The Amish Midwife

by Mindy Starns Clark

  “Lex, you should wait. We could go together this summer. Or you could wait and go to Philadelphia in two weeks.” He braked for a hotel shuttle that slowed ahead of us. “But don’t go crashing in on someone who doesn’t want you.”

  I didn’t answer. Someone who doesn’t want you. The words stung but not badly enough to stop me. I was going to go find this woman named Marta. Sophie had given me the address of her office. I already had it programmed into my GPS. Obviously she was related to me. Why else would she have told me not to come?

  I pulled my camera from my bag. He grimaced. I slipped it back inside.

  “Thanks for giving me a ride,” I said as he pulled up in front of the airline door.

  “Are you flying into Harrisburg?”

  “Philly,” I said, liking the way it sounded. Philly. Philly. Philly.

  He put the car in park and beat me to the trunk. “Call when you get there,” he said.

  I nodded.

  “And come home if it’s too weird.”

  Home. I wanted to cry.

  He hugged me quickly.

  Surprised that I wished he’d kissed me, I said, “I’ll be back,” trying to sound upbeat.

  His eyes darkened and then he smiled just a little. His lips moved but I couldn’t hear his words.

  “Pardon?”

  “We’ll see,” he said.

  He left me and walked around the car to the driver’s side. I rolled my bag toward the revolving door and stepped through, my Coach tote over one shoulder and the cloth bag with the carved box and my baby quilt over the other. When I turned my head, his old beater was easing its way into the stream of traffic.

  Eight hours later I rolled the same bag through the Philly airport, imagining Mama and Dad there twenty-six years before with me in their arms. For the first time I wondered why they met my birth grandmother at the airport and not a lawyer’s office or her home or their hotel. Where did they stay when they were in Philly? Downtown? Out by the airport? How long were they here? Did they see the Liberty Bell? Independence Hall? Who held me on the plane?

  An hour later I was sailing past the Philly suburbs, heading west on the Expressway in my Ford Taurus rental car. Patches of snow, with blooming crocuses poking out, hid in the shadows at the side of the road. The river to my right ran high and muddy. The bare trees along the hillsides hung heavy with vines.

  “I’m in Pennsylvania,” I said out loud, and then I wondered if Dad would have come with me if I had asked him to a couple of years ago. I turned up the radio to drown out my sorrow.

  I’d decided to get off of the Turnpike at Valley Forge and take the back roads the rest of the way to Lancaster County because one of the guidebooks I’d skimmed had recommended it for a better view of the countryside. At first that made for slower going, with far more lights and traffic than countryside, but eventually the congestion lessened and the scenery improved.

  I nearly slammed on my brakes at the sight of my first Amish farm. A man drove a team of four mules pulling a plow through a field. He wore a straw hat, cobalt blue shirt, black trousers, and suspenders. A woman and a girl, both wearing dresses out of the same blue material, black aprons, and white bonnets, bent low in a garden plot. Two barefoot toddlers played in the grass. As the scene went by, a line full of clothes flapped in the breeze, the white house and barn both backdrops to the colorful display. Soon I was driving forty miles an hour with a line of cars behind me. The farms were immaculate. Tidy fields. Trimmed lawns that looked robust even in the early spring. Gardens newly planted or being planted. White houses and barns. Clothesline after clothesline, usually strung by sturdy pulleys from the back porch to the barn, of solid-color shirts and dresses in maroon, forest green, and blue. And black pants, aprons, and white bonnets. It dawned on me it was Monday. Wash day. Tuesday was ironing and gardening. Wednesday was sewing and Thursday market day. Friday was cleaning, Saturday baking, and Sunday the day of rest. It was all spelled out in the song “Here We Go Around the Mulberry Bush,” which I use to chant. I was seven before I realized Mama ran our house on the same schedule.

  The matching clothes, immaculate farms, and whitewashed houses and barns had a stylized appeal. I liked things uniform. It appealed to, as James would say, my sterile sense of decor. But none of it was sterile. It was all very much alive. The people. The scents wafting through my open window. The vibrant colors snapping on the lines. It was orderly and patterned and obviously it all had a purpose.

  Ahead, along the busy road, a group of children walked, swinging black lunch pails that looked like what Dad used to take out to the orchard when he was too busy to come in for lunch. Two girls skipped. A boy kicked a rock. The car behind me honked. My speed had dropped to thirty. I accelerated before a corner, and then this time I did slam on my brakes. Ahead, in the middle of the lane, was a black buggy with a gray roof and an orange caution triangle on the back. Now I had an excuse to go slow.

  I passed a one-room school where a young woman swept the porch. Walking ahead was a mother holding a young child’s hand with a baby on her hip. As I passed them, I saw a boy on a bicycle-like scooter weaving along the shoulder of the road. The car behind me passed my rental and the carriage, which, surprisingly, clipped along at twenty-five miles an hour. Ahead was a straight stretch, so I passed the carriage too, glancing over my shoulder. A woman drove it, the strings of her heart-shaped bonnet blowing away from her face. I looked in my rearview mirror. The horse was beyond beautiful. It moved like a racehorse, its lean muscles rippling with graceful determination.

  A few minutes later I was in the town of Strasburg—that or I’d time-warped to 1776. I half expected to see George Washington walk out of one of the brick houses. The entire town looked like a Federalist colony with building after building of red brick with white trim and black shutters. At the crossroads in the middle of town, an Amish carriage waited for the traffic signal to change. Ahead a gaggle of Amish girls stood on the sidewalk. It was hard for me to tell, but they looked as if they were fifteen or so. They had gathered around a boy with a tray in his hand. The sign on the shop above the teenagers read “Pretzels.” There were several other shops in the little downtown district. The village was obviously a tourist draw.

  A few miles out of town, the GPS instructed me to turn left onto a one-lane country road. Green pastures rolled up the sloping hillside. A flock of sheep dotted one side. A McMansion topped the hill to the left. I sighed. Obviously not everyone in these parts was Amish. But next was an Amish farm. A woman stood on the back porch, working the pulley to bring in the line of clothes.

  I maneuvered a turn in the road and immediately faced a covered bridge. I eased the car over it, holding my breath as I hoped it would hold, hoped the GPS wasn’t sending me on a road meant only for carriages. The wooden planks groaned as the car bumped back onto the asphalt. At the top of the hill, the GPS instructed me to turn left onto a highway.

  “Arriving at your destination,” the digitized voice immediately declared. To the right was a brick cottage and to the side of it an outbuilding. My heart began to pound. I turned the car into the driveway and parked, my hands frozen on the steering wheel.

  At the least I hoped to be able to meet Marta, to see if she looked anything like me. But honestly, I also hoped she would change her mind and tell me everything she knew about my story. By tomorrow I’d be in Harrisburg searching for my original birth certificate. Or meeting my birth parents.

  I forced my right hand to put the car in park and turn off the ignition. Then I slowly opened the door, patting the pocket of my jacket to make sure my camera was where it belonged. Maybe I could sneak a photo of her—especially if she did look like me. As I stepped from the car, the front door to the cottage opened and a young woman stepped out. She wore a cap over auburn hair, and for a second I thought she was Amish. Obviously the GPS hadn’t done its job. But then I noted her dress—a yellow print. The cap had a round shape to the back, not heart-shaped like the Amish woman’s in the buggy. May
be this young woman was Mennonite. Whatever she was, she was far too young to be Marta. She was younger than I.

  “Since when have you been driving?” she said, breaking out into a smile as she came down the steps.

  I turned my head, half expecting to see someone behind me. I turned back toward the girl just in time to watch her freeze at the bottom step, her smile disappearing just as quickly as it had come. “Oh, sorry. I thought you were someone else.”

  She moved backward and up one step.

  “Who? Who did you think I was?” I asked, moving forward, trying to sound far more matter of fact than I felt. She thought I was someone else, someone who looked like me.

  “Uh…no one. Never mind. Can I help you?”

  I hesitated. A boy, maybe twelve or thirteen, clad in navy blue slacks and a short-sleeved checked shirt, banged through the door. As he gaped at me for a moment, I thought I could see the flash of recognition in his eyes as well, but then it passed. Standing a head shorter than the girl, who wasn’t that tall herself, he simply acknowledged me with a nod, flicking impatiently at blond bangs that fell across his forehead.

  “Hi,” I said. “Did you think I was someone else too?”

  He shrugged but didn’t reply.

  My head spun. These kids could be relatives of mine. Had they seen in me the familiar features of someone else in the family? An aunt or a cousin? Did they recognize the unique tilt of my nose or the shape of my face from other relatives? I wanted to ask, to press it further, but at the moment they both seemed very unsure and nearly ready to bolt back inside.

  I cleared my throat, trying to rein in my emotions and focus. “I’m looking for Marta. I heard she needed an assistant.” I felt bad, just a little, about my white lie.

  The girl turned to the boy. “Did Mom say anything to you about needing help?”

  He shrugged again. “No, but it makes sense, considering—”

  The girl gave him a “Be quiet now” look. Then she turned back to me. “She’s not here.”

  “Could I wait?”

  The untied ribbons of her cap danced along her collarbone as the girl shook her head. She looked to be about fifteen, but her confident demeanor made her seem older.

  “I’d wait in the car.” I spoke quickly. “Or I could come back in a little while.”

  “How about if you leave your number? She can call if she chooses.” The girl squared her shoulders.

  I tried not to let my disappointment show. There was no way Marta would call me. I decided to stall. “Sure. Do you have a piece of paper and a pen?”

  The girl nudged the boy and he disappeared inside, leaving the two of us to stare at each other. He reappeared with the paper and pen, and I jotted down my cell number, writing beside it, Pennsylvania Certified Nurse-Midwife. I handed the girl the pen and paper. “Maybe you could put in a good word for me.” I hoped my voice sounded light but she frowned. “Thank you,” I said, wishing I were better at small talk.

  They both said goodbye, grimly, as I climbed into the car. I waved as I started the engine. Slowly I shifted into reverse and then looked behind me. A black Toyota Camry pulled in to my right. A woman popped out of the car. She wore a cap and black cape and completely ignored me.

  The girl said something to her and pointed toward my rental. The woman shook her head. I turned off the engine and climbed from the car. “Marta,” I said, stepping toward her. “I’m Lexie.”

  Her eyes met mine, and in the space of a single moment I thought I could detect an entire parade of emotions rippling across her features: shock, joy, sorrow, fear. Blinking, she seemed to struggle for control. Then, slowly, all signs of emotion disappeared from her face, her eyes turning cold and hard. Watching her, I realized it was almost as if somewhere inside she had slammed shut a solid steel door.

  Taking a deep breath, Marta crossed her arms at her chest and spoke, her voice betraying nothing. “I told Sophie to tell you not to come.”

  “But I need to talk with you. I have a few questions—”

  “I can’t answer them.” She dropped her hands to the sides of her body. There, in the late afternoon light, I couldn’t help but search for some sign of a physical resemblance between us. I was tall and slender and blond, and she was short and round, the hair under the cap on her head a sandy gray.

  “Sophie said—” I began, but she cut me off with a wave of her hand.

  “I’m sorry. You have to go. Now.”

  Turning around, she began moving toward a small outbuilding. As she went I heard a buzzing, and then she reached under her cape, pulled out a cell phone, and answered it.

  “Yes?” she snapped, pressing the phone to her ear.

  I remained where I was, completely still and totally stunned. The boy and girl stared. The sunny afternoon took on a chill, and it was then I realized I was standing in the shadow of a row of fir trees. The shadow extended to the cottage as well, though not as far as the nearby chicken coop or the small outbuilding that Marta was marching toward now. Taking a step forward, I focused on that outbuilding and read the sign on its door: Marta Bayer, Midwife. That must be her office.

  Oddly, she didn’t go inside but instead paused at the doorway, still speaking into the phone. Her tone sounded shrill, but I couldn’t make out the words. Was she talking about me? Telling some long-lost relative of mine to sound the warning that I had come to town despite having been told to stay away?

  “You should leave,” the girl whispered.

  “I really need to talk to your mom.” I kept my eyes and ears focused on Marta.

  “I’ve never seen her like this.” The girl’s voice was confidential now, and that caught me by surprise. A door banged to my left, and I looked over my shoulder to see that the boy had gone back into the cottage.

  Still outside by the other building, Marta began pacing back and forth as she talked. I took another step forward, listening intently.

  “That’s ridiculous,” she said. “I’ve done nothing wrong.” She stopped and turned her head upward, toward the treetops. “But I have a mother in labor.”

  Ah. So she wasn’t talking about me, but about her suspension.

  “Maybe I can help out,” I said softly to the girl.

  “I doubt it.”

  I looked again at the short, plump figure in the distance, her face still tilted upward. Was she praying? Cursing? Hoping? “How long will the suspension last?” She closed her eyes. “I see. Well, keep me posted.” At that, she took the phone from her ear, pressed a button, and continued the rest of the way into the building without so much as a backward glance.

  “Please leave,” the girl pleaded again once the door had fallen shut behind her mother.

  I shook my head. Moving slowly to give Marta time to cool off, I started toward the little building myself. When I reached the door, I gave it a single rap, twisted the knob, and opened it. As I stepped inside, I half expected to find Marta in the midst of some sort of tantrum, maybe tossing around some files, or upending a chair. Instead, she was sitting at a plain wooden desk, talking into the phone again, her eyes on a chart that was open in front of her. From her much gentler tones, I decided that this conversation was with someone different than the last.

  “How far apart?” she asked. Whatever answer she got, it wasn’t one she wanted. “All right. Hold on a moment, please.” Grimly, Marta put a hand on the receiver, lowered the phone from her mouth, and looked up at me. I thought she was going to speak, but instead our eyes simply held for a long moment. Finally she raised the phone to her mouth again and spoke. “I’ll be right there,” she said. Then, still maintaining our gaze, she added, “Oh, and I’ll be bringing an assistant with me.”

  SEVEN

  Marta drove. I didn’t speak. I barely breathed. I was ecstatic that she’d asked me to help her and still afraid she’d change her mind. It was the foot-in-the-door that I needed. She sped over the covered bridge and up the lane. At the main highway she turned left, away from Strasburg. I took my camera fr
om my pocket. The highway dipped and ahead, in a valley that looked as if it had been scooped out of the landscape, were lush fields and an occasional stand of trees. White houses and barns and outbuildings peppered the scene. I snapped a couple of photos and then kept my nose to the window. Finally, I asked the status of the mother in labor.

  “Thirty-six years old and it’s her seventh child,” Marta said. “Barbara’s been in labor for a couple of hours.”

  Five minutes later, Marta pulled into the driveway of a farmhouse and stopped behind a carriage parked in front of a garage.

  “Mamm’s in the kitchen,” an Amish girl called out to Marta, swinging a basket of eggs. She wore a black apron over a magenta dress. A younger boy, maybe eight, ran past her, toward the barn. “Go help Daed. The milking can’t wait!” she called after him. The boy made a face and zigzagged on his way.

  Marta grabbed a black bag from her trunk and strode toward the back door after the girl. I followed, suddenly feeling as if it were my first birth, not baby number 256.

  A refrigerator stood just inside the kitchen door. I did a double take. So much for what I’d heard about the Amish not having electricity. The mother, who didn’t look much older than I, stood at the counter next to a stove. “I was just hoping to get dinner in the oven,” she said. She had on a white nightgown and a cap and smiled as Marta introduced me, but then she held up her hand and leaned against the counter. Marta stepped behind her and rubbed her back. I decided now wasn’t the time to ask about the kitchen appliances.

  “That,” Barbara said after a minute, “was a hard one.” She turned toward her daughter. “Start the potatoes. But first go tell your daed it’s time.” A toddler, a little boy with a bowl-shaped haircut, slid into the kitchen in his stocking feet and wrapped his arms around his mother’s legs. She said something to him that I couldn’t understand, in Pennsylvania Dutch I assumed. One of the words sounded like wunderbar, which was on the very short list of the German words I remembered. It meant “wonderful,” “fantastic.” Maybe she was telling the toddler he was wonderful or that the baby would be. Then she turned to the girl. “Take Samuel with you out to the barn.”