The first full week after his father’s passing was like a strange dream, Clayton thought, the kind where a person’s surroundings were both familiar and unfamiliar at the same time. The house was unchanged, yet without Daed there it felt completely different somehow. The shop, as well, seemed both unchanged yet inextricably altered, starting with the Raber and Son Clockmakers sign above the door, which was all wrong now. Clayton would not contemplate changing it, but he found himself staring at it often, wishing the sign’s words were still true.
Each day, while he worked at the shop, all sorts of food made its way into the kitchen of the house—casseroles and loaves of bread and trays of sweets and more, all lovingly prepared and delivered by members of the community. And though Clayton appreciated how such efforts were temporarily lessening his mother’s load, he had to admit that most of it tasted a little off somehow—not bad but different from what he was used to.
Chores were the same way. Though the complete takeover of those first three days had come to an end, somehow things kept getting done here and there. Friends and neighbors were obviously still popping by to handle various tasks. And even though Clayton knew this, each time he walked up from the shop at the end of the day to find the horses returned from the pasture, or Rosie milked, or the chickens gathered into their coop, he was startled. It always took a moment to remember that folks were just trying to be nice and lessen his load during this difficult time.
Until it struck him one day that it wasn’t “folks” who were still doing all of this. It wasn’t the community or friends or neighbors. It was family. His family. His sisters, finally getting their way by slipping in while he was at work under the guise of community concern and doing the chores they had said all along he wasn’t capable of handling.
The evening he figured it out, he had come into the barn straight from a full day in the shop, smelling of varnish and sawdust and linseed oil. But with nothing that needed doing there, he remained untouched by the additional odor of animals and hay and earth.
His steps heavy, Clayton said only four words to his mother when he went into the house. “Who did the chores?”
She looked up from where she stood at the sink, her expression distant and vague as she named two of his sisters.
The very thought made Clayton furious, and he demanded to know why she had let them do that.
Mamm, who still seemed in a state of quiet bewilderment at Daed’s passing, simply answered that Clayton’s sisters were dealing with the loss too, and allowing them and their children to help was one way they were able to cope.
“It doesn’t hurt you to let them help,” she added as she reached into the cabinet and pulled out two plates.
Clayton didn’t know how to tell her that somehow it did hurt. Coming into the house well before dark and with no outside chores to do meant a very long, quiet evening with just his grieving mother for company.
“They won’t be coming into the shop, if that’s what’s bothering you,” she added when he gave her no reply. “They know how you feel about that.” Then she looked up at him. “Unless you have changed your mind.”
“I haven’t.”
“But you’ll let me come help you?” Her voice sounded tired, as though she wanted to do so but hadn’t the energy just yet.
“When you feel up to it. There’s no rush.”
“But Saturday will be busy.”
He nodded.
She sighed gently as she served up a plate for Clayton and then one for herself. “I will come down to help you on Saturday.”
Anger at his own selfishness roiled up within him. It was because of him that Mamm felt forced to work in the shop so soon after losing Daed. “I can ask Joanie. Or one of the nieces. It’s just one day a week. I’ll take care of it.”
His mother stroked the back of Daed’s chair. It was pushed fully under the table, without a place setting in front of it. “How I wish you would, Clayton. I know I shouldn’t be sad, but I just miss him. I miss him.”
Clayton limped to his mother’s side as quickly as he could and put an arm around her as silent sobs shook her body.
“I thought I had prepared myself for this,” she murmured as she struggled for control. “I thought I had given this whole matter over to God. I thought I was ready to walk this road.”
“I’ll ask Joanie. I promise,” Clayton whispered, unable to think of anything else to say to comfort his mother. He didn’t think there were other words that could. Sorrow wasn’t a time for words.
She shook her head, swallowed heavily, and sniffed. “No. No, I will help you. I want to do this for you, Clayton.”
“But—”
She patted his chest lightly, just over his heart. “I understand how you feel. I didn’t until I began living in this house without your father, but now I know how hard it must be for you to be working in the shop without him and how awkward and strange it would be to have new people in there right now. I will come, Clayton.”
“All right,” he said softly.
The days slipped by, and before Clayton knew it another week had passed. Now that the chores were no longer being done for him, he was able to keep busy until sunset, and his work went by more quickly. But sometimes it felt is if time were creeping by. Each day meant another one without Daed.
Another one without Miriam.
Clayton was thinking of her late one Sunday afternoon, almost two weeks after the funeral, when he went to the kitchen sink for a glass of water and saw Norman and Abigail Beiler walking across the yard toward the house. They carried nothing in their hands, and Miriam was not with them.
“Looks like Norman and Abigail are coming by,” he said to Mamm.
“Goodness. I don’t think we have room in this kitchen for any more food.”
“They’re not bringing food.”
Mamm slid a plate into the sink of sudsy water. “Well, then. If you’ll get one of the cakes we’ve been given, I’ll start a pot of coffee.”
He was at the pantry still deciding between a strawberry angel food cake and an applesauce spice cake when the knock came at the door. He reached for the angel food and set it on the counter next to the coffeepot. “I’ll let them in,” he said.
He crossed the kitchen and headed for the open main room and the front door, greeting Miriam’s parents and inviting them inside. Immediately, Clayton could see that they both wore worried looks on their faces. Distraught looks. Were they angry with him? He couldn’t imagine why. He hadn’t seen Miriam since the funeral, so they couldn’t possibly think he was messing up their plans with Vernon. Except for the day of the funeral, she hadn’t come over even once, not for weeks.
“Won’t you sit down?” Clayton said, as polite as he could as he motioned to the sofa. Mamm appeared then and welcomed them as well, saying she had a pot of coffee going and they were just in time for dessert.
“That’s very kind, but no, thank you, Lucy,” Norman said, as he and Abigail seated themselves onto the couch. Clayton noticed that Abigail had a crumpled handkerchief in her hand and her eyes were slightly puffy.
“Is everything all right, Norman?” Mamm’s brows had furrowed with instant concern. She could see as easily as Clayton had that the Beilers were upset about something.
“No,” Norman answered sadly, and Abigail squeezed her eyes shut.
Clayton’s heart skipped a beat. “Is Miriam okay? She’s not hurt, is she?”
Neither of the Beilers looked his way as they shook their heads.
Mamm came to Abigail’s side, taking Daed’s armchair next to her. “Then what is it? What has happened?”
Abigail blotted her nose with the handkerchief. She opened her mouth and closed it again, unable to say anything. Or unable to find the right words. She lifted her head to look at Clayton, who was still standing in the middle of the room. He couldn’t read the look on her face, but it occurred to him that perhaps the Beilers needed to speak to his mother alone.
“I have some work to do outside. I
’ll just be going if you’ll excuse me.” He turned on his good heel and had taken only two halting steps when Norman spoke.
“Please stay, Clayton.”
Norman’s voice was hopeful but adamant.
Clayton turned back around to face his neighbors.
“Please?” Norman said, less forceful this time.
Clayton hobbled fully into the room and lowered himself into the chair Mamm usually sat in after supper.
After a few seconds of silence, Norman cleared his throat. “We have a problem. And we don’t know if you will help us, but we know we have to ask. As hard as it is to ask, we know we must.”
“Norman, Clayton and I are happy to help you in any way we can,” his mother said, her own woes pushed aside for the moment. “You know that.”
He shook his head. “Wait until you’ve heard me out, Lucy. We’ve come to ask no small thing.”
Beside him, Abigail sighed and looked up at her husband. Her eyes were shimmering with ready tears.
“What is it that we can do for you?” Surprise made Mamm’s words sound airy and unsure.
“It’s not what you can do, Lucy. It’s what Clayton can do.”
Norman turned his head to face Clayton. So did Mamm. Abigail glanced at him and then quickly looked down at the handkerchief in her hand.
“Me?” Clayton exclaimed, his mind instantly awhirl. What could a disabled man like him do for the Beilers?
Norman rubbed his beard with one hand, lost in thought. “The thing is, Clayton, we’ve… Abigail and I have known for some time that you are fond of Miriam.”
Heat rushed to Clayton’s face in an instant. He said nothing.
“And she’s always been fond of you.”
“As… as… a friend,” Clayton stammered. “We’re just friends. I’ve barely talked to her in weeks. I hardly ever see her anymore. She… she hasn’t been around like she used to be. You have my word!”
“She hasn’t,” Mamm replied in her son’s defense, her voice as earnest as Clayton’s had been.
“No, I know that,” Norman said, shaking his head as if Clayton had completely misunderstood him. “Her attentions have been, uh, elsewhere. We just… she… ” He expelled the air from his lungs, apparently unable to say the words to finish his sentence. The pained look on his face made it appear as though he had already said them, and they had been appalling to utter.
“She what?” Fear that something dreadful had happened to the only woman he had ever loved made Clayton’s voice quaver.
“She… ” Norman began again but then stopped.
“What?” Clayton heard the desperation in his voice but didn’t care. Something was terribly wrong. “She what?”
Abigail lifted her gaze to him, the shimmering tears slipping down her cheeks unchecked. “She’s with child.”
EIGHTEEN
The silence in the living room was broken only by the gurgling of the percolator in the kitchen as it produced coffee that none of them would be drinking. For several seconds no one said anything. Norman stared at a speck on the rug. Abigail’s eyes were closed in obvious distress. Mamm was stone still. As the impact of Abigail’s announcement slammed into Clayton, a thousand warring thoughts somersaulted in his head—and only one image, that of his beloved Miriam in the arms of another man. Heat rose again to his cheeks, blistering hot this time with equal parts anger and shame. He did not want to picture her kissing another man, lying with another man, and he did not want to imagine who that man was. But he couldn’t help it.
“Vernon Esh?” his mother said in a hushed voice, assuming the one who had done this was Miriam’s Amish suitor.
But Clayton knew it was not Vernon. It was the man in the car, the one who took her away late at night after her dates with Vernon were done. It was the man who waited for her in secret, who disappeared with her for hours, who dumped her back out on the driveway before dawn.
Clayton felt the fingers of his right hand curl into a fist, as though that man was in the room and Clayton was preparing to slug the living daylights out of him. He covered the fist with his left hand to hide it and quell his rising rage. It was not the Amish way to respond with violence to any kind of provocation, not even to condemn a man’s immoral dealings with a young, unmarried woman.
But how dare that man touch Miriam? How dare he take what did not belong to him? How dare he?
“It wasn’t Vernon, Lucy,” Norman was saying to Mamm, though Clayton could barely hear him over the roaring in his ears.
“It wasn’t?”
“It wasn’t Vernon,” Norman said again, softer this time, as Abigail swallowed back a sob.
Clayton’s voice stilled in his throat, waiting for a name. But no one said it aloud, and he realized he was relieved. He didn’t want to hear it. Better this person remain always in his mind as just a shadowy figure inside a car.
“The father of the child is Englisch,” Norman continued. “He was a performer Miriam met in Lancaster, at the Fulton. An actor. He was in town for the run of a play. They became friends, so she says.”
“Friends?” Mamm whispered, and again Abigail choked back another sob.
“So she says.” Norman repeated, with a slow shake of his head. “The man and the play are gone now, on to another city. He knows what his actions have resulted in, but he wants nothing to do with Miriam or the child.”
“Oh dear Lord!” Mamm murmured, and then she bowed her head in silent lament.
Both of Clayton’s hands were balled into fists now, and his chest heaved with outrage and anguish.
His sweet Miriam…
“How could a man do such a thing to a young girl and then just leave her?” Abigail murmured, her voice breaking on the last three words.
“Because he’s Englisch!” Norman exclaimed, his voice now breaking too.
Because he’s an animal! Clayton thought. Miriam, Miriam…
“And now Vernon wants nothing to do with Miriam either,” Norman went on, wiping his glistening cheeks with his weathered hand.
“Oh, Norman! Abigail!” Mamm’s mother-heart was breaking for her neighbors and their only daughter.
Clayton had never felt such a blinding ache before, not even when Daed died. His father’s passing had been expected, though not welcomed. This was not like that at all. Clayton had always known Miriam would someday bear another man’s child, but he had never considered it would happen like this. He was still trying to wrap his head around this knowledge when he realized Norman had said his name.
“Ya?” Clayton looked up at Miriam’s father.
“We’ve come to ask if you would be willing to help us. Help Miriam. We wouldn’t be asking if the situation weren’t so dire. We don’t know what else to do.”
“Oh!” Mamm said, as she realized ahead of Clayton what Norman was about to say.
As she turned to her son with dread and wonder etched in her face, it also became clear to him why the Beilers had come over.
“We know you’re fond of our Miriam,” Norman said, repeating his words from minutes earlier, but this time with a heaviness in his tone that made them seem forged of iron. “We know you’re a man of character, and that you would treat her with kindness and respect. The babe she is carrying needs a father and a name. Miriam needs a name. We are humbly asking if you might give her yours, Clayton. Please. Would you consider marrying her?”
For Clayton, time seemed to stand still in the room. It was as if an invisible curtain had been drawn across the moment and the earth was no longer spinning on its slow journey around the sun. For a clockmaker, it was a sensation he was wholly unfamiliar with. Clayton was aware that the Beilers were looking at him—Norman, earnestly, and Abigail, over the tips of her fingers as she dabbed at the tears in her eyes. His mother was looking at him too. Her eyes were wide as she sat forward in Daed’s chair.
Daed.
Oh, how Clayton wished his father were in the room hearing this conversation. He would be in this frozen, timeless moment wit
h him. Daed would know what he should do.
Clayton could barely make sense of the request that had been placed before him. He had only ever wanted one woman. He had long since divested himself of any notion that she would ever be his. Ever. It was not to be.
And yet now Miriam was in trouble, and here was her father begging Clayton to take her, remove her disgrace, and give her unborn child his name. Marry her.
“I know it’s a lot to consider, son,” Norman continued when Clayton said nothing. “Believe me, we don’t take lightly what we’re asking. But you… you’ve always cared for her. If you still do, perhaps you could find it possible to look past this terrible mistake she has made. If anyone could, it would be you.”
Clayton looked over at Mamm. Her face was awash in questions but she said nothing. It was not her decision to make.
“Does Miriam know you are over here asking me this?” Clayton said as he turned to face the Beilers again.
“Yes,” Norman answered.
“And how does she feel about it?”
Norman exhaled as if releasing a breath he’d been holding for weeks. “She knows you can help her, Clayton. She knows Vernon won’t. And she knows this Englisch man who took from her what she had no right to offer him won’t, nor do we want him to. I wish to never see that man. Ever.”
“Are you saying Miriam will marry me if I ask her?” Clayton replied, barely able to say the words.
Norman nodded. “She will.”
For several long moments, Clayton just sat in his mother’s chair letting that notion swirl about in his head. Miriam will marry me. Miriam will marry me.
He did not think about the fact that she was pregnant, unwed, and desperate, only that it was possible he could marry the woman he loved. That he still loved.
Despite what she had done, and with whom she had done it, he still loved her. She carried an unborn child who needed a father and a name. Perhaps there would be more children down the road, Lord willing.
A wife he loved and children of his own! These were but daydreams he’d seldom allowed himself to dwell on. And now both seemed inconceivably within his grasp.
The Amish Clockmaker Page 15
