Roman looked up from sanding a chair and frowned when Luke entered the shop. “You’re late again, boy. What’s the problem this time?”
Luke stayed near the door as if he was afraid to come in. Was he dreading another lecture or worried that Roman might fire him? That’s what he’d planned to do if Luke showed up late again without a good excuse.
“Well, how come you’re late, and why are you standing by the door?”
Luke made little circles in a pile of sawdust with the toe of his boot as his gaze dropped to the floor. “I … um … I’m late because I had an errand to run on the way here.”
Roman set his sandpaper aside and straightened. “I warned you about this habit of being late. Said if it happened again, I’d have to let you go.”
Luke lifted his gaze. “Are you sayin’ I’m fired?” Roman nodded.
Luke shuffled his feet a few times. “I know you and me haven’t seen eye to eye on some things, but—”
“That’s true, we haven’t.” Roman took a step toward Luke, and a whiff of smoke permeated his nostrils. Either Luke had taken up smoking, as Roman had suspected, or the boy had been hanging around someone who did.
Luke’s eyebrows drew together. “I know you have a fair amount of work right now, and if I leave, you’ll be shorthanded.”
“That’s my problem. I’ll do fine on my own until I can get someone else.”
Luke shrugged. “I think you’re gonna regret having fired me.” He pulled a pair of sunglasses from his shirt pocket, turned on his heels, and headed for the door.
Roman grunted and went back to sanding the chair.
“Now how’d that happen?” Judith muttered as she made her way across the yard to check on her drying laundry. The line was down, and clothes were strewn all over the ground. At first, she thought the towels she’d hung must have been too heavy and caused the line to break, but after closer inspection, she realized that the line had been cut. “Who would do something like this?”
She bent to retrieve one of Roman’s shirts and noticed a pair of sunglasses lying on the ground a few feet away. No one in her family wore sunglasses like that, and her heart started to race as she realized that whoever had cut the line had probably lost their sunglasses during the act.
Grabbing up the glasses along with one of the dirty shirts, Judith hurried toward Roman’s shop. She found him bent over his workbench, sanding on the legs of a straight-backed chair. “There’s been another attack,” she panted.
He rushed over to her. “What’s happened? Has anyone been hurt?”
She shook her head as she held up his shirt. “My clothesline’s been cut, and now everything needs to be washed again.”
“That’s it—just a broken line—and you’re all in a dither?”
“It didn’t break on its own, Roman. I checked the line, and it was obviously cut.” She showed him the sunglasses. “I found these on the ground not far from the clothes.”
He reached for the glasses. “These look like the pair Luke had in his pocket. He put them on as he was leaving my shop.”
Judith glanced around the room. “Where’d Luke go?”
Roman shrugged. “Don’t know. I fired him.”
“Why would you do such a thing?”
“He was late to work again, and I’m getting tired of it. That fellow’s been a thorn in my side for some time—coming in late to work, arguing with me about how things should be done. I’m even more convinced that he’s been smoking.”
Judith’s eyes widened. “He’s always seemed like such a nice young man.”
“Looks can be deceiving.” He frowned. “Makes me wonder if that ab im kopp might be the one who broke into our house and my shop. That crazy fellow’s certainly had opportunity.”
“Ach, Roman, surely not.”
“Luke hasn’t joined the church yet, and from what I’ve heard, he’s been seen with a rowdy bunch of English fellows. You never know what kind of pranks he might decide to play.”
Judith slowly shook her head. “The things that were done here were more than pranks, and what reason would he have for singling us out?”
He shrugged. “Can’t say for sure, but it could have to do with his broken relationship with Ruth, or he might be nursing a grudge against me because we’ve butted heads so many times. With me firing him just now, he may have decided to retaliate by cutting your clothesline.”
She sank into a chair and released a deep moan. “May the Lord help us all.”