Blood of the Prodigal. P. L. Gaus

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СКАЧАТЬ porch and poured coffee for himself and Cal. “It’s wiser to be a historian than a prophet, Caroline,” he scolded.

      Caroline turned to Cal, taunting. “The Professor doesn’t like to be thought so predictable.”

      Cal held out his palms in mock surrender, laughed, and sidestepped the jab by pointing to Caroline’s loose stack of papers. “Another book?”

      “It’s a revision of a collection of children’s stories I edited a few years ago,” Caroline said. She stacked the pages on edge, laid the manuscript on the glass-topped patio table where she had been working, and joined them in white wicker chairs by the porch windows. The day had begun brightly, but now a front was coming in from the north. A cool afternoon breeze blew through the tall screens of the porch.

      The porch was more than spacious, running the entire length of the two-story brick colonial, extravagantly wide and screened on three sides, with windows stretching from floor to ceiling. Because of a gentle slope to the Brandens’ long back yard, the porch seemed to hover over the lawn, so that the Brandens and their guests enjoyed a spectacular view of the eastern hills and Amish valleys. In summers, the porch had come to be Caroline’s favorite place to work, and often, Branden would find her standing there, watching the hawks ride thermals, or gazing at the patchwork of Amish farms and fields in the distance.

      Caroline sat in an old-fashioned, low and wide wicker chair, her legs crossed casually. She peered at Branden and Troyer over a fresh mug of coffee. “You did take the case,” she said.

      “Wasn’t up to me,” Branden said. “The bishop made the decision. I just showed up for the interview.”

      “How’d that go?” Cal asked.

      “Slowly, as you predicted,” Branden said. “We toured Holmes County for over an hour before he asked anything about me.”

      “Typical,” Cal said.

      “Mostly we talked about the people and the farms we passed. In remote regions of the Doughty Valley. He showed me each of the family farms under his leadership. Named all of the children, parents, grandparents, land holdings, livestock, relatives, and relationships. Even courtships. Essentially, he introduced himself to me by detailing all of the district over which he serves as bishop. Eventually, he wanted to know about me. And Caroline. And whether we had any children.”

      Cal glanced at Caroline and saw the memory of her losses pass heavily across her eyes. Troyer and Branden exchanged glances, wondering how she would handle a case involving a child.

      Eventually Caroline asked, “Does he have a lot of children?”

      “Fourteen. Thirteen living,” Branden answered gently, grateful to see her strength. He wondered again, briefly, how he’d mention the Federal Express envelope to her. Wondered how she would handle the prospect of moving to the new university professorship he had been offered.

      He took a moment, turning his coffee mug in his fingers, sipping from it thoughtfully, and then said, “Actually that’s the whole point of this case. His children, that is. One of his sons, Jonah Miller, is dead to them, but still alive.”

      He glanced from Cal to Caroline, giving them a chance to think it through.

      “He left home?” Cal asked.

      “Shunned,” Branden answered, pointedly.

      “His own son?” Caroline said. “That’s hard to believe.”

      “He’s the bishop,” Branden answered. “If anyone in that district were to have been mited, the bishop would have done it himself.”

      “I would have hoped the mite was a thing of the past,” Caroline said.

      “He wouldn’t have had any choice,” Branden said. “He’s the bishop.”

      “Many of them would not so much as have spoken his name,” Cal added.

      “Then there’s more to this case than the custody of a boy,” Branden said. Cal and Caroline waited for an explanation. “Bishop Miller did actually speak his son’s name, once. At the end of our interview, Cal. He said something like, ‘It’s my son, Professor, who has the boy. Jonah E. Miller. He’s been lost to us for nearly ten years.’ Then he handed me this note.”

      Branden gave the note first to Cal. When Cal had read it, he passed it, disquieted, to Caroline. She read it out loud.

      Dear Father.

      I want my boy to see some of the world.

      You’ll have him back in time for harvest.

      Do not try to find us.

      Jonah.

      “Extraordinary,” Cal said after a pause. He ran the fingers of both hands back through his long white hair.

      “Because of the note?” Caroline asked.

      “Yes, but more,” Cal said. He slouched in his white wicker chair, his stocky legs out straight and crossed at the ankles, coffee mug balanced on his belly, eventually saying only, “There must be more.”

      “Agreed,” Branden said. “Let’s think it through.” He leaned forward, rested his elbows on his knees, and counted out each assertion on the fingers of his left hand. “First, the bishop put the ban on his own son, ten years ago.” The first finger went up.

      “Must have been good cause,” Cal said.

      “Indeed,” Branden said, and another finger went up. “Also, the bishop evidently thinks there’s good cause, now, to involve outsiders in this case.” A third finger popped up.

      Cal stood up, walked over to the large windows of the screened porch, ran his eyes out toward the far hills in the east, and said, “He’d not have mentioned his son, or have involved us in this case, if it were simply a matter of a father taking his boy for the summer.”

      “Precisely,” Branden said, and held up a fourth finger.

      “Whatever the reason, his Dieners would have concurred,” Cal said.

      “Right again,” Branden said, and lifted his thumb.

      “You’d think that if the bishop were really worried about his grandson, he would have gone to the police,” Caroline said.

      “They don’t trust them,” Branden said.

      “Partly,” Cal said. “More likely, they think it’s not yet necessary. They simply haven’t gotten to the point where they think that the police need to be involved.”

      “So,” Caroline said, “you’ve been asked to help the Old Order Amish find Bishop Miller’s grandson, who has evidently been taken for the summer by his father. The father was earlier shunned by his people. The note says that the boy will be returned at the end of the summer.”

      “By harvest,” Cal interjected.

      “Where’s the boy’s mother?” Caroline asked.

      “Dead, according to the bishop.”

      “Do СКАЧАТЬ