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Plus, the milk—”
    My brain hiccupped mid-sentence.
The milk in the sink. Glasses of milk on the bedside tables.
    I looked at Grady, horrified. He shook his head as if he couldn’t believe what I was thinking, what we were now both thinking.
    â€œFuck it,” Grady mumbled. “I’m calling in the CDC.”

CHAPTER 3
    By Saturday morning, the Lancaster City Bureau of Police was overwhelmed with technicians and investigators from the Centers for Disease Control in Washington, also known as the CDC. They were the knights and wizards of food-borne illness, and with the high number of fatalities in the Kinderman case, they were rightfully concerned. So was the public. News of an entire family dying—an
Amish
family at that—had made local headlines. The story was picked up by the Huffington Post. It was lurid and frightening enough to draw attention.
    I was neither officially on the case nor, thanks to my pleading with Grady, officially off it. I couldn’t forget my promise to Hannah to look into the sickness in the Amish community.
The curse.
I never mentioned that conversation to Grady, but I did my best to convince him that the department shouldn’t close the caseuntil the CDC or the coroner determined the exact cause of death. Then again, there wasn’t much for me to investigate until they did, and I had plenty of other work to do.
    Within twenty-four hours, E. coli, the most likely suspect, had been eliminated. It wasn’t found in the Kindermans or in their cows. Nor was a viral infection the cause. The CDC labs set in to dig deeper, looking for less likely pathogens. I knew they’d combed the Kindermans’ farmhouse from top to bottom and were fanning out agents to speak to other Amish families in the area to see if anyone else had been ill recently. Remembering my own stonewalled investigation as an outsider a year before, I didn’t envy them.
    I decided it was time to talk again to a source of my own. I went to see Hannah.
    â€”
    â€œI can’t believe it. The whole family!” Hannah’s voice was mournful as she placed two cups of strong, black coffee on the table. Supper was over in the Yoder household, and the older children were upstairs giving their mother a break by bathing the younger ones.
    â€œIt’s devastating,” I agreed. Scenes from my walk-through of the Kinderman farmhouse rose up, my gorge rising with it. I swallowed down the burning acid in my throat. “It must be so hard on your church.”
    Hannah tsked. “We pull together in God. It’s all we can do. This is in his hands. But ocht—ist hard.” She shook her head, thewhite strands of her bonnet swaying, and took a sip of her coffee. Hannah’s hair was as neat as usual, and her thick blue dress and apron were ironed. But her eyes were swollen and red and her face was grim. She looked like a different woman without her typically placid expression. Hannah always seemed busy yet somehow at peace. At least, before today.
    â€œWe all pray the Lord spares any more children.”
    â€œMe too,” I agreed. “I want you to know, we’re going to find out what caused these deaths.”
    â€œYou’re a gut friend,” Hannah said, toying nervously with her cup. “Did you ever speak to Henry Stoltzfus, the
brauche
man?”
    I felt a twinge of guilt, but I had to tell the truth. “No, Hannah. I went to see Samuel and Aaron at the hospital, and I talked to their doctor. He was convinced it was the flu, but the tests for it were negative. I wasn’t sure what I’d say to this . . .
brauche
man. I can’t accuse someone of a crime without knowing what’s actually going on.”
    Hannah’s lips pressed tight. “I don’t see how anyone could be so evil. But some are now sure it is
hexerei
. We’ve never seen anything like this sickness in the cows. It’s not natural.”
    There were plenty