Her Last Breath: A Kate Burkholder Novel

her mother and begins to play with the puppy, lifting its face to hers and giggling as it licks her cheeks.
    I cross to them and kneel. “What’s his name?”
    “Sammy. Ouch! He bites.”
    “He’s teething, like babies do,” I tell her. “He needs something to chew on. An old doll might keep those little teeth busy.”
    Martha Schlabach continues with her chore, but I feel her eyes on me as I reach for the puppy and bring its snout to mine. I get a whiff of puppy breath an instant before he bites the end of my nose and I’m reminded that my face is still sore. “He’s a feisty one.”
    “ Datt says he’s going to be a good hunting dog some day.”
    “And a good friend, too.” I pass the puppy back to her and rise. Brushing the grass from my knees, I make my way back to Martha. I’m wary now of saying something inappropriate in front of the children, but I need to know if she called the tip line. If she did, I need to know exactly who saw what.
    Martha is a no-nonsense woman, a busy mother of seven whose days are filled with work from the crack of dawn until her head hits the pillow at night. Neither of us has the time or the patience for a polite Q & A session so I decide to take the direct approach.
    “I know you called the tip line,” I say quietly.
    She doesn’t look at me as she pins an apron to the line. “My husband wouldn’t approve of such a thing. My getting involved in someone else’s affairs.”
    “All information that comes in is confidential,” I tell her.
    “As if you can be trusted, Katie Burkholder.” Her laugh grinds from her throat like a sludged-up engine on a cold morning. “I don’t partake in idle gossip about my neighbors.”
    I resist the urge to roll my eyes. Martha didn’t have a problem blathering about Mattie or me when we were teenagers. Not only was she a gossipmonger, but half of what she passed along came from her own imagination. For an instant I’m tempted to remind her of that. Instead, I move closer to her and lower my voice. “If there was an argument or confrontation between Mattie Borntrager and someone else, I need to know about it.”
    She turns her attention back to her laundry, snapping open a work shirt, pinning it to the line, biting down on another clothespin.
    “The buggy accident that killed Paul wasn’t an accident,” I tell her.
    The Amish woman’s hands go still on the trousers she’s holding. “I don’t want to get involved.”
    “You already are.”
    Sighing, she looks down at the trousers and lets them drop into the basket, as if what she’s about to tell me requires all of her concentration. “I called,” she admits.
    “Thank you.”
    “I know it was God’s will, but my heart is broken about what happened to Paul and those precious children. If someone did this thing…”
    “Someone did,” I say. “If you know something, you need to tell me about it.”
    The woman stares at me, assessing me, trying to decide if I’m worthy of whatever information she’s safeguarding. I hold her gaze, willing her to open up.
    In Pennsylvania Dutch, she orders the youngsters to the house to wash their hands. When the girl with the puppy rises to go with the others, Martha stops her. “Sarah, put that puppy down and come here.”
    Reluctantly, the girl sets the puppy on the grass and starts toward us. Big hazel eyes go from her mamm to me and back to her mamm. The puppy continues to bite at the hem of her dress, but she doesn’t seem to notice now. She’s looking at us as if she’s done something wrong. I want to reassure her, but I defer to her mother and wait.
    When the younger children are out of earshot, Martha turns her attention to the girl. “Sarah, do you remember when Sally had that bay colt?”
    “ Ja. I got to stay up past my bedtime to help datt. ”
    The woman smiles. “That colt is almost as much trouble as that puppy of yours.”
    “ Datt says he’s going to be a good trotter.” The girl looks down at the puppy growling and tugging at the hem of her dress and giggles.
    Martha glances toward the house, watching the children, and addresses me. “Sarah and I have discussed gossip and we know it’s wrong to speak badly of our neighbors, don’t we, Sarah?”
    “Yes, ma’am.”
    “I’m going to ask you to make an exception, Sarah, and tell Chief Burkholder what you saw that night you went out to the pasture to get Sally and bring her in.”
    The girl looks down at her bare feet, drags her toes through grass