Mother For His Children, A

by Drexler, Jan

  Moolah groaned as another contraction gripped her. The cow was weakening. If he didn’t do something soon, he would lose both of them.

  * * *

  Levi’s face was cast in shadow and unreadable. Would he let her help, or would he send her back into the house?

  Another bellow from the laboring cow wrenched an exasperated nod from him. “All right. What do I need to do?”

  Ruthy hung her shawl and sweater over the gate and pushed up her sleeves. Standing behind Moolah, she pulled the cow’s tail to one side. As another contraction started, the small calf’s nose appeared, only to retreat once the contraction subsided, sending a wave of dread through Ruthy. Was the poor thing still alive?

  “It looks like the calf might have a turned leg. Maybe both.” She looked at Levi again. “We need to reach in and straighten the legs, and then the calf can slide out.”

  Levi hung the lantern from a nail protruding from the beam above his head. His face was pale in the light. “I’ve seen it done, but...” He lifted his big hands, shrugging. “I’m not sure I can do it.”

  “I can try, if you can hold her head still.”

  Levi nodded and Ruthy eyed the cow again. Moolah was the biggest Holstein she had ever seen, much bigger than Daed’s Guernseys. She found soap and water in the milking parlor while Levi lit and hung some more lanterns. The more she scrubbed her hands and arms, the more nervous she got. Why did she tell Levi Zook she could do this? If she were wrong, or if she weren’t strong enough to help this poor cow, then the family would lose a valuable animal.

  Moolah bellowed again and kicked the side of the calving pen.

  “Is there anything else you need?” Levi Zook’s strained voice told of his worry. Did he doubt her ability, too?

  “I’ll need a bucket of lard, and a length of stout chain, or rope, in case we have to pull the calf out.” Ruthy went through the procedure in her mind, remembering all the possible outcomes, as Levi disappeared through the door.

  Moolah was still standing in the calving pen, but she didn’t relax between contractions as a cow should. By the time Levi returned to the barn, Ruthy knew what course to take.

  “First I need to find out exactly what’s wrong.” Levi nodded, waiting for her instructions. “Hold her head still and talk to her. It will help if she can rest between contractions.”

  Ruthy scooped up a handful of lard and greased her left arm up to the elbow and past it, waiting for the contraction to end. As Moolah’s muscles loosened, she inserted her hand into the birth canal. She felt her way past the head and pushed past the neck to the calf’s legs. Just as she thought—they were both turned back along the calf’s body instead of lined up along the nose as they should be. She pulled her aching arm out. Daed had always told her to check the cow with her left hand to save the strength in her right for the real work.

  “I think everything will be fine, but we need to move quickly.” Ruthy started greasing her right arm with the lard. “I just need to bring the two front hooves forward, and it’ll slide right out.”

  Levi Zook nodded, his face green in the lamplight. What would she do if he fainted while she was working?

  “I need you to hold her head. She won’t like what I’m doing, and she may try to get away from me. You have to keep her still.”

  Levi nodded again. “Ja, just be quick about it.”

  Ruthy braced herself and forced her right hand past the calf. She found one hoof and, cupping it in her hand, brought it forward alongside the nose.

  She found the second hoof just as another fruitless contraction started, gripping her arm in a vise. Ruthy closed her eyes and gritted her teeth, the only way she knew of to withstand the intense pressure.

  “Are you all right?”

  Opening her eyes, she saw Levi holding Moolah’s halter with one hand and reaching toward her with the other.

  “Ja, ja, ja. I’m fine.” She gasped as the calf struggled, nearly slipping the second foot out of her hand. “Just waiting for the contraction to end. Don’t let go of her head.”

  As the contraction subsided, Ruthy brought the second hoof forward and lined it up with the first. When the next contraction came, the calf’s nose, cradled between the two soft hooves, followed her hand through the birth canal. Moolah gave a straining push and the little heifer dropped to the soft, straw-covered floor.

  Ruthy backed up until she was leaning against the side of the pen, and Levi joined her, letting a tired Moolah tend to her new calf.

  “That was wonderful-gut, Ruth. You did just the right thing.”

  Ruthy nodded. Levi Zook’s praise brought heat to her cheeks. Her arms were trembling from the exertion of manipulating the calf.

  “I must wash up....” Ruthy reached for her sweater and cape, but both hands were covered in grease and slime.

  Levi plucked one of the lanterns from the beam above them and led the way to the basin in the milking parlor. Warmth from the cow shed kept the water from freezing, but it was still cold. By the time Ruthy had washed her hands and arms again, her teeth were chattering. Her dress was filthy, but cleaning it would have to wait.

  The entire time she scrubbed in the freezing water, Levi stood silently, holding the lantern. He watched her, she saw as she glanced at him once, like Moolah had watched her calf as it struggled to stand. What was he thinking?

  “Are you going to stay with the new calf for a while?” Ruthy dried her hands on a piece of sacking she found near the basin while Levi threw the wash water outside.

  “Ja. I want to make sure she’s eating well.” Levi didn’t look at her, but led her back to the warmth of the cowshed and the calving pen. “You could stay....” He bit off his words, as if he hadn’t meant to say them.

  “I really should get back to the house.” She put her arms into the sleeves of the sweater Levi Zook held for her. “Morning will come awfully early tomorrow.”

  “It’s already tomorrow.” Levi’s voice was soft as he settled her shawl over her shoulders. “It’s past midnight.”

  Ruthy shivered one last time as Levi turned her to face him and drew the shawl closed in front. He stood, unmoving, for a long minute, his eyes dark. Ruthy thought he was leaning toward her. If he kissed her, what would she do? At that thought she turned toward Moolah and her calf, breaking the moment.

  “She’s a fine heifer calf, Levi Zook.” Ruthy struggled to keep her voice light, normal.

  Levi leaned on the gate of the calving pen next to her, closing the gap she had tried to put between them. “God was good to us, tonight.” His voice was rough and he cleared his throat. “Without your help, we could have lost both the heifer and our best milker.”

  “We make a good team when it comes to delivering calves, Levi Zook.” She smiled at him.

  Levi laid his hand on her arm and leaned closer, his own smile warm. “Ja, we do. A good team.”

  The calf stood once, and then fell into the straw. Ruthy watched Moolah give the calf an encouraging lick, then the calf stood again and started searching for the teat that would give her the sustenance she needed. A calf needed its mother from the very first minutes of life.

  “God makes families, even for animals, doesn’t He?”

  Ruthy wasn’t aware she had spoken aloud until Levi Zook grunted his agreement.

  “He does. It’s part of His care for us.”

  Ruthy glanced at his profile in the lantern light, suddenly sorry she had mentioned it. With Levi Zook still grieving for his wife, her comment would be a sad reminder, but he only grasped her hand more firmly and pulled it so her arm rested entwined with his as they watched the calf until it finished eating and dropped into the soft straw bed, sound asleep.

  Levi blew out the lanterns and they left the cows in the quiet barn.

  * * *

  In the dark kitchen, Ru
th gave him a whispered “Good night” and slipped through the Dawdi Haus door. Levi padded across the kitchen toward his own room and bed, too aware of the short night ahead. Morning wasn’t far off.

  He dropped his trousers and shirt on the floor and crawled into his cold bed, shivering as he waited for warmth to gather under the quilts. When Salome was still alive, they would keep each other warm on nights like this, but ach, would she ever complain when he climbed into bed after being up late like he was tonight. He chuckled at the memory.

  Ruth was right. God was so good to put people in families, but would he ever know the joy of a wife again?

  As his mind drifted toward sleep, the night’s events replayed in his mind. What would he have done without Ruth Mummert there? She was...like his right hand. The memory of her presence warmed him even now. He drifted to sleep with the feel of her arm entwining in his.

  * * *

  In spite of the short night, the morning’s work had to be started on time. As Ruthy entered the kitchen, Levi was already kneeling in front of the stove, coaxing the fire to wakefulness.

  “If you’re running late, I can start the stove.”

  “Ne, denki.” He paused to blow on the embers and added a handful of tinder. “I’m almost done here. If I leave the fire for you to start, that will just delay my coffee.”

  As Ruthy reached past him to take down the coffeepot, he stood, bumping into her. If he hadn’t grabbed her arms to steady her, she would have fallen back, but instead found herself held close to his broad chest. She laid her hands against his shirt front to keep from falling against him.

  “Are you all right?” he asked. His voice was low, with the same intimate tones he had used in the barn last night. Ruthy’s stomach fluttered.

  “Ja, I’m fine. We shouldn’t try to stand in the same place—there isn’t room enough for both of us.”

  “I don’t mind.”

  Ruthy looked into his face. Ne, she hadn’t been dreaming last night. Levi’s eyes were warm as he held her close. She didn’t move until she heard young men’s feet on the stairway and she pulled back.

  “Breakfast will be ready by the time you get back from choring.”

  “You won’t forget the coffee this time?”

  Ruthy picked up the coffeepot and waggled it in front of him.

  “Ne, I won’t forget your coffee.”

  Levi stared at her, holding her with his gaze as firmly as his hands had held her seconds ago. “Ruth, I...”

  “Dat, did Moolah have her calf?” Nathan asked as he burst into the kitchen with his brothers.

  Levi smiled before he turned to his sons.

  “Ja, we have a new heifer in the barn.”

  “Whose turn is it to name her?” James asked as the three boys and Levi closed the door to the porch behind them and their voices faded.

  Ruthy rubbed her arms where Levi’s hands had left the burning of awareness behind. Elam’s touch had never set her skin afire the way this man’s did.

  She worked at the pump to start the water flowing, and then filled the coffeepot and set it on the stove. Condensation formed on the sides of the blue enameled pot as heat from the stove met the cold metal and evaporated in an instant. In an instant everything had changed.

  Ne, not an instant, but in a night. She would never look at Levi Zook the same way again.

  * * *

  Levi leaned against the side of the calving stall, watching Moolah with the new heifer calf. Even though her start had been rocky, the calf was bright and alert in the midmorning light, standing close to Moolah’s sturdy side.

  He turned as the door of the cowshed opened. Ruth walked in with a thermos. He had forgotten to go into the house for his coffee break, but she remembered. Ja, he thought again, he had done a wonderful-gut thing when he’d brought Ruth Mummert here.

  “How is the new little one doing?” Ruth pulled a clean cup from under her shawl and handed it to him while she unscrewed the lid of the thermos.

  “She’s doing wonderful-gut, thanks to your help.” He held his cup steady as she filled it with steaming coffee, the cream and sugar already added.

  “It’s all those hours I spent with Daed in the barn, I guess.”

  “You said he runs a dairy farm?”

  “Ja, he and my brothers together. The boys are all married and have families of their own. They live on adjoining farms and have forty cows all told. But with the three of them working together with Daed they have plenty of hands for the milking.”

  “He has Holsteins?”

  “Ne, Daed breeds Guernseys. He says they have the best quality milk.”

  Levi glanced at the woman next to him. She was watching the black-and-white calf with a wistful smile on her face. Was there anything he couldn’t talk about with her?

  “I’ve heard of Guernseys, but everyone around here has Holsteins. What makes their milk better?”

  “Higher butterfat, almost as high as a Jersey’s, but with quantity closer to a Holstein’s. Daed says with Guernseys we have the best of both worlds.”

  Levi took a sip of his coffee. What would happen if he crossbred his Holsteins with a Guernsey bull?

  “I brought some cookies, too.” Ruth pulled a tin box out from under her shawl. What else did she have hidden under there?

  “Ach, denki.” Levi took two cookies and popped one into his mouth.

  Ruthy laughed. “I had better get the rest of these to the boys before you eat them all.”

  “Ne, don’t go yet.” Levi put his hand on her arm, stopping her with his touch, but then drew his hand back. It was all he could do to keep from letting his hand travel up to her shoulders and draw her close to him.

  “I...I just want to say denki for being willing to help last night. We might have lost both Moolah and the calf if you hadn’t been here.” And if she hadn’t stepped forward just when he needed her.

  Ruth shrugged slightly, her hands full of the cookie tin and the empty thermos. “Moolah needed help and I knew what to do. It was nothing.”

  “Ne, it wasn’t nothing. Most women would never step out of the house on a cold night, and yet you stayed out here until both the cow and calf were out of danger. I appreciate that.”

  Ruth turned her face up to his, her blue eyes gray in the dim light of the barn. Levi stepped close to her, his arm going around her waist without thought. She leaned her head onto his shoulder as he drew her close. It was only a brotherly embrace, nothing more. He leaned and laid his cheek on her kapp.

  A brotherly embrace never felt this good....

  Ruth jumped in his arms as a man cleared his throat behind them.

  Ach, ne... Levi turned to see Deacon Beachey standing in the door of the cowshed.

  “Elias told me I’d find you in here,” the older man said, “but he didn’t tell me you were occupied.”

  Ruth ducked her head, her cheeks bright red. “Good morning, Deacon.” She turned to Levi, avoiding his eyes, and took the empty coffee cup after tucking the thermos under her shawl. “I’ll just take the rest of these cookies to the boys.”

  Deacon Beachey stood silent as Ruth went into the barn and closed the door behind her. Levi’s gut broiled with disgust at himself. Of all the people to come in when he had weakened... The deacon’s job was to make sure the Ordnung was being followed, and the man had seen he and Ruth in a position that would be hard to explain. This would be reported, for sure. What would happen to Ruth’s reputation?

  “I heard there was a young woman living here that you aren’t related to, Brother Zook.”

  Brother Zook. This was an official visit.

  “Ja, that’s right. I hired a housekeeper from Lancaster County.”

  “I take it that young woman is her.”

  “Ja, Deacon. Ruth Mummert.” Deacon ha
d met Ruth at the last church meeting. This formality turned Levi’s blood cold.

  “John Stoltzfus defended you. He said there was no harm since she lives in the Dawdi Haus, separate from the family, but I have to wonder, considering what I just witnessed.”

  Levi shrugged, helpless in his own sin and thoughtlessness. “I have no excuse. I meant to give her a brotherly hug, to thank her for her help, but...”

  Deacon Beachey stepped close to Levi, his voice quiet. “Is this the first time you have touched her in this way?”

  Levi’s mind rushed back to the kitchen this morning. He could tell himself he had only tried to keep her from falling, but the truth of it... He shook his head in response to Deacon’s question. The truth of it was he felt a rush of...something...when he was close to her. If he closed his eyes, he would see himself pulling her closer.... A desire he hadn’t known existed sputtered with a growing flame—a desire for more moments like the one after the little calf had been born, when he and Ruth were working together. A partner, a friend...

  “Deacon, I have not sinned. I have done no more than touch her arm and give her that one embrace....”

  “Levi, remember what Christ said, ‘If you look at a woman with lust in your heart, you have committed adultery.’ If you have not sinned outwardly, that is good. But where have your thoughts led you?”

  Levi turned to watch the new calf, now lying prone on the soft hay, Moolah standing over her, chewing her cud. God knew where his thoughts were leading him. His desire for Ruth was to be more than a partner and friend.

  “Should I send her away?”

  “Would that be the best thing to do?” Deacon Beachey stroked his gray beard, watching Moolah and the calf. “We need to consider her feelings, and your children, too.”

  “The children love her.”

  The deacon turned. Nothing could be hidden from this man.

  “Only the children?”

  Levi rubbed his forehead. How did he end up in this mess?