by Sarah Price
Silence.
“I wish that you’d marry me, Elizabeth.”
For a long moment they stood there, facing each other. Frederick looked pained, waiting for her response, while Lizzie tried to comprehend exactly what had just happened. The words seemed to echo in her head. Had she just been proposed to by this man? He was, after all, a man she barely knew, and what little she did know was not flattering.
“I . . . I don’t know what to say,” she heard the words slip from her mouth. “I find this most . . . unexpected.”
“Do me the honor, Elizabeth. My heart is pained in anticipation.” And he did look pained. His cheeks were pale and his eyes wide as he waited for her response.
“I certainly meant you no pain,” Lizzie managed to say. “That was never my intention.”
He took a step forward. “I did not mean to insinuate . . . ”
She cut him off. “But I certainly must decline and for reasons that you are well aware of, Frederick.”
“Reasons?” Clearly that was not the response he had been anticipating.
Lizzie took a deep breath, the shock of having been proposed to suddenly giving way to the underlying anger that had been dormant. “Indeed! You claim to love me despite having fought your feelings and despite our very different backgrounds, both familial and financial! Had you been so eloquent about your feelings for me instead of the reasons why you should not have such feelings, perhaps I might have been inclined to consider such an offer. However, there are other reasons why I cannot accept!”
He seemed confused. “I wish to know these reasons!”
“How could I possibly marry a man who has worked so hard to destroy the one bit of happiness for my dearest sister?”
“Jane?”
“Do you deny that you have kept Charles Beachey in Ohio, encouraging him to court your sister rather than return to Leola where a young woman sits, brokenhearted at the rejection of your best friend?”
At this question Frederick glanced away. “I cannot deny that.”
Lizzie’s mouth fell open at his admission, but no words came to her lips.
Frederick quickly tried to explain. “I cared enough about my friend to not wish him to experience emotional distress, for it was my observation that she did not return his ardor. She barely talked to him.”
“She’s shy!” Lizzie cried. “And yet you interfered!”
“Only to protect my friend, not to hurt your sister,” he explained.
“Were you protecting George Wickey then?”
Immediately, at the name of George Wickey, Frederick stiffened and lifted his chin. His eyes narrowed and acquired the familiar piercing darkness that represented the Frederick Detweiler she had come to know. “What about Wickey?”
“Do you deny having stolen the land of his birthright from George, leaving him landless and without a means of earning a living now that he has reached age?”
“Is that what you heard?”
“Indeed! How callous and prideful a man you must be! Why should any good Amish woman wish to align herself with such a man who would destroy the happiness of two people, only for his own selfish gain?”
He took a step backward, his eyes glaring as he stared at her. “This is your opinion of me, then? The character you tried so hard to discover?” Straightening his suspenders and placing his hat on his head, he returned to his formidable self. “Your explanation is most sufficient, despite the overbearing tone of pride that you have . . . ”
“Pride?” she cried out. “You speak of me having pride?”
“Your pride has tainted your eyes, Elizabeth Blank!”
She laughed but out of disbelief, not joy. “From the first moment I met you, you have done nothing but display a pride in your own position in life while looking with complete disdain at those around you. Nothing could be good enough for the proud Frederick Detweiler! Such arrogance and contempt! Why, from the first words out of your mouth I knew that you would be the last man on earth that I could ever be prevailed upon to accept an offer of marriage!”
Her final words changed his expression once again to that of pain. With his hat shielding his eyes, she could only see the way his mouth trembled, just a touch. He tilted his head to stare at her, the lower parts of his eyes visible and full of sorrow. For a moment Lizzie wished she could take back her words, so hurtful and accusatory. Yet the thought of Jane sitting at home, pining for Charles Beachey, gave her a feeling of vindication.
“I shall leave you now,” he mumbled. “Thank you for your time, Elizabeth.”
Without another word he turned and began to walk up the path toward the road. She watched him until he disappeared. Then, once he was out of sight, she let the tears flow from her eyes, and she covered her face, ashamed at her own behavior and wondering if there had been a hint of truth to Frederick’s words.
Had she too been as prideful as him?
Chapter Seventeen
LIZZIE SPENT THE rest of the day quietly crocheting in the kitchen of the Kaufman home. She could barely speak, for her head was filled with words that sent conflicting messages between her conscience and her heart. Charlotte was busy baking cookies for the kinner who would return from school in the early afternoon, having given up trying to engage Lizzie in any sort of conversation. Charlotte’s parents had gone visiting some former friends from Pennsylvania who had moved to a neighboring town almost ten years prior. So the house remained quiet, for which Lizzie was thankful.
“That’s the third time you have unraveled that row,” Charlotte observed gently. “Do you want to talk about what is bothering you?”
“Nee, nee,” Lizzie replied, pulling at the yarn. It came apart easily, but she was too irritated to roll it back into a ball. She sighed and tossed it onto the seat next to her and exhaled loudly.
“Mayhaps you need some fresh air, then?” Charlotte glanced out the window and smiled. “The clouds are breaking, and I think we shall get blue skies and sunshine within the hour!”
Lizzie shrugged noncommittally. After a few more moments of silence she excused herself to retire to her room, commenting that she felt a headache in her temples.
In the solace of her room she stood at the window, staring outside at the hill behind the house. At the top of the hill was a cluster of trees, and she wondered what was beyond them. Most likely the edge of another farm. For a long time she stared at the trees, unable to keep her mind from returning to the confrontation with Frederick. Somewhere, she thought, on the other side of those trees, someone might be staring up and wondering what was on her side. Perhaps they too imagined an expansive farm instead of the small farmette that was occupied by Wilmer Kaufman and his family.
Different perspectives engender different realities. She sighed and turned away.
For most of that day Lizzie stayed in her room, her head spinning and her temples throbbing. She emerged briefly for supper and to help Charlotte with the dishes, still remaining quiet and aloof, unresponsive to her friend’s attempts to converse. No one else seemed to notice as Wilmer talked about the splendor of the day, working on the Bechler farm with his son John and, later, his younger sons, who had joined them after school.
While the sun set behind the house in the evening hours, Lizzie sat outside on the porch, her crocheting on her lap but her hands stilled from working the yarn as she watched the golden orb descend behind the hill. On a whim she stood and began to walk behind the house and up the hill. She wanted to pass through the trees to see what, indeed, was on the other side. Was it a farm? Or merely another hill?
Her feet became damp with dew, but she ignored the uncomfortable feeling as she walked on. The fence line stopped just before the trees, and Lizzie bent down to slip between the two boards that made the split-rail fence. Her skirt caught on a splintered piece of wood, and she yanked it free, annoyed to see a hole near her hem.
At the top of the hill she paused and stood, her arms hugging herself as the evening air was becoming cool now that the sun was se
tting. Instead of an expansive farm as she had imagined, she found herself looking down at another farmette and, just beyond that, a road that curved between another pocket of trees. On the other side of the road were more contemporary houses, most likely belonging to Englische families, not Amish.
“If you please spare me one moment,” a voice said behind her.
Lizzie turned, not frightened this time by the intrusion. Indeed, she realized that she had almost expected Frederick to appear. He was now standing before her in the same clothing as before, still perfectly laundered and with nary a spot. She wondered if he too had been tormented all day, reliving their conversation and the feelings brought about by the conflicting emotions that she had experienced.
“I would not dream of repeating any of the words that were met with such repulsion earlier today,” he said solemnly, taking a step forward. He held a white envelope in his hand, which he proceeded to reach out and hand to her. “However, I did wish to request that you take this and, when feeling the urge of curiosity, read my words as an answer to the two charges against me that you spoke of earlier.”
Reluctantly Lizzie reached out her hand and took the envelope, feeling the weight of multiple pages within it. She stared at it for a moment before looking up at Frederick. She had no words to say. Or, rather, she couldn’t speak for the forlorn and miserable look on his face, one that reminded her far too much of Jane’s expression upon learning that Charles was destined to marry Grace Detweiler.
“I shall bother you no more,” he whispered, bowing his head and turning to retreat back down the hill where his buggy had been parked, near the stable on the Kaufman farm.
She waited until his buggy disappeared from view before she turned around, facing the setting sun, which had begun to barely brush against the horizon, its great orange rays peeking through the clouds and forming a colorful quilt in the sky. Slipping her finger under the flap on the back of the envelope, she opened it, ashamed to see that her hand was shaking as she withdrew its contents.
Unfolding the letter, her eyes quickly flowed through the lines, her heart racing with each word that was laid before her in Frederick’s neat and precise handwriting.
Dear Elizabeth,
I shall not repeat words of sentiment in this missive, but I would request your indulgence in permitting me the opportunity to respond to the two charges against my character, which you laid before me this morning.
While I am under the impression that your acquaintance with George Wickey has been but just peripheral, I can assure you that mine has not. Upon the death of his daed, George was, indeed, granted a rather large parcel of land that abutted my own property. It was never my intention to acquire it but rather than wish to farm his land and worship with his community, George chose to engage in a most unusual rumschpringe .
His onkel, Jacob, tried most everything to set his ward, George, on the track of godliness, but George refused baptism and began to spend his free time with other young men, less reputable and clearly not men that would join the church.
When he began to disappear for days at a time, there was naught that could be done to find him. His farm sat unworked and his bills began to accumulate. And then came the news that George had acquired a gambling habit, one that brought with it much debt.
Jacob Beachey was beside himself and vowed to pay the debt. However, with so many kinner of his own, several that had come of age and were in need of their own farms, Jacob Beachey did not have the extra funds to save George from his own sins. There was talk of selling the land, but being that it was landlocked and without much by way of a farmhouse, there was not much interest from anyone besides developers, a most undesirable outcome.
It is true that I offered to purchase the property in order to save George Wickey from his terrible debt and to save the community from having valuable farmland turned into housing for the Englische .
While George should have been grateful, he was not. Instead he asked me to turn it back over to him . . . which I refused. It was shortly after that when I learned he had begun taking my sister, Grace, home from singings. She was just sixteen and unwise to the world of courtship. Within just weeks he had begun to arrange for an elopement with her, an elopement before baptism and one that would certainly have been her ruination.
Thankfully she confided in me before that unhappy event could occur. You can only imagine how devastated she was to learn of George’s deception, having! only wanted to marry her for her access to land, the very land he had so willingly abandoned for want of a dice and a card game!
As for the charges against me in regard to your sister, Jane, of that I cannot beg anything more than forgiveness. My observation of Jane was that of casual friendship and circumstance, not of romantic interest in Charles. I feared for his heart and distracted him with the suggestion that he might wed Grace and have the tract of land that lies between his father’s farm and my own. The conversation went no further, and no courtship has ensued, however.
Had I suspected that Jane truly felt emotions for Charles, mayhaps I would have been less inclined to interfere. Still, there was the issue of the expectation of marriage from your own maem, a story that was spread throughout Leola before Charles’s bags were unpacked upon arrival! It was distressing to think of Charles Beachey marrying into a family where the maem was prone to gossip and the younger sisters to such silliness.
If I offend you by these words, I do apologize. I write with an open heart and with truth, in order to explain myself. While I cannot hope to redeem my favor in your eyes, I do hope that these words set the story straight so that you think less ill of me, now that the facts have been shared.
With much blessings,
Frederick Detweiler
Lizzie stood there at the top of the hill, the letter in her hand and her eyes watching as the sun finally dipped down below the horizon. The colors of the sky changed from orange and reds to dark purples and blues. She watched the quilted pattern of colors shift behind the random scattering of clouds, which began to fade as day rapidly dissolved into nighttime.
If the contents of the letter gave pause, she showed no outward signs. Inside, however, she could scarce make sense of what she had just read. Was it possible that George Wickey had lied to her? His character certainly was in grave question, given that he had not attended one single worship service in Pennsylvania and had certainly not thought much about returning to Ohio to attend to his onkel.
As for the other matter, Lizzie tried to recall the two nights spent at the Beachey house. How could Frederick have presumed that Jane was indifferent to Charles? It was true that the men had worked outside of the house on most days. Frederick had certainly failed to witness Charles’s attention to Jane and her response when the house was quiet in the early morning hours. As for the evenings, Lizzie recalled that Jane had, indeed, sat quietly crocheting, rarely engaging in conversation when other people occupied the room.
With her face tilted toward the sky, Lizzie shut her eyes and prayed. She prayed for God to forgive her for having rushed to judgment and having formed a first impression that was so far from the truth. She had let the tongue of one man speak ill of another without questioning the motives behind such evil words. And to think that George Wickey had tried to cajole a young Grace to betray her faith and elope with him, all for the want of land that he had gambled away to begin with!
Chapter Eighteen
IT WAS TWO days later when William and Leah insisted that both Charlotte and Lizzie accompany them on a buggy ride to explore the countryside. They were to leave the following Monday morning to return to Leola, a slight delay in their plans after Wilmer had pressed them to stay for church service.
With a free day of leisure, a buggy ride had seemed like a natural course of pastime. Lizzie barely cared what they did or where they went. She was merely counting down the days until she could return home and disappear into the routine of life on her daed’s farm, far away from the confusion she felt from her time spent a
t the Kaufman farm.
She had tried to remain upbeat but found it increasing hard as she repeatedly replayed the scene with Frederick. She thought back to having met him and his horrible words about her. She remembered his disapproving looks and proud mannerism at the Beachey farm. She couldn’t forget their words in the buggy ride home from the singing. And yet . . .
She remembered him helping her over the puddle in the driveway after the storm. She recalled his look of hidden curiosity when she had tossed his horrid words back at him. She could feel him standing next to her when she walked down the road each morning.
Despite the mixed feelings, she realized that she found it hard to forget the very things she wished not to remember.
She was barely paying attention, knowing not where they were, unaware of the direction in which the horse and open-topped buggy went. So oblivious was Lizzie that she neglected to see Charlotte watching her and failed to notice William turn down a particularly long lane.
“I believe this is the place, ain’t so, Charlotte?” her daed asked.
Charlotte glanced over her shoulder and, after taking a moment to recognize where they were, nodded her head. “Ja, this is the Detweiler farm.”
At the mention of Frederick’s last name Lizzie snapped out of her daydream and looked around at her surroundings. Plush green fields with a plain wooden fencing kept the horses grazing on the hilltop while two perfectly painted white buildings stood in the dip of the valley. A windmill was stationed behind the one building, spinning slowly in the midday breeze. As far as the eye could see were rolling hills of pasture and crops, all carefully manicured. The horses that frolicked in the one pasture were gorgeous Standardbred horses, several with gangly colts beside them.
