by Mary Ellis
Should we plan to rebuild the house and try to keep the farm going?
We should just sell the place while the prices are high and move elsewhere, her daed had said several times.
It’s getting too crowded in Lancaster—too much traffic. It’s dangerous to even cross the street for the mail, her mamm had muttered too often to count.
With so many Englischers settling in the area, it’s getting hard to keep the Plain ways.
Amy remembered her parents’ complaints and those from other district members with bitter nostalgia. Now Edna and Samuel King no longer had to worry about the number of buggy accidents or increased land taxes or aggressive tourists trying to take their pictures in town. They wouldn’t fret about anything ever again.
Now, two weeks later, Amy was no closer to figuring out what to do. Impulsively, she stalked away from those clustered on her aunt’s porch following a preaching service. She headed across the meadow toward a stand of tall pines. Talk, talk, talk—that’s all her Amish family ever did, just like Englischers. Maybe it’s all human beings ever did. But she needed to think, alone, in only God’s presence.
Ever since the night of the fire, the bishop, ministers, and elders had been dropping by to speak with her grossdawdi, Uncle Joseph, and John. Even though she loved her fiancé with all her heart, they weren’t married yet, so why did the elders speak to him more so than her? They hadn’t yet announced their engagement, although everyone knew they were courting. They had both taken classes and joined the Amish church. John had moved to a room in their barn loft so he could spend his free time helping with the remodeling to the King home. The long-range plan had been for mamm and daed to eventually move into the new dawdi haus addition, leaving the main house to Amy and John. That unfinished addition had gone up in smoke along with everything else.
Amy swallowed down her selfishness. Because her mind just now was a confused stew of emotions, she should feel grateful that others were concerned with her well-being. Settling herself on a sunbaked boulder, she turned her face skyward to plead once more for guidance.
But the answering voice came from a tall, muscular man rather than from a merciful Lord.
“I thought I saw you slip off,” said John, striding toward her. “Too many folks around your uncle’s house, no? It’s hard for a person to find a quiet moment.” He sat down in the tall grass by her feet, tipping his hat back to catch the warm sun on his face.
“That’s the truth. And four girls to one bedroom is three too many,” she joked—her first attempt at humor in weeks.
He reached for her hand, cradling it gently inside his. “I imagine so. When one gal runs out of things to say, someone else pipes up.” He focused his sea-blue eyes—truly his best feature—on her. “You’ve been given much to think about the last few days. I know your uncle and the bishop spoke to you about selling your parents’ farm.”
“Jah, they have.” She wished this discussion could be postponed indefinitely.
“Plenty of people are interested in the land, English and Amish, besides your uncle and his sons.” John paused, waiting for a reply. When she sat mutely watching a bumblebee’s move between clover heads, he continued. “And I hope you’ve seriously considered my idea. I have nothing left here in Pennsylvania except for you, Amy. The addition I was building onto your parents’ house is gone. I can’t continue to live in a barn loft on property about to be sold. Both of my brothers reside in Maine. I can’t afford to buy your daed’s acres here in Lancaster, not since the proceeds must be split among your sisters, but my older bruder says I could buy decent farmland up north with what I’ve already saved…and your share of the inheritance.” John’s assurance slipped a notch when she failed to respond. “That is, if you’re still willing to marry me in the fall.” He seemed to be holding his breath, waiting.
She turned to face him and ran her index finger down his smooth-shaven cheek. “Of course I’ll still wed you, John. My parents’ passing didn’t change my feelings for you.”
He smiled, blushing like a schoolboy. “Whew, that’s gut to hear.” He leaned up to brush a quick kiss across her lips.
He tasted of peppermint candy and sheer devotion. John was the only thing Amy felt certain of. She’d fallen in love the night they met and had never doubted his commitment to her for a single moment.
“Thomas said his district grows larger each year. The Englischers have welcomed Plain folks to the community, but there’s little chance the area will become a tourist hot spot like here—at least, not in our lifetime. What say you, Amy? Land in Maine costs a fraction of what it does in Lancaster. I want to farm, but I can’t afford to do so here. I don’t like working construction, but I’ll continue if you don’t want to leave your family.” His ruddy complexion glowed with health and hopeful expectation.
Amy pulled back her hand and rose to her feet. Clearing her throat, she composed her thoughts—the ones that had been churning in her head for days. She’d discussed John’s ideas with her sisters and grandparents. She’d prayed nightly for direction, and finally it had been delivered. Now she needed to stop behaving like a child and speak up. “I have talked things out with my family, and I’ve decided to accompany you to Maine. We can marry before we leave, or, if you prefer, your brother can marry us upon arrival. But there is one catch.” She paused in her narration to meet his gaze.
He opened his palms wide. “Name it. I only wish to see my future fraa happy.”
“Nora wants to move north with us. None of the young men in this district interest her in terms of courting. She yearns for a fresh start where everyone isn’t as familiar as old shoes.”
John’s brilliant smile slipped a notch. “Thomas and Sally have a large home, according to his letter. I’m sure they will take in Nora until we marry and buy our own place.”
“Danki. Having one sister near will lessen the pain of leaving home. Rachel and Beth refuse to leave our grandparents. They are planning on moving into the attic of the dawdi haus and adjusting as well as can be expected.”
“We’re not moving to the moon, Amy. You’ll still see them occasionally.”
“I’ve looked up Maine on a map. Visits will be few and far between.” Amy inhaled a deep, calming breath. “As the eldest King sister, I’ve made another decision too. I refuse to sell my parents’ farm to an English developer. I don’t want dozens of houses springing up next to my grandparents. The traffic on this road is bad enough already.”
John’s smile vanished altogether. “But no farmer can afford to pay what this land is worth.”
“You mean worth by English standards. This land has been in my family for generations, constantly divided up into ever smaller plots for sons who marry. My uncle wishes to buy our acres and combine them with his. My cousins want to farm. They will secure bank loans to add to Uncle Joseph’s down payment. The amount won’t come close to what a land developer would pay, but it will be enough for the four King girls to make new beginnings.” She lifted her chin. “As you already pointed out, land in other places is far cheaper than here.”
He opened his mouth to argue, to protest the foolish idea of turning down a million dollars, but stopped. Maybe it was her ramrod posture, or the set of her jaw, or the hard glint in her cornflower eyes, but he closed his mouth before it started catching mosquitoes. “Your sisters agree with you?” he asked after a pause.
She nodded. “Jah, they do. Perhaps for the first time the four of us see eye to eye.”
John pushed off the rock to rise to his feet. “Then it’s settled. I’ll tell the bishop and Uncle Joseph of your decision. Shall we head back to the house? I could use a cup of strong coffee.” He held out his elbow toward her in a gentlemanly fashion.
Amy stood and hooked her arm through his, and then they strolled across the meadow back to the house. A long-absent sense of relief settled deep inside her. Finally she felt she could breathe again.
John Detweiler stared across starlit fields under a full moon, trying not to c
ough. The foul smell of smoke still hung in the air of his austere quarters. The night of the fire, he’d left his windows open to catch the evening breeze before taking Amy to the social gathering. Instead of cool air, the windows had allowed in thick, cloying smoke. District women and the four sisters had washed his walls and floor and laundered his bedding, yet the stench still remained throughout the barn, including his loft bedroom. Amy’s aunt and uncle invited him to bunk with their sons next door, but he’d declined. He could tolerate the loft for a while longer. Because the woman of his dreams had agreed to become his wife, he was a happy man. They would soon leave the fast-paced, crowded world of Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, for the tranquil countryside of Waldo County, Maine.
Maybe the winters would be long and harsh.
Maybe the soil might be less fertile than that of the Garden Spot of America.
Maybe he would have to build a house from the ground up for his new bride without the plentiful able hands in his current district. Amish homes without electrical wiring wouldn’t be readily available in a four-year-old community. Four years in existence—as opposed to nearly three hundred years in Lancaster.
But those years had wrought much change to the lives of the descendants of the original Swiss refugees. And in his opinion, those changes hadn’t been for the better. Scouting parties of Amish had been quietly looking at land in other parts of the country for years. For the price of a farm in this part of Pennsylvania, a father could buy several homes for his sons in other states. What drove the Amish from Lancaster wasn’t tourism but its consequences. Once Englischers visited, many wanted to stay and build houses, driving up prices and clogging the narrow roads with increased traffic. They demanded things like city water, professional police forces, and modern schools, raising taxes for everyone.
Many Amish families earned great sums selling quilts, crafts, furniture, and baked goods to the constant stream of tourists…and had become corrupted by the almighty dollar in return. He’d heard of Amish with gas-powered air-conditioning, modern propane-powered light fixtures, and women no longer content with traditional clothing fabrics, not when permanent press made ironing an unpleasant memory. Many had forgotten that subsistence existence, demanded in the Ordnung, had served the Amish for generations.
Almost every young woman he knew worked for a while in the English world, facing the temptations of a fancy lifestyle. He didn’t want that for his sweet Amy. So far she’d remained home, helping her mamm with housework and occasionally babysitting for the English woman down the road. But once he overheard Nora and Amy talking about looking for jobs in a tourist shop to help their parents pay bills. John cringed, thinking about Amy with women who wore short skirts, low-cut blouses, and heavy makeup. Already he’d noticed subtle changes in her demeanor he didn’t like. He hadn’t appreciated the way she’d turned his words against him regarding land prices up north. She became evasive with his questions and forthright with her opinions, even on matters she knew little about. It’s not that he thought women shouldn’t have a say, but why should she burden herself with difficult choices when she had a man who loved and cherished her?
John walked to his cot and withdrew a tattered, dog-eared road atlas from beneath the mattress. An Englischer had either lost it or thrown it out a car window when it no longer served a purpose. He had found the atlas in the ditch and taken it home to study when sleep wouldn’t come. By kerosene lamplight he located Indiana, Kentucky, Missouri, Tennessee, and Wisconsin—states that many Old Order Amish had settled in when Pennsylvania and Ohio had grown overcrowded. His fingers quickly found his favorite map—Maine—home to his older brother, Thomas, and Thomas’s wife, Sally, and his younger brother, Elam.
John slipped on the reading glasses he’d purchased at the dollar store. He stared at the small dot that would become the new home of the John Detweiler family. Even the town’s name portended a good life for those wishing nothing more than to farm and serve God—Harmony. Now that the prettiest woman in the world would be at his side, perhaps harmony would replace the doubt and disappointment filling his heart of late.
TWO
From Thy wounded side which flowed
Amy King had never felt so tired in all her life. When John said they would travel to Maine by train, she imagined herself sitting comfortably in a train car watching pretty scenery pass by. She had no idea how long it took to get to the Amtrak station in Philadelphia, first by hired driver to Lancaster and then by bus. The train itself rattled down the tracks so fast, she felt as though her stomach had taken permanent residence in her throat. But the countryside fascinated her and Nora—what they could see from the moving bullet.
John buried his nose in a paperback from the bus terminal bookstore, purchased before they boarded: The Agriculture of New England. He couldn’t wait to take up the reins of a draft team or feel rich, soft earth between his fingers. Amy couldn’t wait to sleep in a real bed instead of in a seat with her head bouncing against the window. She had no clue regarding what their accommodations would be like in Harmony because John had not yet visited his brother in his new home. He had never met his nephews or his sister-in-law, Sally. The eldest Detweiler had left Lancaster a long time ago, moving originally to Missouri before settling down in the Maine community—the first of New England—with his bride of one year.
After the train deposited them in the seaport town of Portland, they caught a bus to Augusta and then climbed into transportation arranged by his brother. She begged John to see the ocean for the first time, but he promised they would travel there for their honeymoon. Fortunately, Thomas had received John’s letter in time and had arranged a van. Otherwise, they would have been looking for hotel rooms in the middle of the night on foot. It seemed strange to carry all her clothes and personal items in one large cloth duffel bag that held Nora’s things as well. House fires never announced their arrival, allowing people to safely remove their possessions beforehand. With a stab of sorrow, Amy remembered whom she and her sisters lost that horrible night. Odd how she could mull over the destroyed fabric for her wedding dress, her hairbrush and pins, and her brand-new tennis shoes, but she couldn’t think about the parents she wouldn’t see again this side of heaven.
“This is it, folks,” announced the driver in an unfamiliar accent. “This is the Thomas Detweiler farm.”
Amy shook her head as though waking from a dream. In the darkness she saw nothing but the gaping mouth of a dirt lane.
The driver lowered his voice to speak to John, who sat next to him in the front seat. “Would you mind much if I left you off here, young man? We’ve had a lot of rain recently. I could get the vehicle stuck if the driveway has turned muddy.”
“Not at all.” John sounded cheery, as though he were chatting at a potluck instead of having just traveled a thousand miles by six different conveyances. “We have little luggage, so the walk won’t be any trouble to us.”
“Wake up, Nora.” Amy shook her sister’s arm. “We’re here.”
“Where?” Nora straightened, peering around with a frown. “I don’t see a thing.”
“Harmony, Maine.” Amy accepted John’s hand as she climbed from the van’s backseat.
“It’s about time,” muttered Nora, not hiding her crankiness.
John paid the driver and hefted both bags by the shoulder straps. The van disappeared down the road in a great hurry. “I can’t wait to see my brother’s face. It’s been years. He’s gotten married, become a minster, and fathered two boys during that time.” He slipped an arm around Amy’s waist.
Amy clung to him and breathed deeply, glad to be out of the stuffy vehicle with odors of onions and garlic. “That driver must eat his lunch and dinner in there on a regular basis.”
“Englischers love to eat on the run.” John filled his lungs too. “Smell that fresh clean air. Do I detect a hint of pine and not the exhaust fumes from tour buses?”
Amy grinned at him despite her overwhelming fatigue. Beyond them lay only inky darkness.
“No buses filled with shutterbugs will be nice for a change.”
“How will we find the house?” wailed Nora. “It’s pitch-black out here.”
“You can see the dirt and gravel at your feet, can’t you?” John mustered an easygoing tone. “We’ll put one foot after the other until a house appears in front of our noses. Grab on to your sister and hang on tight.”
His tender patience with Nora warmed Amy’s heart. He’d had to call upon it many times since they left their other two sisters and grandparents in Lancaster. Even though Nora begged to accompany them north, she’d done an uncharacteristic amount of complaining on the trip. Amy snaked an arm around Nora’s waist. “Lean on me. I’ll catch you if you fall. It’s been a long day.”
Nora turned her face up. Moonlight filtered through the canopy and glinted off her cat-green eyes. “What if they don’t like us?” she whispered close to Amy’s ear.
“What’s not to like? Two sweet, always cheerful, hardworking women like us?” Amy patted her back as John laughed under his breath.
“That’s what I’m worried about.” Nora’s whisper floated on thick humid air.
“We have a clean slate with an opportunity to make good first impressions,” stated John. Then he added, “All three of us, I mean. I’ve never met Sally before.”
As they walked up the lane, Amy clung to John while Nora clung to her. Please Lord, don’t let John’s kin be in talkative moods tonight, she prayed. I just want to sleep.
A serenade of nocturnal animals and insects closed in around her, but it did not offer the familiar comfort as it did back home. These critters might be dangerous for all she knew. According to John’s book, moose, black bear, fox, and coyote filled the Maine woods. What would prevent a lost wolf from wandering down from Canada? They owned no maps to confine themselves to acceptable national forests.
