by Drexler, Jan
She followed Sam into the house, where a girl sat in a chair, a book open in her lap. She looked up with startled eyes as Sam opened the door.
He looked up at Ruthy with disgust. “Martha’s always reading when she’s supposed to be working.”
Ruthy smiled at Sam and glanced at Martha. “I like to read, too. It’s hard to put a book down when there are chores to be done, isn’t it?”
“Ja, for sure.” Martha’s sweet smile warmed the room. “Dat said we should leave you be so you can settle in today.” The girl looked at Ruthy’s suitcase. “Or I could help you unpack...”
“I’d love your company, but don’t you think Waneta needs your help?”
Martha’s face told her she had guessed right, and Sam tugged at his sister’s hand. “Come on, Martha. ’Neta’s going to be mad if you don’t help her instead of mooning around.”
“I’ll see you later, all right?” Ruthy gave Martha a smile as the girl followed Sam back into the main house.
Ruthy closed the door behind them, looking around her new home. The front sitting room was cozy, with two chairs and a small side table. It would be a comfortable place to sit in the evenings while she worked on her sewing.
At this thought Ruthy sank into the rocking chair. Sewing for seven children? And their father? First thing tomorrow she would need to start in on taking inventory and planning for their summer clothes. Although Sam’s trousers seemed pretty short—she may need to make sure they had enough winter clothes first. Why hadn’t Levi Zook told her how many children he had in his letter?
And why hadn’t she followed Mam’s advice and asked before making this trip?
She knew why. Even if he had told her the size of the job, she would have come anyway. Any excuse to get away from Lancaster County and the gossip. If she had to suffer the sight of her Elam with Laurette Mast one more time...
Ruthy bit her lip. Ne, not Laurette Mast. She was Laurette Nafziger now—Elam’s Laurette.
Well, nothing would get done if she sat here wasting time. She went into the bedroom to put her clothes away. The bed had three quilts layered on it, with an extra one folded across the end of the bed. At least she would sleep warm.
Smoothing the quilt beneath her hand, Ruthy felt the empty silence of the little house. Her own quiet, empty house.
For sure this was the future God had waiting for her. Life as a maidle, forever unmarried, caring for other people’s houses and families. It wouldn’t be a bad life, giving herself in service to others.
Ruthy’s eyes stung. Ne, not a bad life, but not at all what she had dreamed of during the eight years Elam had courted her. The life she had planned was at Elam’s side, raising his children, building their future together. She rubbed her hands together, working some warmth into them. Her bony hands, too large for a woman. No wonder Elam had turned from her to pretty, petite Laurette.
Ruthy knew what she looked like in Elam’s eyes. She was too tall, too thin, her mouth too wide. Even though she tried to shrink down when she was near him, he must have felt small next to her. No man wanted a wife who towered over him.
Ja, a maidle. That’s what she would always be.
And if she wasn’t careful, she’d sink into that trap of self-pity she had tried to leave behind.
Work—hard work—was what she needed, and it looked like she had found it. Well, first things first. Unpack and then out to the main house to help Waneta with the afternoon chores. There were nine mouths to feed, and that meant there was no time for lazing around, even as exhausted as she felt.
At the sound of a knock on her door, Ruthy opened it to find a little girl on the other side.
“Hallo. Nellie, right?”
The girl giggled. “Ne, I’m Nancy. Nellie is my twin sister.”
Eight children? This was really too much. Levi Zook should have told her.
Nancy’s cheeks were rosy and chapped.
“Have you been outside in this cold?”
“Ja, I was helping Elias with the chickens, but when Dat and the boys came home he didn’t need me anymore.”
A cold knot tightened in Ruthy’s stomach.
“Nancy, who is Elias?”
“My oldest brother. He and Waneta are twins just like Nellie and I are twins.”
Ruthy gripped the door, watching the eight-year-old bounce on her toes as she spoke. She counted up in her head. Nine. Nine children. She smiled at Nancy, the innocent bearer of this shocking news.
“Where is your daed now?”
“In the buggy shed. Do you want me to get him for you?”
“Ne, denki. I think I’ll go out and see the buggy shed myself.”
Ruthy closed the door of the Dawdi Haus and headed through the short breezeway to the kitchen, with Nancy following. Waneta nodded a hello to her as she peeled potatoes, the noise of the children’s voices making it impossible to say anything more. As Ruthy opened the door to the back porch, she kept Nancy from coming with her.
“I want to speak to your daed alone.”
Nancy nodded as she closed the door, and then she twitched her winter shawl from the hook and threw it around her shoulders as she barreled out the door. Five boys were throwing snowballs at each other in the yard as she passed. Would she ever remember their names? As she reached the door of the buggy shed at the side of the barn she stopped with her hand on the latch, trembling. Five boys? Sam was inside the house. She turned to the boys in the yard again, counting. There was James, David and Jesse, the three she had met in town, and two older boys with them. One of them had to be Elias, the oldest brother, but who was the other big one?
Just then one of the boys shouted to him, “Hah, Nathan, you missed me again!”
Biting back her anger, she swung open the door of the shed and stepped in, face-to-face with Levi Zook as he rose from wiping the buggy wheels with a rag. He loomed over her in the confines of the room, suddenly dark as she shut the door on the bright midafternoon sunshine. But for all his size, his eyes were the gentlest she had ever seen, with lines that crinkled when he smiled at her.
A snowball hit the outside of the shed with a thud, bringing Ruthy back to the anger that had propelled her in here. She opened her mouth to speak, but Levi Zook only bent down to wipe the wheel hub again.
* * *
“Levi Zook, just how many children do you have?”
Levi gave the freshly greased wheel hub a final wipe with his rag before he looked into the face of the furious young woman. He knew this confrontation was coming—he had been dreading it ever since before Christmas, when she had agreed to take the job. He should have told her, but he hadn’t wanted to risk her turning down the job. If Ruth weren’t here, Eliza would be sure to take the younger girls to live with her as she had insisted she’d do ever since Salome died a year ago.
“Only ten.” He stumbled over his words as her face paled and she reached out to the wall for support. “But they’re gut children and they won’t be a bother to you.”
“Only ten? You didn’t think you should tell me this before I accepted your job?”
Levi rubbed his hand across his face and through his beard, sighing. “Ja. I should have told you.”
She stared at him, her mouth twitching. Was she going to break out into tears? He wouldn’t blame her if she insisted on going back to Lancaster County, but then what would he do? Finding a wife who would take on ten children wasn’t as easy as he thought it might be when he first started looking. He pushed up the front of his broad-brimmed hat and rubbed his forehead. Tension made his head ache.
All the single women he knew were either much too young or they had better offers than he could give them. Hiring a housekeeper was the only alternative he could think of to keep his family together. This situation had to work, but how could he make her stay?
Ruth
covered her mouth with her hand, turning away from him. When she glanced back he could see she was laughing. Laughing at him?
“I’m sorry,” she said, her laughter bubbling up so that she could hardly breathe. “Ach, Levi Zook, you should see yourself. You just wiped grease all over your face.”
Levi pulled his hand away from his face. She was right. It was covered with black grease. He wiped at his face with his rag, but Ruth stopped him.
“There must be a clean cloth here somewhere,” she said between gasps. She sorted through the rags on the workbench and found a folded scrap at the bottom of the pile.
“Denki.” Levi took the rag and wiped his nose and forehead. His beard would have to wait. What must she think of him? He must have looked like some schoolboy the way he kept spreading the grease around. He tried to wipe his hands clean and waited for her to stop laughing. Could he live with a woman who laughed at him, no matter how her eyes danced in the dim light of the shed?
“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you about the children earlier. I meant to, but I just didn’t know how to do it in a letter.”
“So you thought you’d let me figure it out as I met them.”
“For sure, I didn’t plan it that way.”
She pulled her shawl more tightly around her shoulders. Her laughter still showed in the smile she gave him.
Levi turned the rag to find another clean spot and rubbed at his cheek. “I wouldn’t blame you if you decided not to stay. I shouldn’t have kept this from you.”
Glancing out the small window, she watched the boys playing in the yard. She chewed her bottom lip while he waited, and then she turned to face him. “You need me, Levi Zook, and your children need me. Waneta has been trying to run the house all on her own?”
He nodded and rubbed at the grease still covering his hands. “Ja, but it’s too much work for her at times.” At times? It was too much work for her all the time, even with Martha’s help. She needed a woman to guide her and teach her the things Salome hadn’t been able to during the years she had been ill.
Levi looked up to see Ruth regarding him with those blue eyes. She was nearly as tall as he was, and she held his gaze with a half smile. Her anger had disappeared quicker than ice melted on a summer day.
“You don’t need to worry about me running away from a little work, but please tell me you aren’t hiding more children in the hayloft.”
“Ne, no more surprises.”
“We’ll start fresh then, now that I know what to expect.”
As she went back to the house, Levi watched her through the open door. Ruth Mummert was enough of a surprise all by herself.
Chapter Two
“Martha, get in here and help me this minute!”
Waneta’s strident voice reached Ruthy, even in the back bedroom of the Dawdi Haus, and she sat up on the bed. The room was rosy and dim with the glow of the setting sun. She must have fallen asleep.
She hadn’t realized how tired she’d been after the long train ride, but her short nap had been anything but restful. Even this far away from Bird-in-Hand, Elam dominated her thoughts and intruded on her sleep. She pushed him away as Waneta’s voice carried through the house again.
“Martha!”
The poor girl sounded at her wits’ end. Ruthy bent down to slip her feet into her shoes. Levi Zook had told her to take it easy this afternoon, but it was nearly suppertime and certainly Waneta could use some help.
Ruthy repinned her kapp and went into the kitchen of the main house. Chaos reigned. The two little girls chased each other around the big table with flatware in their hands, their laughter high and shrill. Sam scraped a chair across the wooden floor to a counter where a cake waited to be frosted. Waneta struggled to pull a roasting pan from the oven, her hair falling around her face and her kapp limp and nearly falling off.
Seizing a towel from the counter, Ruthy grabbed one end of the roaster.
“Waneta, this ham smells wonderful-gut.” Together, they lifted the roaster onto the counter next to the stove and Waneta closed the oven door with a bang.
“Denki, but you’re supposed to be resting. Dat said you’d be tired from your long trip.”
“I’ve rested enough, and you look like you could use some help.”
“Ja, for sure I can, but you shouldn’t have to help with your own welcome supper.”
“Never mind that. Just let me help.”
Waneta’s brown eyes startled wide and she dashed around Ruthy. “Sam! You know better than that! Look what you’ve done to the cake!”
Ruthy turned to see Sam holding a chunk of unfrosted cake in his hand. Her smile froze on her face. If this was the way Levi Zook raised his children, he needed her more than he thought. It was time for her to start earning her money.
A vision of her elementary school teacher, Mrs. Studer, flashed into her mind. The Englisch woman had ruled a classroom full of forty-five children from first through eighth grades with a calm voice and a no-nonsense approach to rules. Ruthy had loved her. What would Mrs. Studer do with this mess if she were here?
Stepping to the table, Ruthy caught each of the eight-year-old twins by the arm as they ran past her. “What are the two of you supposed to be doing?”
Their flushed faces looked into hers, and then they both glanced at Waneta.
“We’re setting the table,” one of them said, grinning at Ruthy. When Ruthy kept her face stern, the grin vanished.
“Then you should be setting the table, shouldn’t you? Games like this should be saved for outdoors.”
The girl who had spoken nodded her head. Ruthy turned to her twin sister, ready to scold both of them, but the tears in the girl’s eyes stopped her words. She was so much more sensitive than her sister. How different could twins be?
“You will need to help me with your names for a while. I know one of you is Nellie, right?” The silent twin nodded her head and she turned back to the more daring girl. “So you’re Nancy.”
“You’re right.” The girl grinned again, her blue eyes sparkling.
“Nancy, you go ahead and finish putting the flatware on the table and Nellie can get the plates.”
Nellie went to a cupboard near the sink and opened it, revealing a generous stack of white plates. Such a tender child in this boisterous family seemed out of place. Ruthy turned her attention back to Sam, who was sitting on the chair next to the decimated cake, calmly eating the piece he had stolen. Waneta glanced at Ruthy as she opened a jar of pickled beets and gave her a quick smile. At least one person approved of the way she was handling things so far.
Ruthy knelt next to the little boy.
“Are you enjoying that cake?”
Sam nodded and grinned at her. His blue eyes were full of mischief, but his sweet smile made her long to give him a hug.
She couldn’t give in to that! This boy was a little thief who needed to be taught a lesson.
“It would taste better with frosting on it, wouldn’t it?”
“Ja,” Sam said between bites. “’Neta makes the best frosting.”
“It’s too bad you won’t get any, then.”
Sam stopped, the cake halfway to his mouth for another bite. “Why won’t I get any?”
Ruthy rose and took a spoonful of frosting from the nearby bowl. “You’re eating your cake now instead of after supper. So when the rest of us have our pieces with frosting, you won’t be able to have any.” She started frosting the untouched layer of cake and exchanged a glance with Waneta. The girl gave her a grateful smile.
“If I give it back, will you put frosting on it?” Sam held out his remaining chunk of cake.
“Will you promise to leave desserts alone until after the meals from now on?”
Sam stared at the cake, considering. Then he nodded. “I’ll try.”
/> “All right then.” Ruthy got a plate from the cupboard and Sam deposited his cake on it. “I’ll frost this piece just for you.” Sam slid down from the chair and headed into the front room.
“Denki,” Waneta whispered. “Dat always complains about pieces missing from the cakes, but I don’t know how to stop him.”
“I have a brother who tried the same thing when he was Sam’s age. Mam made him give up his desserts for a month when he didn’t stop.”
Waneta giggled. “You’ll have to threaten Sam with that. Nothing I say will make him behave.”
Ruthy set the broken cake layer on top of the first one and spread it with another dollop of frosting. Dessert wouldn’t be pretty, but from the way Sam liked his sister’s cake, she could tell it would still taste good.
“Do you always make the meals by yourself?”
Waneta drained a pot full of cooked potatoes. “Usually. Martha is supposed to help me, but she always disappears just when I need her.”
Ruthy tried to remember who Martha was, then placed her. The girl with her nose in a book in the Dawdi Haus earlier. Levi Zook needed more than a housekeeper—that man needed someone to take his younger girls in hand. He had been right when he said this task was too big for Waneta.
While Waneta piled slices of ham on a platter and filled the table with green beans, carrots, bread and pickles, Ruthy mashed the potatoes. Waneta sent Nancy to the back porch to ring the dinner bell, and soon the kitchen was full of children finding their places on the long benches that sat along the sides of the big table. Levi Zook came into the kitchen last, combing his fingers through his beard. Once he took his seat at the head of the table, Ruthy took the only place left, on the end opposite Levi Zook.
Every eye at the table was focused on her and she felt her face grow hot. Had she done something wrong? Were they waiting for her to do something?
“She’s sitting in Mam’s chair,” said one of the older boys.
