have been seeing someone outside the district.â Roc kept on with the possibilities, trying to jar loose their tightly held belief that this involved a vampire. âMaybe she started seeing an Englisher .â
âRoc,â Hannah said with firm conviction, âour parents had suggested other single men who might take up the mantle of fatherhood for Josefâs baby, but she wouldnâtââ
âIf it was someone they might not approve of, then they might not know either. You probably wouldnât even know.â
âShe would not risk being shunned.â
Roc blinked but kept on. âShe might.â
âShe was never alone,â Hannah said in crisp tones.
Roc frowned. âWhat do you mean?â
âWe kept an eye on her. Others kept watch too,â Levi explained, glancing at Hannah. âBecause we feared something like this might happen.â
âOkay, then maybe she went to the doctor. She was pregnant, right? So maybe the hospitalââ
âAnd how would she have gone?â Levi questioned.
Roc opened his mouth then closed it. Back in New Orleans, there would have been a dozen ways for someone to get to an ER. But here in Promise, Pennsylvania, where buggies outnumbered cars, or at least seemed to, where telephones were rare commodities, in the Amish community at least, where hospitals werenât even the first choice, the possibilities were more limited. Would a pregnant woman have hitched a horse to a buggy by herself? Maybe. But then wouldnât they be missing a horse and buggy? One of those red scooters so many of the youngsters used going to and from school was out of the question for a pregnant woman. If sheâd asked for a ride from a neighbor, then the neighbor would have told the family, and the whole community would already be in the know. The natural grapevine wove through the community, tying them all together and keeping them better informed than any telephones, newspaper, or twenty-four-hour news station could.
Levi shifted in his chair. âI admit, Roc, we jumped first and foremost to a difficult conception. But I went over to our Mennonite neighbors and used their telephone. I called the doctor in town. Heâs the one in our district who looks after some of the women, especially those expecting. He hadnât seen Rachel for over a month.â
âSince she had problems before,â Hannah explained, âwe thought maybe she was having trouble and went straight to the hospital.â
âThe simplest explanation is usually the most likely,â Roc agreed.
âUsually.â Levi nodded his agreement. His stony gaze revealed no doubts as to what he believed had happened to Rachel. But still the Amish man let Roc think it through without interrupting, without arguing his case. He simply waited. It was Hannah who reached over and touched her husbandâs sleeve, but Levi cupped her hand, patted it once, twice, and they both watched Roc with solemn gazes.
Frustrated with them, with himself, with the whole situation, Roc pushed away from the table and walked toward the back door of their kitchen. He stared out the window at the yellow daisies planted around the base of a stout oak. Life had certainly been simpler before heâd ever come to Pennsylvania. If heâd been on a drinking binge for the last six months, then he could easily doubt all heâd seen, doubt his sanity, doubt the blood and bodies. But he hadnât been drinking. His eyes had been opened to an even more frightening world than heâd ever known existed. And he couldnât close his eyes just because he wished it away.
âBut why?â he asked, without facing the Amish couple. âWhy would heâ¦Akivaâ¦this vampire ââhe emphasized the word they seemed reluctant to useââwant Rachel? It doesnât make sense.â Roc remembered meeting the woman, Rachel, several months ago in his desperate search
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