Chapter Eight

“You know Ben?” Deputy Aiden asked.

“Very well,” I said. “He was like another nephew to me. We heard . . .” I swallowed. “We heard that he was caught in the fire.”

Deputy Aiden’s thick hair peeked out from under his sheriff’s department baseball cap, and his brown eyes were tired. I wondered what time he had awakened to rush to the fire.

Deputy Aiden frowned. “You said he was like a nephew to you, so he’s no real relation?”

“He’s relation enough,” Lois said. “He moved to Holmes County from the village in Michigan where Millie lived. He even stayed with her until he got on his feet.”

Deputy Aiden didn’t comment further on our relationship. “How did you two even get this close to the barn?” he asked. I knew that he was avoiding answering my question. I supposed he felt he couldn’t tell me because Ben and I weren’t “real” family.

“Deputy Little let us through the line,” Lois answered. “I told him about Millie’s connection to Ben. He let us right in.”

Deputy Aiden scowled, and from the look on his face, the younger deputy was going to get a talking-to about protocol around active fire scenes.

“It wasn’t Deputy Little’s fault,” I said. “We may have suggested that I was his actual aenti.”

He raised his brow. “You lied?”

“Millie would never lie,” Lois exclaimed. “I may have exaggerated.”

Deputy Aiden shook his head.

“Please,” I said. “Ben is a nephew to me. He helped me take care of my ailing sister in Michigan. I consider him my kin.” I took a breath. “Please tell me what has happened.”

“I’m sorry, Millie,” the kind deputy murmured.

That’s all he had to say to confirm the rumor, and I faltered as the wind was knocked out of me. Ben was so young and had his whole life in front of him. A life with so much to look forward to. He’d told me the day before that he would be twenty the next week. It was a terrible loss, and the type that made me wonder where Gott was in all of this. I closed my eyes and said a silent prayer for peace. It was all that I could ask for because I was afraid there would be no understanding why Ben was taken from this earth so soon.

Lois linked her arm through mine. “If you can’t stand, I will hold you up,” she whispered. “Just like you have held me up countless times.”

I couldn’t look at the smoldering flea market. Instead, I turned in the opposite direction, pulling Lois along with me. Across the road from where the flea market stood was a pasture. Dozens of beef cows dotted the hillside, quietly chewing on the grass. They had no idea what was happening on the other side of the street. It made me wonder how many people were going about their own days, happily or unhappily, unaware of the suffering around them. Not knowing was a gift of sorts. It would be too much to absorb all the suffering in the world. However, when it was your personal suffering, you could only marvel at the fact that the world did not stop and take notice of what you had lost.

Ben had been a gut, hardworking young man. He just wanted to make his way in the world. He had always been cheerful, even when life was difficult for him. I could not imagine why Gott would take a life like Ben’s from this world so soon. The world needed earnest young men like him. It all seemed like such a terrible waste. I knew it wasn’t my place to question Gotte’s ways, but even so, there were so many questions in my heart.

“Millie?” Deputy Aiden asked in a gentle voice as he joined us looking at the pasture. “Are you all right? Do you want Lois to take you home?”

It was a good question. I would have loved to go home to my cat and goats, but I knew I couldn’t now. I owed it to Ben to find out what had happened.

“Millie, do you need to sit down?” Deputy Aiden asked.

I shook my head and straightened my spine. Even with my determination to appear strong, I was grateful to Lois for not letting go of my arm. “Nee, can you tell us what happened?”

“You’re not his next of kin,” Deputy Aiden said.

I couldn’t lie to him. “I’m not, but I am the closest thing he has to it in Holmes County. He has family in Michigan.” Ben’s letter came to mind, and specifically the line in it where Ben had hinted that he had had some sort of falling out with his district.

“If you aren’t real family, Millie, I can’t tell you what happened. I’m sorry.” He said this as if he really was sorry.

Lois let go of me and put her hands on her hips. “Sure, you can. We are your best source for learning more about Ben. Isn’t that what you want?”

Deputy Aiden gave her a look. “You’re right, but if my sheriff found out I spoke with you, I could be in real trouble.”

“We would never tell Sheriff Marshall,” Lois said. “Not to put too fine a point on it, but I detest that man and make it my goal to avoid him.”

“Lois,” I said.

She shrugged. “I know what I think, and I say what I think. He’s not kind to the Amish, and my best friend just happens to be Amish. I can dislike him if I want to.” She stomped her foot as if she needed to drive her point home.

I shook my head and turned my attention back to Deputy Aiden. “How did you know that it was Ben you found?” I pressed my lips together. “I suppose in a fire that it can be hard to tell.”

He sighed. “Ben was easily identifiable. I know I shouldn’t be telling you this, but yes, I do need information about him in order to investigate the case. He didn’t have any burn marks on him. He died from smoke inhalation.”

I let out a breath. I don’t know why, but that made me feel better. Ben was still gone, but I shivered to think of him, or anyone, being burned alive. Just the thought of it made my stomach turn over.

Deputy Aiden smiled at me kindly, as if he knew what I was thinking.

“Where was he in the building?” Lois asked. “From the looks of it, the back of the building was what caught on fire.”

Deputy Aiden nodded. “It was, and the back is almost a complete loss. I didn’t tell Waller this, but I would be surprised if the entire building isn’t condemned and has to come down. As for Ben, he was in a small office by the front door. We are lucky the fire didn’t burn that part of the building too. It came very close, and there is certainly smoke damage. The fire spread fast. There is a lot of dry timber and hay in these old barns, and they go up like kindling.”

“Did he have a means to escape?” Lois asked. “Was he trapped in that room?” She shivered. “I can’t imagine how awful that would be.”

“That’s one of the issues we are struggling with. Ben could have gotten out if he wanted to. There was a window in the room. He could have smashed it and easily climbed out to escape the fire, but from what we can tell, not a single thing in the office was moved. The door was never opened, the window never even cracked.”

My brow wrinkled. That didn’t make any sense at all. Something must have been in the way to stop Ben from making his escape. He wouldn’t have just sat there and waited for the fire to reach him. I couldn’t believe that. “Where was Ben in the room?” I asked.

He frowned as if he were debating whether or not to tell me this next bit. “He was lying on the floor. His head was on a pillow, and he was under a blanket. It appears he was asleep.”

“Asleep?” Lois shouted. “In the middle of a raging fire?”

Deputy Aiden nodded. “That’s what it looks like.”

“How could he sleep through that? A fire that large must have made a terrible noise.” I folded my arms around myself.

“That’s what I would like to find out.” Deputy Aiden squinted as the sun came out from behind a cloud. “From all evidence, he was sleeping when the fire struck, and it appears that he never woke up or had a chance to escape.”

“Could he have been dead before the fire?” Lois asked.

Deputy Aiden removed sunglasses from the breast pocket of his uniform and slipped them over his eyes. “It’s possible. The coroner will have to make that determination. I saw the body, and as far as I could tell, there was no injury on him. It could have been something internal that killed him.”

“Like poison?” Lois asked.

Deputy Aiden eyed her. “Poisoning is not as common as the mysteries in books and on television shows would have you believe. Now, I did my part in telling you what happened. It’s your turn. Tell me more about Ben. It seems to me the people we have interviewed know very little about him. I can’t tell if they honestly don’t know, or if they simply don’t want to speak to me about him because they are Amish and I’m a cop.”

“How were you able to identify the body?” Lois asked. “If no one admits to knowing him.”

I cringed at her question, but it was something that had to be asked.

“Ford Waller, the man that you saw me speaking to a few minutes ago, is the owner of the flea market. He identified the deceased as his night guard, Ben Baughman. Other than knowing who Ben was, he wasn’t much help in telling me about him. He said that Ben told him he was renting a room from an Amish family and didn’t have relatives in the area. That’s all he knew.”

“He’s renting from the Keims,” I said. “The family with the Christmas tree farm.”

Deputy Aiden’s brow went up. “I know it well. Emily Keim works for Bailey.”

I nodded and realized that I should have remembered that. Bailey King was the owner of the popular Amish candy shop in Harvest, Swissmen Sweets. She owned and operated it with her Amish grandmother, Clara King. Bailey was Deputy Aiden’s girlfriend. They had been together for a long while now, and everyone in the village wondered if they would ever get married, but no one more than Deputy Aiden’s mother, Juliet Brook. The Juliet Brook of the comfort pig. Even amidst the sorrow nearly consuming me, there was a small spark of joy about this town and this community. Ben had seemed happy here, too, certainly more so than he’d been in Michigan. My word, I could not believe he was really gone! My eyes welled up, and it felt like a buggy was parked on my chest.

“So it’s Emily and her husband I should be speaking to,” Deputy Aiden mused aloud, oblivious to my thoughts.

“Doesn’t it seem strange to you that an Amish flea market should need a night guard?” Lois said. “Ben died because that was his job, but I don’t think in all the time I’ve lived in Amish Country that this town ever needed such a precaution.”

“It is unusual,” Deputy Aiden admitted. “I’ll admit that. I don’t know of any other business in the county—Amish business, I mean—that has a guard like this.”

I held the corner of my apron the way I did when I was a child. Realizing what I was doing, I dropped the apron and stood a bit straighter. “Ben said it was because things were being stolen from the flea market at night. After he was hired, he chased off would be robbers on two occasions.”

“This was never reported to the sheriff’s department. Had it been, I would have known about it.”

I shrugged. Deputy Aiden and I both knew the reason for that. The Amish who rented space at the flea market would have been made uncomfortable had the police been on the grounds.

“Who broke into the flea market? When were they here? What do you know about this?” Aiden’s tone sharpened.

“I—I don’t know much. I don’t even think Ben knew,” I added. “He just said that he thought they were young men. I asked him if they were Englisch or Amish, and he couldn’t say anything other than they were wearing Englisch clothing. I don’t think he even saw any of their faces. They realized there was a guard at the flea market, and they left.”

“How could he have been sure they were intent on robbing the flea market?”

I shrugged. “I know that’s not a great deal of help.”

“Okay,” Deputy Aiden said. “What did they want to steal, or what did they steal last time, assuming that it was the same group of young men?”

I frowned. “Ben didn’t say that either. I didn’t think to ask, but I wasn’t at the flea market to learn about his work. I just wanted to check on him and see how he was getting on before he went to his next job.”

“What job was that?”

“Stocking shelves at the market. He worked so many places. He was always busy.”

The deputy rocked back on his heels. “How many places was he working?”

“Four,” I said.

“Why so many? I know the Amish take pride in hard work, but that seems a lot even for the Amish.”

“He was just starting out here and wanted to earn money. He was living alone for the first time in a new place. There were many expenses, and he didn’t know that many people. I would have helped him, of course, but he didn’t want to take charity. I could barely convince him to stay at my home for a few weeks before he found a more permanent place to live.”

Deputy Aiden nodded as if he were considering my explanation.

“Deputy?” I began. “If Ben died from smoke inhalation in the fire, was it an accidental death?”

“Or murder?” Lois blurted out.

Deputy Aiden looked at us both in turn. “Would either of you know a reason someone would want to hurt Ben?”

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Lois on the verge of speaking. Since I was afraid she might say something about Tess, I shook my head. I didn’t want to bring Tess into this just yet. The poor girl would be distraught as it was when she heard about Ben, if she hadn’t already. It would be no help to her to have the police arrive on her doorstep asking questions about her relationship with Ben.

A man in coveralls waved at Deputy Aiden.

He nodded at the man and turned to us. “Ladies, thank you for your help. Now that I know where Ben has been living, we have a good place to start. I have to go, and . . .” He looked at us both. “I would ask you to leave the area. This is a crime scene until otherwise stated and a dangerous one at that.” He walked away.