. Sweet as whipped cream to Mammi Vera, and Bethany knew her grandmother was no Sunday picnic to be around. Helpful to Rose, attentive to Naomi, a hard worker to Galen. It was a shame that his reputation was so low and irreparable. And why did he have to be so handsome?

As Bethany walked through the privet, she saw a woman in jeans and a jacket and a bandana heading to the porch of Eagle Hill with a tray in her hands.

“Hello,” the woman said. “You must be Bethany, right?”

“Yes. That’s me. I’m Bethany Schrock.” She took the breakfast tray out of her hands. “And you must be the lady preacher.”

“Not much of a preacher, actually. More like a youth pastor. Not much of a youth pastor, either.” She waved a hand in the air to dismiss the topic. “Just call me Geena.”

Bethany looked into the pleasant, beaming face of a small woman with olive skin, brown hair, and chocolate brown eyes. “Are you comfortable in the guest flat?”

“It’s fine.”

“Hot, though. We’re having a terrible heat wave.”

“The flat stays pretty cool.”

“Rose said you were from the Philadelphia area. Are you planning on staying long?”

Geena looked up at the sky. “I’m not sure. I . . . well . . . to be perfectly honest, I was fired from my church.”

“Fired?” Bethany asked, amazed. “For the Amish, only God fires ministers. And that only happens when they pass.”

Geena smiled. “I guess you could say that’s true for the
non-Amish too. But the day jobs might switch up a little more often.”

“It must be hard to be a preacher. Preachers make me nervous. Whenever I’m around them, I always think about things I shouldn’t have done but did and things I should do but haven’t.”

Geena’s eyes went wide for a second, then she burst out laughing.

Why was that so funny? Sometimes, the sense of humor of English people struck Bethany as very odd.

Geena spent the morning walking around the farm, watching the sheep in the pasture, the horses grazing in the field. A field of white linen draped across the yard—sheets on a clothesline wafting in the summer sun. It was so peaceful here, so quiet . . . until a high-pitched shriek came from the direction of the barn. The door slid open and two little boys burst out of it, little one chasing the bigger one, with the golden retriever at his heels. The little boy was hollering in a language Geena couldn’t understand and running so hard to catch up with the bigger boy that he lost his hat. But both boys stopped abruptly at the sight of Geena.

“You’re the lady preacher!” the big boy said. He had dark hair, nearly black, and twinkling eyes, and she knew this cute boy was going to be trouble in a few years. “I’m Luke Schrock and this is my brother Sammy.” The younger boy resembled his mother, Rose. Softer, with round cheeks, a headful of wavy curls, and rather sizable ears.

“I’m Geena.” Two sets of brown eyes gawked at her curiously. “Something going on, boys?”

“We’ve never met a lady preacher before,” Sammy said.

Geena laughed. “I’m a youth pastor, not a preacher. But I didn’t mean me—I meant, whatever caused you both to come flying out of the barn like it was on fire.”

“Oh, that,” Sammy said.

Luke gave his brother a warning frown, but too late. Sammy, oblivious to undercurrents, blurted out, “Luke bet me a dollar to ride the goat backwards and I did, and now he won’t pay up.”

Luke jabbed him with his elbow. “You didn’t stay on it longer than five seconds! I bet you for a full minute.”

“That backwards stuff is harder than it looks!” Sammy complained.

“Luke made a bet?” someone said stonily.

The boys whirled around to discover their grandmother, Vera Schrock, had appeared on the porch steps and overheard Luke’s bravado. Geena watched the boys exchange a glance. She knew boys well enough to know their instinct was to bolt and run, but these two knew better. They turned to face their accuser.

Quick as a whip, Luke said, “Why, Mammi Vera, your hearing must be going bad. Sammy and I were just introducing ourselves to the new guest and telling her to be careful of the goat.”

That drew a stern look right out of the book of grandmothers. She wasn’t buying this boy’s wide-eyed, butter-wouldn’t-melt look for a minute. “Wer eemol liegt, dem glaabt mer net wann era a die Waahret secht.” She glared at Luke and pointed to the house. Head hanging low, he trudged inside. Sammy, wisely, stayed behind. Before Luke went into the house, he turned and balled his fist to pantomime an uppercut at his brother.

“What did your grandmother say to him?” Geena whispered to Sammy.

“He who lies once is not believed when he speaks the truth.” The kitchen door slammed shut. “And about now she’s getting warmed up for a long lecture about the devil and lies.”

Sammy turned and headed to the barn—a sanctuary from lectures and grandmothers and bullying brothers. Geena grinned. Set aside the buggies and bonnets and beards, and she could have been observing any family in America.

4

B
ethany arrived at the Sisters’ House with a new plan of attack. She tucked a strand of curly dark hair behind her ears as she continued to shuffle through things, sorting them into three piles: keep, give away, throw away.

Books and magazines: give away.

Two sets of binoculars with broken lenses: throw away.

Bags and bags of fabric scraps: give to Naomi for her quilting group, which, by the way, Bethany still didn’t want to join.

Threadbare rugs: throw away.

The keep pile was empty . . . until one sister after another would wander into the room and pull things out of the give away and throw away piles and move them into the keep pile.

Since there wasn’t any rain on the horizon, Bethany planned to empty out the living room so she could wash the windows and sweep and scrub the floors. She sighed, gazing around the cluttered room. Most every Amish family in Stoney Ridge practiced upkeep. The sisters practiced downkeep. Spiderwebs clung to the corners, a thick layer of dust covered every horizontal surface. There was collective clutter and then there was individual clutter. The sisters called it all functional clutter.