The Amish Midwife

by Mindy Starns Clark

  Returning to the main room, I gave her today’s dose with a glass of water and sat down as she swallowed the pills.

  “Tell me what my mother was like when she was young,” I said, trying to distract Mammi from her tears. “Was she pretty?”

  Mammi sniffled, nodding.

  “Prettiest girl in Lancaster County. You would think that would be a blessing, but…” She shook her head as her voice trailed off, and I waited silently, willing her to continue. “Once my brother died, we were having trouble making ends meet,” she finally went on, “so Giselle took a job over at the nursery, in the greenhouses. She liked the work itself, but her beauty turned out to be such a distraction to the others—many men were employed there, you know—that they finally had to move her into the main office instead. I thought things would be better after that, because only women worked in there.” She barked out a noise that sounded like a sob mixed with a laugh. “I forgot about the one exception. Little did I know that by moving from the greenhouse to the office, my baby had gone from the frying pan into the fire.”

  I sat back, apprehension rippling through my stomach, wondering where Mammi was going with this.

  “Giselle’s boss,” she explained, waiting for me to catch on. “The head of the company.”

  “Burke Bauer,” I whispered, and Mammi nodded.

  “It is no great mystery to see how they must have…how it all came to be. After having been surrounded by overeager boys for so long, Giselle would have been relieved to find herself in the company of a man, of someone far more mature, especially a successful authority figure that everyone seemed to respect. Once that man admitted to Giselle that he had fallen in love with her, the fact that he just happened to be married was beside the point as far as she was concerned. I am so ashamed for my daughter, but what can I say? She was a child on rumschpringe, so naive, so self-oriented. So ready to sew her wild oats, regardless of the consequences.”

  I thought about her choice of words, wondering if that’s all I had been: a consequence.

  “Bauer was indeed handsome,” Mammi said, dabbing at her eyes. “And also rich and generous and charming. But I never understood the hold he had over Giselle. He was like a drug to her.”

  “Do you think she really loved him?”

  “Oh yes. Desperately so.”

  “So Giselle and Burke had an affair,” I said flatly, wishing she would get to the point, wondering where Alexander fit into this story. The same man had fathered Ada and I both. But which man? Burke Bauer, as Mammi believed? Or Alexander, the one I was named for, the one I wanted it to be, the one who had said of Ada, With everything I am, I am her father.

  My heart sinking, I knew now that he had been speaking figuratively. He was her father in exactly the same way that Dad was my father. With everything he was. Except his blood.

  “Of course, I knew nothing of this at the time,” Mammi continued. “No one did. They were very careful, very discreet. Later, there were rumors, of course, that Giselle was involved with someone older, someone who was married. But even her sisters did not know who it was, or even if it was true. The only one who was fully aware of their relationship was Alexander. And that was all thanks to me.” Mammi’s eyes suddenly filled with fresh tears.

  “What do you mean?”

  At my question, Mammi seemed startled, as if she had just remembered who she was talking to or what she was saying. She put a hand to her mouth as more tears began to course down her cheeks.

  “Oh, Alexandra, I have already said too much,” she wailed. “Do not ask me anymore. If I had not…it is just that…really, everything was my fault, all my fault.”

  At that, she began to sob in earnest.

  I wanted to press her to continue regardless, but she was growing more hysterical by the minute. Finally, I had no choice but to drop it, soothing her with comforting tones and rubbing her arm until she calmed down enough to fall asleep.

  An hour later, my phone rang and Ada’s name popped up on the screen. It was Alexander. “She’s conscious,” he said. “They’re doing tests to see if she has a brain injury. And they’ve already given her a transfusion. Her count was low again.”

  He went on to say that Klara had left a message at the Gundys’, and Alice had called back, saying she would be over shortly. She would give Mammi her supper and spend the night; I was free to go. I asked if he wanted me to come to the hospital and he declined, saying it was kind of me to offer but they were fine. I could only imagine how much Klara didn’t want me there.

  I felt icy cold with loneliness as I watched Mammi sleep. I had a sister, but would I be able to have a relationship with her? I had pieces of my past, but would I ever have the whole story?

  Alice was all business when she arrived. “When did Frannie eat last?” she asked.

  “Lunch, I assume,” I said. It was past seven. “I upset her,” I said, lowering my voice. “I was asking her some questions about the—family.”

  Alice didn’t respond as she took a jar of soup out of her basket. “Would you like some?” she asked as she stepped into the kitchen.

  I declined, saying I needed to go. I’d heard the Amish were gossipy, but I certainly hadn’t witnessed that. What I wouldn’t give for a good dish on the Lantz family.

  As I pulled out onto the highway, hungry, tired, and mad, all my frustration was headed in one direction, the only avenue open to me right now: Marta.

  TWENTY-NINE

  Eat something,” Marta said. “Let me make you a sandwich.”

  I stood in the middle of her kitchen, taking up half the tiny room, my hands on my hips, feeling like a teenager again. I could hardly believe I’d been here a month and was still begging Marta for answers.

  “No, just tell me what you know.” I felt like a broken record.

  She wasn’t matching my emotions, not at all. “I’ve told you what I know.” She sighed. “I was twelve when you were born. No one confided in me. I don’t know what Mammi told you today, but you know she’s had a stroke and is on medication. I wouldn’t say she’s a trustworthy source.”

  “Whom were we born to?”

  “I’m pretty sure you already figured that out.”

  I glared at her until she answered anyway.

  “Giselle. Right? Isn’t that what you discovered?”

  “And who is our father?”

  “I already told you. It isn’t my place to say.” Marta took her cap off her head and rubbed the back of her neck.

  “Okay, then, tell me about Lydia’s first baby.”

  Her eyes were no longer kind. “That’s really not your business, is it?”

  “Does it have anything to do with Lydia’s death?”

  “Of course not.” Marta turned her back to me, stuffing her cap into her pocket, and then washing her hands at the sink. “Now,” she said, her voice even again. “Tell me again what happened to Ada.”

  It was Ella, standing in the doorway, who got me out of the house before I exploded. She grabbed her coat and motioned to me. Like a fool, I thought she had some information.

  “Sorry,” she said, as we walked beneath the dark, cloud-covered sky toward the bridge. “I just thought you looked the way I feel when I need to get away from Mom.”

  I fumed some more—and then shivered. A cold front was moving in. It was mid-April but felt like February. The weather in Pennsylvania was so fickle, I wondered if spring would ever arrive.

  “Maybe you should call Sean,” Ella said. “He might have some advice for you.”

  I hadn’t told him yet that Ada and I were full sisters. I hadn’t told Ella either.

  “So, are you pretty serious about him?”

  I thought of Ada asking me the same thing. “I don’t know,” I answered.

  “He sure has a nice house.”

  “He just sold it. He’s moving to Baltimore.”

  “Bummer,” Ella said, sounding like a patronizing parent.

  “He asked me to go with him.”

  “A
nd live with him?” She sounded shocked.

  “No,” I quickly said. “I would work there. Or go back to school to become a doctor.”

  Ella sighed. “You’d have the perfect life. Just think of the house you two could buy. When you got married, you would have something big enough for lots of kids.”

  Except that I was already in my mid-twenties, so by the time I was done with my residency I’d be pretty old. I always imagined having babies before my mid-thirties.

  “Have you been serious with someone before?” Ella asked.

  I told her about James. I was still talking when we reached the bridge, telling her how he played cribbage with an old guy in his neighborhood on Saturday mornings at the park and how he’d drive down to Aurora and go to church with Dad on Sundays. I told her how he hummed “Row, Row, Row Your Boat” when he parallel parked his old car and how he’d never let me pay for anything, even though he didn’t have much money. I didn’t tell her that Ezra’s charm reminded me of James when he was in high school, before he grew up.

  “Why did you guys stop going out?” she asked, stopping in the middle of the bridge.

  “Because I came here.”

  She laughed. “That sounds like a stupid reason.” She turned toward me. “Except that you met Sean…” Her voice trailed off.

  “So,” I said, pretty sure I knew what she really wanted to talk about. “How’s Ezra?”

  She grinned. “Good. Really good.”

  “Ella, you’re sixteen and he’s Amish.”

  “He says he’ll leave.”

  Obviously he hadn’t joined the church yet so he wouldn’t be shunned, but he wouldn’t be embraced, either. It was hard for me to imagine Ezra living outside the circle of his family.

  When we returned to the cottage, Marta was nowhere in sight. I was pretty sure she was out in her office but I was too tired to care. I made myself a sandwich and trudged up the stairs to my alcove.

  I awoke that night to Marta shaking my shoulder. “Hannah’s in labor,” she said. “Jonas just called.”

  “She’s breech,” I muttered. “She needs to go to the hospital.”

  “She’s sure the baby turned.”

  I’d heard that before.

  “She’s three weeks early.”

  “Two,” Marta corrected.

  I sighed. Sometimes due dates were debatable, and even more so with the Amish.

  “Ella is going to go with you,” she said. I began to be aware of the light on in the bathroom.

  “I’ll be fine.”

  “It’s snowing,” Marta said. “Take my car. The tires are better. Ella can help you with the chains if needed.”

  “Chains.” My feet hit the cold floor and I stumbled to the little window. Amazingly, there was a snowdrift piling up below.

  As it turned out, we didn’t put on the chains, but we should have. When we were still two miles from Hannah’s house, I slid into a ditch.

  While I was flipping through my contacts to call my 800 number for roadside assistance, Ella pulled out her phone and began texting Ezra, explaining to me as she did that he was at Will’s right now, covering plants, and should be able to get here quickly. After a moment, her phone dinged. “Yep. He says he’s on his way.”

  I groaned, picturing the kid racing to our rescue on his motorcycle.

  “Tell him to send Will.”

  “Will’s coming too,” she said, already typing a reply.

  I put my phone away, thinking of poor Hannah in labor and how fortunate for all that she had a couple of big, strong brothers—and that one of those brothers carried a cell phone.

  Fortunately, though I’m sure Ezra would have preferred rescuing his sweetheart via motorcycle, the two men soon arrived in a sleigh, their horse prancing about in the frosty air. We all crowded in for the ride back. Will was calm and collected, and as we rode along I seized the opportunity to ask some questions about Hannah—how she was feeling, how often her contractions were coming, how much pain she was in. I could tell my questions were making him uncomfortable, so once I felt I had enough basic information, I dropped the matter. After that, all was quiet except for the slushy clip-clop of the horses moving us through the snow.

  “Hey, did you guys hear Ada’s in the hospital?” Ella volunteered. “She might even have a brain injury.”

  I started to speak, but Will beat me to it.

  “Not to worry. Her tests came out all right. No brain injury, only a small cut. Four stitches to the head, but Alexander says they don’t even show because they are hidden by her kapp.”

  Even as I was relieved to hear such good news, I felt a twinge of jealousy that Will had found out all of this before I did. She was, after all, my sister.

  When we reached the farm, Hannah’s husband, Jonas, met us at the door of their house, which I hadn’t been in before. Hannah was in the back bedroom, and it was cold as ice. In an adjacent room, little Rachael was asleep in a crib, covered with blankets.

  I instructed Ezra to build up the fire and told Ella to close all the doors in the house except for the back bedroom. If it didn’t heat up soon, I would move Hannah into the kitchen. She was warm from labor and had no idea how cold it actually was.

  She was right, the baby had flipped, but it was still a difficult labor with intense back pain. Hannah was quiet and withdrawn, pulling away from her husband. Finally I got on the bed beside her. “Hannah, are you afraid?” I whispered.

  She nodded.

  “May I pray for you?”

  She nodded again.

  I put my arm around her shoulder and prayed silently, the way I’d seen Marta pray all those weeks ago, asking God to take away Hannah’s fear and give her the strength to have the baby. I whispered, “Amen” when I was done.

  A couple of minutes later Hannah closed her eyes and growled as a contraction overtook her. After a few more contractions, I checked her. She was ready to push. An hour later, at 5:17, a little girl slipped into the world, perfect in every way. Baby number 263; number eight in Lancaster County. Hannah fell into her husband’s arms and sobbed as I suctioned the baby. I then wrapped her in the warm blankets Ella had brought in and tucked the baby in the bed beside Hannah, covering them both with more warm blankets. A few minutes later Rachael called out from her room in Pennsylvania Dutch. Maybe she’d heard us, or maybe it was her usual waking time. Jonas went and got her. He returned with the girl and she fell onto the bed beside her mother, hugging her and then kissing her little sister’s head.

  In all the other deliveries I’d done over the years, I searched the faces of the babies…the mothers…the fathers…the grandmothers. This was the first time I searched the face of the older sister. I found myself looking at her over and over, staring when I could. Her face was lit up and full of joy. She was elated. I’d never seen such happiness.

  “What do you think?” I knelt beside the bed, level with her.

  “She is wunderbar,” Rachael said. “I love her already.”

  I stood and slipped away, not wanting to explain my tears, my loss, not even to myself. After a while Rachael climbed off the bed and went down the hall. I heard her laughter, mingled in with Ella’s and Ezra’s. I heard Will’s voice and then the door close. Ella returned with Rachael, holding the little girl’s hand, asking Hannah what she wanted to eat and then telling me that Will and Ezra had gone after the car. The snow was already melting.

  By eight o’clock, Ella and Rachael were both asleep on the living room couch and the house was warm. Hannah’s mom had arrived and taken charge of the kitchen. Nancy hugged me when I entered, thanking me for taking such good care of Hannah, and inviting me to have a cup of tea and breakfast.

  “I hear you’re Marta’s niece.”

  I nodded.

  “Which makes your mother Giselle?”

  “Yes,” I said, wanting to add, at least I think so, but I didn’t. “Did you know Giselle?”

  “Oh, yes,” Nancy said. “We were all very close. The Lantz sisters used to
visit us a lot. My mother and Frannie were good friends. They were both young widows. It’s a shame how everything turned out. I still see Klara and Marta, but it’s not the same.”

  I wrapped my hands around my mug of tea, hoping she’d continue.

  “Klara and Giselle were as close as any two sisters could be, and both were so protective of Marta.” Nancy went on to say that later, during all of their rumschpringes, Klara couldn’t get it out of her head that Alexander was interested in Giselle, even though it was obvious he was smitten by Klara. It looked as if I’d finally found my Amish gossip. She sighed. “Poor Alexander,” she said. “I don’t think he’s ever recovered from Klara not trusting him.”

  “Do you know what happened to Giselle?”

  “No.” Nancy looked straight at me. “I really don’t know.” She stood and put another piece of wood in the fire. “But I’ve always wondered.”

  After I checked on Hannah one more time and woke Ella, I asked Nancy where Will was. I wanted to thank him for pulling Marta’s car out of the ditch.

  “He took Christy to the doctor,” she said. “Hired a driver. They left just after I arrived.”

  I must have looked pleased.

  “He’s taking her to a specialist. The first doctor thinks something is wrong with her heart.”

  Marta had canceled my appointments for the day, so I slept soundly until I heard a man’s voice downstairs and sleepily thought it was Zed’s, meaning it was late afternoon and he had arrived home from school. It wasn’t until I reached the bottom stair that I realized the voice was way too deep to be Zed’s—it was Will, sitting on the sofa with a girl who looked to be ten or eleven, leaning against him with her eyes closed.

  “This is Christy,” Will said, his voice low. “I’m afraid she’s all tuckered out.”