Plain Killing (14 page)

Mary Aaron flew by the car and threw open the back door. “Get in!” she screamed.

Rachel twisted around to see Hannah, in a school uniform, scrambling into the backseat.

“Go! Go, now!” Mary Aaron shouted, leaping into the car.

As Rachel shifted into gear, the third figure materialized in front of the car. A man in a skullcap.

“You better get out of that car!” he bellowed, passing the driver’s side door, slamming his hand on the window.

As Rachel hit the gas, she glanced up in the rearview mirror to see Mary Aaron struggling to close the back door. “No, you don’t!” she hollered.

“Don’t let him in! Don’t let him get me!” Hannah screamed.

As Rachel pulled away from the curb, she heard the man cry out, then the slam of the back door. “Lock the doors!” Mary Aaron ordered.

Rachel hit the lock button on the door, screeching tires as she pulled away down the dark street.

“Faster!” Hannah insisted.

Rachel speeded up, glancing in the rearview mirror. The man had started to run after them down the middle of the street, but now he was slowing down. Giving up. “Where are we going?” She gripped the wheel. “Back to the hotel?”

“Not until we’re sure we’ve lost him,” Hannah said. Her voice was tremulous, her breath coming in quick gasps.

Rachel flew through an intersection, not entirely sure where she was, although she knew that Canal Street and their hotel were still on the right. “Should I call 9-1-1? Find a policeman?”

“Best not,” Mary Aaron said grimly. “She wants to go home.”

Rachel clutched the wheel as she peered through the murk. Here and there, faintly, ghostly illumination from closed business windows and streetlights shone feebly through the fog but did little to help her see where she was going. Cars and trucks, construction cones, and trash cans parked willy-nilly on either side of the street didn’t help. From the backseat came the sounds of Mary Aaron whispering and Hannah softly weeping.

“Do you want me to drive to the airport?” Rachel asked.

“We can’t go on the airplane,” Mary Aaron said. “She doesn’t have identification. She doesn’t have anything.”

At a traffic light, Rachel turned right and then right again, onto the brighter, broader Canal Street. She glanced in the rearview mirror again. “He’s gone.”

Twenty minutes later, they were safely back in their hotel room.

Hannah—petite, sandy-haired, gray-eyed—was still pretty and plump. In the uniform she barely looked sixteen. Except, maybe, for the bright lipstick.

It was hard to believe this young woman who’d run away from her traditional upbringing and found her way south to New Orleans had gotten herself admitted to a private girl’s school. She’d spoken barely a word since they’d left the car, not to explain who she believed was chasing her or where she’d been all this time.

Mary Aaron followed her into the bathroom, and Rachel heard the shower running. When the two emerged a half hour later, Hannah’s hair was pinned up and she was wearing one of the two nightgowns Mary Aaron had brought. The school uniform had vanished; Rachel suspected it had gone into the dry-cleaning bag that her cousin stuffed into the trash can.

“Will someone tell me what’s going on?” Rachel asked.

She was so tired that she could barely keep her eyes open. She couldn’t remember when she’d last had a decent night’s sleep. But she was overjoyed that her wild-goose chase had paid off. They’d found Hannah, and from all appearances, she was eager to go home with them to Stone Mill.

Hannah crawled into one of the beds and buried her head under the pillow.

“She doesn’t want to talk about it,” Mary Aaron said. “Tomorrow, we will decide what to do. For now, we rest.”

Rachel had volunteered to take the pullout couch in the sitting room, and she was too weary to pursue answers tonight. They’d sleep, and then they’d eat breakfast, and then maybe she’d get some of the answers she wanted. She had assumed that falling asleep would be the least of her worries, but sleep didn’t come easily. She kept remembering the man chasing Mary Aaron and Hannah and couldn’t stop her mind from going places she didn’t want to go. What if Mary Aaron hadn’t slammed the door on him? What if he’d gotten into the car? And Beth Glick was never far from her thoughts.

Yet they’d done what they set out to do. In a few hours, she’d start to put everything into perspective. She’d insist that Hannah tell her why she’d needed them to come for her, and she’d ask if she knew anything about Beth’s whereabouts for the past two years. And she’d call Evan to tell him that they’d found Hannah and were bringing her home, if not by plane, then, she supposed, by car. She could just keep the rental and drive home.

Not what she’d planned, but then, when did her life ever go as she’d planned?

Neither Hannah nor Mary Aaron stirred until after nine the next morning. Rachel left them drinking coffee from a courtesy pot in the room and went downstairs to request that the rental car be brought to the front door. She’d valet-parked.

“Give me fifteen minutes,” she told them as she left the room, “and then meet me in the lobby.” She was eager to call Evan to tell him that they’d found Hannah and she was safe, but she didn’t want to talk to him in front of Mary Aaron and Hannah.

She found a bellhop to call for her car, checked out, and then found a secluded nook in the lobby from which to ring Evan. “You’re not going to believe this,” she said when he answered. “We found Hannah. She’s with us.”

“You found Hannah?” he repeated, obviously dumbfounded. “How . . . Rachel, I . . .”

“I know. Divine intervention? Anyway, I can’t talk now. Hannah and Mary Aaron will be down in a minute. We’re getting ready to leave the hotel. I just wanted to let you know that we’re driving back to Pennsylvania.”

“Driving? Why aren’t you flying?”

“Hannah has no ID, so we have to drive.”

“I can’t believe you found her.” He still sounded stunned. “She okay? How the hell did you find her? I haven’t heard back from Larry on the trace.”

Rachel pressed her hand to her forehead, honestly not sure how to answer the question of whether or not Hannah was okay. “She’s not hurt. The short version is that Hannah called the B&B again last night and Hulda gave her my cell number. We picked her up in the French Quarter. Wherever she was, she just walked away. Or ran.”

Rachel glanced toward the elevator. Someone was coming down. “I need to go. Hannah seems unhurt, but she’s scared to death. She insists we get out of New Orleans as soon as possible. I think she believes that someone may come after her.”

“Does she know anything about Beth or Lorraine?”

“I don’t know anything yet. She hardly said two words last night. She didn’t have anything with her, not even a purse, and she was wearing a schoolgirl uniform: knee socks, Mary Janes, and way too much red lipstick.”

“A
school uniform?
”

Rachel lowered her voice, even though there was no one nearby. “Like what a grade school girl would wear: white blouse, plaid skirt, navy tie. Evan, it was . . . very odd.”

The elevator opened, and Mary Aaron and Hannah stepped out into the lobby. Both were dressed in Amish clothing, Hannah’s hair tucked beneath Mary Aaron’s
kapp
and her cousin’s head covered with the blue scarf.

“I have to go,” Rachel said into the phone.

“Rachel, I don’t like the idea of—”

“I have to go, Evan. I’ll try to call you later.” She hung up and turned to greet them with a smile.

Fifty miles northeast of New Orleans, Rachel pulled off I-59 and into Timmons’ Family Restaurant. Hannah hadn’t said a word since they left the hotel that morning, and she remained quiet through breakfast. After they finished a meal of eggs, bacon, and pancakes, she excused herself to go to the ladies’ room. Rachel watched her walk away and then murmured to Mary Aaron, “Do you think she’ll come back? Maybe you should go with her.”

Mary Aaron shook her head. “She’s not going to run away. She wants to go home,” she said, switching to Deitsch.

Rachel thought for a moment. “Why now? Why not six months ago? Why not a year ago, when she first left?”

“I think she was being held against her will. I get the idea that it’s only been over time that someone, whoever was holding her, loosened the reins.” Mary Aaron set her utensils around the rim of her plate, one at a time. “None of it matters now. She’s safe. Her family will take her back if she makes confession before the church.”

Rachel wanted to think Mary Aaron was referring to the more minor sins an Amish woman in the English world must have committed. But she knew that wasn’t what they were talking about. “What does she have to confess?”

Her cousin gave her a look that said nothing and everything, a gaze so innocent and yet wise in the ways of the world that Rachel stared at her in surprise. “She didn’t say, exactly, but I think bad people kidnapped her.” She glanced in the direction of the ladies’ room. The hallway remained empty other than a stout woman dragging a reluctant and whining three-year-old toward them. “They made her do things . . .”

“With men?” Rachel crumbled her napkin as her eyes clouded with tears. “You mean—”

Mary Aaron gently raised a palm to silence her question. “I told you that she didn’t say. Best not to dwell on evil. It is the good thing about our faith—a woman or a man can turn his or her back on sin and be welcomed into the bosom of the church. Whatever happened to her or didn’t happen, the water of baptism will wash away the sorrow and guilt.”

Rachel sunk back into the bench. What Mary Aaron was saying was true. The Amish faith was one of complete forgiveness for those who repented of their sins. The community would embrace Hannah Verkler and wipe away the years that she had been separated from them. If an English girl had suffered what Rachel suspected had happened to Hannah, it would ruin her life. But the religion that many thought was so stern was based on love and the power of a soul to shine through the clouds of human frailty.

“Did she say how it happened? How did these bad men get her? Does she know anything about Beth? Did they take her, too? What about Lorraine?”

“She hasn’t said. We’re going to have to give her time,” her cousin advised. “When she is ready to talk, she may be willing to tell me how she left Stone Mill and how she ended up in New Orleans. But I can tell you right now, she won’t speak to the police. Not even to Evan. So don’t press her.”

“But if she knows anything about Beth’s disappearance or what happened to her, then—”

“You, above all, should know how stubborn our people can be,” Mary Aaron interrupted. “Try and force her, and you may never learn a thing. She’s grateful that you came for her, but she doesn’t trust you. She thinks of you as an Englisher.”

Rachel thought for a moment. “Last night, I got the impression she was afraid that someone would come after her. Do you think she’s really in danger?”

Mary Aaron shrugged. “Hard to say.”

“Do these men know where she’s from? Know her family?”

“I don’t know that, either,” Mary Aaron said. “I’ve been thinking about it, though, and I think it’s best if she doesn’t go home yet. In case the bad people know where she came from.” She looked up at Rachel across the table. “I was thinking that she could stay with you. At Stone Mill House. Just until she can square things with her bishop and elders. And maybe we can find out if she knows anything that could help us find out what happened to Beth.”

“She doesn’t want her parents to know she’s all right?”

“She wants to see her parents and let them know that she’s okay, but she doesn’t want the community to know yet. I have a feeling that once she’s baptized, she’ll leave Stone Mill. No one will ever find her again. Not the men she’s afraid of, not even the police. But for now, can you let her stay with you?”

“Of course. But if she doesn’t trust me, then why would she want to stay with me?”

“There’s nowhere else.”

“If I tell Evan she’s at the house,” Rachel said, “he’ll insist on speaking to her.”

“So don’t tell him.”

Rachel should have been surprised by her cousin’s suggestion, but she wasn’t. In the last two weeks, she’d learned a lot about Mary Aaron that she hadn’t known. “I can put her upstairs in my apartment. No one goes up there. And I think you’re right; no one in the community, Amish or English, should know yet.”

“Just us, Hannah’s mother and father, and her bishop.”

“That’s five people.” Rachel grimaced. “How do you keep a secret if five people know?”

“Six,” Mary Aaron corrected. “You’ll have to tell Ada. Nothing goes on in the house that she doesn’t find out.”

“Will she keep quiet?”

“As the grave.”

Rachel considered that thought. Mary Aaron was right. Ada was no one’s dummy. It would be impossible to hide Hannah in the house without her finding out, and if she did, she’d be hurt that they hadn’t trusted her enough to tell her.
Only among the Amish,
she thought. Give a secret to six Englishers and the whole county would soon know it. She smiled at her relapse into the culture of her upbringing. The Plain people had a tradition of keeping apart from the world and—if need be—from members of their own community. “I agree,” she said.

The restroom door opened, and Hannah emerged, looking like a daughter of the church, untouched by the outer world. The conversation between Mary Aaron and Rachel ended abruptly.

Mary Aaron began to make a show of stacking the dirty plates and gathering up the silverware. “
Goot
pancakes,” she observed, “but the eggs taste different. Maybe white chickens.”

“I’d better make the most of this stop.” Rachel got to her feet. “Ask the waitress if we can have iced tea and pie to go. Once we get on the road, I’d like to make time.” She smiled reassuringly at Hannah as she walked past her into the ladies’ room.

From the bathroom stall, Rachel called Evan again.

“Where are you?” he asked.

She closed the lid on the toilet seat and sat down. “In Mississippi. We stopped to get something to eat. I think we’ll drive until I get tired. I’m hoping we can make Virginia today. We’ll stay somewhere tonight and drive the rest of the way tomorrow.”

“What did Hannah tell you?”

Rachel closed her eyes. What Mary Aaron suggested had happened to Hannah was beyond an Amish mother’s worst nightmare. Beyond any mother’s nightmare. “Nothing. Mary Aaron says she won’t talk to me. She doesn’t trust me.”

“But she called you.”

“Because I have a phone, I imagine. I don’t know. Right now, she’s not talking to me. Just to Mary Aaron and only a little.”

Evan groaned on the other end of the line. “Does she know anything about Beth?”

“I don’t know,” she repeated, trying not to be annoyed. “Mary Aaron thinks we need to give her some time. She may be able to tell us something in a few days.” Rachel considered what she was going to say next. A part of her thought she should bring Hannah home and never say a word about what Mary Aaron had told her, but another part of her . . . What if Lorraine was in the same kind of danger Hannah had been in? What if these men had been the same ones who had taken Beth?

“So you’re trying to tell me that Hannah calling you from New Orleans has absolutely nothing to—”

“I think she was kidnapped,” Rachel interrupted.

“What?”

“I think she might have been kidnapped and taken to New Orleans.”

“Was she kidnapped from Stone Mill?” he asked, incredulously.

She continued on her own train of thought. “I think she was being held there, Evan, and made to—” She couldn’t say it.

He was quiet for a moment. Then he said, “She was wearing a schoolgirl’s uniform and lipstick?”

“Yes,” Rachel said.

“Rachel . . .” He hesitated. “What we might be talking about here is the sex-slave trade.”

Rachel took a deep breath. “I know.”

“You have to try to find out what you can,” he said.

“I know.” She stood up. “I need to go. They’ll be coming to look for me.”

“You said she was in the French Quarter?” he asked.

“Yes.”

“Okay. I think I’ll give the local police a call. Maybe even check with the FBI. See what I can find out.”

“I have to go,” Rachel repeated.

Evan was quiet on the other end of the line for a second. “Stay safe.”

“I will.” She disconnected and stood there for a moment. Then she heard the bathroom door open.

“We’re going to step outside to get some air.” It was Mary Aaron. “Meet you at the car.”

“See you in a minute,” Rachel called.

 

After dropping the rental car off and picking up Rachel’s Jeep at the Harrisburg airport, they arrived in Stone Mill after dark on the following day. Once in the valley, they drove Mary Aaron home, leaving her at the end of her lane. Mary Aaron hugged them and promised to come over as soon as she could. Hannah got into the front passenger’s seat.

Rachel and Hannah then headed for the B&B. They were traveling along Buttermilk Road, which connected much of the Amish community to the town, when Hannah surprised Rachel by speaking up. “Could you stop? Here?”

The girl had barely spoken to Mary Aaron since they’d left New Orleans the day before, and to Rachel even less. Hannah had seemed to be hardly aware that anyone else was in the car.

“Sure.” Rachel braked immediately, thinking maybe Hannah was carsick. She’d had a touch of it earlier in the day. “Are you feeling bad?”

“
Ne.
I—I just want to get out here. Just for a minute.”

Rachel looked over to see Hannah staring out the window into the darkness. The only thing nearby was an Amish school. “You want to stop here?” Rachel asked. “At the schoolhouse?” She eased onto the shoulder.

Rachel wanted to ask why, but something made her keep her questions to herself, for once. The thought that Hannah might have changed her mind about coming home and intended to run passed through her mind. But what could Rachel do? She wasn’t holding Hannah prisoner. Rachel suspected that someone else had already done that, and she couldn’t do anything to break down the tentative bonds of friendship they’d formed.

Rachel slowed the car to a crawl as she turned into the steep driveway lined with tall evergreens. Summer vacation hadn’t ended yet, and weeds clogged the rutted lane. Rachel could barely make out the one-room schoolhouse in the headlights, but directly ahead, a homemade swing hung from a big oak tree. Just beyond stood a seesaw hewn from a single pine log.

Hannah slid out. Rachel was torn between following her and waiting in the car so as to give her privacy. She stayed put and lowered her window. Fortunately, Hannah didn’t go far. She walked over to the homemade rope-and-board swing, sat down on it, and pushed off. Minutes passed as Hannah swung in the dark. A mosquito buzzed around Rachel’s head, and she swatted at it. Another five minutes. Hannah hadn’t done anything but swing.