An Amish Reunion

by Jo Ann Brown

  “All right.” Resignation filled Hannah’s voice.

  As he cleaned honey and bread crumbs off the little girl’s hands, he stole a glance toward her older sister. He almost gasped aloud at the pain and despair on Hannah’s face. Every instinct told him to toss aside the cloth and pull Hannah into his arms and console her. When they were walking out together, he wouldn’t have hesitated, but everything was different since the night he decided he had to be single-minded in the pursuit of his dream of running a construction company.

  “While you’re getting the stickiness off her, I’ll get my beekeeping equipment.” Her voice was muffled, and he guessed she was struggling to hold back the tears he’d seen in her eyes when she wasn’t aware he was looking in her direction.

  Again he’d had the chance to say something comforting, but he couldn’t think of anything that wouldn’t upset her. What a disaster he’d made of what had been a gut friendship! To be honest, he was surprised she even talked to him after he’d avoided her during the past three years.

  The back door closed behind her, and Daniel focused his attention on Shelby who slapped the high chair tray, getting her fingers sticky again. Picking her up, he sat her on the edge of the table. He succeeded in getting most the honey off her, but some stuck in her hair.

  “She’s a gut girl,” said Grossmammi Ella from her chair by the window.

  “Ja, she is.” He grinned at Shelby. “And she’s washed.”

  “Not that one! Our Hannah is a gut girl.”

  Daniel wasn’t sure what the elderly woman was trying to convey to him. Did she want him to leave her great-granddaughter alone so he didn’t have a chance to hurt her again, or was Grossmammi Ella hoping he’d court Hannah? He thought about assuring her that he had no plans to do either. Nothing had changed for him. He was working toward his goal, and it required every bit of his attention.

  The door opening allowed him to avoid answering the old woman. In astonishment, he saw Hannah was dressed as she’d been when she’d left. Didn’t beekeepers wear protective suits to keep from getting stung? She held a small metal container with a spout like an inverted funnel on one side and small bellows on the other. The odor of something burning came from it.

  “Is that all you’re bringing?” he asked.

  “The smoker is all I need.”

  “What does it do?”

  She looked at the container and squirted some smoke into the air between them. “It baffles the bees. The smoke masks the chemical signals bees use to communicate with each other. They can’t warn each other I’m near. Otherwise, they’d believe the hive is in danger, and they’d attack. It’s an easy way to get close to a hive without getting stung.”

  “A gut idea. I’m not fond of bees.”

  “They’ll leave you alone if you leave them alone.”

  “But we aren’t going to leave them alone.” He reached to take Shelby’s tiny jacket off a nearby peg. It was bright red, and the front closed with a zipper and was decorated with yellow ducklings, something no plain kind would wear.

  “What are you doing?” Hannah asked.

  “Getting Shelby’s coat on her. I’ll let you help your great-grandmother.”

  “What? I’m not taking a toddler or Grossmammi Ella near the bees.”

  “They could stay by the road and—”

  “Don’t be silly.” She pushed past him and strode toward the front door. “You stay here with them, and I’ll go to the bridge.” Turning, she smiled, and something pleasant—something he remembered from when they spent time together—rippled through him. “I don’t need you to point out where the bees are. I can find them.” She left.

  Daniel went out onto the porch with Shelby in his arms, her coat half on. Behind him, he heard Grossmammi Ella asking where everyone was going. He saw her struggling to get to her feet. He didn’t hesitate as he rushed back into the house, not wanting the old woman to fall.

  Making sure Hannah’s great-grandmother was seated again and the door closed, he stared out the window as Hannah stepped over the stone wall beside the guardrail. She hurried down the steep hill toward the creek.

  He wasn’t worried about her falling in. The current was sluggish because the water behind the dam upstream beside the remnants of the old mill was still partially frozen. Daniel wanted to get as much work as possible done before the water rose when the ice melted. Once the failing joists were replaced, he could complete the interior work even if it rained. Discovering the hive had threatened to destroy his timetable.

  He had to make this job a success. The bridge was one of the few in the area not washed away by Hurricane Agnes in 1972. The wear and tear on the bridge couldn’t be ignored any longer. The original arched supports and the floor joists needed to be strengthened. Most of the deck boards would have to be replaced. The walls were rotted. Work he knew how to do, and he’d been pleased when the highway supervisor, Jake Botti, asked him to take over the project. It was the first step toward his long-held dream of becoming a general contractor.

  Suddenly Shelby began chattering in his ear and wiggling. He set her on the floor. Once he took off her coat, she waddled to a chair and began to try to pull herself onto it.

  Daniel’s eyes shifted between the toddler and Hannah who was standing by the bridge and staring at the beam where he’d found the bees. She squirted smoke at the opening several times. She paused, then squeezed the bellows on the side of the smoker again. The wisps of smoke swirled around her, making her disappear; then she emerged from the gray cloud and retraced her steps to the house.

  He opened the door before she could. “Did you see them?”

  “Ja.” She left her smoker on the porch, then came into the house. Motioning with her head toward the kitchen, she walked past Shelby who was focused on climbing onto the chair.

  Grossmammi Ella didn’t acknowledge any of them as she continued to gaze out the window. Unsure if she’d notice if Shelby fell, Daniel grabbed the toddler before he went into the kitchen.

  “Would you like some tea while we talk?” Hannah asked as she opened the cupboard and reached in for two cups.

  “Sounds gut. I’ll put Shelby in her high chair, if you’d like.”

  She shook her head. “Let her play on the floor. Next to the sewing machine, there’s a small box of toys I found in the attic. Will you get them out for her?”

  He complied, trying to curb his impatience. He wanted to ask about the bees again. If Hannah couldn’t move them, work would have to be delayed until an exterminator could come to the bridge. Having promised he’d get the project done in six weeks or less, losing precious time might make the difference between finishing on time or being late.

  Hannah didn’t speak again after she’d placed two steaming cups on the table. Sitting, she waited for him to pull out the chair across from her. She took a sip from her cup, then said, “You’re right. It’s a hive of honeybees.”

  “Can you move it?”

  She nodded as she wrapped her hands around her cup. “I’ll have to move it twice.”

  “Why?”

  “If we lived farther away from the bridge, I could move your hive once. Because I keep my own hives so close to the bridge, if I move those new bees to a new hive behind the house, they’ll simply return to the bridge and rebuild their hive. I’ll keep them in the cellar in the dark for the next couple of weeks or so. Then, when I put the new hive outside, the bees will have lost their scent trails to the bridge. They’ll become accustomed to the new location and stay here.”

  He watched her face as she continued speaking of relocating the bees as if they were as important to her as her great-grandmother. Her voice contained a sense of authority and undeniable knowledge about how to execute her plan. The uncertain girl he’d known three years ago had become a woman who was confident in her ability with bees.

&
nbsp; When she smiled, an odd, but delightful tremor rushed through him again. He dampened it. They were in the here and now, not the past.

  “Daniel, I’ll need you to do one more thing for me as part of our bargain.”

  “What’s that?”

  “The hive is going to need a new home. I don’t have any extra honey supers, and it will take at least a week or two for some to arrive from my supplier.”

  “Honey supers?”

  “The boxes stacked to make a hive.”

  He wasn’t sure what she was talking about, but he said, “Show me what you need, and I’ll build it. Anything else?”

  “No. I’ve got the rest of the materials I need.”

  When Hannah went to the back door, he scooped up Shelby and followed. Somehow he was going to have to persuade these two stubborn Lambright women they could trust each other. He wasn’t sure how.

  Daniel faltered as Hannah walked to two stacks of rectangular boxes set off the ground on short legs. She glanced back as if wondering why he’d stopped, but she halted, too, when her gaze settled on Shelby. Hannah explained what size the four stackable boxes she’d need for the new hive must be as well as describing the cross braces that supported the frames for the honeycomb.

  “Sounds simple enough,” he said when she finished.

  A raindrop struck his face, then another. He glanced up as rain pelted them. Together they rushed into the house. Shelby giggled as she bounced in his arms.

  Hannah closed the door behind them. “It looks as if the sky is going to open up. You’re going to get wet.”

  If you don’t head out now. He finished the rest of her sentence, which she hadn’t spoken. She couldn’t make it any clearer he was overstaying his welcome.

  He’d take the hint, but not until he got the information he needed. “When will you be able to move the bees?”

  “It can’t be a rainy day or a warm one. The rain can hurt the bees when I cut the comb out of the old hive, and, if it’s warm, they’ll be flying about looking for nectar. A lot of the bees could be lost that way.” She looked past him to where rain splattered on the window over the sink. “As soon as you have the supers built and the weather cooperates, I’ll move them. Looks like rain tomorrow, so I can do it the day after if everything’s ready.”

  “Sounds gut.” He slapped his forehead. “No, day after tomorrow won’t work. You’ve got to take Shelby to Paradise Springs that day.”

  “What?”

  “On my way here, I stopped at the health clinic and made a doktor’s appointment for Shelby.”

  “You did what?” Her brown eyes darkened with strong emotions. “Shelby is my responsibility, not yours.”

  “Ja, but, when I told my mamm about finding Shelby, she insisted the kind be seen by the doktorfraa as soon as possible.” He grinned, hoping she’d push aside her anger. “I learned many years ago not to argue with my mamm when she speaks with that tone.”

  Hannah’s eyes continued to snap at him, but she took a deep breath and released it as he set the toddler beside the box of toys again. He pulled out the appointment card with the time on it and handed it to her.

  In a calmer tone, as she put the card in the pocket of her apron, she said, “I’m sorry. I should have thanked you for making the appointment, Daniel.” Before he could relax, she hurried on, “But from this point forward, making appointments for Shelby has to be my responsibility and mine alone. If the note’s right, she’s my sister. If she’s not, she was left on my porch. But I do appreciate your mamm being concerned about her. Please tell her.”

  “I will, and, Hannah, if you’d like, I’ll go with you and Shelby to the appointment.” He glanced at the kind. “I can see she’s not cooperating with you.”

  “That’s a gut idea.”

  Surprised at her quick acceptance of his help, when she’d resisted at every turn before, he said, “I’ll pick you up about a half hour before the appointment, if that works for you.”

  “That should be fine.”

  When she didn’t add anything else, he knew he needed to leave. Something he couldn’t name urged him to stay, but he ignored it, unsure what would happen if he lingered an extra minute more.

  Ruffling Shelby’s hair, he bid Hannah and her great-grandmother goodbye. He heard the toddler cry out in dismay as he closed the door behind him. The sound chased him across the grass and toward his buggy on the road alongside the creek. As he climbed in, a motion inside the house caught his eye.

  A shadow moved in front of the living room window. Was Hannah watching him leave? He was surprised when he realized he hoped she was.

  He sighed. Hannah Lambright was as unpredictable as the bees she loved, and he was going have to be extra careful around her.

  Extra, extra careful.

  Chapter Four

  Daniel kneaded his lower back as he got to his feet. He’d already worked a full day and had decided to use a few hours after supper to work on his special project. He stretched out kinks and looked around the living room of the house he was building in the woods on his family’s farm. Nailing floor molding was a time-consuming job, especially when he wasn’t using a nail gun as he did when he worked for Englisch contractors. He could have borrowed an air compressor to power his tools, but he’d decided he wanted to build the house as his ancestors had. Now he was paying for his pride.

  Hochmut. One of the most despised words among the Amish, because plain folks found pride contemptible. But he’d had a gut reason for his decision. He intended to use the house as a showcase for his skills when he solicited clients. He needed to stick with the choice he’d made. His family considered him too frivolous already because he took a different girl home from each singing.

  Mamm had mentioned more than once—some days—it was time he considered starting a family as his other brothers were doing. She’d been delighted as each of her kinder married. Both of his sisters were wed as well as three of his six brothers, not including Isaiah who was a widower. His oldest brother Joshua remarried last year, surprising Daniel who’d wondered if Joshua would recover from his grief at the death of his first wife.

  Leaning one shoulder against the kitchen doorway that needed to be framed, Daniel appraised what else wasn’t done. The rest of the molding, painting, appliances in the kitchen, furniture. A year ago, he’d thought the idea of having a showcase for what he could do was an inspired idea, but now he just wanted to be done. Once he had projects completed for clients, he could use them as examples, and he’d give this house to his twin brother, Micah, when he married.

  Micah was in love with Katie Kay Lapp, the bishop’s daughter, but Katie Kay couldn’t know because his twin brother, Micah, hadn’t asked to take her home. Not once. Instead, he’d stood aside month after month, mooning over the vivacious young woman while others courted her. That Katie Kay seemed to have no steady suitor had convinced Micah he had a chance with the woman who was at the center of every gathering.

  If Micah did get up his gumption and walked out with Katie Kay other than in his imagination, the house in the woods would be the perfect wedding gift. Maybe it was a gut thing Micah continued to hesitate because the house was taking longer to finish than Daniel had expected.

  On other jobs, Daniel was accustomed to working with a crew. He’d had to do the work of different trades as he poured a foundation, raised walls and put on the roof. When he hadn’t known how to run the propane lines to power the refrigerator, the range and the stoves that would heat the cozy house, he’d watched and learned from a plumber at a project where Daniel was doing the roofing. With each unfamiliar task, he was able to correct any mistakes he made on his house, so he wouldn’t have to do the same for his clients.

  The door opened with a squeak. Daniel added oiling the hinges to his to-do list as his brother Jeremiah walked in.

  Li
ke the rest of the Stoltzfus brothers, Jeremiah was tall and unafraid of work. His hair was reddish-brown and a few freckles remained of the multitude that once covered his face and hands. His hands were often discolored with the stain and lacquer he applied to the furniture pieces he built. He wasn’t shy, but could never be described as outspoken either. He stayed quiet when he didn’t have anything to say.

  “You wanted to borrow my miter box,” he said in lieu of a greeting. He held out the tool that would allow Daniel to cut the corners for the supers he planned to make for Hannah tonight.

  “Danki.”

  Jeremiah squatted to appraise Daniel’s work. “Are you painting the molding white or staining it?”

  “I haven’t decided.” He grinned at his older brother. “I know you’d stain it. You hate painted wood.”

  “Paint hides the beauty and imperfections in the wood.” Glancing over his shoulder, he said, “I hear you’re involved with Hannah Lambright again.”

  “Involved? Not really. I’m helping her take care of a toddler, and she’s helping me move a beehive off the bridge.”

  “That sounds like involvement to me.”

  Daniel picked up his hammer and moved across the room. Kneeling, he drove another nail into a section of molding. “Not in the way you’re insinuating. Hannah treats me as if I’m a necessary evil.”

  “That can’t be a surprise to you.”

  It wasn’t, but he didn’t intend to admit that to his brother. Jeremiah was the one who was most like their daed. Paul Stoltzfus had been calm, taking each challenge as it came. Jeremiah, on the other hand, was calm almost to the point of appearing passionless for anything but his work. If his brother had recently taken a girl home from a youth gathering, Daniel hadn’t heard of it. Jeremiah wouldn’t walk out with a girl without planning every detail and considering every ramification. He wouldn’t have made the mistakes Daniel had with Hannah.

  “I’m pleased,” Daniel said, “she can remove the bees. I wasn’t looking forward to getting stung.” He gestured with his head toward the boards on the far side of the room. “I’m making her a hive, and she’ll make sure the bees are out of our way.”