Thursday, December 21
I’m glad you had time to meet for lunch today,” Dale said when he and Neil met outside Bill’s Diner two days after their visit to the sheriff’s office. “Yesterday, when I went for a walk with Amanda, she was still shaken up about our visit with Deputy Beck and Sheriff Brewer. Do you think Susanna feels better about everything?”
“I couldn’t tell ya. I meant to stop by to see her yesterday evening, but I couldn’t get away,” Neil replied. “I do know that she was hoping that the sheriff was going to be shocked and upset about the bridge. I have to admit I felt the same way.”
“I’m kind of surprised, too. Traci could have gotten really hurt.”
“I’m trying to see things from the sheriff’s point of view, but it’s frustrating, you know?”
“Jah. I find myself worrying that the person who is bothering them might be someone we know. Then, just as suddenly, I realize that no one we know would deliberately set out to hurt them.”
But someone was doing such things, Neil knew. Plus, hurting other people and their property didn’t have to make sense to him. Thinking about the man who had been attacking women over in Munfordville recently, he said, “Some people are just twisted, though. There’s no understanding the why of it.”
Dale nodded. “Do you still want to go grab something to eat?”
“Sure.” Since his choice was to either go home and face his father, who was still mourning their new situation, or enjoy a sandwich at Bill’s before working an eight-hour shift, Neil knew there wasn’t really much of a choice.
Soon after the hostess said hello, she placed them in Lora’s section. The entire diner was decorated in lights. On the outside there were flashing colored lights. Inside silver garland lined the walls and some truly ugly-looking snowmen made out of socks dangled from the ceiling.
Dale frowned at the snowmen. “I don’t reckon securing them by the neck was the way to go. It looks like they all got hanged.”
He laughed. “It kind of does, at that.”
They were still chuckling about it when Lora came to take their order. “What has the two of you in such a good mood?”
“Your hanging snowmen. They look a bit gruesome.”
She wrinkled her nose. “I know. I tried to tell May to not hang them by the neck, but she wouldn’t listen. I think they look more like Halloween decorations than Christmas.” She shrugged. “What can I get y’all?”
After they ordered, Dale said, “Lora seems happy, doesn’t she?”
“She really does.”
“I was surprised when she came back to the area. But look what happened? She’s now English, working at a diner, and married to a sheriff’s deputy. She’s happy, too.”
“I’m glad for her,” Neil said. “But is there a reason you’re making a point to tell me all that? Or are you just stating your surprise?”
“I guess I was just thinking that Lora’s life is a gut reminder to me about the Lord giving each of us choices in our lives.”
Neil gritted his teeth. “Just say what you want to say.”
“Only that a lot happened to Lora that could have made her bitter and discouraged. But instead of her acting that way, she seems to have learned from it all.” Playing with the corner of the napkin in front of him, Dale mumbled, “At least it seems that way to me.”
“Are you suggesting there’s a lesson in there for me?”
“Nee.” Flushing a bit, Dale shrugged. “Well, maybe.”
Neil’s instant reaction was to tell Dale to mind his own business. He hadn’t just given up his farm, he’d had to change his whole way of life. Instead of rising early with his brother and father to milk cows and tend to their other livestock, he was now working at Horse Cave Salvage.
Instead of tilling soil and planting crops on the same land that his grandfather had walked, he was working inside for a relative stranger.
Furthermore, he was trying to ease his family’s financial burdens instead of simply assuming that his needs would be taken care of.
Neil’s life was different in almost every way that counted. But maybe, he realized, Dale did have a point. Things were different, but he had adjusted. He’d also found happiness in his new job. And, well, if they hadn’t had to move, then Susanna wouldn’t have come to Horse Cave. Already he was having trouble imagining life without her.
“You know better than most how hard these changes have been for me. But I’m getting better. So you may consider your point taken.”
“Are you mad at me for trying to help you?”
“Nee. I know you mean well,” he said as Lora returned with two hearty bowls of potato chowder and thick roast beef sandwiches.
After silently offering a quick prayer of thanks, they dug in. Neil figured it was his turn to do a little digging of his own. “It looks like you and Amanda are getting along all right.”
“Anyone would get along with her. She’s easy to talk to.”
Intrigued, Neil smiled. “What have you been talking to her about?”
“Her, mostly. I realized that I knew who she was, but next to nothing about what she was like.”
“Did you find out anything interesting?”
“I did.” His smile grew. “She used to babysit for several families back in Berlin.”
“And?” Dale had a huge family but no one in need of a babysitter. It was kind of strange that he cared about Amanda’s babysitting jobs.
“Well, that means she likes kinner.”
“Jah. I guess she would, if she likes watching them. But what does that have to do with you?”
He averted his eyes. “Nothing.”
No, it was something. “Wait a minute. Are you saying you’re glad she likes kinner because you intend to have some with her?”
Dale sputtered on his sip of water. “Not tomorrow.”
It was becoming hard not to start grinning. “But that’s what you meant, right?”
Dale took another sip of water. “Well, yes.” He held up his hand before Neil could even contemplate how to respond to that. “Now, don’t you start acting like you are a font of wisdom about relationships and courting. All I’m saying is that I think that Amanda Schwartz, with her golden hair, blue eyes, sweet disposition, and her—”
“Experience with children?” he interjected.
“I was going to say her love of children means she’s pretty special,” Dale corrected with a grin. “I mean to get to know her better, too.”
“I guess you do have a good point.”
“I know I do.” After taking another bite of his sandwich, Dale eyed Neil carefully. “Now, what about you and Susanna?”
“I ain’t courting her. I’m trying to help her.” And, he thought, to make amends for how rude I was when we met.
“That’s it?”
“Ain’t that enough?”
“Do you believe what she says about the gunshots and the board?”
“I thought I did, but after speaking to the sheriff and Eddie, I don’t know. I guess it’s safe to say that I believe she believes it.”
Dale frowned. “I wouldn’t tell her that.”
“I haven’t. What did your father say about the broken fence?”
“That Mr. Schwartz was right on the money. Someone deliberately broke it.”
As Neil finished his sandwich, he contemplated what he should do next with Susanna. Leave her alone? Talk to his parents and tell them that he’d met the Schwartz family and believed they’d gotten them all wrong?
Looking at the clock above the door, he pushed his plate away. He needed to get to work. He spied Lora standing by the kitchen door. She was talking on her cell phone. When she noticed him staring, she hung up and hurried over.
“We need our check, Lora. I’ve got to get to work.”
“Um, okay.” As she flipped through her pad of paper, she said, “Listen, that was Eddie. He called to tell me that he was going to be working late.”
Obviously alerted by her tone, Dale said, “Everything okay?”
“I don’t know. Dispatch just took a call. There’s a fire on your old property, Neil.”
“You sure?”
“Oh, yeah. The fire truck is on the way there now.”
“So are we,” Dale said as he tossed a twenty on the table.
Neil was right behind him. “Lora, I hate to ask you, but could you call the salvage for me and explain that I’ll be late?”
“Sure. But do you really think you should go over there? Not to be mean, but their fire ain’t your problem anymore.”
“I don’t have a choice,” he said as he strode out of the diner.
Right then and there, it didn’t matter where the fire was. All he cared about was that Susanna might need him.