Page 39 of The Hidden One

“I think they sent someone down the well,” I tell him.

“Huh.” Noncommittal, then, “Interesting.”

“Any idea what they’re looking for?” I ask.

He looks around to see if anyone has noticed him talking to me. “Not sure,” he says, without looking at me. “I was on patrol when Sarge called and asked me to bring coffee.”

The tempo of the men’s voices rises. Deputy Vance makes eye contact with me then saunters over to the well for a look. I stick with him in time to see a man in a Tyvek suit being raised from the depths. He’s wearing a headlamp. Gloves. A face mask. Shoe covers. As if he’s expecting to encounter some kind of biological contaminant or evidence. Even more interesting is the fact that he’s carrying two small cardboard boxes.

What the hell is in the boxes and what does it have to do with Jonas? Does it have anything to do with the murder of Ananias Stoltzfus? More importantly, how did the sheriff’s department know to find it in the well?

I try to get closer, but I’m stopped by a deputy. I’ve lost track of Vance. I hang around a few more minutes, but the deputies and crime scene investigators are starting to break down the lights and generator. Whatever they were looking for, they found.

A few minutes later, I’m sitting at the big table in the kitchen, working on my second cup of coffee. Junior and Effie sit across from me, eating scrambled eggs and toast without enjoyment or enthusiasm, staring into their plates, unspeaking. Dorothy pours herself a cup of coffee from the old-fashioned percolator and joins me.

“Do you have any idea what the police were looking for?” I ask the question of no one in particular, knowing any one of them might have an answer.

Dorothy shakes her head. “No one would say.”

Reuben enters the kitchen. He’s fully dressed in trousers and a blue work shirt, single suspender looped over his shoulder. He doesn’t look at anyone as he goes to the counter and pulls a plate from the cupboard.

Dorothy starts to rise, but he raises his hand. “I’ll get it, Mamm.”

The Amish woman settles back into her chair, worried eyes moving from Reuben to me and back to her son. “Es is dunk-oiyah,” she tells him. There are eggs.

Without responding, he goes to the stove and shovels two eggs onto his plate. I can tell by his body language he’s still angry. That he’d prefer not to deal with any of us this morning. Likely, that he’s not proud of getting himself handcuffed and nearly arrested.

“I was just asking your mamm if she had any idea what the police were looking for,” I say to him.

He glances at me over his shoulder, sets down the spatula, and joins us at the table. “I shouldn’t have lost my temper,” he mumbles. Still not making eye contact with anyone.

For the first time I notice the abrasion on his cheekbone. The burgeoning bruise beneath his eye. And I wonder how much those deputies roughed him up. If they had cause.

Dorothy scoots a small bowl toward her son. “Es is gebacht brot un abbel budder zu.” There’s toast and apple butter, too. “Now eat.”

Reuben raises his gaze to his mother. “That deputy pushed you,” he said.

Dorothy waves off the statement. “I got in the way is all.”

Mouth tight, he snags toast and slathers it with apple butter. “They’re not supposed to do that.”

Junior sets down his fork. “I-I threw r-rocks into the well,” he blurts.

All eyes turn to Junior. The boy has stopped chewing. He sits stone-still, his eyes moving from me to his mamm to Reuben. “Melvin M-Mast said you can c-c-count the seconds between when you let go and it hits the water and f-figure out how deep it is. We w-wanted to know.”

Dorothy gives him a sympathetic look and pats his hand. “I don’t think the police are looking for rocks.”

“They were looking for bones,” Reuben says.

That gets my attention. “What bones?” I ask.

He shrugs. “I don’t know, but I heard the deputy say something about bones. When they lowered that light and camera. He was talking on the radio. To the guy down in the well.”

“Are you sure they weren’t talking about the bones in the field?” I’m keenly aware that Junior and Effie have stopped eating and that this isn’t the kind of conversation to have in the company of young children, especially when they know their father is in jail.

Reuben raises his gaze to mine. “He said the bones in the well.”

“Any idea who they belong to?” I ask. “Or who put them there?”