Ella Finds Love Again (Little Valley 3)

by Jerry S. Eicher

  The older girls nodded, and Ella picked up baby Barbara. “You girls did great out here waiting so patiently.”

  “I think they’re more patient with you here,” Ivan said.

  Ella glanced away. Ivan shouldn’t be saying things like that.

  “Why don’t you eat first,” he said. “I’ll be in soon, and then you and the girls can leave.”

  “Nee, I’m planning to stay, for supper,” she said.

  “I appreciate that,” he said. “But I won’t have you waiting in the living room while I eat.”

  “Nee,” she said again, this time meeting his eyes. “We will eat with you.”

  “Ella, I appreciate the thought, but you can’t eat with me.”

  She touched his arm. “I’m not leaving, Ivan. I want to eat together as a family. It’s Old Christmas Day. The girls deserve it, and yah, it will do you gut too.”

  He swallowed hard. “I can’t allow it, Ella. You know the rules. They will do awful things to you.”

  “I don’t care,” she said, her eyes still looking into his. “We will eat together tonight.” With Mary and Sarah beside her, the baby in her arms, Ella returned to the house. She would leave him to think this through on his own and perhaps it would be easier when he arrived in the house.

  Ivan was left staring blankly at the barn wall.

  Ella settled the girls down in the living room, leaving baby Barbara with Mary and Sarah. Soon she had the fire roaring in the stove and the food cooking.

  “Ella, I can’t do this,” Ivan repeated, suddenly appearing at the kitchen door.

  Ella had the table spread, the bread warm, the butter platter out, and the casserole steaming in the center of the table. She’d just seated the girls in their proper places.

  “Sit down,” she said. “And don’t talk.”

  “But you…”

  “I want to do this,” she said. “It’s Old Christmas, and the Savior was born on this day.”

  “So our people believe,” he said, taking the chair, and slowly sitting down. “But, Ella, knowing what this means, are you sure?”

  “I’m quite sure,” she said, waiting with her hands folded.

  Ivan struggled with the idea.

  Ella waited.

  He looked to his girls and then back at Ella. He bowed his head, and the German words came. Words he had known for so many years, spoken to others, for others, but now Ella thought they must be spoken for himself. Never had she heard such a heartfelt prayer from the lips of this man. Not even in his prime, when he thundered in his Sunday sermons.

  She had tears in her eyes when he was done, and she was certain he did also. Not wanting to draw attention to either of them, she looked away, measuring out the food for the girls. When she was done, Ivan still sat there, as if frozen to his seat, his hands on his lap.

  “You can eat,” she said, catching the look in his eye and the pain roiling inside of him. An idea came to her, and she simply responded. As she had done for the girls, she dished out his food for him, filling his plate with steaming casserole and then taking a piece of bread and buttering it for him.

  “Which jam?” she asked.

  He pointed and she spread blackberry jam liberally on the bread. She laid it beside his plate.

  “Ivan, if you don’t eat, I’ll feed you,” she said as he sat silent, unsure of what to do. She saw the tears forming in his eyes.

  “This is too much, way too much, Ella. You shouldn’t do this for me.”

  “Let me worry about that,” she said, filling her own plate.

  “Are you trying to win me back to the faith?”

  “Nee,” she said. “That’s not my place. I told you—it’s because it’s Old Christmas.”

  He nodded and, taking up his spoon, began to eat. If someone should look through the window from the road and see them eating together, it would just have to be so.

  After the meal, Ella washed the dishes over his protests and put away the leftover food, which he was to keep. Finally, when it was time to go, Ivan hitched Moonbeam to the buggy and then helped her carry the girls out and lifted them inside.

  “You’ll never know what this means to me,” he said, his hand on the side of the buggy. “I thank you from the bottom of my heart.”

  “I can’t come again,” she said. “But I hope you decide soon what you’re going to do—for the girls’ sake as well as your own. It’s not gut to go on this way.”

  He nodded in the darkness, his face barely visible. “May Da Hah keep you safe and bless you greatly.”

  “Thank you,” she said. She slapped the reins and they took off. Only when she was on the road did she realize she had thanked an excommunicated man for his blessing. That was strange. It had felt like a real blessing.

  Thirty-eight

  By the last week in January winter still showed no signs of breaking. Ella had decided to take a chance on a washday. If the weather turned too cold to dry clothes on the line, the basement would serve as a last resort. Drying laundry inside made a mess, with water dripping all over the concrete floor, but it was better than frozen wash.

  Everything else in Ella’s life seemed frozen in place too. Each week the regular routine came and went. Ivan dropped his girls off on Monday and picked them up on Friday.

  Robert Hayes had not been heard from, nor had Eli shown up with any news about the man. The Englisha man would best be forgotten, even if Ella felt the occasional pang remembering his presence right here in her living room. As for Bishop Miller, he had made no move yet, but Ella figured it would come when she least expected it.

  As it turned out, the day would allow her to hang the laundry on the line after all. And so she hurriedly did the wash and took it out to hang on the line. After a few minutes, her fingers were cold and red from the wet wash, and she welcomed a greeting from behind her as Ronda opened the kitchen window and called, “Good morning, Ella!”

  Ella turned and waved. At least Joe and Ronda seemed to love each other. It was gut to have such an example close at hand. Perhaps it would rub off on her. Ella laughed bitterly at the thought. Love for her seemed utterly out of the question.

  No sooner had Ella turned her attention back to the laundry than from out on the road came the sound of horses’ hooves, the driver arriving at a great pace. When he slowed down, Ella turned to see who it was but couldn’t tell from this distance. Surely of all things this wasn’t Bishop Miller coming to see her this morning. Not on laundry day. She turned and slowly pulled the final wet dress from the hamper, shook it carefully, and pinned it to the wire. She made no attempt to approach the buggy.

  Steps sounded behind her. It sounded like a man was approaching. She would have to face him after all. From behind her a voice came.

  “Ella?”

  Startled, she turned. It was not the deep voice of Bishop Miller; it was someone else…someone unfamiliar. “Yah,” she said, turning around to see one of Ivan’s nephews walking quickly toward her. What was his name? She searched her memory. Lucas?

  “You must come!” he said, his young voice urgent.

  “Come?” she asked, her red hands dropping to her side. “Come where?”

  “It’s Ivan!” he said. “There may not be much time.”

  “What?” she asked, suddenly feeling cold all over. Has Ivan lost his mind? Burned down his house? With the pressure on him, anything seems possible.

  “I’ll tell you on the way,” he said, seeming ready to grab her hand if she didn’t respond.

  “I must tell Ronda and ask her to take care of the girls,” Ella said, picking up her clothes hamper. It felt like her body was moving in slow motion.

  “Then you must hurry!” he urged, following close behind her.

  At the front door she didn’t knock but simply walked in, the young man following.

  “Ronda!” she called.

  “Yah?” Ronda answered from the kitchen.

  “Can you watch the girls? I have to go with…Lucas. Something has happened with
Ivan.”

  “Oh!” Ronda said. “Of course I will. You go. I’ll bring the girls upstairs. Don’t worry—just go!”

  Ella allowed herself to be led out the front door, and then she shook off the young man’s hand. “I’ll come,” she said.

  “Then run!” he commanded, and they ran together toward his buggy.

  Her coat was much too thin for a buggy ride on a cold morning, but she didn’t say anything. There obviously was no time for such things.

  In the buggy she pulled the blanket up to her chin, but it did little to cut the bite of the wind. She hadn’t been driven so fast since Joe’s night drive to the clinic. Still, Lucas urged the horse on with sharp slaps of the reins. Snow flew up from the buggy wheels as it slid sideways at turns. Lucas hardly slowed at the stop signs.

  “You have not told me yet,” she said, her teeth chattering.

  “Ivan was cleaning off snow with the shovel—the big one they pull with the horses. He was using the colt hitched with his older horse and something happened. I don’t know what, but the horse got away from him.”

  “Did anyone see it happen?” Ella asked, trying to pull the blanket up higher.

  “Daett saw it when he was already being dragged,” he said, his voice dropping. “We live pretty far down the road, so you can’t see a lot. When I got there, he looked like he had been under the shovel for a ways. The lines were all tangled up under his arm. It’s hard to tell what all happened, but Daett and Susanna are with him now.”

  “Why am I needed?” she asked, glancing at him.

  “Ivan asked me to bring you,” he said. “In case…”

  “But why wasn’t he taken to the clinic?”

  “Ivan wouldn’t let Daett call for the ambulance or load him onto the spring wagon. Ivan only wants to speak with you.”

  “But they didn’t have to listen to him,” she said. “I can’t do anything for him.”

  “I don’t think anyone can,” he said. “And I don’t think it would have done much good to move him. It might have made things worse from the way it looks.”

  Ella shook her head.

  “He might want to make things right with you,” he said. “That’s what Daett was thinkin’. And Daett sent for the bishop too.”

  “Bishop Miller?” Ella asked, sitting up straight.

  He shook his head. “That’s too far away. Bishop Mast.”

  “Then we must get there,” Ella said.

  “I’m going as fast as I can,” he said, as he passed another stop sign with only a slight drop in speed.

  Great spurts of steam were coming out of the horse’s nostrils, and his sides were heaving.

  “You had best slow down,” she said. “We are almost there.”

  “I know,” he said but didn’t pull back on the lines. “I’ll drop you off and then walk the horse for a while to cool him down.”

  Ella saw a tight knot of people in the barnyard ahead, their black coats in sharp contrast to the snow around them. Lucas slowed down, allowing her time to climb out and walk around the buggy before taking off again. She approached the scene, noticing the two horses tied to the fence, the tangle of leather straps around them, the overturned snow shovel off to the side, and at the center Ivan, who was lying on a blanket. The snow surrounding the blanket was patched with red. The crowd parted as Ella made her way to them.

  “She has come!” someone whispered, but Ella had eyes only for Ivan. His face was drawn and white, tense with pain, his hands on his chest that was spattered with blood.

  Ella knelt beside him, reaching to touch him, his hands first and then his face. He opened his eyes, and barely whispered, “You have come.”

  “Yah,” she whispered. “Of course. You knew I would.”

  “She calls me,” he said, his voice raspy. “And there is not much time.”

  She stroked his face, not caring how it appeared to those around her.

  “I must tell you,” he said, making as if to rise, but falling back on the blanket with a groan. “You and Susanna. Where is Susanna?”

  “I’m here, Ivan,” Susanna said at Ella’s shoulder, trying unsuccessfully to hold back her tears.

  “Then listen carefully,” he said through his pain. “The girls are to be with Ella. They are hers. Remember that.”

  “With Ella?” Susanna asked.

  He nodded, grimacing. “Yah. Though I am excommunicated, I am still their father. It is my last wish. The girls are to be Ella’s. As if they were her natural born. Do you understand?”

  “Yah,” Susanna whispered. “I understand.”

  “Then I can go,” he said, lying back, allowing a long breath to seep out through his lips.

  “The bishop is almost here,” a man’s voice whispered.

  “Yah, the bishop,” Ivan said, his eyes focusing. “I must speak with him.”

  “Yah, Ivan, I am here,” Bishop Mast said, kneeling down beside him.

  “Tell Bishop Miller I am sorry. That I regret the suffering I’ve caused. Perhaps he can forgive me.”

  “He would if he were here,” Bishop Mast said. “But I will tell him.”

  Ivan’s face seemed to light up briefly. His hands lifted slightly, his eyes stared into space.

  “Ivan,” Bishop Mast said, “you are forgiven.”

  But Ivan’s eyes weren’t on the bishop’s face. He was looking over the bishop’s shoulder, toward the open heavens.

  “Lois!” he whispered. “You have come. And He is with you!” He lifted his arms slowly, pushing back on the bishop’s shoulder, fixed on a sight only he could see.

  “I am not worthy,” he said.

  Ella had heard him say the words before, only now the despair was gone and his voice rang with hope.

  Ella watched as the light left his eyes and his arms fell back to the ground.

  “He’s gone,” someone said. “He called her name—Lois, as if he saw her.”

  “He was forgiven,” Bishop Mast said, gladness in his voice. “This has been a great mercy, and we can thank Da Hah his soul was spared.”

  The blanket was wrapped around Ivan and his face covered. Susanna was openly sobbing now. Ella was glad she hadn’t brought the girls with her. Da Hah had spared them this pain, if not the pain from the loss of their father.

  Ella sent a buggy for the girls with instructions to Ronda that they were to come at once. Meanwhile, Ella waited with Ivan’s body until the long black car that had been summoned arrived to take him to the mortuary.

  When the girls arrived, Ella knew what she must do. She took them to the scene alone. Just the three girls.

  “There was an accident here,” she said slowly. “Your daett was taken by Da Hah to be with your mamm in heaven.”

  “I want to go too,” Mary said, blinking away tears.

  Ella knelt beside the girl. “Not yet, but someday. Only Da Hah can take us to heaven—when He is ready for us.”

  “Will you be our mamm now?” Mary asked, her face upturned.

  “Yah,” she said, tears stinging her eyes. “I am your mamm now.”

  Mary shivered in the cold but drew close to Ella. Ella drew Mary and Sarah tightly to her. Baby Barbara rested in her arms.

  “Come, girls,” she said. “We’d best go inside.”

  Mary and Sarah followed her without a backward glance.

  The girls are mine now, Ella realized, the reality of it drawing ever nearer, crashing upon her senses. Forever mine.

  Thirty-nine

  Ella stayed inside with the girls as people began to arrive. There was little to do but wait for the body to be returned.

  “I need to go back to the house and make sure everything is okay. I also need to pick up a few things,” Ella told Susanna. “May I borrow your buggy? It shouldn’t take too long.”

  “Nee, you should stay here with the girls. We’ll send someone,” Susanna said. “That’s what people are here for—to help.”

  Ella reluctantly gave in and gave instructions to the girl who would be
in charge. “I have wash lying around yet and some in the basket. Just fold it and lay it on the kitchen table. I can take care of it after the funeral. And tell Ronda upstairs to keep some fire in the stove. She’ll know how much.”

  The girl nodded and left with two other girls who would help.

  The hearse returned late in the afternoon, and Ivan’s body was brought into the main bedroom. Ella waited until the Englisha men were gone and Susanna had left the room before she took the girls in. She wanted to be alone with them the first time they saw their daett’s body.

  She held baby Barbara tightly against her shoulder, and had Mary and Sarah on either side of her.

  “Why doesn’t Daett move?” Mary asked.

  “That’s just his body,” Ella explained. “He’s really in heaven now.”

  “I didn’t want him to go,” Mary said. “Will I have another daett now?”

  “I don’t know,” Ella said, pulling the girl tightly against her with her free hand. “But come, let’s go now. There are other people wanting to come in.”

  Ella tried to smile when Susanna met them in the living room. At least her life had purpose now, with three people depending on her. It would be hard, but they would make it somehow. People would tell her that now more than ever she should marry the bishop, but now more than ever she knew she couldn’t. Besides, he likely wouldn’t want a woman with three girls anyway. Girls who weren’t even her own by birth.

  “You don’t have to take the girls,” Susanna whispered, when she sat down. “I know how it was between you and Ivan, and I know it never would have worked out.”

  “Don’t you want me to have them?” Ella asked. Is Susanna trying to interfere? If the family is going to make a fuss about this, I’d best fight their decision early. I’m going to abide by Ivan’s request.

  “I just wanted to be sure you weren’t feeling pressured,” Susanna said.

  “But you heard what Ivan said,” Ella whispered.

  Susanna nodded. “I’m not asking that Ivan’s wish be changed. We owe him that much, and the family will not object. If there is any problem, I will see to it myself. But I want to make sure you’re okay with the arrangement. It’s a huge responsibility.”