Hidden Life (9781455510863)

by Senft, Adina

  “Why not?”

  “Because—well, because it’s rude.”

  “It’s rude for friends to visit?”

  “It is if they don’t call first.”

  “Oh. Call first. Yes, I’m sure you did that. And the phone out there in the shanty on the highway probably rang a long time, too.”

  “Well, I didn’t actually—”

  “Never mind. The point is, you can’t stay with Mamm and me because it wouldn’t be fitting, but Karen’s boys can double up for one night and leave the other room for you. You can take your meals with us.”

  “Emma, I meant it. I’m not going to just land on you and expect you and your family to—”

  “I know you expect nothing. That’s why you get something. Now, come on. It’s getting late and Mamm will be watching for me.”

  Helplessly, Tyler looked at Grant and spread his hands. “I guess she told me.”

  Grant gazed at Emma and nodded slowly. “Then you had better listen.”

  Chapter 16

  The car’s seat was covered in leather so soft it was almost like fabric. Emma settled into it and felt it cup her body like a hand around a baby bird. Tyler backed it around and then set off up the lane so slowly that by the time they got to the highway, Grant’s wagon was already out of sight over the crest of the hill.

  But it wasn’t her place to criticize. Maybe her driver was afraid of falling into a ditch.

  “So what brings you all the way out to Lancaster County, Tyler West?”

  “I’ll give you one guess.”

  “I’ve been racking my brain and I can’t think of a single thing. It can’t be my book, because we settled that before I got on the train.”

  “And we also settled that I was an optimist.”

  “Then your optimism is wasted. If you plan to hound me for the next two days, you’d better drop me off at home and take yourself back to New York.”

  “Man alive, Emma, do you talk this way to every guy who comes to see you? I think I have the solution to your singleton problem, if that’s the case.”

  His face still held humor, but his mouth had set. In her panic, she had hurt his feelings.

  Dismay and regret stabbed her like a needle through three layers of fabric. “I’m sorry. Forgive me. Mamm is always telling me I’m too blunt—that I speak before I think about the person receiving the words.”

  “I’m looking forward to meeting your mom.”

  “You’ll like her.”

  “So in answer to your blunt question, part of the reason I came is to see if it would do any good to ask you again. People do change their minds. And the other part was just to see where you live. Google Earth is great up to a point, but it has its limits.”

  “Turn left here onto the county highway,” she said, her gaze averted from the place where Pap had…where the gut Gott had seen fit to take him. “I’m not going to change my mind.”

  “I can see why.” He drove with easy confidence now that they were on solid asphalt. His car must be very delicate underneath. “All those people, staring from me to you like they’d never seen either of us before. I suppose every one of them would have an opinion about you being published, wouldn’t they?”

  “Some of them already do. A man was—well, he thought he might court me, and then he found out about my writing. That was that.”

  “Court you? Wow, that was totally out of left field.”

  “The field on the left belongs to Moses Yoder. And that has nothing to do with Calvin King. The man.”

  “Sorry. Cultural references. I keep forgetting. What I meant was that I’m surprised. I thought the thing that bugged you most was that you were single. Where did this guy come from?”

  “If I tell you all this, you must swear to keep it to yourself and not say anything. Particularly not to—” She stopped herself. “To anyone.”

  “You really know how to crank up the suspense. Turn here?”

  She blinked and dragged her gaze to the stop sign. “Yes. Did you remember this from Google Earth?”

  He shook his head and pointed to the little screen set into the dashboard. “GPS. I’ve already been to the house once, remember?”

  “It’s only half a mile. There isn’t time to tell you, so we’ll go for a walk after dinner.”

  “Isn’t that what couples do? Won’t that make people talk?”

  “I don’t think so. If we were in a closed buggy, now, and you were driving me…well, that just wouldn’t happen.”

  “I guess not. I can’t drive a buggy.”

  His face was deadpan, but his eyes danced, and she chuckled in spite of herself. “You are a brat, Tyler West.”

  “So my sisters used to tell me.” He wheeled the car into the lane, and every one of Karen’s children popped out from among the trees to stare.

  When they saw their aunt, who normally lived a quiet and retiring life that did not involve being driven around in low-slung cars, their little eyes practically fell out. “Would you like to meet the children?”

  “Sure.”

  Nathaniel was the first to run over. “Aendi Emma, what are you doing in this car?” he squeaked in Deitch. “I thought you went to Matthew and Elam’s. This man came before. What does he want? Why is he driving you?”

  She could barely get a word in edgewise. “Englisch, Nathaniel. It’s rude to speak Deitch in front of our guest. This is Tyler West, a friend from New York City.” She opened the door, and he stepped back.

  Maryann followed more cautiously, but Emma could see she was full of as many questions as her brother. “Is he courting you, Aendi?” she asked in Deitch. “That’s what Mamm says. You should have seen her when he came before. It’s not very often Mamm forgets her words, but she sure forgot them when he got out and asked for you.”

  Emma could just imagine. Karen was going to have a field day with this, drat Tyler’s paint-spattered hide.

  “Aendi, Maryann is supposed to speak English.”

  “From now on. No need to translate what you just said, Schatzi. Tyler, these are Karen’s children, Nathaniel, Maryann, and Victor over there by the garden.”

  “He’s shy,” Maryann confided. “He thinks the car will hit him like Grossdaadi.”

  Emma stifled another pang of distress, and went to six-year-old Victor. She knelt and took him in a hug. “The car won’t hurt you, Schatzi. The man who hit Grossdaadi was speeding on the highway. Tyler’s car is turned off, you see? No one will speed in our yard. Your Mamm wouldn’t have it, would she?”

  Victor shook his head, then turned to look at Tyler. “That man is your friend?”

  “He is. So you must come and say hello, and he will be your friend, too.”

  Tyler shook hands with them all as solemnly as if they were the ministers lined up at the head of the congregation. Then Emma shooed the boys off to play. “Maryann, can you ask your mother if she can put Tyler up for the night?”

  “He can have Nathaniel’s room.”

  “That’s very kind of you, Schatzi. But please ask all the same.” She touched Maryann on the cheek and the girl ran around the corner of the house. “Come and meet my mother.”

  They found Lena at the kitchen table, snapping green beans. “I heard the car come back. You had no trouble finding Amelia’s?”

  “None at all. I’m sorry we didn’t get a chance to speak before. I’m Tyler West.”

  Lena dried a hand on her apron and offered it to him. “Ah. The Tyler West who was sending my daughter letters this spring?”

  “The same.”

  “I hope you like chicken and dumplings. It’s one of our favorites.”

  “What she means is, you’re invited to supper,” Emma translated. “But you already knew that.” She removed the kitchen apron that still smelled faintly of vinegar and put it in the basket in the washroom, then pulled a fresh one from the peg on the back of the kitchen door. “Just let me get this going.”

  “Can I help?”

  Lena gazed at him ove
r the tops of her glasses. “Did your mother teach you how to cook?”

  “No, but I can read a recipe as well as the next guy.”

  “We don’t use recipes, but if you haven’t had enough work for the day, you could give me a hand with these beans.”

  Emma kept half an eye on him as she cut up the chicken and browned it, then made cream gravy and dumplings and set the whole pot to simmering. She couldn’t tell if he’d ever snapped a bean in his life, but after watching Lena closely, he mimicked her until the whole bowl was cleaned and ready for Emma to cook. A salad rounded out their meal, with a plate of her famous beet pickles for color, and before she knew it, Tyler was leaning back in his chair, weakly waving off the plate of gingerbread pear cake.

  “I haven’t eaten this much since I don’t know when,” he groaned. “No food for me tomorrow. At all.”

  “You’ll be hungry by breakfast time,” Lena said serenely. “You don’t want to miss Emma’s biscuits. They’re so light they practically float away.”

  “Mamm.” If she didn’t stop, Emma’s cheeks would be as red as those beets. She collected the plates and ran water into the sink. “I’ll take Tyler over to the big house and put his things away, and then I think he might appreciate a walk.”

  “Please,” he begged. “Otherwise I’m going to have to run circles around the house.”

  Lena smiled as she settled into her chair and picked up the soft shawl she was knitting. Emma could practically read her mind. That young man appreciates Emma’s skill in the kitchen. I don’t know what he’s here for, and I don’t know if she’ll tell me, but I can appreciate anyone who appreciates my girl.

  Since they’d come back so late, and dinner had taken a while to prepare, twilight had already fallen by the time they stepped outside. Emma led the way down to the creek at the side of the property. A path next to it went under the bridge, which on the other side met a gravel cutoff to the highway. You could walk along it for a good two miles without running into anyone except the farmers who worked the fields on both sides, and once in a while a courting couple who had pulled off to get a little privacy.

  She’d already forgotten how long a stride he had. At this rate, they’d cover the two miles before she’d managed to tell her story.

  As if her thoughts had prompted him, he said, “So, Emma. There isn’t a soul for acres. How about you tell me about this new guy and then maybe I’ll tell you a thing or two about the old guy.”

  “What old guy?”

  “Old as in information previously conveyed. Grant Weaver.”

  Her heart jumped at the mention of his name. “Tell me what? What do you know?” Oh, she just knew they’d been talking out there behind the barn. Wasn’t that just like a man! They were as bad as women—they only did it where you couldn’t hear.

  “Uh-uh. You first. You promised.”

  Fine, if he wanted to be like that. She gave him a considerably abbreviated version of what she had told Amelia and Carrie about Calvin King at their last quilting frolic, including the part about the writing.

  “He told you that he wouldn’t consider marrying you if you didn’t give up writing?” Tyler sounded aghast, as if she’d just said the condition to being Calvin King’s wife was that she must commit murder. “That—that—” He stopped. “Sorry. I’m trying to keep my language clean. I can just picture someone saying something like that to one of my sisters. There’d be blood running under the door.”

  “No blood,” Emma told him quietly. “No bad language, either. I just told him that I could not marry him.”

  He stopped walking, his high-topped running shoes scraping a little in the gravel. “I’m glad to hear it.” She kept going, and this time it was he who was forced to jog a little to catch up. “So that’s what Grant meant about being glad you had people around you who were more than fair-weather friends.”

  “Perhaps he meant you.”

  “I don’t know. I just thought he meant your girlfriends. Amelia and the pretty blond you told me about who invites her chickens to sit at the kitchen table.”

  “Carrie. You know perfectly well what her name is. You’re just stalling so you don’t have to tell me what else Grant said.”

  He jammed his hands in his pockets, evidently aiming for a jaunty look, but that didn’t stop his smile from turning a little rueful. “I’m just savoring my brief moment of having something you want, for a change.”

  “But you do not have the Ordnung keeping you quiet.”

  “You got that right.” He paused, and Emma fought down the urge to take him by his shoulders and shake words out of him, like seeds out of a dried pod.

  Patience. He said he would tell you, so let him keep his word.

  “I guess the bottom line is that he really respects you, Emma.”

  Respect was not going to put wedding invitations in people’s mailboxes. “I’m glad.”

  “I wasn’t sure how much he knew about your trip to the city, so I didn’t say much about that. I hope he doesn’t have the same opinions this King guy does.”

  “I don’t think he does,” she said. “He spoke quite openly about it just before you drove up.” And he encouraged me to paint graffiti on my house. No, best not say anything about that. A woman had to have some secrets.

  “I told him about our walk in Central Park, and how you refused to take a buggy ride because you’d be too tempted to tell the carriage driver how to take better care of his horse.”

  A smile curved her mouth at the memory. “Grant takes good care of his animals. He would have done the same.”

  “That’s pretty much what he said, when he got done laughing.”

  Laughter was good. Laughter meant the story had pleased him—maybe even surprised him.

  “He did say a funny thing, though.”

  When he didn’t go on, Emma choked back a growl of frustration and only poked him in his skinny, underfed ribs. “Stop teasing me.”

  “He said of all the women in the settlement, he feels most at peace with you.” Tyler gave her a sideways glance, as if he were looking for a reaction. But she had been through the hard school of Karen, and had learned that she could choose her moments to react. Or not. When she said nothing, he went on. “Seemed like a backhanded kind of a compliment, if you ask me. Most women want to hear that they get a man going. Charge him up. Turn him on. Not put him at peace. Makes you sound like you’re putting him to sleep. Or getting ready for a trip out to the cemetery or something.”

  The merry words flowed over her like the wind, and she paid it just as little mind.

  She made Grant feel at peace.

  She could think of no higher compliment, and her soul expanded outward in sheer joy, rising through the night sky.

  “…wondered if things were going to change now that he’s been widowed?”

  Emma came back to earth, a little disconcerted. Her feet were firmly on the ground, and Tyler was still talking about Grant. She needed to pay attention. “What did you say?”

  “I said, I was just wondering if you were going to make a play for the guy, now that he’s single.”

  Emma nearly fell over. As it was, she missed a step and had to catch up with a sidestep and a skip. “I will do no such thing. And please don’t talk like that about a man who only buried his wife’s remains last week.”

  “He buried the remains of someone who died a long time ago.”

  “Yes, but he didn’t know that. It wouldn’t be seemly for him to look around so soon. Or for anyone else to look at him.”

  “You look at him plenty.”

  “Not like that.”

  “Yes, you do. And you ask me, he doesn’t mind a bit.”

  She had never met a man who just said what he thought, with no sieve between his brain and his mouth that would catch the unseemly bits. “What do you mean?”

  “Haven’t you noticed he’s different with you than with the other women? He’s…softer. No, that’s not it. It’s like this bubble forms that has only the t
wo of you in it when he talks to you.”

  “You’re making this up. It’s like a game with you. You’re talking nonsense.”

  The scraping of his feet on the dirt track stopped, and she stopped with him. “Emma, get over yourself. You’re so determined that he shouldn’t like you, you’re totally going to miss it when he shows you he does. If you haven’t already.”

  “And you’re such an expert on him and me, then? With one whole afternoon’s experience?”

  “I’ve got eyes, woman. And a whole afternoon is enough, if you spend it talking about the right things. Which I made sure we did.”

  “You talked about me.” On purpose. With an end in mind. Emma didn’t know whether to cry or scream or run away. How was she ever going to face Grant after this?

  “Sure. That’s why I’m telling you all this. I’ve done my bit. Now it’s your turn.”

  God may have been free with His gifts, but Karen made no bones about the price Emma would be expected to pay for hers. At six the next morning, she and John walked into the kitchen together, their newest baby wrapped up tight in a blanket against her chest, as Emma was putting the coffee on.

  Emma looked from one to the other as her stomach plunged in consternation. “Is everything all right? Is the baby well? Did Tyler take sick?”

  John waved off her questions and took Pap’s chair at the head of the table. “Little Jeremy is fine, as you can see. Tyler is still asleep, though he told me last night he plans to help out over at Amelia’s again today.”

  It wasn’t as though Karen and John never came over here. But at such an hour? And as a couple?

  She dropped a kiss on the sleeping baby’s cheek. He smelled like baby powder and contentment. “Mamm should be up soon,” she said. “Do you want me to wake her?”

  “We wanted to talk to you.” Karen rubbed the baby’s back, rocking gently. “Before this goes any further.”

  Emma’s brain felt as slack as her face must look. “Before what goes any further? Was sagst du?”

  Karen looked at her husband and real worry stabbed Emma’s heart. The number of times her sister had let someone else speak for her could be counted on one hand, with fingers left over. “Is it Mamm?” she whispered. “Do you know something I don’t?”