Wild Horses (Sadie's Montana #1)(69)

Sadie was horrified.

“Dat! Why didn’t you tell us? Why?”

He sighed. “Because I was afraid you would all want to return to Ohio with her.”

“Well, we’re here now,” Sadie ground out. “I’m going to the phone.”

She could never remember feeling such anger, such a gripping disgust that she actually felt like vomiting. What horrible pride controlled Dat? Why had Mam been so passive? What caused a person to slowly tilt outward and move toward the edge of reasoning? Was it all because, if it boiled right down to it, Mam refused to give up her own will and submit to Dat’s will?

She yanked open the phone-shanty door, punched 911, and briskly told the dispatcher what she needed to know.

No sirens, please, she begged silently. The school children will go home and tell their parents there was a policeman at Jacob Millers’ and tongues will wag. Well, it couldn’t be helped. There was no time for her own foolish pride now.

The crunch of gravel heralded the policemen’s arrival. Two of them stepped out of the unmarked vehicle. Sadie’s heart beat loudly, and for a second she was glad it was a car that was not the usual kind the police drove with flashing blue lights and “Police” written across it in big letters.

The two men strode purposefully to the door, knocked, and stood aside politely when Dat opened it. They were kind but firm, writing on clipboards, searching the room with their eyes, speaking in short but professional tones.

The Millers answered truthfully. Dat spoke and the girls answered when they were asked. Reuben was white-faced, silent, frightened out of his wits. He slouched in his chair at the kitchen table, trying to appear brave, even nonchalant, but his huge blue eyes completely gave him away.

When Dat described Mam to the men, Anna stifled a sob, and Sadie’s arms were instantly around her shoulders. She slid her face against Sadie, struggling to conceal her emotions.

The policemen’s radios crackled, their badges and holsters gleamed. It all seemed like one big, awful dream that would come to a welcome halt the minute Sadie woke up.

One policeman went to the car while the remaining one told them he was alerting every radio station, television news channel, and airport.

“Why an airport?” Sadie blurted out. “She would never fly. We don’t go… I mean, our beliefs forbid us to fly in an airplane. She wouldn’t be in an airport. Perhaps a bus station? A train station? An Amish driver?”

“Amish driver? I thought you don’t drive cars?” Mr. Connelly, the elder of the two, inquired.

“No, I mean, she would have called a person who provides transportation for us.”

They made phone calls to every driver and neighbor on the list, but to absolutely no avail. Trucks and more troopers arrived, search parties sent to comb the entire region around the house and throughout the neighborhood.

Amish friends and relatives arrived, wide-eyed and in different stages of disbelief. Dat remained strong, his face a mixture of despair, agony, pride, shame, and finally, acceptance. There was nothing left to do as wailing sirens climbed the driveway, lights flashing, radios crackling messages.

Someone from the firehall set up a post inside the buggy shed with thermoses of hot coffee and sandwiches. Neighbors brought kettles of chili and vegetable soup, homemade rolls, smoked deer bologna, pies, and cookies. They comforted Dat, hugged the girls, whispered endearments.

Then darkness fell. With the darkness came a fresh despair, a sense of loss felt so deeply that Sadie thought she could not hold up against its crushing force. She cried with Anna. She went into the bathroom with Leah and sat on the edge of the bathtub and cried some more.

“Why? Why on earth did Dat let her go like this? How long has she been sick and we didn’t know?”

Leah peered into the mirror and fixed a few stray blonde hairs. She shook her head in disgust at her swollen, red eyes.

“Well, I know one thing. Remember last year when we had church at our house? Sadie, I mean it, I honestly don’t think we would have gotten ready without you. Mam got nothing accomplished all day. She just puttered around the way she does, you know.

Sadie sighed.

“There were lots of signs—if only we wouldn’t have been so dense.”

They sat for a few moments, Leah on the floor, Sadie on the edge of the bathtub.

“Do you think she became mentally ill from wanting to go back home?”

“Home?” Sadie’s head jerked up in an angry motion. “Where is home?”

“For me, here. In Montana,” Leah said flatly.

“Is it home to you?” Sadie asked.

“Of course.”

Sadie said nothing.

There was a knock on the door. Richard Caldwell and his wife, Barbara, had come and wanted to speak to her. Surprised, Sadie went to the living room.

Sadie’s boss and his wife sat uncomfortably, glancing at the softly hissing propane lamp. In spite of herself, Sadie hid a smile, knowing they had never set foot in an Amish home.

Despite their uneasiness, their concern was genuine, and their hugs bolstered Sadie’s courage. Once again she was amazed at the change in Barbara, the tenderness in Richard Caldwell, and she was grateful.

“They’ll find her, Sadie,” Richard Caldwell boomed.

And then Dorothy came bustling into the living room, the soles of her inexpensive Dollar General shoes squeaking on the highly varnished hardwood, oak floor.