by Kelly Long
“Jah,” Mamm added, reaching to brush a gentle hand against the curve of Sarah’s cheek. “And I’ll wash the dishes, breakfast and dinner. You just wash up after you bake.”
“Oh, Mamm—I can’t let you do all that.”
Mamm laughed. “Do you think I’m too old for such work?”
“No, of course not. I just feel . . .”
“Sarah,” Mamm said seriously. “Tell me what this saying is: Alli mudder muss sariye fer ihre famiyle.”
Sarah sighed. “I know.”
“Tell me.”
“ ‘Every mother has to take care of her family.’ ”
“Jah,” Mamm continued. “And I’ll take care of you while you take care of all of us.”
“Thank you,” Sarah murmured, her heart full.
“And . . .” Father drew some bills from the money box she’d left on a side counter. “Your wages for the day, little Sarah.” He offered her the money, and she put her hands behind her back, shaking her head.
“Father,” she said, shocked. “I cannot take your money.”
“You are not a child anymore, my daughter. Take the money each day and save it or spend it as you see fit. You have good judgment and you’ve earned it.” Father’s eyes twinkled.
Sarah took the money and slipped it into her apron pocket. She’d never had money of her own before and could not see the need of it, but she wouldn’t disappoint Father or Mamm.
“Thank you both.”
Father smiled and Mamm nodded.
“Now, what are you going to bake for tomorrow?”
Mamm’s question brought her back to the practicality of the moment and Sarah smiled, feeling renewed, despite the awkwardness of a few moments before. “I thought I’d make whoopee pies . . .”
She got no further for all of the “whoops” that the boys let out from various places in the sitting room where they’d been listening.
“Make extra please, Sarah,” Luke called.
“See, Sarah, you’re earning your money well.” Father laughed, and Sarah could not contain her own mirth as she reached for the large yellow mixing bowl and brought down the cocoa powder. It was not going to be as hard as she thought, and she breathed a prayer of gratitude to the Lord as she assembled the eggs.
The Bustles discussed the evening at the King farm with pleasure while Grant concentrated on not missing the minor turn in to their lane. The lack of streetlights made it difficult to navigate the roads. He swung into their lane and soothed the cat they’d been given, which was meowing excitedly on his lap, as if it sensed that it was to become something a bit more than a barn cat.
“Ah, the poor little thing,” Mrs. Bustle clucked. “I’ll take it inside and get it some food.”
“Not too much, dear,” Bustle interjected. “We want it to be hungry so that it can catch—”
“I understand your point,” Mrs. Bustle interjected, still not quite recovered from her escapade with the rat mother.
Grant pulled in and everyone climbed out. He noticed some FedEx boxes in the shine of the porch light.
“Supplies! Great. I can’t wait to get things going.” He picked up the boxes in one strong arm and caught the screen door on his lean hip knowing Bustle would have held it.
“I’m good, Bustle. I’ll just take these back into one of the rooms and have a look. I bet it’s all meds; I ordered some penicillin.”
“Very good, sir, and will you be requiring anything else this evening?”
“No, my friend. Both of you enjoy your rest, and maybe let the cat prowl around a bit.”
“Very good, sir. Good night.”
The Bustles went one way, and Grant went another, down a narrow hallway, close to where he expected to set up his office. He hummed as he opened the boxes, thinking about Sarah King’s hazel eyes. Then he stopped as he pulled plastic-wrapped, size-eleven beach flip-flops from the package. He looked at the address and saw that the zip code was one number off and groaned. Somewhere, a big-footed man was staring down at vials of animal antibiotics. He just hoped it wasn’t somebody who’d take it into his head to sell them as street drugs. And then he laughed aloud at the thought. He was too used to living in the city, not that he didn’t think that drugs weren’t an issue out in the middle of nowhere. And though the sandals obviously didn’t belong to an Amish man, he’d bet there were probably many an Amish youth who experimented during their rumspringa, or time of “running around” as he knew it. He thought of the beautiful Miss King and couldn’t imagine her doing anything more wild than eating a peach out of season, and then he laughed again at himself—he was thinking too much of the girl.
He moved to the next box, expecting to find at least some of the meds, and instead withdrew a lodge comforter with bear paw prints and an indistinct moose on it. Clearly the postal service was a bit lax in this rural area, but he decided to see the humor in it. “All things for a purpose,” he remarked to the cat, which had followed him down the hall.
“I know you’d rather be outside, but I promise there’s plenty of food running about.” He scooped the animal up and made his way up the stairs, depositing the cat on the landing outside the Bustles’ door.
CHAPTER 4
It appears that there’s a colony of bats living in the attic, sir.” Bustle’s voice was bland and low.
Grant smiled, looking up from his book. “Naturally. Does Mrs. Bustle know?”
“I thought it best not to . . .”
“You’re right, of course. When the colony flies out tonight, we’ll go up and seal all the entry holes in the roof. The bats will find another place to roost.”
“Excellent idea, sir.”
“Not really . . . just an old trick from one of those Farmer’s Almanacs I’ve been reading. It’s amazing how much information is relevant for renovating an old farmhouse.”
The two men were sharing breakfast as the morning light poured in through the washed windows. Mrs. Bustle had eaten and was hanging out a washing of cleaning rags on an old clothesline out back. The newly acquired cat, dubbed Fisher after the estate name, was prowling about, having successfully moused twice that morning.
Grant rose and tidied up his place, much to Bustle’s disapproval, then went through the myriad rooms and passages to where his office and treatment rooms were to be housed. He eased open the wooden door with its old-fashioned, varnished knob and sighed to discover that the workers had not yet gotten to this part of the house.
When he’d bought the estate, it had been a hurried affair, and Mr. Fisher had been anxious to leave the area. He wasn’t clear on all of the details, but Fisher had left nearly everything behind when he’d gone, right down to the green velvet window drapes and the hand-tooled, massive desk that he now placed a lean hip against. He mentally compared the room to the simplicity and lack of decoration that he’d seen at the King farm and wondered at the difference. The Fishers had been Amish too, but perhaps they were of a more liberal frame of mind. He glanced down at the scattered papers on the desk and saw receipts for large chain stores, as well as a crushed Avon bag. He mused over this as he thought about Sarah King’s fresh-faced expression and the way the light played across her unadorned, creamy cheeks and brow. Clearly the girl needed no artificial enhancement to improve her beauty. He smiled to himself at his meandering thoughts. He’d had numerous girlfriends throughout his training, but none ever struck his fancy for any length of time. He decided he must check out the local dating scene if an Amish girl in all her plainness was causing him to think about such a thing as the use of makeup.
“Women!” he exclaimed and set about clearing out the room.
By Thursday, Sarah had begun to get the rhythm of working at the stand and realized that she could do something with her hands in the idle minutes between customers. She decided to begin Chelsea’s baby quilt with some trepidation and had gone to the vast attics of the farm to find fabric scraps, once she’d chosen a simple patchwork design. She hid her bundle of cloth and needles in a basket,
not wanting Mamm to know what she was about—since she would be sure to have something to say about Sarah quilting again, as was proper for any Amish girl, in Mamm’s viewpoint.
Sarah had just finished serving her first morning customer and had taken out the quilt squares she had cut beforehand when a buggy turned briskly into the stand’s parking area. Sarah glanced up and felt a sinking in her heart when she recognized her Aunt Ruth and Grossmudder King, obviously out and about for a surprise visit from their farm some twelve miles away.
Sarah gathered the fabric squares and stuffed them back into her basket, rising to greet the two ladies. Aunt Ruth was about forty-five and patiently kind as she helped Sarah’s grandmother down from the buggy. Grossmudder King was in her eighties but got around reasonably well with the help of a cane. It was her tongue that was as sharp as any young person’s though, and it always gave Sarah grief. The woman could find fault like a dog could find a duck, but none of these thoughts showed in Sarah’s polite smile. She moved to assist Aunt Ruth as she helped the old lady navigate the stairs to the stand.
“Move off, Sarah King. I can make my own way,” Grossmudder snapped, gesturing with her cane.
Sarah smothered a sigh. “Of course, Grossmudder.”
“Sarah, how are you?” Aunt Ruth gave her a hug.
“She’d be better if she was married,” Grossmudder muttered, poking at some apples with a bony finger.
Aunt Ruth rolled her eyes at Sarah, who had to suppress a laugh.
Grossmudder stepped by them both and went to where Sarah’s basket was beneath the small checkout table. She prodded the basket with her cane. “And what are you quilting here? I saw you when we drove up.”
Sarah felt as young as thirteen again when she faced the shrunken woman from whom she descended, but she reminded herself that she was doing the quilt for Chelsea, who would love it no matter how it turned out.
“I’m making a quilt for Chelsea’s boppli.”
“Ach, that’s nice,” Aunt Ruth exclaimed.
“Hm . . .,” the old lady declared. “It’ll only be nice if you’ve managed to improve your quilting skills, which I have to doubt since you’ve not attended a quilting for years.”
“Well, Grossmudder,” Sarah returned serenely, “it is true that not everything improves with time.”
Aunt Ruth turned a laugh into a cough while Grossmudder King’s eyes flashed. “Don’t be sassy, miss. You remind me of your mother when she was young!”
“Danki,” Sarah murmured.
Grossmudder huffed. “Well, let’s go down to the farmhouse, Ruthie. I haven’t got all day. Sarah, I’d give meditation to the ways of your tongue; it’s probably why you have no husband as of yet.”
Sarah smiled politely and resisted the desire to point out that somehow her grandmother had managed to marry in spite of her own tongue. She watched the two women drive off with a sigh and considered what excuse she might use to be absent from supper that evening. One meeting with Grossmudder King in a day was more than enough.
She turned her attention to a basket of sweets she’d made the night before. She’d begun to find it pleasant to do the baking after dinner each evening and experimented with different desserts and pies as these seemed to sell the best, especially to the Englisch, who appeared to have a strong liking for sweets.
The night before, she’d made peanut brittle in Mamm’s largest cast iron skillet, mixing the brown sugar, molasses, and freshly shelled peanuts until they reached just the right consistency. She’d also had to fend off her brothers when she’d cooled the brittle on cookie sheets and had started to break and bag it. It seemed she had more willing tasters than true helpers, and she’d soon shooed them all away, finishing each beribboned bag by herself. Now she arranged the bags in neat piles in the early morning sunshine at the stand and smiled in satisfaction as she took her seat to wait for her next customer.
She knew that Dr. Williams would be along at some point; he visited the stand each day, much to her discomfiture. She couldn’t get away from Mamm and Father’s talk and felt that every time her eyes strayed to his tall form, she was betraying a trust. She’d never found it difficult to obey her parents before, but there was something so engaging about the doctor that she seemed to forget all of her best intentions whenever they talked. She expected his visits would stop, of course, when he’d developed his practice in the area, and then she could go back to even footing in her mind. And of course, Jacob made it a point to stop by whenever he could, but he and the doctor had not met since that first day.
A horse and buggy trotted to a brisk stop before the stand, and Mrs. Loder, a neighbor of Mamm’s age, climbed down from the buggy and flung the reins over the hitching post. She wore her visiting bonnet, which was rather askew, and the blue blouse typical of housewives her age, along with a black overdress and apron.
“Ach, Sarah . . . guder mariye.” She climbed the steps to the stand and looked about hurriedly.
“Good morning,” Sarah replied. “Is something wrong?”
Jah . . . I was supposed to go to a quilting for my sister-in-law today and was to bring a sweet, but I set my youngest girl to “watching the cinnamon bread so it wouldn’t burn while I put out the washing, and ach . . . sure enough, Lucy got busy playing and the bread burned.”
“I’m sorry. It’s so hard to be small and to pay attention.” Sarah couldn’t contain her thoughts, knowing little Lucy from various frolics and picnics.
“Ach, I know that . . . She cried and I didn’t scold because she felt so badly, but I still need a sweet in a hurry.”
“Well.” Sarah rose and opened a bag of peanut brittle. “Why not take several bags of the brittle? Just put it onto a platter, and you’ll be ready to go. Sei so gut . . . please, take them with my blessing.”
“You’re a good girl, Sarah, but I need to pay you.”
Sarah smiled. “Nee . . . no. We’re neighbors; it’s my pleasure.”
Mrs. Loder smiled at her and patted her shoulder. “Danki, Sarah. I will take it and hurry!”
Sarah put six bags into a box and handed it up to the older woman when she’d taken up the reins to the buggy. Mrs. Loder expertly turned the horse, and Sarah went back to the steps to wave good-bye.
The sound of the horse’s hooves had just ceased to echo when a car came driving fast from the opposite end of the high road. Loud music blared from the tan automobile as it pulled into the parking area near the stand in a cloud of dust. Sarah resumed her seat and waited. She had not had to deal with any Englisch teenagers yet, and her stomach fluttered as two lanky youths got out of the car.
One was smoking a cigarette and flicked ashes into the dirt at the roadside while the other mounted the steps to the stand.
Sarah offered a faint smile, but then swallowed and looked to the wooden floor when the boy began to come toward her.
Guder mariye, Sarah King.” “
Sarah’s head snapped up at the proper pronunciation and vaguely familiar voice. She met the cold brown eyes of the boy, trying to place how the Englischer knew her name.
“Don’t you know me, Sarah King? You should. You had no problem remembering me at the picnic at the Loders’ last spring. You knew me well enough to avoid me when I might have held your hand by the creek.” The youth laughed and his friend began coming up the steps.
Comprehension dawned for Sarah just as the boy who’d spoken insolently bit into an apple he’d grabbed.
“Matthew Fisher?” she asked.
“Jah, Sarah. Sarah the proud. Sarah the snob.” He spit out a seed and turned to his friend. “Sarah King here and her family were key in running my father off his land. I say I owe her a debt.”
The other boy had torn open a bag of peanut brittle and was chewing. “Maybe we should collect, then.”
Sarah’s heart was pounding and she was praying in the back of her mind as quickly as a running stream. “We didn’t do anything to harm you, Matthew,” she managed. “Or your family.”
&n
bsp; “Liar,” he hissed, slamming the apple on the wooden floor so that it splattered. “You didn’t call it shunning; that would have been a bit too much, right? But you thought you were better, didn’t you?”
His companion had come to stand next to Sarah’s chair and pulled on her kapp string with dirty fingers.
“She’s pretty, Matt. Let’s have a little fun.” He leaned close, and she could smell the lanky teenager’s foul morning breath mixed with the smell of the peanut brittle.
She tried to draw a calming breath. “What do you want?”
The boy laughed and squeezed hard at the nape of her neck. “What do you think?”
“Aw, let her alone already,” Matthew rejoined in a sullen tone. “She’s too much of a priss.”
“I bet I could loosen her up,” his friend said, keeping a firm grip on Sarah’s neck.
Sarah felt as though her heart would beat through her chest, though her clear eyes remained steady. The youth moved to kiss her and she jerked away, knocking over her chair and rising to press herself into the small corner of the stand.
“Sarah, is it? . . . Not shy, are you?” The boy was moving closer and she screamed while he laughed—then his laughter was suddenly cut off and he grabbed for his throat.
Sarah pressed shaking hands to her lips as Dr. Williams drew the boy backward, until he finally shook him like a dog shakes a rat. He flung him down the steps where Matthew was scrambling to rise.
“Let me make one thing perfectly clear,” Dr. Williams said in an even tone. “Should you ever take it into your heads to stop by this stand, or this area again, let’s say even within ten miles of here, I will find you—and you will be deeply, regrettably sorry.”
The boys scrambled to their feet and ran for their car, gunning the engine, then screeching out in a furl of dust.
Sarah tried to slow her breathing, thanking the Lord for sending help, even as the wood floor seemed to rise up to meet her spinning head.
