“I thought you were making an excuse at the school.”
He shook his head as he glanced at the Englisch houses. Christmas lights twinkled on the eaves of many of them. “I need to stop at the store because of a late delivery, but like I said, I can take you home first.”
“Nonsense. The store is on our way. Patch won’t be happy to see his comfortable stable and then have to go out.”
“How about me? You have sympathy for my horse, but none for me?”
“I assume if you don’t want to go back out, you won’t.” She smiled, and he realized she was teasing him.
That pleased him. She was serious too often, and, when she jested with his family, he saw shadows of uncertainty and despair in her eyes. It was a constant reminder how her family must be anxious about where she and Polly were.
He kept the jesting going until he’d unlocked the front door and turned on the store’s lights. Hearing a rumble on the road, he went to the window. The delivery truck from the warehouse that supplied his store was pulling into the parking lot.
“This won’t take long,” he said as he unwound his scarf and tossed it and his coat on the checkout counter. “I need to do a quick inventory to make sure everything matches the invoice.”
“Can I help?” Linda asked.
He was about to tell her he could handle it himself as he always did, but he smiled. “Sure. It’ll go more quickly with two of us working. I’m sure the driver will be glad, too.”
While Polly raced up one aisle and down the other, pausing to look at any container that caught her eye, Linda followed him into the storage room. He opened the door, and the back-up beeps of the large truck became shrill. Taking his handcart from a dim corner, he pushed it onto the covered rear porch.
“Hello, Mac,” he said to the truck driver. “Working late tonight?”
The older man, whose belly strained against his coat, grimaced. “These deliveries have to be made before Christmas, or the boss will get upset.” He rolled his eyes. “And it’s never a good idea to get the boss upset.”
Amos took the invoices before the driver opened the truck and let down a ramp. Handing the pages to Linda, Amos asked her to put a check next to the line for each box as it came into the store.
“Do you have a highlighter?” she asked. “It’d be easier to see any missing items with one.”
“That’s a gut idea for next time.”
She nodded and bent over the list as he helped unload the boxes and the bags of flour and sugar. He realized it was odd how he’d never invited Arlene to be part of his life at the store. Or maybe not odd because she’d never shown any interest. Most of their conversations had revolved around the intriguing gossip she adored.
On the other hand, it was too easy to imagine Linda working by his side again. He looked at where she made a neat check next to each item as he called it off. With her head bowed over the pages, a single strand of her white-blond hair fluttered against her cheek on the cold air blowing into the room. It took every bit of his strength not to push it behind her ear.
When everything was unloaded, Mac bid them a merry Christmas and shut the truck. Amos closed the door and locked it. As he turned, his gaze was caught by Linda’s. Her face was blank, but many emotions swirled through her eyes. He felt dizzy. Or was the light-headedness because they stood close together in the otherwise—save for a four-year-old kind—deserted store?
Look away! The warning blared in his head, but he couldn’t obey it. He took one step, then another toward her, closing the distance between them. He half expected her to turn and walk away. She remained where she was, her fingers clutching the invoice papers.
“Everything checked out,” she said in an unsteady whisper. The strand of hair now curved along her face as he wished his fingers were.
“Danki for your help.” He edged nearer.
“I’m glad to help. You and your family have done so much for Polly and me.”
His hand rose of its own volition toward that enticing tress. Her name burst from him in a breathy whisper as he touched her cheek.
“Are you here, Amos?” came a deeper voice from the front of the store. “Is Linda here, too?”
Amos jerked his hand back as if he’d grabbed a lightning bolt. He avoided looking at Linda as he went to where his bishop stood by the front door. Reuben was listening as Polly tried to tell him every detail of the school program.
“Reuben, is there something in particular you’re looking for?” Amos asked when the little girl was finished.
The bishop nodded. “I’m assuming Linda is here if Polly is.”
“Ja.” Dozens of questions pounded his lips, but he didn’t let a single one escape.
When the bishop looked past him, Amos peered over his shoulder at where Linda stood in the door to the back room. She walked to Amos and handed him the invoices as if she helped at the store every day.
“Guten owed, Reuben,” she said.
“Good evening to you, too.” He drew in a deep breath and let it flow out in an extended sigh. “I hope I’m not going to ruin it by what I have to tell you.”
“The truth may be harsh, but it’s better when it’s not half-hidden in niceties.”
Reuben nodded, clearly pleased with her answer. Amos tried to ignore the pulse of pride bursting inside him. She was wunderbaar, a gutsy woman unwilling to buckle under the challenges she faced.
“Then,” said the bishop, “I’ll get right to the point and say the news isn’t gut. I’ve contacted bishops between here and Lancaster. Each of them has asked members of their districts, and nobody reports knowing you and Polly.”
She sank to the bench by the door and clasped her hands in her lap. “Oh...”
Amos looked at Reuben, and the bishop motioned for him to remain quiet. He understood needing to let Linda respond before he jumped in; yet, it was almost impossible not to offer her comfort. Not just words, but drawing her into his arms and holding her until he could find the right thing to say.
She raised her head, and he knew her courage had not wavered. Her eyes were bright with tears, but none streaked her face. When she spoke, her voice was more unwavering than his would have been if their situations were reversed.
“Danki for your efforts to help find Polly’s and my family.” She closed her eyes and sighed. “Or maybe I should say families.” Looking at him and Reuben, she added, “Either way, I appreciate your help.”
“Don’t give up,” his bishop said in his kindest tone. “More people are being contacted. This search is spreading like ripples in a pond. We’ve assumed you took the bus from Lancaster, but there are connections at that station to many places. We won’t give up until we know the truth, either by you regaining your memories or someone coming forward.”
When she repeated her gratitude as Polly climbed into her lap and put her arms around Linda’s neck, she hugged the kind.
Amos walked Reuben onto the porch and added his own thanks.
“It’s difficult to be away from those we love during the Christmas season,” Reuben said, “but at least we have our memories to comfort us. Linda has nothing.”
“She has Polly, and she has her faith this will be set to rights. Somehow.”
“And she has you, Amos.”
“My whole family has pitched in.”
“Ja, but you’ve set yourself up as her earthly protector.” Reuben put a workworn hand on Amos’s shoulder. “Be careful, son. Once her memories return, everything may be different.”
“I think of that constantly.”
Bidding Amos a good night, the bishop vanished into the night. The creak of springs and leather told Amos when Reuben had climbed into his buggy.
Amos went inside and paused to select a bag of lollipops. Opening it, he offered it to Polly. “You were such a gut gi
rl at the program. Pick two or three to take home with you.”
“And for Mandy?”
Touched by her generosity, he smiled. “Take two or three for her, too.”
“And Debbie?”
“Maybe it’d be simpler if you take the whole bag. Go and get your coat, because we don’t want my brothers to finish off the snitz pie before we get there. Lollipops are gut, but not as gut as Mamm’s pie.”
With an excited shout, Polly ran to the far end of the store where she’d left her coat and mittens.
As soon as the kind was out of earshot, Amos asked, “Bischt allrecht?”
“Ja, I’m all right.” Linda stood and smoothed her apron over her dress. “Nothing’s changed, has it?”
He nodded, knowing it was true. No matter how much he wanted everything to change, for her to regain her memories and for him to be certain there was no other man in her heart, nothing had. He was beginning to wonder if it ever would and what they—what he would do if her memories never returned.
Chapter Six
The bedroom Linda shared with Polly in the dawdi haus had a view of the snow-covered pastures. Paw prints crisscrossed the field, showing where rabbits and a fox had traveled. Tinier marks pinpointed the landing spots of birds. Evergreens bent toward the ground with their burdens of snow, but bare branches were a lacy pattern against the bright blue sky.
It was a lovely, albeit chilly morning three days before Christmas, and, as she sat on her bed and stared out the window, Linda faced a troubling dilemma. Christmas was coming, and she had no gifts for the Stoltzfus family. She wanted to buy them gifts, but how could she? She didn’t have any money.
“Was iss letz?” Polly asked, climbing onto the bed beside her.
“What makes you think something is wrong?” she asked the little girl.
“You look like a cloud on a stormy day.”
In spite of her low spirits, Linda smiled. “Did you make that up yourself?”
Polly shook her head. “No. I heard Mamm say it a lot.”
“What else did she say?” she asked. Polly hadn’t said much about her parents, and the key to unlocking Linda’s memories might be in one of Polly’s recollections.
The little girl shrugged. “Lots of things.”
“Tell me.” She put her arm around Polly’s small shoulders.
Polly screwed up her face in concentration. “She told me gut deeds have echoes, but I’ve never heard any.”
“It means if you do something nice for someone, that person may be happy and do something gut for someone else.”
“Like when I ask Mandy for some milk and we have cookies together?”
“Ja. Like that.” She was delighted by Polly’s perspective which always seemed to have something to do with Mandy and cookies. “Did Mandy tell you we’ll be making sweets tomorrow for the cookie exchange on Christmas Eve?”
“Yummy.” She grew serious as she asked, “Linda, can we get Mandy something special for Christmas?”
“You could make her—”
“No! I want to get her what she wants. A book about a little house and the woods.”
Little House in the Big Woods, Linda translated. She’d heard Mandy mention the book more than once in the past few days.
“I’m sorry, Polly, I don’t have any money to buy her a book.”
“I’ve got money.”
Linda stared at the kind. “You do?”
“Ja. Lots of it. Wait here.” She jumped down from the bed and ran to pull her coat from a peg by the door. What was the kind doing?
Rooting around in one pocket and then the other, Polly drew out a cloth bag. She put her coat on a nearby chair before returning to Linda. “See?”
Linda took the bag, expecting to feel a few coins in it. Her eyes widened when she heard the crackle of paper. She undid the drawstring and peered in. She gasped. The bag was filled with money. Pulling it out, she counted in astonishment.
Why would anyone give a kind more than fifty dollars?
She didn’t realize she’d asked the question aloud until Polly said, “You gave it to me, Linda. You asked me to take gut care of it.”
She tried to remember doing what Polly had described. Nothing. The same gray cloud of nothingness filled her mind, standing between the woman she was now and the person she’d been before...before whatever had happened at the bus station.
Knowing that trying to recover a memory seemed to make it flee from her, she looked at the money in her hand. Instead of wondering why she’d given money to a young kind, she should be grateful she had it. She could buy gifts for Mandy and the rest of the Stoltzfus family.
“Put on your coat, Polly. We’re going shopping.”
“Yippee!” She ran to obey.
Linda found a sheet of paper and wrote a quick note to let Wanda know where they were going and why. She finished it with We’ll be back in a few hours. Setting it on the table in the dawdi haus’s tiny living room, she put on her boots and, grabbing her own coat, flung it on as she walked to the door dividing the living room from the main house.
“Leah, can I use your buggy this morning?” she called into the kitchen.
“Of course. If you need help hitching the horse up, ask Ezra. He’s in the barn.” Her eyes crinkled in a smile. “He’s working on a new type of cheese today, so I’m sure he’ll be there to unhitch the horse when you get back. Nobody’s going to budge him out of the cheese room today.”
“Danki.” Holding her hand out to Polly, she closed the connecting door. She was as excited as the little girl was to select gifts to thank the Stoltzfus family for their warm hospitality. She had ideas about what to get each one...except Amos.
How was she going to find him a gift that would express what he meant to her when she wasn’t sure herself? No, that wasn’t the truth. She knew she was falling in love with him, whether she should or not.
* * *
How long before he paced a path right through the floor? How many more looks could Mamm aim at him, each a silent reprimand that he was overreacting?
Amos didn’t slow as he walked from the front door to the kitchen and back. Where were Linda and Polly? They’d taken Leah’s buggy this morning and left a note saying they were going shopping, but he hadn’t seen them at the store. When he’d come home and found they were missing, too many unsettling scenarios raced through his head.
Perhaps Linda had regained her memories and was heading to the place she and the kind had been going before she was hurt. Could she have gotten tired of waiting for those memories to return and decided to try to find her way to her original destination on her own? Or maybe she’d bumped her head and couldn’t remember him.
The last bothered him most. To imagine her forgetting him when he knew he’d never be able to forget her was painful.
Suddenly Amos heard buggy wheels crunching through the frozen slush on the lane. He sped out of the house and across the yard. He recognized the dark brown buggy horse. The buggy’s wheels had barely stopped turning before he grabbed the door handle and threw it open.
“Where have you been?” He reached into the buggy and grasped Linda by the shoulders.
Startled by his vehemence, she jerked away from him. “Amos, have you lost your mind?”
“Almost.” He drew back his hands when he saw Polly’s face was as pale as Linda’s. Frightening the kind because he’d been fearful they’d left forever was foolish. “Where have you been?”
“I left a note for Wanda.” She motioned for Polly to climb out, then looked at him pointedly.
He stepped aside to give her room to step down. “I know you did. I read it.”
“Then why are you asking where we were? It said we were going—?”
“Shopping, but you weren’t at the store. I know. I ch
ecked every inch when Leah came to tell me you and Polly hadn’t come home for lunch.”
“Yours isn’t the only store in the world, Amos Stoltzfus.”
Her words were like a slap to the face of a hysterical person. It shocked him out of his foolish fear.
“You’re right,” he said. “But I thought you’d lost your purse along with your suitcase after you were injured at the bus station.”
“I did, but Polly didn’t lose the money I apparently gave her.”
As she explained what the kind had told her, he waited for his heart to halt its frantic beat and return to its usual pace. He couldn’t halt his fingers from curving around her shoulders, this time gently.
“Your note said you’d be back in a few hours,” he said as he gazed into her amazing eyes shining in the light from the kitchen. “When you didn’t return...”
“I wanted to surprise everyone with gifts on Christmas. I never guessed we’d be delayed by traffic and crowds.”
“Where did you go?”
“To the Rockvale Outlet shops.”
His hands tightened on her. He forced them to ease before he hurt her. “Did you lose your mind? Driving along that busy highway this close to Christmas?”
“When I saw the traffic whizzing by, I went to the post office. A man there told me how to go through Gordonville and toward Bird-in-Hand before heading south on the farm roads.”
“At least you were sensible about that.” He put up his hand before she could retort. “I’m sorry, Linda. I keep saying the wrong thing, but I’ve got a gut excuse. I was worried about you and Polly. I had the craziest thoughts about you forgetting us.”
She shivered. “Don’t even think that.”
“I try not to.”
“Maybe I should wear the bike helmet all the time.” Her attempt at a smile sent a pulse of delight through him. She was trying to make him feel better.
“Maybe you should.”
As she urged Polly to let Mamm know she and Linda were home, he unhitched the horse.
“Do you need help with your packages?” he asked as he led the horse toward the barn.
Amish Christmas Blessings: The Midwife's Christmas Surprise/A Christmas to Remember Page 14
