A Deadly Shaker Spring (12 page)

Along with the other sisters, Rose exited the west door of the Meetinghouse, steeling herself for what might be waiting. The grounds were quiet and empty. The world had withdrawn, but it had left a mess behind. The Believers spread out along the front wall of the Meetinghouse to inspect the damage. One window was shattered, and five shiny red-purple splotches dotted the white paint, chipped by the impact. The sticky substance dribbled to the ground. Rose counted five piles of broken glass, the remains of quart canning jars.

Like the others, Rose bowed her head for a few moments in silent prayer. One by one, the Believers scattered to attend to the practical problems of repair. The Meetinghouse was the spiritual core of their village and must always be clean and well maintained. The brethren, under Wilhelm's charge, went in search of white paint and brushes, while the sisters gathered
cleaning equipment and scooped up the sticky broken glass.

Rose's immediate concern was of a different sort. She was puzzled by the incident. It seemed tame compared to rats in the schoolhouse and the attack on Sarah, but maybe the point was to keep up the pressure on the Shakers. If Hugo was right—and everyone agreed that Hugo's sense of taste was phenomenal—then their own raspberry preserves had been stolen with vandalism in mind. Apparently a fair amount of advance planning had gone into these ongoing incidents.

Rose wanted to know who had done this and why. She remembered reading an excerpt from Agatha's journal. Hadn't there been an incident much like this mentioned in passing? She made straight for the Trustees' Office, leaving the sisters to guide themselves in the clean-up effort.

As she passed her office, she noticed Sister Charlotte, along with all nine of the children being raised by the Shakers, camped out in a circle on the floor. Of course, the children had been at worship. They'd be terrified. She hated to delay her mission, but she poked her head in the open door. They seemed to be playing a game, led by Charlotte. Far from terrified, they were giggling and clapping their hands. Bless Charlotte, what a godsend.

Rose began to withdraw, but Charlotte saw her and signaled her to wait. Turning the children over to Hannah, one of the older girls, Charlotte hurried to the door.

“I took the children out the back door after worship,
and we all ran over here. Is it safe to take them out? Is all well?”

“Under control, at least,” Rose said. “Tell me, Charlotte, when you all ran here, did you see anyone?”

“Yea, indeed. We saw a car speeding out of the village toward Languor, going so fast it was stirring up a dust storm. I remember because it was the only car on the path. Everyone else must have left as soon as the trouble began.”

“Do you remember anything about the car? The color, who was in it?”

Charlotte frowned. “Brown, I'm sure, but that's all I can tell you about the car itself. I'm just dreadful about cars. They still scare me. Oh, I do remember it was quite dirty, and it looked old, not like ours. There were two people in it, but I couldn't see them well, what with all the dust they were kicking up. The passenger did look like a woman, though.”

“A woman!”

“Yea, at least that was my impression. I thought I saw piles of hair, like one of those old-fashioned hairstyles.” Charlotte was still young enough to show a curiosity about the changing fashions of the world.

“Do you need my help with the children at the moment?” Rose asked. “You seem to have them calm and happy. I doubt there's any danger to them now.”

Charlotte glanced back to see the children concentrating on their game, and she seemed to relax. “All right, Rose, if you say so. I'll just hope that their resilience rubs off on me. We'll be fine.”

Rose picked up her skirts and sprinted up the stairs
to her retiring room. She grabbed Agatha's 1910 journal from her small built-in cubbyhole and thumbed the pages impatiently. There it was, just as she'd remembered:
Sister Martha reported this morning that two dozen jars of plums are missing from storage . . . Not two hours later the brethren found them, smashed to pulp against the barn
. Rose knew just what Wilhelm would say if she showed him this passage—merely a coincidence. But her tingling skin told her it was more.

Samuel was lugging two cans of white paint to the Meetinghouse when Rose located him.

“I need to speak with you,” she said.

“Could it wait an hour or two?” Samuel indicated the pails of paint.

“Nay, I'm afraid your memory may fade. Go ahead and deliver the paint, but the brethren can do the job without you. Then come to the Herb House. I'll be waiting in the drying room, and we can talk without prying ears nearby.” She didn't dare direct him to the Trustees' Office, for fear the children were still in her office.

In no hurry now, Rose strolled alone to the Herb House, breathing in the freshness of the spring air. With its sudden explosion of new buds and sweet smells, spring always astonished and delighted her. She regretted any tension that spoiled her pleasure. Spring, she'd always thought, reflected God in an expansive mood, and she was grateful.

The Herb House—a two-story white clapboard building—stood well back from the path cutting through the center of the village. As Rose climbed to
the second-floor drying room, she almost regretted her choice of a meeting place. Memories flooded her mind, memories of Gennie Malone, who had been like a daughter to her and had left the Society to live in the world. They'd spent many happy days in this room, Gennie's favorite, hanging herbs to dry from rafters and drying racks, spreading the smaller herbs on screens, and stuffing the dried products into small tins for sale to the world.

Rose shook her head at herself. Regrets were pointless, and one never knew the future. Gennie might come back someday. In the meantime, it wouldn't hurt to visit her at the Languor flower shop where she now worked. She might have overheard bits of gossip that could point Rose toward whoever was behind these incessant attacks on the Society. Rose had mixed feelings about Gennie's friendship with Languor's deputy sheriff, Grady O'Neal, but perhaps the two of them could be helpful.

The drying room was nearly bare of herbs now. Over the winter, everything had been packed and sold. To Rose's surprise, no one had yet tidied up. Bits of twine and broken dried herb sprigs littered the floor. Not enough hands to do the work, Rose thought with sadness. She lifted a flatbroom from one of the pegs lining the walls.

She had nearly finished sweeping the litter into a pile when she heard slow, heavy steps on the stairs. Samuel peered into the room, reluctance showing on his thin, weathered face.

“Ah, Samuel, come in and sit down.” Rose beckoned him to the worktable under the east window.

Samuel hesitated, then seated himself across the
long table from her. Leaning forward, he interlaced his strong, knobby knuckles on the table. He stared at them, avoiding Rose's eyes.

Rose laughed aloud, and he glanced up, startled.

“Samuel, please do relax. You look so solemn. I'm not about to pronounce sentence, I promise you.”

“Sorry, Rose,” he said. But his expression remained grim.

“I saw you leave the service,” Rose said. “I want to know who has been doing all this to us, and why. Tell me what you saw when you ran outside. Who was in the car?”

Samuel clenched his fingers. “I couldn't see them clearly.”

“Samuel, do you know who is responsible for these incidents?”

“Nay,” he said, shaking his head, “not for certain.”

“But you have a suspicion.”

“Rose, I wouldn't want to accuse—”

“No one is asking you to accuse. We've known one another for many years. Trust me that this is important. Tell me your suspicions. Please, Samuel. The safety of our village may depend on it.”

To her surprise, when Samuel raised his eyes again, they glistened with tears. He slouched back in his chair and stared out the window.

“There is so much more I need to tell,” he said, his voice low and husky. “So much that I've never told.” With a deep sigh, he sat up straight and faced Rose.

“I was asked to be elder before Wilhelm was chosen. Did you know that?”

Rose nodded. Agatha had told her that Samuel had refused the invitation without explanation. More than once, both Agatha and Rose had regretted the second choice made by the Lead Society in Mount Lebanon—Wilhelm Lundel—and had longed for Samuel in his place.

“Was there something in your past that stopped you from accepting?” Rose asked. Despite her compassion for Samuel's obvious pain, she felt excited as she anticipated finally hearing the answers to questions that went back many years.

“Yea, my past,” Samuel admitted. “I never confessed, you see. I could not accept a position of spiritual leadership, hear the confessions of others, knowing my own sins festered inside me.”

“If there is something you need to confess, now is your chance to redeem yourself, Samuel. To free yourself.”

Samuel nodded slowly. “Yea, it is time.” With a deep breath, he began. “I believe that what is happening to us now began more than thirty years ago. It was 1904, and I was a young brother. I'd found my way to the Society just a few months earlier, and I thought nothing could shake my faith. Life is so simple at that age. You make up your mind, and you think,
That's that
. You believe completely in your own strength of will.”

For the first time, Samuel smiled, a wistful half-smile. “Innocent hubris,” he said, “yet hubris all the same. You see, that autumn a young woman arrived in North Homage, a widow with a young son. Her name was Faithfull.”

He seemed to have drifted decades into the past and become lost in his memories.

“Faithfull,” Rose mused. “Why does that name sound familiar to me?”

“Her full name was Faithfull Worthington.”

“Worthington! Richard's mother?”

“Yea, though they had little contact. You would only have been a child when Faithfull arrived, and she did little with the children. It pained her, she said, because of giving up her own child.” Samuel ran his hand over the notched surface of the worktable. “She was such a tender soul, you see. But strong in body and will.”

“Samuel, did you . . . love her?”

He nodded slowly. “Yea, I loved her. We loved each other. She was gentle, giving, some said weak, but I believe she only gave more than most.” Samuel's face crumpled in pain. “It was my fault, my weakness. And I compounded my own sin by never confessing. I stayed, lived as one of the brethren all these years, but I'm not worthy. I never had the strength to confess.”

“Samuel, you are confessing now.”

He raised his eyes, red and hollow. “There is more,” he said.

“Tell me.”

“We were together. We fell into the flesh. More than once, to my eternal shame.”

Rose schooled her face to show no reaction. She felt little shock—it was a familiar story to her—but great sympathy. She had known love in the world, and she understood its power.

The creak of a floorboard startled them. They had
been so absorbed that they'd failed to hear footsteps ascending the stairs.

“What is this? What is going on here?” Elder Wilhelm's deep voice cut across the room from the landing just outside the drying-room door.

During the summer and fall, when herb bouquets hung upside down from every available hook and board, Wilhelm could not have seen them across the room. But now, they sat exposed. And exposed was just how Rose felt. She told herself sternly that she was eldress now and engaging in the work of an eldress.

“Well?” Wilhelm demanded, as he entered the room. “I'll ask thee again, what is this secret meeting? What has happened between thee?”

“Wilhelm!” Rose allowed shock to show this time. “You are imagining things. I assure you, there is nothing going on here that shouldn't. I have asked Samuel if he has any insights into these recent attacks on the Society.”

“Attacks, hah! They are nothing but the feeble efforts of a feeble world to sap our strength. If they have an importance, they are a subject for the Ministry only. Nay, there is more here, and I demand to know it!”

Rose glared at Wilhelm in stony silence, while Samuel watched his whitening knuckles. The elder's hard eyes glittered with the power of righteous indignation.

“There is only one other reason for a secret meeting between a brother and an eldress,” he said, turning to Rose. “Samuel has confessed to thee, has he not?”

Rose squared her shoulders. “You have interrupted his confession. If you will excuse us, he needs to continue.”

“He should confess to me, his elder.”

“Perhaps so, but he felt comfortable enough to do so with me.”

“This is unacceptable.” Wilhelm's voice approached sermon strength.

“A precedent has already been set,” Rose pointed out, “and you are the one who set it.”

Wilhelm's face reddened. Rose had silenced him by reminding him that Sister Elsa made a habit of confessing to him, rather than to her eldress. But Wilhelm was never quelled for long.

“Samuel, come with me,” he commanded. “The brethren need thy help. We'll discuss thy confession later.”

For a moment, Rose thought that Samuel would defy him. She willed him to do so. He lifted his face to her and sat still. But as she watched, his eyes flooded with pain and pleading, and she knew she had lost him. He stood and followed Wilhelm out of the room.