The Refuge

by Ann H. Gabhart

  I had witnessed such tremors in the Sunday meetings at Harmony Hill, although most of the dances were disciplined marches. Still, at times, one of the believers would be overcome by the spirit to the point of quaking trembles. I never met this Mother Ann. She had passed on into the true realm of heaven many years before, but left behind enough followers to start Shaker communities all across the eastern states, with some in the frontier states, including two here in Kentucky.

  The first weeks after I came to Harmony Hill, Eldress Maria had instructed me to read the story of Mother Ann’s life to help me accept the Shaker way. I could agree with many of the teachings in the book. The need for generosity, the satisfaction of working with one’s own hands to make something useful, the sorrow of riotous living, but the denial of marital love seemed to fly in the face of all that was natural in life.

  So now I could have told Sister Helene how very wrong her Mother Ann was about the institution of marriage, but I had no heart for debate. Instead I answered her wondering.

  “The love shared between a man and a woman is one of the sweetest blessings the Lord bestows on his people. It is the joy of a sunrise, the beauty of a starry sky, the faithful promise of a rainbow. Two become one forevermore.” I stopped, unable to state the one thing that could tear a man and wife apart. Death.

  “That can never be in a Shaker life.” A timbre of sorrow sounded in her words.

  “But if all were Shakers as you say you wish, there would be no babies.” My free hand slipped under my apron to touch my midsection.

  “You and I both know those in the world will never all choose to walk the Shaker way.” She kept her voice low and looked around as if worried a watcher might be listening to her words of doubt. “But should that happen, then the Lord would supply.”

  Again I did not argue or state the obvious that the Lord had already designed a way for children. Mothers and fathers. Instead we sat silently as the day dimmed among the trees, perhaps each wrapped in our own separate worries. What hers could be, I did not know. Perhaps the wondering she thought would plummet her into sin. I tried not to think at all and be no more feeling than the hard wooden stump beneath me.

  After a long while, Sister Helene spoke. “And what will you do now, Sister Darcie?”

  I didn’t answer her question. Instead I said, “I am with child.”

  I expected condemnation or at least distress, but instead her face lit up as though I had presented her with a much desired gift.

  “Even more I have wondered about a woman bearing a child as Mary bore Jesus.”

  “Mine will not be a virgin birth.” I thought it best to make that clear to one who seemed so innocent of such matters.

  “Nay, of course not.” She laughed, something I had not often heard her do.

  “Will I be sent out of the village?”

  “Nay,” she said again. “Believers are ever kind to those in need. You have surely seen that, with the way we feed any who come to us hungry. How we give shelter to those in need. How we took you in when you came among us, even though you lacked belief in our ways.”

  I could not deny the truth of her words. “Yea,” I whispered.

  “You must stay with us so that we can care for you.” She squeezed my hand.

  I had nowhere else to go and months before the baby’s birth. By then, perhaps the Lord would provide an answer to the dilemma of being a mother in a Shaker society. I could not, would not, ever call the child within me brother or sister. I would be his mother.

  Among those in the Gathering Family, I had noted the longing faces of mothers who had not yet surrendered to the Shaker way for families that separated parents and children. Some need beyond their control must have brought them into the village. Perhaps in time, I would share their desperation, with no way to survive on my own. I thought of my brothers. So many years had passed since I had seen them that they could have forgotten they had a sister. Still, they might take me in, but I knew no way to find them up in Ohio or wherever they may have gone by now.

  I couldn’t go back to Granny Hatchell’s farm. When she died, a nephew I had seen only twice showed up to claim it. I had no legal claim. Walter said it didn’t matter. We had each other. We needed nothing else.

  I could not dwell on my loss. Best to think one day at a time. The Bible advised such a course. Even the Shakers suggested as much, with their Mother Ann’s advice to do their work as if each day would be their last or as if they might live a thousand years. It seemed a strange saying. No one lived a thousand years, but sometimes a day could be one’s last.

  I stood up to follow Sister Helene back into the Shaker fold to live that one day at a time. A longing rose within me to become a wordless prayer that I would find a way to care for this baby I carried. Surely the Lord would honor such a prayer.

  4

  DECEMBER 1849

  “You need a wife. Leatrice needs a mother.”

  Flynn Keller wanted to walk away from Silas Cox, refuse to listen, but his father-in-law was trying to help. Might even be right. At least about Leatrice needing a mother. So he stood still and let the man have his say. He deserved that much respect from Flynn.

  Silas lacked some in size, a couple of hands shorter than Flynn and with no meat on his bones, but that never stopped him. He’d try anything. That was where Lena got it. The sometimes foolhardy try anything. Flynn figured that was how come she married him, a man who knew horses but little else.

  Lena loved horses too. Liked riding the more spirited ones Flynn trained, but then she’d gotten on Sebastian before he was fully broken. Not that Lena hadn’t lost her seat on horses before. Never stopped her getting right back on. But that last time she must have hit her head. Flynn saw her fall. Carried her to the house. Called in doctors. More than one.

  They couldn’t do a thing to help her. She never woke up. Some said it was a blessing when she passed on three weeks later. No blessing to Flynn. He would have sat by her bedside forever with the hope of her coming back to him.

  Silas understood. He loved his daughter and grieved over her long and hard. Then last summer when the cholera came through the area, he lost his wife. So he knew.

  “Maybe you’re the one who needs a wife.” Flynn was sorry for his words as soon as the pain flickered across the other man’s face. Silas wasn’t trying to poke Flynn. He aimed to help.

  “That could be. In time. But Beatrice hasn’t been in the ground that long.” Sorrow darkened the man’s eyes. “Lena, God rest her soul, has been gone nigh on two years now. You’ve got to move on, son. If not for yourself, for my granddaughter. You can’t just let her go wild, and you can’t watch her every minute while you work those horses of yours.”

  Flynn heard the thought behind the man’s words. What if Leatrice tried to get on one of the horses without them knowing it? The girl was as headstrong as her mother, even if she was only six. Wouldn’t be seven until spring came again. Just this day Silas had been busy about some chore and the girl had gone missing from the house.

  They’d found her in the far pasture pulling grass to feed Sebastian, the very horse that could be blamed for her being motherless. Sebastian was long ago trained. A fine horse now. Flynn should have sold him, but Lena had loved that horse. She wouldn’t blame him. Flynn didn’t blame him, but he did keep him away from the house where he didn’t have to lay his eyes on him every single day.

  “She knows better,” Flynn said. Words that didn’t mean much.

  “Knowing and doing aren’t the same.”

  Silas looked tired. Things had been hard since the passing of Leatrice’s grandmother. She had somehow kept Leatrice in line, unlike the women Flynn had hired since her death. They had been next to useless. A couple of them threw up their hands and gave up the job after a few days. The only one who lasted longer than a week was Irene Black and that had been a disaster.

  Flynn pulled in a breath and looked toward the yard where Leatrice was on her swing. The little girl pumped her legs up and ba
ck ferociously to go high enough to touch the maple branches with her toes. Her dark hair flew out behind her. She was so like her mother, except for that dark hair like Flynn’s instead of Lena’s blonde locks.

  “You’re right.” No need arguing with Silas over what was the truth. The only way he could be sure to keep his willful daughter in sight was to rope her like a pony and tie her to his belt. And then he wasn’t sure which one of them would be doing the leading.

  He spoiled her. But how could he not spoil a child who’d lost her mother? Flynn knew about that. He hadn’t seen his own mother since he was a boy. After Flynn’s father took off without a word and the cholera epidemic of 1833 stole away Flynn’s sister, his mother packed up his younger siblings and headed back to Virginia to live with relatives. His mother hadn’t died, but she was gone to him nevertheless. Flynn had made his way, but it was different for a boy of fourteen than a girl of four. Nothing the same about any of that.

  Silas was watching Leatrice too. He tensed when the rope caught and popped because she went so high. A laugh drifted over their way. He shook his head and turned back to Flynn. “I hear the preacher and his wife offered to take her as one of their own. Could be you should consider that.”

  “No.” He would not desert his child.

  Silas gave him a hard look. “Even if it was best for her?”

  “That wouldn’t be best. I’m her father.”

  “I know you love her, son.” Silas shook his head a little. “But if she don’t get some sense and soon, you’re liable to lose her. She’s that much like Lena, and we lost her.”

  “Because she fell off a horse.”

  “That she shouldn’t have been riding. You know it’s true, Flynn. I know it’s true.”

  Hot blood flooded Flynn’s face. He clenched his hands and tamped down his anger as he spoke his next words slowly, one at a time. “I’m not giving my daughter away. That’s the last I want to hear about it, Silas. The last.”

  Silas didn’t blanch. “Could be the preacher wouldn’t be right for her anyhow. But that don’t mean you don’t need to do something.”

  As if to prove the man’s point, Leatrice yelled and jumped out of the swing with it high in the air. Too high. Flynn’s breath caught in his chest as she tumbled to the ground and rolled like a stone pitched downhill. Flynn ran toward her, but by the time he was halfway there, Leatrice was on her feet, laughing. She paid no attention to her skinned knee or Flynn as she jumped back into the swing and began pumping it higher again.

  Flynn stepped in front of her and grabbed the ropes. “Don’t you jump out of this swing like that again. You’re apt to break a leg.”

  “Or my head like Mama.” She looked up at Flynn, her dark blue eyes wide. The girl knew how to keep Flynn from walloping her.

  He never liked smacking her bottom anyway. He’d left all that up to Lena or Lena’s mother. Now with Silas looking on, he hardened his heart and kept his voice firm. “Or your head.”

  Tears popped up in the girl’s eyes and overflowed down her cheeks. She jumped off the swing so fast it bounced up and down behind her as she buried her face against Flynn’s stomach.

  Her voice was muffled as her lips moved against him. “I don’t want to break my head like Mama’s.”

  “There, there.” Flynn smoothed down her dark curls. What else could he do? “You’ll be fine. As long as you listen to me and stop doing things that might hurt you.”

  “I miss Mama.” Leatrice sobbed. “And Mamaw Bea.”

  Whether she was shedding intentional tears to make him forget being upset with her or if the tears were the result of real sadness, it made no difference. Her weeping destroyed Flynn. Something he couldn’t fix. He was a man who fixed things. He could take a horse and change every bad behavior, but he had no way to fix a motherless child except, he supposed, what Silas said. Marrying again.

  Flynn wasn’t ready for that. If he had been, that Irene Black might have already captured him. After the first two women quit and Irene took the job of keeping house, she’d wasted no time letting him know she was ready to marry, but he hadn’t been in a marrying mood. Not just for somebody to keep house. He could wash dishes and sweep floors if need be.

  Even if he had been tempted to surrender to a marriage of convenience, he wouldn’t have picked Irene Black. Not after he came to the house unexpected one day and heard her telling Leatrice that bears would come eat her if she didn’t act right.

  The week before, Leatrice had become strangely fearful at night. Flynn thought she was missing her grandmother. But it turned out she was worried about bears eating her while she was sleeping. Flynn sent Irene packing, promised Leatrice what Irene said wasn’t true, but to make her feel better, he barred the doors and nailed down her bedroom window so no bears could get near her. That he could fix.

  Now he wiped away her tears, hugged her again, and sent her off to gather the eggs. As she headed for the henhouse, his heart felt too big for his chest. He did love that child. Would do anything for her. Maybe he could get her a dog. A lazy, old dog that wouldn’t run off with her.

  Silas stepped up behind him. “You might think about the Shakers.”

  Shakers? Flynn didn’t know why Silas was talking about them. Flynn did have some Shakers coming to look at one of his horses. While they usually traded with other Shaker villages, some as far flung as Ohio and Pennsylvania, they got a horse from him now and again.

  The Shaker village was a few miles away, but near enough to hear their bell tolling when the weather was right. Sometimes he even caught the sound of their singing on worship days. The people had odd ideas about how they thought folks should live, but they were honest and fair in their horse trading. That was more than he could say for some others.

  Flynn turned to look at Silas. “You mean to sell more horses?”

  “I’m not talking about horses. I’m talking about Leatrice. Those people take in motherless children, teach them how to read and write.”

  Flynn went stiff. “I know how to read and write. I can teach Leatrice myself.”

  “I’m not saying you can’t, but it would do the girl good to be around other girls her age. Help her learn how to act and all. I’ve heard the Shakers are good at keeping their youngsters in line.”

  “They don’t have youngsters. They all live as brothers and sisters out there.”

  “Then their adopted youngsters.” Silas was like a cur dog with a bone. Not ready to give up his idea that something needed to be done with Leatrice.

  “Leatrice isn’t up for adoption.”

  “Of course not, but you wouldn’t have to leave her there forever. Just until things settle down. Until she settles down. With all those sisters watching her, she’d surely stay out of trouble.”

  “That’s crazy talk, Silas. Completely crazy.”

  Silas shrugged. “Maybe so. You know I just want the best for her. For you too. You could always join up with her.”

  “Me, a Shaker?” Silas had to have lost his mind.

  “Like I said, just for a while. Till Leatrice gets old enough to have some sense. And this way, if you go now, you wouldn’t have to give them the farm. You know the farm here is going to you and Leatrice when I die.”

  “Slow down, Silas. You’ve got a lot of years left in you.”

  “Could be. I’m not in any particular hurry to leave this old world.” Silas shook his head with a little smile. “But those old Shakers are pretty shrewd. Anybody goes to join up, they add their property right in with theirs, excepting slaves. A body has slaves, they have to set them free on the spot.”

  Flynn stared at Silas. “I don’t have any slaves and don’t intend to.”

  “Well, no, but property is property. They’d likely want your horses. I couldn’t claim them as mine. Over there, they own everything together. What’s good for one is good for the whole. At least that’s what they say.” Silas spat on the ground. “Could be some of it’s best for the boss Shakers, but the most of them are generous
to a fault. Will let anybody come live there as long as they work and stay away from women.”

  “I’m not giving Leatrice to anybody. Not the preacher. Not the Shakers.”

  “You’re probably right about the preacher, but you should think about the Shakers. The idea come to me while I wasn’t able to sleep last night, like maybe the Lord put it there. So maybe you should pray about it. See what the Lord wants you to do.”

  Silas turned and headed toward the house before Flynn could come up with the right thing to say. If there was a right thing when somebody came up with such an idea. Him a Shaker? He didn’t believe any of what the Shaker men he’d dealt with told him about their religion from the belief that their founder, this woman they called Mother Ann, had the Christ spirit. There might not be anything wrong with that. Trying to be like Jesus, but they went a couple of steps on past that with their thinking. They claimed God meant for there to be a female holy person like Jesus and that person was this Mother Ann.

  If that wasn’t weird enough, they thought a person could worship by dancing. That went against everything Flynn had ever been taught about church. You danced at the rowdy houses, not at church. Not that doing a jig now and again was all that sinful or sharing some sweet moments arm in arm with the woman you loved was one bit wrong. He and Lena had done some of that kind of dancing. But the Shakers claimed a person could get so filled with the spirit that he would go into trembling fits while whirling around in their dances.

  That’s how come they were called Shakers. Not what they named themselves. That was something about a Society of Believers, but those who watched them shaking in their worship had called them Shakers and it stuck. While it might have been used with ridicule in the beginning, the Shakers latched on to the name for their Shaker seeds, sweetmeats, potions, and more.

  You could depend on Shaker products. Their seed grew. Their cattle looked better than most on the farms around. Could be even their potions would work, although Flynn had never tried them.