Finding Mercy

  Ella knew Grossmamm had other worries besides keeping Andrew and her safe. Though Grossmamm hadn’t wanted to put a damper on Seth’s special day, she had recently received a letter that her only daughter had breast cancer. Ella’s aunt Martha lived in central Pennsylvania and had two little ones, so she could obviously use some help. It sure said a lot about Grossmamm, Ella thought, that she was willing to try to save a man who had been a total stranger just two weeks ago, when her own daughter could use some help. Or was Grossmamm even more upset by the fact Martha had told her not to come?

  “You’ve been so brave through everything,” Andrew told Ella, leaning back on one elbow, facing her, soaking in the sun. He looked strange, wearing sunglasses he’d insisted on buying at a drugstore nearby. Ella knew they stood out around here in their Amish garb. Only a few other plain folk were on the beach, but it was a Monday and off-season. The Englischers basking in the sun and surf wore so little they looked stark naked to her. She just bet Andrew would like to shed his Amish clothes. If someone was a danger to them—and she knew Andrew feared that, since his eyes darted around behind his new sunglasses—would they be safer in modern dress—that is, undress?

  “Are you sure it isn’t time to conquer your past?” Andrew asked. “I’m working on mine, even if I’m doing a lousy job of it. I’m terrified half the time, but I’m still going to face my fears and testify.”

  “You mean for me to wade in?”

  “I mean go in, all the way—with me, of course.”

  “Oh, I couldn’t.”

  “As I said, you’re a very brave woman. Isn’t it time you put that drowning nightmare to rest and fight back like you did against your captor?”

  “I didn’t fight back. The Amish don’t fight back. I just escaped. And you tricked me into coming here today to pressure me to go in!”

  “You know you longed to see the beach and water. I’m not tricking you about anything, not anymore. I’m just hoping you trust me and want to get over your fear of water and drowning enough to go in with me. I think you said the fear of death is terrible, but you have faith the Lord will take care of you. He did, through Sarah and Hannah that day years ago, when you could have drowned. And now I’ll be there with you, holding you up. I’m a good swimmer.”

  “Were you ever a lifeguard, like you were a basketball guard?”

  “No, and don’t change the subject.”

  “You’re trying everything to get me to trust you.”

  “Please argue with yourself, not me. If you don’t trust me, you are a crazy woman to have left Eden County with me. I’m going swimming, even fully dressed as a Pennsylvania country cousin who probably learned to swim in a local pond there. If you come in the water with me, I will not let your head go under. I will not even let you have a panic attack. That has to be part of the struggle too, Ella.” He took off his shoes and hat, tossed his sunglasses on the blanket, squeezed her knee, got up and strode for the water.

  Ella watched him go. Tears blurred her vision of him, of the beach with the scattered people who were here on this hot day. She was perspiring already, but that was partly because Andrew always made her feel warm. Gripping her hands together, she felt the beginning of a panic attack. Why did he have to mention that? Could getting over her fear of the water heal her dark drowning attacks too? They weren’t caused by water most of the time. Dear Lord in heaven, she prayed, if I don’t swim with Andrew, will he think not only that I don’t trust him, but that I don’t trust You? I want him to learn to trust You.

  Her heart thudding in her chest, her hands shaking so hard her fingers fumbled with the laces, she took off her shoes and black stockings. Andrew was in waist deep now. In a big whoosh, he left his feet and floated on his back with his head still above water. She knew full well from the way he always looked around, even in Yoder’s Restaurant last night, that he was fearful of being watched, probably of being shot at again. He’d quizzed Grossmamm about the couple next door, but she’d said they were renting and she didn’t know anything about them, except what they could see: one or both of them were clowns.

  “And I’ll be one if I don’t go in,” she muttered as she got to her feet and started across the sand. It was hot. It burned her feet. Hotter than the hinges of Hades, Mamm would say if she were here.

  The wash of water was cool on Ella’s ankles and feet, so delightful, but the blood pounded in her veins. Trying to concentrate on the strewn shells washed up, she fought the swirling blackness that always threatened her when an attack began. Even in this bright sun, a panic attack! But she could fight that. An attack came from the outside, but she was strong inside. Andrew believed in her, and she was certain that worldly Alex did, too.

  He swam toward her as she went in, shin deep. Her aqua skirts clung to her legs. Andrew stood about ten feet away, the waist-deep waves cresting around him. She almost bolted back toward shore. She could not do this! He wasn’t reaching out for her. He wasn’t helping!

  A wave buffeted her, and her terror surged stronger. But it was now or never for her, with this water and with this man.

  The force of the next cresting wave stunned Ella. It was so different from the pond. But the water looked beautiful, a dozen colors of green-blue frosted with white foam. She bent her knees and rode the first wave. It wasn’t as high as some others. She still dragged her feet on the sandy bottom. Andrew came toward her, reaching out. She took his hand and held on hard, then his other hand touched her waist, helping to buoy her up.

  “I want to keep my feet on the bottom!” she told him, realizing she’d been holding her breath.

  “No fun that way. You’ll float. We’ll tread water. You’ve got to let go. Trust yourself—trust me.”

  “I do, or I wouldn’t be in here—oh!”

  Either the next wave lifted her or he did. Her feet—all of her—floated as she held on to the man she had not even known ten days ago but was now depending on with her life.

  His hands on her waist, hers on his broad shoulders, out in deeper water, they rode the waves together. It was as if they were so safe here, in the Gulf under God’s wide sky, but she saw Andrew turn to look ashore, scrutinizing the few others swimming, though none were near. He turned to frown at a man farther out, riding what she’d call a water motorcycle. He bounced along on the waves, straddling a machine that made a loud, grinding sound.

  Despite Andrew’s unease, feeling triumphant, Ella linked her hands behind his neck. That brought them closer together, rubbing against each other, up and down, around, pressed tight. Swiftly, Andrew’s attention was back on her. His knee slid up between her legs, tugging her sopping skirt with it so she almost rode him like a horse. He lowered one hand to cup her bottom to slide her even closer. Her body, her entire being sprang instantly alert with heat. Yet she shivered and her nipples pointed against his bare skin as the water parted his shirt to reveal a chest with curly, brown hair, and she felt so open to him and…

  Careful, Ella thought. Too easy to just let go, to pretend she was here with her Amish sweetheart, her husband, and that they had a whole life ahead to love each other in bed and out. To live in the Home Valley but visit here, to tend her lavender and sell it. To have children who would bless their home and—

  She got a mouthful of water and spit it out, coughed, so he set her back a bit but still held strong to her. She tried to rein in her emotions. She’d always been careful and practical while Sarah and Hannah were the dreamers, so why were things different now? Keep safe, keep Andrew safe, then pray for him when he had to testify against someone he had trusted who was now his enemy and maybe had sent someone to hurt him, kill him. She’d always known that dreams were real close to nightmares.

  What was that new sound? Not that same machine. They both turned to see a sleek, long-nosed boat bearing down on them, smacking through each wave. Had they floated too far out too? Surely the boater would see them in the water—or was that exactly what he had done?

  Andrew started kicking to get them
closer to shore. She tried to help. Pulling her right hand from clutching him, she dug into the water. Dog-paddling, Seth had called it when he’d taught her and Hannah to swim. But the boat was still coming so loud, so fast…

  “Take a breath!” Andrew shouted.

  She barely had time to suck one in. But they’d have to go down so far to keep from being hit by the boat! What if a deep current held them under? She hadn’t been afraid, since they were together, but—

  Andrew jackknifed into the water, taking her under with him. The old terror, drowning, being pulled downward to death…

  She held her breath, held tight to him, eyes closed against the sting of salt water and so she wouldn’t see that monster hit them. She hadn’t seen the other monster who took her captive. Andrew had said he never saw the face of the man in a black pickup truck who tried to shoot him in Atlanta. The black van that had pursued her: dark windows, so she hadn’t seen a face. A faceless enemy but so very terrible and real…

  Below the surface, a wall of water slammed them, but it wasn’t the boat. In bubbling white foam, they surfaced, both sucking air filled with gas fumes. Andrew swore under his breath.

  “Was that…” she choked out, gasping. “Do you think…they found us? Will they turn back for…another try?”

  “Just some stupid kid, I think,” he said, squinting at the boat as it roared away, spewing a big plume of white water. “Saw him—before we dove, but—I don’t think—he even saw us. Let’s get out. Salt water in the eyes or not, keep them open!”

  Their feet touched bottom, and they staggered toward the shore. A tanned man in a tight swimsuit with a shaved head came up to them as they walked out of the surf onto the sand. Andrew thrust her behind him, whether for safety’s sake or because her sopped clothes were clinging to her, she wasn’t sure.

  “Hey,” the man called to them, “glad you’re okay. I’ve seen that idiot before. I know you all don’t hold grudges, but you can report that to the Coast Guard. I’ll let you use my cell, if you want,” he added, holding out a thin, rectangular phone. “You just fill out a complaint, give your name and contact info, get interviewed later.”

  “Thanks for your concern,” Andrew told him, “but we’re fine.”

  Always fearful he would not sound Amish enough, even speaking English, Ella put in, “We just hope that bad boater doesn’t hurt anyone else. We appreciate your kindness, ya, we do.”

  “Sure. No problem,” he said with a nod as he started away. He called back over his shoulder, “I can phone it in, not give your names or anything. That stupid dude comes back, I’ll get a photo of him too!”

  They collapsed onto their blanket and began to dry off with their towels. “If that kid’s been around before, it’s hardly our enemy trying a new way to eliminate me,” Andrew muttered.

  She shuddered, partly from being chilled, partly from how matter-of-factly he’d put that.

  She repinned her hair, even as she realized her prayer kapp was gone. It was probably floating out there in the waves, but at least they were back on solid land now. And her thoughts about wanting a worldly, forbidden man—she was surely back on solid ground with that impossibility now too.

  * * *

  They decided not to tell Grossmamm what had happened, since it was an accident and not an attack. She didn’t need to be put more on edge than she already was over their hiding out here and her ill daughter. She’d been to the local store and had supper waiting for them as well as three adult tricycles she’d had delivered.

  Another blow to his ego and past life, Alex thought, as the three of them took a tour on the trikes around little Pinecraft that evening. In the prime of his life, Metro Man—who’d ridden in limos and loved big, solid cars—had been reduced to peddling a rented trike around like a kid or an old man.

  Alex judged the Pinecraft area to be over a hundred acres. Spread out in an oval around its grid of little streets, it boasted a park, which seemed a magnet for the few Amish and Mennonite in the “ghost town” this summer. People played checkers, shuffleboard and boccie under huge old Florida oaks with gray Spanish moss hanging off them like twisted hair. The old Pinecraft water tower, even at a little distance from the park, looked like the next tallest thing to the modern buildings of distant, downtown Sarasota. They saw a pair of bearded women—freaks, he supposed people called them—walking a tall, French poodle that had less hair than they did.

  “Probably retired circus performers,” Grossmamm said as they pedaled toward home. “Got lots of them around in the winter, like dwarfs, one lady with leathery skin like a snake’s. Sarasota was the home of John Ringling years ago, such a good place for his workers. The circus used to winter in these parts, then went up the beach a ways to Venice, but they’re all over this area too, especially retired ones. Only some here, because in the summer the circus goes on the road.”

  “But the renters next to us look too young to be retired,” Alex said. “And he keeps practicing, though I haven’t seen her.”

  “Maybe she keeps the house and cooks real good—I smelled something baking,” Grossmamm said as if that closed the conversation on that. Alex just nodded, but he winked at Ella as he caught the quick smile she sent him. He smiled back, but he couldn’t help but think the way Grossmamm Ruth stared at those freaks was just the way some outsiders stared at the Amish.

  He padlocked their trikes to the orange tree in their backyard, and they started inside.

  “Janus, they’re home!” came a woman’s melodious voice over the fence they shared in common with the renters. “You can stop twirling that baton long enough to go over with me!”

  Not too subtle, Alex thought. And the guy was twirling a baton now? But as a very attractive brunette, who, on closer range, he saw was heavily made-up with cosmetics, came around the end of the fence with a tray of something, Alex’s gaze was not riveted on her but on the man behind her. Not only was he twirling what looked like the collapsible baton like cops carried but his face was more painted than hers. A clown for sure, with a bulbous, red nose, exaggerated eyes, black-and-white face paint and what looked to be an orange Halloween fright wig jammed in one front pocket.

  “Sorry,” he said, collapsing the baton and sticking it in the other front pocket of his jeans. He also wore a purple sweatshirt that read in big, white script, Foreman’s Fabulous Circus. “I scare kids sometimes,” he said with a little shrug, “but didn’t mean to startle you or the ladies.”

  He swept Ella and Grossmamm an elaborate bow. Their neighbor thrust out his hand to Alex, who shook it.

  “Janus McCorkle here, and this is my wife, Patricia, known as Trixie. We thought you two might be on your honeymoon until we saw your chaperone here. Pleased to meet you,” he added with another bow as Alex introduced them all by name, trying to think how to explain their relationships and why they were here. Suddenly, the country cousin bit sounded all wrong.

  “Ya, they’ve been married quite a while—a year,” Grossmamm put in. Alex nearly fell over at her quick lie. “And they were nice enough to bring me along for a little while, but this really is my place here. I lost a good husband three years ago, but kept this cottage. Oh, what nice cupcakes, decorated for pretty, so good!”

  Alex saw each one was frosted and sprinkled to make a clown face with two huge jelly bean eyes. While the women clustered together admiring the baked goods, Janus said to him, “I’ve been with the Foreman Circus, as you can see. Broke my leg in a fall, so had to sit this winter out, and Trix was sweet enough to stay with me, when they would have taken her—an aerialist, you know, trapeze artist,” he said with a rocking gesture of both arms over his head as if he was being caught by someone else aloft.

  “Oh, ya, sure,” Alex said.

  “But I’m literally back on my feet now, and using the Foreman winter headquarters to practice, not far from here. We just rented this place,” he said with another sweeping gesture, “for a change of scene, since we miss the life—you know, touring.”

  ??
?I saw your costumes on the clothesline,” Alex told him. He was surprised how much he instantly liked the guy. Maybe it was the clown aura. Or maybe he was just plain starved to talk to a modern, as the Amish said, even one who was a huge stretch from anyone he’d ever known. The guy not only had a variety of facial expressions but several different voices he used, some low, some high. That alone make Alex want to smile.

  “Oh, yeah, the Keystone Kops outfits,” Janus said. “I like to clown for adults even more than kids, put a satirical bent on things, which is really easy to do in this day and age—politicians, financial disasters, corrupt bankers, Hollywood and government scandals.” His voice was low now, almost menacing. “You name it, I try to parade it and deflate it. Hey,” he plunged on, his voice more normal again, “I’d really appreciate it if you’d come see my new act tomorrow, Trixie’s too—give us an outside opinion. We’d be happy to drive you.”

  Alex had promised himself he would not trust anyone, but these people—longtime locals and clowns? Maybe it would even distract Grossmamm from her worries about her daughter.

  “If we wouldn’t be gone too long,” he said. “Things are tiring for my—my wife’s grandmother.”

  “No sweat—except ours,” he said with a smile and clapped Alex on the shoulders as if they were long-lost buddies. “It’s a real nice facility we’re hired to be caretakers of this summer, though I’d love to be out on the road. Just Corky the Clown—my stage name—in my costume and disguise, moving on, always moving on.”

  A fake name, costume, disguise, and the always-moving-on that Janus McCorkle, alias Corky the Clown, longed for, Alex thought, was exactly what he was trying so damned hard to survive.

  16

  “SURE ’PRECIATE YOUR coming along with me, honey,” Jack told Ray-Lynn as they drove toward the Lantz farmhouse in his civilian car late in the afternoon. “I don’t want to upset anyone or, in this case, tip them off it’s official business. But I got word that Ella and their Pennsylvania guest have disappeared and that needs checking out.”