Freni made me cinnamon apple pancakes. After gorging, I went back to my room, hung a DO NOT DISTURB sign on the door, locked the door, and took a good long nap. When I awoke two plus hours later, I felt both ravenous and bloated. I also had a splitting headache. Most importantly, however, at some point during my truncated sleep cycle I’d had a dream, one which, upon awakening, still made sense. A lot of sense. Call it an epiphany if you will. The first piece in solving the puzzle of Lizzie Mast’s incongruous death by drugs had suddenly fallen into place. But in order to see if the piece did indeed fit neatly, I needed my car.
Since I can just as well be sick away from home as I can at home, I gave Susannah a call. She answered just as her machine picked up. Apparently she was giving herself an avocado facial in preparation for her first TV appearance. She sounded as if her jaws were wired shut.
“Susannah, dear,” I said cheerily, despite my pounding head, “do you still have the keys to Melvin’s cruiser?”
She hesitated. “Technically it isn’t against the law,” she finally said. “The law says the cruiser is supposed to be used for official police business, but I’m Melvin’s wife. And what’s more a Police Chief’s business than his wife?”
“Nothing, dear.”
“Cool, Mags, I think you’re finally loosening up. Hey, you want to go for a spin sometime?”
“Absolutely. How about now?”
“No can do.”
“Of course you can, dear. I just want you to drop me off at the old Berkey barn. I seem to have left my car there.”
Susannah wasn’t the least bit curious. “It’s a mask, Mags. I have to leave it on for an hour, and I just started.”
“Avocados are meant to be eaten, not worn,” I said patiently. “But since you insist on putting it on your face, instead of into it—well, it doesn’t bother me.”
“But it will bother me. If I go out now, I’ll look like a Martian.”
“I can’t believe you care,” I said bitterly.
A good deal of the cleansing hour passed in silence. “I do care,” Susannah finally said. “I’ve turned over a new leaf. I now have a reputation to uphold.”
“You do?”
“Look, Mags, I know you don’t like Melvin, so—”
“Oh, but I do,” I said. My nose itched fiercely.
“Give it a rest, Mags. You think he’s an incompetent nincompoop. You’ve said so a million times.”
“Well, I take some of that back. If Jesse Ventura can be elected as Governor of Minnesota, there is no reason Melvin couldn’t be President. He could even ask Dennis Rodman to be his running mate.”
“You mean that?”
“Truer words were never spoken.”
“Because I’ve been doing a lot of thinking about what kind of a First Lady I’d be. I mean, should I be a fashion plate like Jacqueline Kennedy and reintroduce elegance to the White House, or an environmentalist like Lady Bird Johnson and—”
“Susannah,” I said softly, “don’t you think you should wait at least until after Melvin wins the councilman’s seat before you install yourself in the White House?”
“Don’t be silly, Mags. Now is the time to start planning. And I’ve already picked my pet project.” She giggled mysteriously. “Don’t you want to hear about it?”
“If it will make you happy, dear.”
“You’re a pal, sis, you know that?”
“I try to be.” The truth be known, there was no way I would have listened to a woman who was unable to move her lips tell me her plans for the White House, had I not needed a favor.
“Well, I’ve decided that my number one priority will be doggy diapers.”
“What?” I quickly jiggled a pinkie in my phone ear to make sure it was in working order.
“You know, canine nappies. Poochie Pampers. And tougher leash laws. I plan to spearhead a national drive to make every dog owner responsible for cleaning up after his or her pet.”
“That’s what I thought you said. What about cat diapers?” I asked guardedly. Little Freni was, at that very moment, taking her own bath in the privacy of my brassiere.
“Naw, cats are different; they cover it up when they’re through. But whenever I take Shnookums for a walk around our neighborhood, I have to be careful not to step in these huge piles left behind by bigger dogs. Shnookums, of course, always wears the little diapers I make for him from Melvin’s old T-shirts. It isn’t fair what the other dog owners let their dogs get away with.”
I nodded. That was certainly a cause I could get behind.
“I’ll contribute a thousand dollars to Melvin’s campaign.”
“Really?”
“You’ve got my word. Now hurry on over with the cruiser. I need to retrieve my car.”
It is undoubtedly hard to whine through an avocado mask, but she did a pretty good job. “Mags, I told you I can’t do that.”
“I’ll make that two thousand dollars then.”
“I’ll be right there,” she said and hung up.
Susannah showed up ten minutes later, even though she lives a good fifteen minutes away. Somehow she had found the time to cut eye holes in a brown paper grocery bag, which she wore over her head. Why she didn’t find that embarrassing is beyond me.
She chatted the entire way to the old Berkey barn, but the combination of mask and bag made it impossible to decipher a single word. I nodded and smiled at regular intervals and that seemed to keep her happy. To my knowledge she didn’t even ask what I was up to, but her muffled cry of joy when I said good-bye made me a tad nervous. Two thousand dollars was as much as I was willing to contribute to Melvin’s hopeless campaign.
At any rate, I was relieved to find my car exactly where I had left it, and in the same condition. I patted my Beamer lovingly—a sin, I’m sure—and spoke aloud to Little Freni.
“Ready to take a spin, dear?”
Little Freni purred. She loves my car almost as much as I do.
We got in and, after carefully negotiating the stubble in the field, pulled out on the highway just behind, of all people, Lodema Schrock. I will confess now that what I did next was purely of the devil, but I must hasten to explain that I have long since repented for the error of my ways. At any rate, just to irritate my clergyman’s meddling wife, I inched my car as close as I could to her rear bumper without actually touching it. One tap on her brakes, and our vehicles would have kissed, but I knew Lodema would never allow that to happen. She was, after all, a control freak. Besides, we at Beechy Grove Mennonite Church don’t believe in overpampering our pastors, and I knew that Buick meant as much to her as my Beamer meant to me.
Sure enough, when Lodema saw what I was doing, she floored it. Unfortunately for her, the pastor’s old Buick has about as much oomph as a satiated man, and I was able to maintain my distance. From what some of my guests have told me, drivers in both Carolinas would have been proud.
Lodema was livid. She turned to look at me, her face as white as a Longhorn’s breast. I could see her lips moving, but thanks to the roar of her engine, I couldn’t hear a word. How blessed, I thought, to go through life being unable to hear one’s enemies—or in Susannah’s case, a money-siphoning sister.
Finally, when I thought both she and the old car were about to blow gaskets, I dropped back and, when the gap was right, passed her with as much ease as I might have passed an Amish buggy. Of course, I couldn’t resist looking back with a gloating grin. Who knows, I may even have stuck my tongue out at her.
Perhaps it was Divine retribution but I noticed my turnoff in the nick of time. I had to do some fancy steering to get my Beamer on to Augsberger Lane in one piece. The pinging of gravel against my newly waxed finish was like a volley of stones striking my soul.
“Darn!” I said, which is as bad as I can swear. “Darn, darn, darn!”
Lodema Shrock leaned on her horn as she passed on the highway behind. No doubt the Mennonite Women’s Sewing Circle was in for a few chuckles at my expense.
Needless to say, thanks to my headache and a pockmarked car, I was not in the best of moods when I pulled into the Troyer drive. Therefore, I prayed for a Christian tongue. If the Good Lord did not see fit to give it to me— well, then it is really His fault, isn’t it?
Gertrude Troyer was on her hands and knees in her front yard weeding her dahlia bed. The Amish may be plain people, but they have an appreciation for the beauty of creation. Still, kneeling in a flower bed seemed a little too fancy to me.
She looked up suddenly, startled to see me, and for a second I thought she was going to bolt. Had she, I would have been flattered. After all, a fierce reputation is better than none. But Gertrude quickly composed herself and continued to weed as if I weren’t there.
I got out and approached her. “Your husband anywhere around?”
She pulled a dandelion out with its root intact, a feat which impressed me. “Do you see him?”
Her caginess impressed me even more. “That isn’t the question I asked, dear. Is he around?”
She refused to answer.
“Fine. I’ll find out for myself” I trotted off in the direction of the barn.
“Miss Yoder!” She was a spry little thing and caught up with me after I’d gone only a few yards. “Miss Yoder, it is not right that you should—ach, what is the word— barge, yah? Barge into our farm. It is illegal, no?”
“No. I’m not barging into anything. I’m merely looking for a neighbor.”
She grabbed my right elbow with her dirt-stained hand. “But the barn you will not go into.”
“Says who?” I said as I started for the barn.
She grabbed my arm with both hands and tried to restrain me. She was surprisingly strong, but not nearly as devious as I. A hard kick to her shins and I was free and running.
“Jacob!” Gertrude yelled. “Jacob!” Fortunately she has a thin high voice that didn’t carry at all well.
I raced for the barn, ignoring the horse and buggy parked outside the closed main door. The horse whinnied as I approached, and it was only then that I realized Jacob must have company. Why hadn’t I noticed the horse before? Jacob, like any Amish man, would never leave a horse hitched unless he was intending to go somewhere momentarily. Besides, the buggy didn’t belong to the Troyers. Not that it mattered now. Magdalena on the warpath is as unstoppable as a German panzer, if I may be permitted to use a very unpacifist analogy.
The barn door was not locked, but it was heavy. I’ve been opening barn doors all my life, and I knew to throw my shoulder into the act. It slid open smoothly, so smoothly that I took Jacob by surprise. In fact, I caught him right in the act of taking money from another man. It looked to be an enormous amount of cash.
I gasped, not at the size of the wad—I’ve seen bigger before—but upon recognizing Jacob’s companion. It’s hard to say who was more surprised, the men or I.
Needless to say, I found my tongue first. “Benjamin Keim! What are you doing here with Jacob Troyer?”
Elam and Seth’s father looked as pale and rigid as Freni might have, had the Almighty chosen to smite her for blasphemy. His arm remained extended, his hand still clutching the cash. Only the blinking of his eyes convinced me I wasn’t looking at a statue.
As for the drop-dead gorgeous Jacob, he recovered the instant I said his name. He turned to me, just as calmly as you please, his full lips arranged in the most seductive of smiles.
“Good morning, Magdalena.” His voice was like that of a cat purring, not out of contentment, but from a need to be fed. “It is good to see you.”
“I wish I could say the same,” I snapped.
“You look upset, Magdalena. Is there anything I can do to help?”
I laughed bitterly. “Well, you could come right out and confess. That will save me oodles of time. Maybe even a few gray hairs.”
“What should I confess?”
He smiled again, and just seeing that smile made me feel a need to confess—if you know what I mean. It took all my inner strength to look at his shoes while I spoke.
“You can confess to supplying the young people in this county with drugs.”
As you well know, I don’t swear, but if I did, I’d swear that even Jacob’s shoes smiled. What’s more, the man seemed to read my mind.
“Ach, such an imagination! And what is this you say about drugs?”
“Don’t play stupid with me, buster. That’s drug money passing hands right now.”
“If you must know, Magdalena, the money Benjamin is giving me is for a horse. A plow horse. Is that not right, Benjamin?”
“Ach!”
I had no trouble looking above Benjamin Keim’s shoes. He had too much Yoder blood cruising through his veins to jump-start my hormones.
“Benjamin,” I said sternly, “at least have the decency to admit to your crime. Buying drugs for your sons is horrible enough. Don’t add a lie to your sins, it may break the camel’s back.”
His blue eyes thawed, becoming the pale watery pools I was used to. “Elam was right. You speak in riddles. What is this camel’s back?”
“Forget camels!” I shrieked. “Just admit that you are buying drugs from this creep!”
Benjamin hung his head but said nothing more. “Well, Miss Yoder,” Jacob said smugly, “you are not so right about things as you think.”
I studied his laces. The left one had a knot.
“So straighten me out.”
“Well, from what Benjamin tells me, his sons came to him this morning and told him that you had given them uh—uh—”
“An ultimatum?”
“Yah, maybe that is the word. So now Benjamin comes to me and wants to give me this money so that I stop selling these drugs to his sons.”
I looked up, too angry to lust. “So you admit it! You do sell drugs!”
For the first time I could see that what I had once thought of as a seductive smile was nothing more than a smarmy smirk. I could stare now straight into Jacob’s eyes, and not feel the slightest quiver in my loins.
“Yah, I sell drugs,” he said almost casually. “There is much more money to be made with drugs than with farming. And do not think I keep all this money, Magdalena. I give very much to the widows’ fund, like a good Christian, yah? But the farming, I must do a little so the people do not become too suspicious.”
“Shame, shame, shame! And you call yourself a Christian!”
He blinked, and had the nerve to look crestfallen. “But I am a Christian.”
“True Christians,” I shrieked, “don’t corrupt teenagers! True Christians aren’t drug dealers.”
He shook his once handsome head. “Ach, but I take care of these kids. I make sure that the drugs I sell them are pure.”
“And that’s Christian?”
“Perhaps you don’t understand, Miss Yoder. The world has come to Hernia. These children, they will take drugs anyway. So I protect them. I buy the drugs they want from a good source, and I myself test them.”
“Well, bully for you! Maybe we should erect a statue in your honor.”
“Ach, no!” He may have been a drug dealer, but he was still Amish enough to be horrified by the very thought of a graven image.
“That was sarcasm, dear.” I stepped confidently forward. “You know I’m going to have to turn you in.”
“But my boys,” Benjamin cried, “you will turn them in too?”
I turned from Jacob to face Benjamin and nodded reluctantly. “Yes, but I promised them that if they cooperated—which they obviously did—I’d do everything in my power to see that the law took it easy on them.”
“You have such powers, Miss Yoder?”
I smiled encouragingly at the boys’ father. “I’m not saying they won’t go unpunished, but I will make it clear to the judge that they cooperated and were instrumental in Jacob’s arrest. I’m sure some sort of plea bargaining can be arranged.”
“What is this plea bargaining?”
“Well, it’s like this,” I said, and fell flat on my face in the straw at Benjamin’s feet.