Death of a Winter Shaker (2 page)

Rose sighed and pulled her work toward her. Copying numbers into a ledger book for the second day in a row had brought her aching shoulders. To ease them, she pressed back against her firm ladder-back chair, crafted by Brother Hugo especially to fit her tall, thin body.

As the only remaining trustee of the North Homage United Society of Believers, now known even to themselves as Shakers, Rose was responsible for the community's financial well-being, as well as relations between Believers and the outside world. Now thirty-five, she had been a trustee for ten years, and they had been good ones. Perhaps her humility needed further development, but she felt she had been born for this position.

She examined her figures with satisfaction. Even in these dark times, the small squares on the ledger page added up to a comfortable total. Demand had been steady for packaged seeds and preserves and other Shaker products. Most of their northern Kentucky neighbors had not fared so well. Rose was pleased they were in a position to donate a goodly amount of produce to the poor.

“Gazing into space to rest from thy exhausting
labors?” Elder Wilhelm Lundel's voice dripped with disdain. At sixty, the spiritual leader was an imposing, muscular man with a full head of white hair. His broad shoulders nearly touched the sides of her office doorway. He wore the brown smock and slate gray trousers of the nineteenth-century brethren. As required in the Society's earlier days, he was clean-shaven. The stern set of his jaw made clear his displeasure with Rose. Again.

As part of his plan to create a Shaker rebirth, Wilhelm had adopted the old-fashioned form of Shaker speech, using the more formal “thee,” rather than “you.” Rose allowed herself the uncharitable thought that he had done so in part because it made his words sound weightier.

“If this calling is too difficult for thee,” Wilhelm continued, “I'm certain we can find others eager to replace thee.”

Rose clenched her teeth in irritation. Eldress Agatha had taught her a prayer when she was a quick-tempered child—
Mother Ann, lend me thy patience and humility.
She used it often with Wilhelm. Rose raced silently through the prayer four times before her jaw began to relax.

Calmer, she met the elder's eyes. “You should take a look at these numbers, Wilhelm.” She slid the account book off the desk and held it out to him. “We're doing well.”

“Financially, perhaps. For now.” Wilhelm did not even glance at the page. He lifted a ladder-back chair from a wall peg and sat facing Rose, more than half a room between them. “Spiritually,” he said, “we are rotting away.”

Rose relaxed her tired shoulders against the slats of her chair back. “I'm well aware that we are growing smaller,” she said, with the weary air of one who has endured the same argument many times too often.

“Smaller! Hah! We are near death. A hundred years
ago we had more than four thousand Believers. Four thousand! And now the eastern societies have fewer than one hundred among them.

“We are all that is left of the western societies. Pleasant Hill, South Union, the Ohio and Indiana societies, they are all nothing but empty, rotting buildings. And why?” Wilhelm leveled a thick index finger at Rose. “Because they turned their hearts to the world, that's why.”

“The world is changing,” Rose objected. “Our strength has always come from our ability to adapt and give to the world. We do well in troubled times because we invent tools which save effort. We share our inventions with the world and gain friends and Believers. Brother Hugo came to us at first because we gave him a chance to develop his carpentry skills most creatively. And he has been a devout Believer for nearly sixty years now!”

“They wallowed in luxury and adorned their bodies shamelessly,” Wilhelm continued as if she had not spoken. “They spurned the simple life of worship and hard work and modest dress, and they pandered themselves to the world. They were lost to God. And that is the result of thy ‘adapting to the world.'” His sneering tone made her words sound foolish and shallow.

Rose sighed. What was truly foolish, she knew, was to continue the argument.

“What brings you here, Wilhelm?” Normally he would have summoned her to the Ministry House, to show who was elder and who was merely trustee.

“Eldress Agatha.”

Rose snapped to attention. “Is she all right?”

Her mentor's failing health worried Rose for many reasons beyond the loss of her friendship. Until a year ago, when she suffered her first stroke, Agatha had been more than a match for Wilhelm, but now Rose found that the task of tempering Wilhelm's religious fervor
fell to her. As Agatha sank, Wilhelm soared. At his insistence, North Homage Believers had reverted to nineteenth-century Shaker dress.

“She is too ill to continue,” Wilhelm said, his heavy face showing no sorrow. “I am recommending to the Lead Society in Mount Lebanon that Agatha be relieved of her duties as eldress.”

He can't even wait for her to die,
Rose thought. Agatha's body might be weakening, but the two strokes had barely touched her mind. Rose felt her quick temper rising. Aware that Wilhelm was watching her reaction, she tried to give him none.

“And who will you recommend to become the next eldress?”

“Not thee.” Wilhelm leaned forward and planted his fists on his knees. “Thy past shows a certain . . .” His eyes glittered as he sought the most cutting words. “A certain spiritual weakness.”

Rose bit the inside of her lip. Her past again. Her year in the world. She had returned at nineteen, confessed at worship service to the whole community, and been welcomed home. Wilhelm was the only one who continued to use her past against her. She tried to pray, but this time anger won.

“My past is long past, you know that well, Wilhelm. I've confessed, I've atoned. Now it is up to God alone to judge me.”

“As I've no doubt He will.” A small smile played on Wilhelm's wind-roughened lips. “Meanwhile, I have another plan for thee. One which may help thy redemption.”

Rose's fury dissolved into wariness. “What might that be?”

“I have a journey for thee to undertake, beginning in March, when the weather warms. I want thee to lead the conversion of souls throughout Kentucky and Ohio.”

“Wilhelm, that would be a mistake. We aren't in the
eighteenth century anymore. These are the 1930s, the country is tired and hungry. It has no energy for revivalism. We should help people now, not stir them up. As long as God feels we have work to do, He will provide us with the help we need.”

Wilhelm stood and gripped the back of his chair, his eyes blazing. “We have a sacred calling, given to us by our beloved Mother Ann. We are called to save as many poor wretches as possible from their disgusting, carnal lives in the world. What good does mere charity do them? What is a full belly compared to the eternal joy of life as a Believer?”

Rose wilted in her chair. So this was his plan to dispose of his two most outspoken critics. By March, if Wilhelm had his way, not only might she lose her position as trustee, she would be sent away from her home on a mission she couldn't support. And dear, wise Agatha would no longer be eldress.

Unless the Lead Society in New York interfered, Wilhelm would hold total control over North Homage. And he would drive them straight back to the eighteenth century. Her head had begun to throb, a common result of any discussion with Wilhelm.

Startled by a sudden movement, Wilhelm and Rose turned to the open doorway. Gennie leaned against the doorjamb, her small chest heaving with the effort to catch her breath, brown eyes wide with terror.

“Oh Rose!” she whispered. “It's so horrible.”

E
VEN WITH THE
G
REAT
D
EPRESSION IN FULL SWING
and hobos wandering from town to town, violent crime was rare in small, rural Languor County, Kentucky. The Shakers' reputation for generosity brought many hungry, homeless men—and sometimes women and children—to their door. But not everyone admired the Believers. Some resented them for their stores of meat and vegetables, and the shiny, black Plymouth parked next to the Trustees' Office. Their refusal to fight in war, even to defend their country, infuriated many. So the discovery of a murdered man in North Homage's Herb House stirred both anger and glee in many of their neighbors' hearts.

“We haven't had a murder round here in five years,” the county sheriff, Harry Brock, said when he arrived at the Trustees' Office steps at midmorning. “Funny it happened here, ain't it?”

Sheriff Brock's thin, wiry form seemed to shift constantly. His suspicious eyes darted between Wilhelm and Rose, who stood a respectable distance apart. Running a distracted hand through his thick white hair, Wilhelm fastened his fierce eyes on the horizon. A still-shaken Gennie huddled beside Rose. The sky was splotched with black, and a growing wind whipped at Rose's cloak. She drew the thick wool closer.

“Sheriff Brock,” Rose said, raising her voice to
command his attention. “We Shakers do not murder. To kill another human being goes against our most sacred beliefs. It is abhorrent and certainly not funny.”

To her discomfort, Brock grinned at her. “Yeah,” he drawled, “but here we are. Funny.”

Curious Believers had begun to cluster nearby. A plump, middle-aged sister, Elsa Pike, elbowed through a group of whispering women. She ignored Rose and barged toward Wilhelm. Elsa's behavior no longer surprised Rose, but she had grown increasingly concerned that Elsa seemed to respect only Wilhelm.

“Elder, we gotta do something,” Elsa said, anger pinching her plain, flat features. “Word's out that we killed somebody. That's hogwash, pure and simple, everybody knows we Shakers don't kill, but there's horses and wagons comin' in already, just to see for themselves. Couple folks even stopped at the kitchen and asked the way to the body, of all the nerve. And if they think I'm going to cook for them and make it a party, well, they got another—”

“Elsa!” Wilhelm rarely used a sharp tone with Elsa. It silenced her. “Yea, a young man has died, but of course we did not cause it. Go back to thy work now. There will be no extra cooking. The gawkers will have nothing to feed their disgusting curiosity.”

Elsa hesitated. “This young man, was he one of us? One of the brethren?”

“Nay, only a Winter Shaker, and not a promising one.”

“I knew it,” Elsa crowed. “It's that Johann, ain't it? He was askin' to get killed, the way he carried on. And with sisters and young girls, too.” Her smirk was more self-righteous than shocked.

“Hush,” Wilhelm urged. He glanced at the sheriff, who had hurried off toward a tall young man just emerging from a dusty black Buick used by the Languor County Sheriff's Office. Wilhelm almost pushed Elsa away, but stopped himself before he actually
touched her. “Be careful about statements like that if the police question thee. Now get back to the kitchen.”

Looking pleased with herself, Elsa trotted away on strong, hill-country legs.

Molly Ferguson, Gennie's roommate, stood apart from the crowd. She balanced a laundry basket on one hip, and her dark eyes fixed on Gennie. With a flick of her index finger, Molly signaled for Gennie to approach her. Molly's eyes were wide and murky, her cheeks paled to a ghostly white against the black rim of hair edging her bonnet.

Behind her, a group of men, mostly brethren, milled at the base of the Trustees' Office steps. Elder Wilhelm murmured with Brothers Albert and Hugo and a tall, weathered man Gennie did not recognize. His head tilted toward Wilhelm, but he watched Rose. Rose's attention was on Brock. She wouldn't miss Gennie for a moment or two.

“Hurry,” Molly whispered. She clutched Gennie's wrist in a painful grip. “The sisters in the Laundry said you found a dead guy.”

Gennie winced and nodded.

Molly's eyes went black. “Shaker?” she asked.

“Nay, don't worry,” Gennie said.

“Who was he? Did you know him?”

“Yea, but just by sight.”

“Gennie,” Rose called, “we need you now.”

“What was his name? Tell me,” Molly whispered, her husky voice straining with urgency.

“Johann Fredericks.” Gennie tossed the name over her shoulder as she raced back toward Rose. When she arrived, breathless, she turned to wave to Molly. The laundry basket lay overturned, clean work smocks cascading onto the grass. Molly's running figure receded toward the fields behind the Children's Dwelling House.

*
      
*
      
*

“This is Deputy Grady O'Neal,” the sheriff said, indicating a tall man in his mid-twenties with straight brown hair that fell forward whenever he moved. “Did you get hold of Doc Irwin? Good. This here's Gennie Malone, the young lady who found the body.”

Everyone turned to look at Gennie, who straightened at being called a young lady.

“We'll need her statement,” Brock continued.

“I'll stay with her while you question her, if you don't mind,” Rose said. Her tone said that it didn't matter whether they minded.

“We'll look at the scene first,” Brock said. “Here's Doc now.”

“Gennie, you stay here,” Rose said, placing a warm hand on her shoulder.

“Sorry,” Brock said. “We'll need her to tell us what everything looked like when she entered the building, what she moved or touched.”

“But she's only a child.” Rose's arm went around Gennie's shoulders and held tight.

“Then she's a child who found a dead body,” Brock said bluntly.

“Besides,” said Deputy O'Neal in an educated voice that just covered a gentle Kentucky drawl, “she seems to be holdin' up fine.” He smiled over at Gennie, who smiled back and shyly lowered her eyes.

“Let's go, then, but you stay close to me, Gennie.” Rose cringed inwardly as she noticed the glance that passed between Gennie and the young deputy. She would have to talk with Gennie soon.