The Prodigal Son Returns

The Englischer, Bram Lapp, climbed out and headed for the barn.

“Ach, it’s that man who was here yesterday. He must want to talk to Dawdi again.”

She went back to her hoeing, but found herself working with only half her mind on the weeds.

Why was he here? He said he wasn’t going to pick up the horse until next week. And a buggy? It just didn’t fit with what she knew of the Englisch. Ja, she remembered, he wasn’t really Englisch, but if he wasn’t, then why was he still wearing Englisch clothes? But the Englisch didn’t drive buggies. When they drove a horse it was with a wagon or cart, not an Amish buggy. And if Dat was right and he was trying to become part of the community again, then why was he still wearing Englisch clothes?

Ellie gave a vigorous chop with the hoe that took out a dandelion and three bean plants. She was thinking in circles again. She stopped hoeing and sighed. Dat had asked them to welcome the man, but Ellie’s first reaction was to ignore him, just as she ignored all Englisch.

Ja, he was friendly and attractive. But so Englisch.

She tackled the weeds again.

The Englisch were just like these weeds. If you gave them a chance they might choke a person, distract them from the Amish life—the Plain life. She had seen it happen to other people who had opened themselves to their Englisch neighbors, but it wasn’t going to happen to her family. It didn’t matter that this man wanted to become Amish again. The Englisch influence was like a dandelion root: you could try to chop it out, but if you left even a little bit, it would grow again and take over. How could a person turn from one to the other?

Ellie moved to the next row. The squash vines were healthier than the beans. Once they grew a little larger, they would cover the ground with their broad leaves, and the weeds would lose their hold. That was what she loved about her life. Peace, order, community—the Ordnung—were a protective covering that kept worldliness from taking root. Once she got rid of these few small weeds, the squash vines would grow unhindered through the rest of the summer.

* * *

Bram headed to the buggy he had left outside the barn humming “Blue Moon” under his breath. He stopped with a soft whistle. If he wanted to keep on John Stoltzfus’s good side, he’d have to forget those songs for a while. In fact, he had a lot of habits from Chicago that would have to go, but that was part of the job.

John had given him some good, sound advice about the farm he wanted to buy. The man really knew his business. He’d answered Bram’s questions for almost an hour and never seemed to be in a hurry. The older man’s excitement about the prospects the farm held made Bram wish...what? That he wasn’t just buying it for a cover? That he could build it into the kind of place he could be proud of?

Bram stopped, resisting the urge to look back at the barn. With someone like John Stoltzfus around, he’d be able to make something of that farm. Who knew—with someone like John, maybe he could even make something of his life.

He pushed the thought away. Too little, too late. With any luck, he’d find Kavanaugh and be taking off before midsummer anyway.

When Bram reached the hitching rail, the two children at the edge of the garden caught his eye. That little girl was the one from yesterday. She was pretty cute when she wasn’t screaming her head off. He chuckled as he watched her try to catch a butterfly that danced among the flowers.

His breath caught when he saw the mother. Dressed in brown again today, Ellie had her back to him. He was glad he wasn’t one of the weeds she was hoeing. He’d never survive an attack like that. Her movements were brisk, businesslike, but at the same time Bram found himself caught up in the rhythm of her slim form as she worked.

How did she manage, raising her children without a husband? Bram understood the loneliness of living alone, but to add the responsibility of children to that was beyond him.

Bram found himself drawn to her like a butterfly to a flower. He shook his head. No, he couldn’t get involved with a woman like that. A woman like that meant home, responsibilities, commitment. A woman like that deserved better than what he could ever give her. A woman like that would be too hard to leave when his job here was over.

But still, he couldn’t ignore her. They were going to be part of the same church, the same community. They could at least be friends.

The little girl’s laughter carried toward him on the warm breeze, making his decision for him. He had to get to know her somehow.

* * *

A man’s laugh broke through Ellie’s thoughts, and her stomach flipped when she recognized the Englischer’s voice behind her. There he was again! That man was as persistent as a dandelion and much more dangerous.

He squatted next to the children at the edge of the garden, smiling as Danny held up a grubby fist full of wilted weeds and babbled at him. Susan, usually the one to hold back, had her hand on his knee, ready to add her part of the story.

Ellie gripped her hoe. She needed to stop this now, before he wormed his way into their lives, but how?

Bram turned to Susan, laying his hand on hers as he said something that made the girl giggle. Ellie’s breath caught at the rapt expression on Susan’s face. Somehow the man had broken through her shyness. She smiled as Susan laughed again and gave Bram the dandelion she held in her hand.

Ellie gave herself a mental shake. Ach, what was she doing? What nerve that man had, going behind her back to push his Englisch ways on her children!

Ellie dropped the hoe and hurried to the edge of the garden. She scooped Danny up from the ground and took Susan’s hand.

“Come, children, it’s time to go into the house.”

“You don’t need to take them in. Susan was just telling me about her pet chicken.” He smiled at her daughter, his hand resting on the girl’s shoulder. “She likes animals, doesn’t she?”

“As long as they aren’t horses.”

Bram’s dimple flashed, and Ellie started to return his grin before she caught herself. His face was so open and friendly, his blue eyes deep and inviting, his smile intimate as he watched her.

As lovely as a dandelion blossom in spring, she reminded herself. Lovely and insidious, with the ability to turn the whole garden to weeds. With an effort she held her shoulders a little straighter.

“I must take the children in now.” She kept her voice controlled and polite, then turned and walked away from him. Her face was burning. She hated to seem so rude, but an Englischer was an Englischer, and her job was to protect her children, wasn’t it?

The back door of the little house was safely closed before she let herself look through the small porch window. The man—Bram—stood where she’d left him, watching. Why did she feel as if she had taken the hoe to one of her squash plants instead of a dandelion?

“I like that man,” Susan said. “Can he come back again?”

“We’ll see. Let’s wash our hands, and then you can play with Danny while I make a pie for supper.”

Susan climbed onto her stool and pulled at the small hand pump that brought water to the kitchen sink.

“He’s a nice man.” She wiggled her fingers under the running stream.

“Ja, I guess.”

“He isn’t afraid of horses.” Susan’s eyes grew large as she said this. “He told me Dawdi’s horse isn’t scary, and he’ll let me pet it.”

“When will this be?”

“Next week. He said he’ll come back and I can pet Dawdi’s horse.”

Ellie dried Danny’s hands and set him on the floor.

“Susan, take Danny in the front room and help him find the cows.”

Ellie rubbed at the spot between her eyes where a headache was threatening. How had he convinced Susan to look forward to petting a horse?

Movement out by the garden drew her eyes to the window over the sink. He was leaving. She watched until the buggy left the drive and turned into the road. How dangerous was he? Ellie tucked a loose strand of hair under her kapp. Well, he was Englisch, wasn’t he?

Wasn’t he?

She got out a mixing bowl to make piecrust, then dug into the flour canister with more force than she meant to. Flour spilled onto the counter and floor, wasting it. Ellie bit her lip as tears threatened to come.

Why was a simple thing like making a piecrust so hard? Nothing had been right since Daniel died.

Ellie wiped up the spilled flour. She had to keep everything balanced, normal.

What was normal, anyway?

Just do what needs to be done; keep to the routine. That was something she could do. It was when something unusual happened that her life tilted.

That Englischer. He upset everything.

Ne, that was unfair. He was just the little nudge that sent her stack of balanced plates teetering. It wasn’t him; it was her own fault.

Ellie crumbled lard into the flour with her fingers and then added an egg and a teaspoon of vinegar.

Her thoughts found their familiar rut and followed it stubbornly. Her pride had urged Daniel to buy the extra land. The extra land that needed more work and new, green-broke horses.

Her pride, her hochmut, had caused her to plead with Daniel, to force him to see things her way. She had wanted the larger farm, and she had urged him to buy the new team so he could work more land. If she had just kept to her place, listened to him...but no, she had to keep after him until he agreed to her ideas. If it hadn’t been for her nagging, he never would have bought that half-trained team.

The half-trained team that spooked easily. Too easily. A loose piece of harness, a horsefly bite, a playful barn cat... She’d never know what had set them off that day. All she knew was by the time she’d reached the barnyard with Susan, Daniel was already under their hooves, his body broken and bloody.

Her stubbornness had cost her the only man she had ever loved.

She worked the stiff dough with her hands until it was ready to roll. The rolling pin spun as she spread out the crust.

Ach, ja, the punishment for her disobedience had been bitter.

But now, wasn’t she sorry? Hadn’t she prayed for forgiveness? Gott had to be pleased. What more could she do? She went to church, wore her kapp, followed the Ordnung...

The piecrust was a pale full moon. Ellie eased it off the wooden breadboard and laid it on the pie plate.

She must try harder. The Ordnung, the church rules, was there to keep her close to Gott. She just had to obey them perfectly, and everything would be all right.

No matter how handsome that Englischer Bram Lapp happened to be.

She knew what was most important.

The crust eased into the pan. She trimmed the edge with a knife and then crimped the edges with her fingers. Neat. Perfect. And empty.

* * *

Bram swayed with the buggy, letting the clip-clop of the horse’s hooves set the pace of his thoughts. He’d known moving back to Indiana wouldn’t be easy, but he’d never expected to plunge into a pool with no bottom. Nothing was the way he remembered it. The life he knew as a boy on his father’s farm held none of the peaceful order he had found here.

From the simple white house nestled behind a riotous hedge of lilacs to the looming white barn, the Stoltzfus farm was the image of his grossdatti’s home, a place he thought he had forgotten since the old man’s death when he was a young boy. A whisper of memory rattled the long-closed door in his mind, willing it to open, but Bram waved it off. Memories were deceptive, even ones more than twenty years old. They covered the truth, and this truth was that he had a job to do. Grossdatti and his young grandson remained behind their door.

But a question snaked its way up Bram’s spine. What would Grossdatti say if he could see his grandson now? Bram cast a glance down at the dust caked in the perfect break where his gabardine trousers met his matching two-toned wing-tip shoes. Fancy. Englisch. Twelve years as one of Kavanaugh’s boys had left their mark.

Was it those long-forgotten memories that kept bringing him back to the Stoltzfus farm? He liked the family. John seemed to be on his side, ready with advice, but the older man was almost too trusting. He’d hate to see what the Chicago streets would do to a man like that.

That little girl. Now, she was something, wasn’t she? Bram smiled. When she wasn’t screaming in terror, she was almost as pretty as her mother.

The smile faded. The mother. Ellie. She was worse than a bear defending her cubs. He had to get past that barbed-wire barricade she threw up every time he tried to talk to her. There was something about him that rubbed her the wrong way. If he figured that out, then maybe she’d be more civil.

Something else he couldn’t figure out was why he cared so much.

Bram chirruped at the horse to try to quicken its pace, but it had only one speed. The drive into Goshen was slower than he remembered, and it took even longer when he had to stop for a train at the Big Four Railroad crossing. The people in the cars stared at him as the train rumbled south toward New Paris and Warsaw.

Oh, what he wouldn’t give to trade places with them. But it would be no use. The mob would find him, even if he went as far as Mexico. No, it would be better to keep on course. He’d run across Kavanaugh eventually, then Peters and the bureau would do their job. Maybe Mexico would be a good place to think about after that.

The train disappeared around the bend, and Bram urged the horse up and over the tracks, then on into Goshen.

Main Street was still the same as it had been when he was seventeen. He let out a short laugh at the memory. He couldn’t believe he had once thought of this place as a big city.

There was something new. He pulled the horse to a stop in the shade at the courthouse square and stared. On the corner of Main and Lincoln, right on the Lincoln Highway, stood a blockhouse. A limestone fortress. A cop behind the thick glass had a view of the entire intersection.

Bram tied the horse to a black iron hitching post and then snagged a man walking by. “Say, friend, can you tell me what’s going on? What’s that thing?”

The man gave him a narrow look that made Bram aware of how out of place his expensive suit was in a town like Goshen. “That’s our new police booth. The state police built it to keep an eye on the traffic through town and to keep gangsters from robbing our banks.”

“What makes them think Goshen is their target?” If the state police were working the same angle as the bureau, it sounded like Peters had good reason to think Kavanaugh had come this way.

“You remember back in thirty-three, when Dillinger stole weapons and bulletproof vests from some Indiana police facilities?”

Bram nodded. Oh, yeah, he remembered. Kavanaugh had gloated about that coup for weeks, even though he hadn’t been in on the heists.

“Well, one of those police armories is east of here a ways, and the other two are just south of here, along State Road 15.”

Bram looked at the street signs. He had just driven into town on State Road 15.

“To get to any of those places from Chicago, the gangsters had to drive right through here, right through this intersection and right past our banks. And then when Dillinger and Pretty Boy Floyd hit the Merchant’s Bank in South Bend a couple years ago, we decided we had to do something to protect our town.” The man nodded toward the policeman in the booth. “All he has to do is radio headquarters, and this place will be swarming with troopers.”

“So does it work?” Could one cop in a blockhouse discourage the plans of a gang intent on robbing one of these banks? One lone cop wouldn’t stop the gangs he knew.

“It must.” The man gave Bram a sideways look before walking on. “We haven’t seen any gangsters around here.”

Bram had heard enough. He walked across the street and found a spot outside a barbershop on Lincoln two doors from the corner, next to the stairway that led down to the ground-floor establishment. His favorite kind of lookout. Have a quick cigarette, watch for a while, make sure he knew the lay of the land before making his move. He shook his head. He was here legitimately; he didn’t need to take these precautions. But still he lit his cigarette, bending his head to the match sheltered in his cupped hand. Habit kept him alive. The bank could wait ten minutes.

He watched the quiet town, pulling the smoke into his lungs. Traffic in Goshen’s main intersection rose and fell like the waves on North Beach. Businessmen, lawyers and shopping housewives followed the traffic signals with none of the noisy chaos of the Chicago streets.

He threw the cigarette butt on the ground and screwed it into the sidewalk with his toe. Time to talk to the man at the bank. He took a step away from his cover, but slid back again as a Packard drove by on Main, heading south at a slow cruise. Bram watched the driver. No one he recognized, but he’d know that Packard anywhere. It was Kavanaugh’s.

But the big question was, what was he doing here? Bram waited, watching the cop in the blockhouse. He was no fool. Even though the Packard was out of Bram’s sight, he could tell the cop was following its progress through town.

Bram counted to fifty—enough time for the Packard to make a slow cruise around the block and come back. Would he come back, or was he cruising through on his way to Warsaw or Fort Wayne?

The Packard eased into view again, slowing to a halt at the traffic signal. Bram stepped farther into the shadow of the doorway when he saw Kavanaugh clearly in the backseat of the Packard and Charlie Harris in the shotgun seat. They didn’t look his way, but kept their eyes on the blockhouse. The cop inside leaned into his radio microphone just as the signal turned green. The Packard roared north, back toward South Bend.

It looked as if that police booth worked. Bram gave a low whistle. He never would have believed it if he hadn’t seen it. Maybe Kavanaugh wouldn’t think hitting this place was worthwhile. Maybe they wouldn’t be back. Maybe Kavanaugh would keep heading east, and Bram could get out of this backwater and leave the past behind him for good.

Bram looked at the two banks, sitting diagonally across the intersection like two fat, stuffed ducks. Kavanaugh leave these two beauties alone just because of some cop?

Yeah, and maybe there were snowball fights in hell.

Chapter Four

Bram backed Matthew’s team into place early Wednesday morning, watching as they felt their way past the wagon tongue and stopped just as their tails met the singletree. This was a well-trained team, all right. He’d do nicely to look for one as good. That would be another day, though. Today he was looking at equipment at the auction house in Shipshewana.

The farm’s price had been lower than he expected, and he had needed to use only about half of his cash reserves. There was plenty left over to buy whatever else he needed to complete his cover.

He climbed into the wagon seat and then steadied the horses as they shifted, eager to be off. Now he had to wait for Matthew. That man spent so much time with his wife—if Bram didn’t know better, he’d think they had been married for only a few days instead of nearly a year.

His Dat had never spent more time in the house than he needed to. The house and kitchen were Mam’s place, and Dat stayed in the barn or the fields. Whenever Dat was in the house, Mam crept around as if she was walking on eggshells, but it didn’t do any good. It didn’t matter how hard she tried—she could never do anything good enough for Dat.

He rubbed his chin as Annie’s laughter drifted through the morning air. Mam and Dat had never acted like these two, that was for sure. He couldn’t remember ever hearing Mam laugh, or seeing her smile, but Annie brightened up every time Matthew walked in the door.

“Sorry,” Matthew said, finally reaching the waiting wagon.

“You’re sure Annie will be all right?” Bram laid on the sarcastic tone in his voice, but Matthew didn’t seem to notice.

“I think she’ll be fine for the day.” He picked up the reins, and the horses leaned into the harness with eager steps. “Mam is coming over later to help her get ready for tomorrow’s sewing frolic.” Matthew grinned at Bram. “Annie’s really looking forward to it.”

Matthew’s excitement was so contagious, Bram couldn’t help his own smile. He could do with a bit of whatever made his brother-in-law so happy.

“Giddap there, Pete. Come on, Sam.”

“You say this auction is big?”

“Ja, for sure it is. Every week, too. It’s one of the biggest in the state, and people come from all over.”

Bram shot a glance at Matthew.

“From all over? Englischers, too?”

“Ja, some Englischers, especially these last few years with the hard times. But mostly Plain folk—Amish, Mennonite, Brethren.”

Bram shifted his shoulders. His new Plain clothes felt comfortable, something that surprised him. He rubbed at the right side of his trousers, where he had inserted a pocket holster under the seam last night after Matthew and Annie had gone to bed. His pistol rested there, out of sight but not out of reach. Who knew who could be hiding in a crowd?

As they drew closer to Shipshewana, the traffic got heavier, and by the time they turned onto Van Buren Street, they were part of a line of wagons, buggies and cars headed for the field behind the sale barn. Matthew pulled the horses up at a shady hitching rail at the edge of the field. Auctioneers’ voices drifted out of the barn, quickening Bram’s heartbeat with their cadence.

“It sounds like things have started already.”

“Ja, the livestock auction started at six o’clock. The equipment sale starts at nine, so we’re in plenty of time.”

“Good. I’d like to look things over before the sale starts.”

Matthew led the way to a line of plows, cultivators and other farm equipment outside the sale barn. The first thing he needed to do was to plow his fields, then plant. Matthew said he’d loan Bram his team, but time was pressing. This work should have been done a month ago.

“Here’s a good-looking plow.”

Bram ran his hand over the seat of the sulky plow. The paint wasn’t even chipped. The blades had a few scrapes, but the whole thing looked new.

“This one hasn’t seen much use, has it?” Matthew walked around to look at the other side. “It’ll go for a pretty penny.”

That didn’t bother Bram. He had enough money for anything up for sale here.

“Good morning, Bram. Matthew.”

Bram turned to see John Stoltzfus heading their way. John’s familiar face sent a pleasant nudge to Bram’s senses, and he smiled. He couldn’t remember the last time being recognized didn’t send him reaching for his gun.

“Are you looking for a plow, Bram?”

Even though John’s voice was friendly, his question merely curious, Bram’s nerves arose. He did a quick check of the crowd around them. Everyone seemed to be focused on the auction and farm equipment. He turned his attention to John.

“Ja. I’m getting a late start on the farm, and I need everything.”

“You’re planning on buying all the equipment you need?”

“Well, I need a plow first. I’ll start with that.”

“It looks like you might have found one,” John said, taking a look at the sulky plow. “But don’t buy everything at once. You have neighbors, you know. I have a harrow you can use.”

“And you can use our planter,” Matthew said.

John turned to Bram. “All you need to do is let the church know, and we’ll have your whole farm plowed, planted, cultivated and harvested before the day is over.”

Matthew and John both laughed at this. Bram wanted to join in, but caution nagged at him.

“Why would you do that? Why would you loan me your equipment?”

“You’re one of us, son.” John’s words came with a puzzled frown. “Have you been gone so long that you’ve forgotten our way? How we work together?”

Forgotten? This wasn’t part of his memory of growing up here.