The Roll of the Drums

by Jan Drexler

  “Whatever is going on, it doesn’t look like it’s going to happen this morning. You need to get some sleep.”

  He rose from the chair and drained his cup of coffee. “I told your daed I’d help him start cutting hay, but with this weather, it looks like we’ll have to put that off.” He looked around the barnyard again, tapping his finger against the side of his cup. “Don’t stay here at the house today.” He turned to Ruby as he spoke, his eyebrows peaked in concern. “Take the children to your mother’s. We’re too isolated here, hidden from the road and the neighbors.”

  “I don’t see why I should leave. I have so much work to do around here.”

  “I need you to, Ruby. I can’t take a chance—”

  He broke off, looking into the woods past her shoulder. Ruby turned, but she only saw a deer bounding away, its white tail flashing in the dark underbrush. Gideon shook his head, then grasped her elbow, pulling her close.

  “I can’t risk losing you too.” Gideon’s voice was low, nearly a moan. His eyes, so close to her own, were dark in the dim light. “Obey me in this. Please. I won’t be able to rest if I don’t know that you and the children are safe.”

  Safe. The word echoed in Ruby’s mind. She had always felt safe in Weaver’s Creek, but Gideon’s experiences had made him wiser to the ways of the world than she was. His actions while they were in Millersburg had shown her that.

  She nodded. “For sure, Gideon. I will do whatever you want. Whatever you need me to do.”

  “Denki.” He caressed her arm, then his hand moved to her back and pulled her close, tightening his hold until she was pressed against him, enclosed in his arms. He spoke into her ear, his voice intense. “Stay there until I come for you. Your mother won’t mind, will she?”

  Ruby shook her head, breathing in Gideon’s scent, safe in his arms. “She will enjoy having us stay as long as we need to.”

  “It won’t be long before I join you there later today. But you are right, I need to sleep.”

  Her breath caught when he tightened his hold on her once more, then she pulled back, looking into his face. His gaze lingered on her eyes, then dropped to her mouth. He paused, cast a glance into her eyes once more, then leaned closer. Ruby stilled, waiting for his kiss, knowing it would be tender and careful, just as he was.

  “What are you doing?”

  Ruby jumped at the sound of Roseanna’s voice. She tried to pull away from Gideon, but he didn’t release her.

  “I’m hugging Ruby and enjoying it very much.”

  Roseanna’s eyes narrowed. “You never hug me like that.”

  Gideon finally let go of Ruby and turned to his daughter. “That’s because you are my daughter. When I hug you, I kiss you here—” He kissed the top of her head. “And I kiss you here.” He kissed her cheek. “And sometimes I kiss you like this.” He buried his face in her neck and blew raspberries until she pushed away, laughing.

  “Daed!” Sophia came running out of the house. “Kiss me silly too!”

  He grabbed Sophia and kissed both girls, tickling them until they were breathless.

  “Now you’ve both been kissed, so go get ready. Ruby is taking you to Lydia’s house today.”

  They ran into the house and up the stairs, still laughing.

  Gideon turned to Ruby, his grin at the girls’ joy fading as he looked at her. “I . . . I don’t know why I held you like that. I didn’t mean to do it, I guess I . . .”

  “You aren’t thinking clearly.” Ruby finished for him, her back and shoulders turning ice cold after the heat from his touch. “You haven’t slept. I understand.”

  He took a step closer. “I don’t know what to think about you, Ruby. You came into our lives just when we needed you the most, and you continue to bring happiness to my children.” He stroked his beard, his eyes searching the woods again. “Lovinia has been gone for more than a month, but it seems like we buried her yesterday. And with the possibility of danger, I can’t help thinking about what happened last spring, like I’m reliving a nightmare.”

  “That nightmare is in the past. It won’t happen again.”

  “Won’t it? You don’t know that, and neither do I. We’re in the midst of a war, and none of us are safe from its devastation.” He scanned the woods again. “You’ll take the children to your mother’s then?”

  “For sure, I will. As soon as we’re ready.”

  He followed her into the house, then with a final squeeze of her hand, he went into his bedroom and closed the door. Ruby peered out of the window over the sink into the thick trees. Nothing was moving. He must be imagining things, but she would still do as he wished. Anything to erase the haunted look she had seen in his eyes.

  Gideon woke feeling sluggish and weary. The clouds had moved on, and the noonday sun shone brightly. He sat on the edge of his bed, listening. Even though he was alone in the house, the old building creaked as a gust of wind shook the leaves outside his window, showering drops of water as it passed.

  Rubbing his face, Gideon tried to bring himself to full wakefulness. His imagination had been playing tricks on him, making him see raiders who weren’t there. What must Ruby think of him? What had she told Lydia and Abraham?

  He got dressed and went out to the kitchen. Ruby usually left the coffeepot at the back of the stove so they could enjoy a second cup partway through the morning, but as he headed toward it, something on the floor made him freeze. He looked closer. It was a leaf. A wet leaf.

  Breaking into a cold sweat, he looked around. The loaf of bread Ruby had made yesterday wasn’t on the counter where she had left it, and the coffeepot was sitting on the table. He lifted it. Empty. He stared at the leaf.

  Gideon shook himself. His imagination had carried him away again. For sure, Ruby had emptied the coffeepot before she left, and she had taken the loaf of bread to her mother’s. The leaf? It had blown in the door when Ruby and the children went out on their way to Lydia’s.

  “Gideon?”

  Levi’s voice called to him from outside. Gideon shook his head to clear it of the lingering thoughts and stepped out the door.

  “It’s good to see you,” Gideon said.

  Levi came jogging toward him. “Have you seen Champ?” He was breathless by the time he reached Gideon and leaned his hands on his knees.

  “Your horse? Did he get loose? We can check the barn and pasture to see if he found his way over here.”

  “I don’t know how he got out. I know I fastened the stable securely last night. I checked it twice.”

  Gideon halted halfway to the barn door. “You’re sure?”

  Levi nodded. His normally pink face was red with exertion. “Father blames me for being careless, but I don’t see how he could have gotten away.”

  “Was anything else missing or out of place?”

  “I don’t think so.” Levi frowned as he thought. “Mother did make a comment that the chickens hadn’t given as many eggs this morning.”

  “Have you seen any strangers around?” Gideon’s hands shook. He clasped them behind his back, trying to appear relaxed.

  “You mean like those raiders we were talking about yesterday? No one like that.”

  “But strangers?”

  “A man came to the door yesterday evening. He was looking for a handout, and Mother gave him a plate of food.”

  “What kind of man?”

  “Old, I guess. He wore a black suit that was worn at the elbows and knees.” Levi looked at him. “He didn’t look like he could be a soldier. He said he was a minister, on his way west. But he couldn’t have taken Champ.”

  “Why?”

  “He left long before I checked the barn for the night. I saw him riding his mule along the road toward Millersburg soon after supper.”

  Gideon continued toward the barn, Levi hurrying to keep up with him. He had to make sure nothing had happened to Bett and his team.

  “You think that old man is a thief?” Levi asked as Gideon opened the barn door.

  Th
e horses and the cow were grazing in the pasture on the other side of the barn. Gideon whooshed out a breath of relief.

  “I don’t know if he is or not. But he sounds like the same man that stopped by Elizabeth’s house on Monday. Ruby said he was on his way west then, so why was he still in the neighborhood yesterday?”

  Something heavy fell in the haymow above their heads. Levi’s eyes grew wide as he stared at Gideon. Gideon put one finger to his lips in a warning for Levi to remain silent. He went to the horses’ stalls and called them in from the pasture.

  “As long as you’re here, Levi, you can help me harness Samson and Delilah. I was getting ready to take them down to Abraham’s when you stopped by.”

  He put halters on both horses and tied them.

  Levi glanced up at the floor of the mow. “For sure.” He took Delilah’s harness off its hooks and started toward Samson.

  “Wait—” Gideon’s voice broke and he cleared his throat. “This is Samson’s harness.” He took the other harness into Samson’s stall. “You have Delilah’s.” He worked to keep his voice steady, but it was higher pitched than normal. He cleared his throat again and harnessed the horse, not bothering to brush him first.

  Levi didn’t say anything but worked until Delilah was ready.

  “I’ll drive the horses along the road. Meanwhile, would you open the back gate for the cow? She can graze in the woods this afternoon.”

  The younger man glanced upward again. “I’ll meet you at Abraham’s then?”

  “Ja, for sure, at Abraham’s. We’ll see if he’s ready to cut hay now that the sun has come out. The fields might be dry enough.”

  Gideon gathered the reins and drove the team out of the barn and along the lane toward the road, walking behind them. His back itched, but he resisted the urge to look behind him. That noise he and Levi had heard might have been a rat, but only a man could knock over an object that large.

  Levi caught up to him just as he turned the team off the road and toward Abraham’s barn. The children were playing by the barn and waved when they saw him.

  “What was in your barn?” Levi said, his breath coming in puffs. “Was it that minister?”

  “It could have just been an animal.” Gideon risked a look back toward his house, but it was obscured by the trees at this distance. “Or it could have been a man. I don’t think it was the man you saw last night, though, because we didn’t see his mule.”

  Abraham came out of the barn as they approached. “I didn’t expect you to come by today, Gideon. Ruby told us you had been up all night.”

  “Let’s go in the barn to talk,” Gideon said, looking up the road again. “Someone might be watching us.”

  As they unharnessed Samson and Delilah, Abraham asked, “What is going on?”

  Gideon related the story of Morgan’s Raiders and the danger they might be in.

  “Our driving horse, Champ, is missing, and Gideon and I heard someone in his barn,” Levi said. “That’s why we brought his team down here.”

  Levi sounded more frightened than he was. Gideon laid a hand on the younger man’s arm to calm him.

  “We don’t know if it was a man in the barn, but something was there. And with the Beilers’ horse missing, I didn’t want to take a chance leaving the team at home.”

  Abraham scratched at his chest under his beard. “But the horse might have wandered off. And you might have heard a raccoon in your barn loft.”

  Levi glanced at Gideon. “I was sure I had fastened Champ’s stall door securely.”

  “Haven’t you had problems with that horse before?”

  “You don’t believe me,” Gideon said. His arms ached, and he rubbed his elbows. He didn’t know if his suspicions were correct or not. But he couldn’t shake the feeling that something was terribly wrong.

  “I believe that you heard something, and I believe you might have a reason to be worried. But we’ve had drifters travel through here before, and things have gone missing from our farms. There’s no reason to think these raiders might be involved. It might be serious, or it might be nothing to worry about. Let’s go talk to Amos and see what he thinks.”

  By the time they reached the Beilers’ farm, Gideon was feeling embarrassed. Abraham’s supposition that there could be drifters in the area was reasonable, and they had seen no signs of strangers in the area during the three-mile drive. If a company of soldiers was nearby, surely he would see signs of their camp, or they would hear men moving about. At the very least, a wagon with three men would be stopped and questioned, but the road was quiet. The late summer insects droned in the grass along the road.

  Amos was on the porch as they drove up. “Did you find that horse, Levi?”

  Levi jumped down from the wagon seat. “Ne, Father. He just disappeared.”

  The minister’s face was as red as his son’s as he faced them. “You should check the woods.” He pointed around the side of the house, where a large stand of trees covered a hilltop. A thin thread of smoke hung in the air above the treetops. “Someone is back there, and they might be the ones who took my horse.”

  Levi gave Gideon a panicked look, and Gideon knew how he felt. He was not going into those woods to confront anyone.

  “You should come too, Amos.” Abraham tied the reins to the brake handle and climbed down from the wagon. “Whoever is back there is on your property. We should welcome them, and if you don’t like where they’re camping, we can suggest a better place.”

  Gideon’s head roared. If those two men walked into a rebel camp, they might not survive.

  “Let me go,” he said, his mouth dry. “I won’t let them see me. I’ll just find out who they are and if they’re any threat to us.”

  Amos turned to go back inside his house. “See if they have Champ too. I paid too much money for that horse to lose him to a bunch of thieves.”

  “Do you want me to go with you?” Levi’s face was pale.

  Gideon shook his head. “This is something done best by one man.” He judged the distance to the edge of the woods to be a quarter of a mile. “I should be back in an hour. I’ll let you know what I find out.”

  Abraham patted his shoulder as he left the Beilers’ barnyard. The long, lonely walk across the fields awaited him, and he would be exposed to anyone who was watching.

  Supper in Mamm’s kitchen was crowded. Ruby had already forgotten how much room Gideon’s family took up at the kitchen table, but Mamm didn’t seem to mind. She gave the three older children tasks to do to help put the meal on the table while Ruby held Daniel. He was fussy this evening and wasn’t happy sitting in the tall chair Mamm kept for her grandchildren.

  “He might be getting a new tooth,” Mamm said as she sliced the cold ham she had brought in from the springhouse.

  Ruby tried to open Daniel’s mouth to look, but he buried his face in her dress.

  “I’ve tried everything I know to soothe him,” Ruby said, rocking him in her arms.

  “Try this.” Mamm sorted through her drawer of cooking tools until she pulled out a thick wooden ring. “You used this when you were a baby, and it helped.”

  Ruby turned Daniel around. He reached for the ring and pulled it to his mouth. His crying stopped as he chewed on the toy.

  Roseanna patted her brother on the back. “That is better, isn’t it, Danny?” Her voice crooned soothingly.

  “You’re going to be a good mother someday, Roseanna,” Ruby said, holding a clean diaper handy to catch the drool dripping from Daniel’s mouth.

  Hugging her brother, Roseanna said, “I like babies. Except when they’re crying.”

  Ruby noticed Sophia watching them. “What about you, Sophia? Do you like babies?”

  The six-year-old shook her head. “They stink too much. I like grown-up boys like Ezra.”

  Mamm laughed as she put the sliced ham on a plate. Ruby put Daniel in his chair and tied him securely with a length of cloth, then took the loaf of bread from the bread box.

  “I should have
brought the loaf I had at Gideon’s house. We could have had that with our supper.”

  “It will be there when you take the children home. How long did Gideon want them to stay?”

  “He didn’t say. He is very worried about the possibility of—” Ruby broke off, remembering that the children were listening. “He is worried that the roof might leak in the rain and the children could get wet during the night. So I know we’ll stay here for tonight, at least.”

  “Where did the men go this afternoon? Your daed took the spring wagon, and Gideon and Levi were with him. They were gone most of the afternoon.”

  “I don’t know, but I’m sure they’ll tell us about it at supper tonight.” Ruby took the lid off a pot of boiling water. “It’s time to put the corn in.”

  “Roseanna, will you go ring the bell?” Mamm put the plate of cold ham on the table, out of Daniel’s reach. “Supper will be ready as soon as the corn is cooked.”

  Gideon was silent during supper, not eating much, and even Daed only gave short answers to Mamm’s questions.

  Finally he said, “We’ll talk later,” with a slight nod toward the children.

  So Ruby and Mamm talked about the quilt they planned to make.

  “Who will it be for?” Ruby asked.

  “I thought it might be good to give it to Elizabeth. I was surprised when she didn’t come with you today.”

  “I think she was feeling lonely after hearing about Reuben. This morning she said she would spend the day with Katie, and possibly all night. Katie has been begging her to come for a long visit.”

  “That’s too bad about Reuben. Such a sad end, and Elizabeth has already been alone for so long,” Mamm said.

  Daed took a piece of bread and spread butter on it. “We can’t help Reuben, but we can make sure Elizabeth is no longer alone.”

  “She has talked about joining the church,” Ruby said, then stopped, biting her lip. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have said anything. Elizabeth has talked to me about it, but I should leave it to her to tell you.”