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The Quilt That Knew

By Patrick E. Craig

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Chapter 1
Little Girl Lost

Barry Winders watched the bird drop out of the sky and into the woods. His brother chuckled. “You should have steered him to the left, Bee. Now you got to go into Jepson’s woods to find him.”
Barry scowled. He handed his shotgun to his brother and headed for the edge of the trees. Jepson’s woods lay in a rural section between Apple Creek and Dalton, Ohio, and the fields surrounding the woods were prime hunting grounds for pheasant. But the woods themselves near Jepson’s pond were still wild and choked with underbrush. To find that pheasant in there would take some work. He looked at his dog and swept his arm across the area in front of him.
“Butch, hledeg! Find dead!”
Butch was good. He wouldn’t stop until he found the bird. The German Shorthair ran along the edge of the brush excitedly and then caught a scent and bounded into the woods. Barry ran after him. Butch barked, and Barry saw him cutting toward a thick patch of scrub. He followed as quickly as he could. Except for the sound of his feet brushing through the wild grass and the dog running ahead of him, the woods were quiet. It was one of those early fall mornings in Ohio; the trees turning red and gold and enough nip in the air to warrant a down vest. The ground was still damp from the morning dew and the bottoms of his jeans were wet from striding through the tall grass all morning.
Up ahead, Butch was puzzling around the scrub, trying to find a way in. Barry ran up and patted the dog.
“Found him, hey Butch? Good dog!”
The bird was in this patch of brush, and Barry looked for a way into it. He walked around to the right and spotted a small opening. Going down on his hands and knees, he crawled through. Butch followed him, whimpering excitedly. The ground sloped upwards into the center of the patch and it was wet and muddy. As Barry scrambled up the incline, his foot slipped on the muddy ground and slid out from under him. A sharp pain shot through the front of his lower leg. He looked down at his jeans. There was a tear. He pulled his pants leg up. There was a deep gash below his knee that was bleeding pretty good.
“Shoot, Butch, what did I hit?”
Looking down, he noticed a square corner of something that looked like wood protruding from the ground. He brushed away the dirt from around the corner. As he cleared away more dirt and leaves, he saw that he had stumbled over the corner of a box, what looked like a big box, that was buried in the dirt.
“Hey, Billy,” he yelled. “I found something. Bring the shovel out of the truck.”
In a few minutes, his brother scrambled through into the center of the brush with the old army trenching shovel they carried in the pickup's bed.
Barry pointed. “It looks like somebody buried a big wooden box here. Gimme the shovel.”
Barry dug, and in a few minutes, he had uncovered the top of the box. It was big, square, about five feet long, made from wood. Nice wood, like maple or mahogany. The lid was smooth and finished and fastened down into the sides with nails.
“It looks like a chest. Look, the lid has hinges.”
“Wow, maybe’s it treasure, Bee. Open it up.”
Barry pushed the point of the shovel in between the lid and the box and pried up. The lid moved a little. He worked his way down the side and got the lid up all the way on that side. Pushing his fingers into the gap, he pulled. It wouldn’t give.
“Billy, pull down there.”
Billy grabbed the lid at the bottom and together, the two boys pulled up. The nails in the lid came out slowly with a harsh screech. They pushed the lid over and looked inside. The first thing Barry saw was a flash of color, some kind of blanket. He reached down and pulled on it. Part of it came away in his hand and he jerked back in shock. A very decomposed human face stared up at him.

Detective Elbert Wainwright watched as the team from the Coroner’s office pulled the box from the ground, slipped straps under it and walked it back to the ambulance that was sitting in the field outside the woods, lights flashing. Wainwright’s sergeant, Gary Pulley, scratched his head. “Find anything, Elbert?”
Elbert shook his head. “No. We spent five hours this morning going over every inch of ground, Sarge. My forensic boys took dirt samples, checked for casings, anything that might be a clue. Nada.”
“So, what have you got?”
“Coroner says the body is that of a girl, probably a teenager, about five foot four inches. The back of the skull is badly fractured. Looks like the cause of death was a blow to the back of the head with a heavy, pointed object. The coroner estimates that the body has been in the box for thirty-five or forty years. The box is only five feet long, so whoever put her in had to fold her up to get her in. Because the box was sealed so well, the decomposition was not complete. In fact, it was like she was almost mummified.”
“So, there are still skin and hair samples?”
“Correct. They are going to the lab.”
“Anything else?”
“A few things. First, the box is made of high-quality hard maple or mahogany. Interestingly enough, and except for the nails in the lid, all the fasteners that hold the box together are wooden pegs. Only a master craftsman, or somebody who builds quality cabinets, does that kind of work.”
“Why the nails, then?”
“Somebody was in a hurry to get the body in there and get it buried, so they nailed the lid shut. They probably already had the box. It’s a chest or a cabinet of some sort.”
“What else, Sergeant?”
“The body was wrapped in a quilt. And it looks like an Amish quilt.”

Elbert Wainwright sat at his desk and puzzled over the case. He hated cold cases, really hated them. Usually there was absolutely nothing to go on. A body in a box, buried for forty years. An Amish quilt. Nobody was missing around that time, at least nobody reported missing. And what about the quilt? The Amish were notoriously close-mouthed as far as their personal lives were concerned. Why would the murderer wrap the body in an Amish quilt? Where do you start?
The phone on his desk rang. The voice on the other end was familiar. Sheriff Jim Merriweather.
“Hi Delbert.”
“Elbert, sir.”
“Right, right, Elbert. So, what’s going on with the Amish Quilt case?”
Elbert grimaced. Why was the sheriff’s department poking its nose in?
“Well, Sheriff, not much so far. Nothing to really go on. A hardwood box, a dead girl who was never reported missing, and a partially rotted quilt.”
“So, you checked the missing persons records? No Amish people missing around then?”
“Well, if there were, the Amish certainly didn’t say. You know the Amish are pretty secretive about their personal stuff. And if they put someone out of the community by shunning them, they certainly don’t let us know. People leave the Amish community a lot and go out into the world. After that they are dead to the Amish and they say little about it. They figure it’s their own business. So, a girl who disappeared could just have been thought of as a shunned runaway and we never would have heard a thing.” Elbert paused. “Why the interest in the Amish folks, Sheriff?”
“Well, Delbert, I’ll put it right on the line. We have an election coming up and if I don’t swing the Amish vote, I could go into early retirement, if you get my drift. If the Amish think that I’m ignoring a murder case that has to do with them, they might stay away from the polls more than they usually do. So, I have a suggestion.”
“What’s that, Sheriff?”
“There was only one man who could consistently swing the Amish vote his way election after election. That was Bobby Halverson. He was a good friend to the Amish and looked after them. In fact, his best friend was an Amish man, Reuben Springer. They were war buddies.”
“War buddies? I thought the Amish didn’t fight in wars.”
“Well, it’s a long story. Reuben got tossed from the church just before Pearl Harbor and ended up sharing an apartment with Bobby. When the war came, they enlisted together. It was the dangdest thing. They landed on Guadalcanal together and Springer won the Congressional Medal of Honor fighting alongside Colonel Red Mike Edson. Reuben saved his position from being overrun and killed twenty-five Japanese soldiers single-handedly. He got shot, bayonetted, and clubbed, but he stayed alive and helped keep the Emperor’s legions from capturing Henderson Field. Saved the battle, saved the field and saved Guadalcanal, which basically saved the war. When they shipped Springer home, he went back to the Amish church. I guess what happened to him made him realize that war wasn’t such a great thing. Anyway, he and Bobby stayed really close. That’s what helped Bobby get elected when he ran for sheriff.”
“I remember Sheriff Halverson, but what has he got to do with this?”
“Well, I was thinking you might invite Bobby to help you on the case, kind of as a civilian expert. You guys hire them all the time. Bobby could get you in to see a lot of Amish people that would most likely shut the door in your face.”
Elbert scowled. He didn’t much like people telling him how to run his cases, but when he thought about it, it was actually a pretty good idea. Good for him and good for the sheriff.
“How do I get in touch with Bobby Halverson?”
“He lives out in Pennsylvania on the farm of Reuben Springer’s daughter, Jenny Hershberger. And by the way, you might want to get Jenny involved, too. She knows the history of the Amish community in Ohio and Pennsylvania like the back of her hand. She’s published books and writes a column that’s syndicated in a few national papers. What Bobby doesn’t know about Wayne County Amish, Jenny does.”
Elbert scowled again. Boy, this sounds like some kind of Amish Homeward Bound movie.
“Look, Sheriff, I can go with Bobby Halverson, but getting some old Amish woman involved is a little beyond the pale, isn’t it?”
Sheriff Merriweather laughed. “Jenny Hershberger is not some ‘old Amish woman, Delbert. She’s chain lightning in a dress. One of the sharpest gals I ever met. I’ve even read her books. No, take my word for it. If you want to get inside the Amish community, you’ll put these two on your payroll.”
“I think I heard an implied, ‘but if you don’t’, in there somewhere, Sheriff. And it’s Elbert.”
“Right, Elbert. Well, I’m not making any threats, but your captain and me, well, we’ve been buddies for a very long time. A word from me could…”
“Yeah, I hear you, Sheriff. I could either end up on the winner’s stand, or checking permits at dairy farms, right?”
“Well…”
“Okay, Sheriff, got a phone number?”

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