CHAPTER 24

My head is reeling with the bishop’s disturbing revelations as I get into the Explorer and start down the lane. It’s difficult for me to believe an Amish bishop could be so cruel. Is it possible Wanetta Hochstetler is still alive? Did she, as a damaged and broken woman, try to return home to her family, only to be shattered by news that they were dead? Or that she wasn’t welcome?

But there are other, darker questions pulsing at the back of my brain. Did Wanetta Hochstetler find her way back to Painters Mill? Did she have something to do with the murders of Dale Michaels, Jules Rutledge and Jerrold McCullough? The people who murdered her husband, caused the deaths of her children and destroyed her life? It doesn’t seem likely. She was thirty-four years old when she was kidnapped; that would put her at around seventy now. The more recent murders required a good bit of strength—too much for a woman that age. Too much for a woman of any age.

But I know better than to discount a female perpetrator based on strength alone. If she’s determined and armed—or insane as the bishop asserted—anything’s possible.

I pull over in the parking lot of a carryout on the west side of town and call Glock. He picks up on the first ring with his usual, “Hey, Chief.”

I summarize my conversation with Bishop Schweider.

“You think she’s got something to do with these murders?” he asks.

“I don’t know. She certainly qualifies in terms of motive, but she’d be old now. I can’t see her pulling off three murders.”

“She might’ve had help.” He pauses. “Hoch Yoder.”

I tell him about my conversation with Hoch. “Pay him a visit. Tell him you’re following up. See if you can get anything new out of him. Put some pressure on him. Rattle him a little. At this point, I think it’s best we don’t let on that she might still be alive.”

“Where are you going?”

“Nicktown, Pennsylvania. It’s about four hours away. The Swartzentruber Amish don’t use community pay phones, so I’m going to drive over there and see what I can find out.”

“Chief, are you sure you don’t want to take someone with you? Any of us are happy to tag along.”

I don’t believe “tag along” is the exact term he had in mind, but he’s being magnanimous. With three people dead, he’s worried that I won’t have backup if I need it. There’s a small part of me that agrees with him, but with my department strapped tight and the threat of flooding in the forefront of our minds, I don’t take him up on the offer. “The Swartzentruber Amish generally don’t like dealing with outsiders, especially the government. Best if I go alone.”