The Choice (37 page)

Abel shook his head. “I don’t think so. He’s telling the truth. He’s been crazy about her since the day he met her.”

Carrie’s shoulders sagged. “Steelhead, Emma is . . . she’s Amish!”

Steelhead nodded. “I know. I know. We have a few things to figure out.”

“A few things to figure out?” Carrie put her hands against her head; she couldn’t believe what she was hearing. “She’s broken her vows to the church. She’ll lose everything.”

Steelhead looked uncomfortable, but unconvinced. “We’ll work it out.” He crossed his large arms over his chest. “I’ve never felt like I belonged to anyone before meeting Emma. The times I’ve spent sitting in your kitchen, talking to her, getting to know her, I knew—we both knew—we belonged together.”

Carrie stood to face Steelhead, astounded. “If you truly loved her,
why
would you . . .
how
could you . . . take everything meaningful from her?”

Steelhead looked dazed, stumped. He scratched his head, as if he hadn’t thought that deeply in a long time. Slowly, he turned to head back to the house, then stopped. “We were going to tell you, Carrie. In fact, Emma was coming to tell you what we’d done, but that barn fire kind of threw us for a loop. Then Emma didn’t want to tell you, on account of that little police problem with Abel, then Esther was here . . .” Steelhead snorted. “And she’s a little scary. Even for me.” He zipped up his coat, as if he suddenly realized he was barechested. “We came back to tell you today, but when we got here, no one was around, and then . . . well, our passion just overtook us.”

Carrie clapped her hands over her ears as Abel made a cutting motion at his throat, trying to warn Steelhead to stop talking.

Steelhead dropped his head. “Won’t you at least come and talk to Emma? She’s awful upset you found us like that. You mean the world to her, Carrie.”

As Steelhead turned and left, Carrie plopped back on the hay bale. “Abel Miller, did you know about this?”

An awkward look covered Abel’s face. She knew that guilty look on his face meant he was hiding something. Carrie fixed her gaze on him and sure enough, he just started spilling.

“I went to City Hall to try and stop them, Carrie. I knew what they had planned and I felt responsible, bringing Steelhead here. They were determined to go through with it. Emma was just as determined as Steelhead. But it wasn’t my place to tell you.” He paused. “That’s why I couldn’t tell you where I’d been.”

She crossed her arms, still glaring at him. “Just how many more secrets are you keeping?”

He stiffened. “Don’t go throwing stones, Carrie. You know as well as anybody how secrets get started.”

She looked at him, puzzled.

“Planning to leave with Solomon Riehl was no small secret.

” Her cheeks flushed, stung by his words. Yet he wasn’t wrong. How many times did she lecture Andy about the seed of deceit beginning with an untruth? How often did she remind him that an untruth grows, so quickly, so quickly, into a lie?

For a long time, neither of them spoke.Then Abel sat down next to her on the hay bale, so close she could smell the faint scent of detergent on his clothes. “Aw, Carrie, she loves him. He loves her.”

“Her way of life is as different from his as cheese from the moon. It isn’t as simple as falling in love, Abel.”

“Maybe it is,” he said. “Maybe it should be.”

Then a thought, a ray of hope, cut through the fog. “Maybe . . . maybe Steelhead could go Amish.”

Abel looked at her as if she had lost her mind. “And give up his motorcycle?”

“A motorcycle is easier to give up than a family.” Her voice dropped to a whisper. “Would it be so awful bad to go Amish?” He shrugged. “Expecting an English guy, especially one like Steelhead, to go Amish would be, well, it would be like asking Schtarm to be a buggy horse.”

She covered her face with her hands.

He pulled her hands away from her face. “Would it be such a terrible thing to go English?”

Carrie looked him straight in the eyes. “You know the answer to that. She’ll lose everything she holds dear. She’ll be shunned, like she doesn’t even exist anymore.” She shuddered.

“So it’s better that she end up alone, or with an Amish fellow she doesn’t even love, than marry a man she does love? They share the same faith, Carrie, the same beliefs. They just express them in a different way.”

Carrie knew he wasn’t talking about Emma and Steelhead anymore, but she hadn’t meant to get into that particular territory. She still hadn’t sorted it all out. Each time her mind drifted to that kiss, which was often . . . oh, that sweet, sweet kiss . . . it made her feel lightheaded and her stomach all dizzy, just like she felt as a girl when she swung too high on a tree swing.

She pulled her hands out of his and stood to leave. “Maybe that’s what the will of God might be for her.”

He stood, facing her. “Is that really how it seems to you?”

“For the Amish, that’s the way it is.”

They stared at each other, a standoff. The silence between them was as thick as blackstrap molasses.

“She hasn’t lost everything.” Abel picked up Old-Timer’s water bucket. “She has him.”

The sound of wheels churning up gravel made them both turn their heads toward the road. Esther and Abraham rolled up the driveway in a wagon. Seated between them was Yonnie. Andy sat in the back on top of a bale of hay.

“Abraham brought some hay for your animals. On the way, we stopped for pecan pie at the Stolztfuses’ stand and saw Yonnie and Andy, so we gave them a lift,” Esther said, helping Yonnie ease out of the buggy. “Ada insisted we bring a pie for you too.”

Carrie glanced at the house and saw Emma peering out the kitchen window, a stricken look on her round face. Then Steelhead came up behind her. A cold chill shuddered through Carrie.

The next day, Abel found Carrie hanging sheets on the clothesline. He picked up some clothespins and handed them to her. “Carrie, we still have a problem we need to take care of.”

She glanced at him and took a clothespin out of her mouth to speak. “Which problem would
that
be, Abel? My sister, marrying your English friend? Or my barn burning down?”

Ignoring her, he handed her a wet sheet. “I think we need to go to the police and tell them you found Veronica McCall’s telephone at the fire site.”

She pinned the sheet to the clothesline. “No.”

“Why not? What’s wrong with just telling them?”

“Vengeance belongs only to God.”

“Who’s talking about vengeance? I’m talking about justice.”

“I won’t judge another person. It’s not our way.”

“Carrie, I’m just talking about telling the truth.” He rubbed his face, exasperated. Then he dropped his hands and hooked them on his hips. He was studying her as if he didn’t quite know what to make of her. “Is it so wrong to want to stop her from doing this to anyone else?” He took a step closer to her and lifted her chin so that she would look at him. “Is it, Carrie?”

Abel’s words rankled her. As Carrie went about her chores that day, she prayed to God about what to do with Veronica McCall. By early afternoon, an idea came together in her mind. She felt in her heart it was the right thing to do, that God had given her this plan, but she knew she had to do it alone. She wanted to keep Abel out of this. This was between Veronica McCall and her. So she waited until she knew Abel had gone birding with Andy. She threw on her cape, put the black clothespin cell phone in her apron pocket, and hitched up the buggy to go to Honor Mansion.

When she arrived, she stood at the open door of Veronica McCall’s office. “A farm is not a farm without its barn,” Carrie said, in a voice so steady it could not be her own.

Veronica’s eyes lit up. “So you’re ready to sell?”

Carrie sat down in the chair across from her. “That’s not what I meant. Do you remember I told you that Amish proverb, the very first time we met?” She placed the black clothespin cell phone on the desk in front of Veronica.

Veronica’s eyes went wide in shock. Then she got up and closed the door to her office. “Where did you find this?”

“In the remains of the barn at Cider Mill Farm. I spent the day raking through the ashes. Just when I was about to give up, I found that.”

She reached across the desk to grab it, but Carrie closed her fist around it. “I must have left it there when I was visiting Abel.”

Carrie fixed her eyes on her.

“What?” Veronica asked. She snorted. “You couldn’t possibly be insinuating that I set that fire.”

Carrie held her gaze, then Veronica dropped her eyes. “You can’t prove anything. A lost telephone earpiece does not implicate me.”

“No, not alone, but a number of things put together do.” Out of her apron pocket, Carrie fished the page about Abel’s arrest that she had printed for her, months ago. She unfolded it and set it before Veronica. “It even has the date that you printed it.” She pointed to the top of the page.

“That’s not much to go on.”

“Your phone records show that you made calls to the fire department about fifteen minutes after the Stoltzfuses’ fire had been set and then fifteen minutes after the Cider Mill Farm fire.”

A stain of color spread across Veronica’s sharp cheekbones. “That’s outrageous! How dare you accuse me of such lies!”

“Not lies.” She pulled out both sets of phone bills that Grace had given her, one from Veronica’s cell phone company, the other from Honor Mansion’s telephone service.

“Where did you get these?” Veronica asked, eyes narrowed in suspicion.

Carrie chose to deflect that. “There’s one more thing. Yonnie saw your car at the house around three o’clock. She was in the kitchen and saw you go into the barn. Then she fell asleep and didn’t see you leave.” She looked at Veronica. “But she did place you at the site, at just the right time. And the police said a woman gave an anonymous tip about the fire and about Abel Miller setting it. So even though one piece of evidence alone isn’t much, put it all together and it’s a convincing picture. Like a puzzle, all filled in.”

Veronica stared at Carrie, furious, bested. “What is it you want?”

Carrie took the paper and folded it up again. “Nothing.”

Veronica raised an eyebrow in suspicion.

“It’s not my place to judge you, Veronica McCall. I’ve made plenty of mistakes myself.” She took a deep breath and looked Veronica straight in the eyes. “I forgive you. For burning my barn.”

The only evidence of nervousness that Veronica showed was of a pencil, twiddling back and forth in her hand. Other than that, she remained still.

“But if anything else were to happen, I will go to the police. It wouldn’t be right of me to let you continue to hurt people. Innocent people.” Carrie slipped that paper back into her apron for safekeeping, then lifted her eyes to meet Veronica’s. “I forgive you, but I don’t trust you.”

Veronica stood and walked to the window, crossing her arms tightly against her chest.

Carrie rose to leave and was almost to the door when she turned back. “I just don’t understand why you would harm Abel. He’s been so good to you.”

“Sure you do.” Veronica spun around. “You’re nobody’s fool, Carrie.”

As Carrie’s hand turned the door handle, Veronica’s voice dropped to a whisper, almost a hiss. “He treats you like spun sugar.”

Keeping her hand on the handle, Carrie lifted her chin a notch. “I know.”

Veronica’s eyes hardened. “I don’t think I’ve given you enough credit.”

And I might have given you too much
, Carrie thought as she closed the door behind her.