“He looks young to have his own business already. Most fellows in their late teens are still working with their fathers.”
“Ivan is an orphan. He lives with his sisters Jenny and Bethany. Bethany is married to Michael Shetler. He owns a clock and watch repair shop. I see Gabe coming this way.”
He sat down next to Lilly so that he was facing Esther. His plate was piled high with ham, corn on the cob, potato salad, green beans and two slices of pecan pie. “Aren’t you eating, Esther?”
“Did you leave anything for me?”
He laughed. “There might be some church spread and bread left.”
“That sounds goot.” Esther was fond of the peanut butter and marshmallow cream mixture that was popular among the Amish.
“Gabe, I saw a bird near the river yesterday that I’ve never seen before. I looked it up on my computer and I think it might be a swallow-tailed kite. Is that possible?”
“Not likely but I guess it is possible. There have been a few sightings in the state. Was it flying when you saw it? Did it have a white head and body with black-tipped pointed wings and a deep forked black tail?”
“That is exactly what it looked like.”
Gabe’s eyes lit up with excitement. “Where did you see it?”
“You know where the bog lies west of my cornfield?”
“Sure.”
“He was flying over the water and then landed in a dead pine.”
“I wonder if he is still in the area. Could you show me? When you’re done eating and visiting, I mean. Not right this minute.”
Lilly grinned. “I’ll eat fast.”
He looked at Esther with a huge smile on his face. “Would you like to go birding with me this afternoon instead of hanging out here?”
Chapter Eight
Gabe watched a bright smile transform Esther’s face. It gladdened his heart to know his simple suggestion made her happy. He wanted to keep her smiling. To see her delight every day she was near him.
“May I bring my sketch pad?” she asked.
“Of course.”
“Then I should dearly love to accompany you on another walk in the woods.”
“You had best go get something to eat first.” He pointed toward the tables. She rose and hurried away.
“Esther is a charming young woman,” Lilly said.
Gabe continued to watch Esther as she made her selections from the bounty remaining on the serving tables. “She is. I’ve never known anyone quite like her.”
“You’ve never known anyone who is deaf?” Lilly asked.
He looked at her. “It isn’t Esther’s deafness that makes her unique. At least not to me.” With a jolt he realized he was beginning to like Esther much more than he should. Why did he find her so attractive? He barely knew her.
“Still, it takes a special person to overlook what many would see as a drawback to a relationship where free communication is impossible.”
He sighed and looked down at his plate. “It can be difficult. Sometimes I wonder how much of what I say she truly understands and how much she guesses at.”
“Have you considered learning sign language?”
He glanced at Lilly again. “Wouldn’t that take a long time?”
“I imagine it would take years to become proficient. Learning a few simple words might not be difficult. I can do some research on the subject if you’d like?”
He saw Esther talking to Jonah. The boy rapidly signed and then took off toward the ballfield where a game was getting underway. Gabe took a bite of ham. He could ask Esther to teach him or he could surprise her by having Jonah show him signs for a few words. He liked the idea of surprising her. “I think her brother might help me with that. Don’t say anything to Esther. I might not be able to master a single word.”
Lilly chuckled. “I think you’ll do much better than that, but I won’t tell her.”
“Danki.”
Esther returned and sat down across from him. “Jonah is going to let Waneta know where I’ve gone so she won’t worry. Not that she would.”
Gabe let the comment pass. He had no idea how to heal their relationship without knowing the cause of their discord. Maybe one day Esther would confide in him.
It didn’t take them long to finish their lunches. Gabe told his father where he was going. His brothers were visiting with friends, except for Moses who was enjoying a game of volleyball while Nancy looked on.
Gabe and Esther got in the pickup with Lilly. “Could you stop by our farm so I can get my binoculars?” he asked.
“Sure. Esther do you need anything?”
Esther didn’t answer. She was searching inside her bag. He touched her arm. She looked up with a smile. “What?”
“Lilly wants to know if you need anything from the house.”
Esther turned to Lilly. “I need my colored pencils. I thought I had some but apparently I left most of them in my room. Do you mind stopping at the Fisher farm?”
“I don’t mind at all,” she said making sure Esther was looking at her when she spoke this time.
It didn’t take long to reach his farm. Lilly drove faster than Gabe liked, but he didn’t say anything to her. He simply wasn’t used to speed so he didn’t know if hers was excessive. He and Esther quickly gathered what they needed and were soon back in Lilly’s truck. She drove to her place and turned into one of her potato fields. Skirting the edge she continued along the bumpy track to a second field, this one planted in corn.
She stopped the truck and pointed. “Follow the edge of this field until you come to a split rail fence. Just beyond it is where the bog starts. Be careful—the ground is mushy. In places you can easily sink up to your knees so stick to the grassy areas. You can spot the dead pine I spoke of from the fence. You know to be careful of the wildlife. The moose have been frequenting this area.”
“I’ll watch for them.” He got out and waited for Esther. She quickly joined him, still grinning. Lilly turned the truck around and drove away.
Esther looked at him. “How does one go about watching for birds?”
“You find a place to get comfortable then watch and listen for their calls.”
She chuckled. “I can watch. You’ll have to listen.”
He smiled. “Come along but watch your step. Stay to the grassy places or you might sink up to your neck in the mud.”
“Not how I would want this day to end.”
She scrambled over the fence without his assistance. He followed, scanning the area for any sign of moose and saw none. He spotted the dead tree Lilly had mentioned. It was on a small rise of land that jutted out into the bog. It looked like a good place to settle. He should be able to see quite a distance from the base of the tree. He pointed in that direction and Esther nodded. Together they made their way carefully toward the elevated ground. They reached it after about fifteen minutes of circumventing puddles and leaping from one patch of heavy grass to another.
At the base of the tree he noticed a clump of bushes that would provide them with suitable cover. “I think this will do.”
“What are we looking for exactly?”
“Birds.”
She rolled her eyes at him. “I gathered that much. Any special type of bird?”
“A swallow-tailed kite, but who knows what other interesting species we might discover while we wait to see if he returns to this spot.”
“What would tempt him to come back?”
“They feed mostly on flying insects. I understand they like dragonflies and there are plenty of those around. They’ll even snatch lizards and snakes out of the trees.”
She looked up at the dead branches overhead. “There are snakes in these trees? Why would you want to sit under one?”
He waited until her gaze returned to his. “There aren’t any snakes in this tree.”
&n
bsp; “How can you be so sure?”
“Because I’m familiar with these woods.” He hoped he was right. After clearing away some dried pine needles, he sat cross-legged on the ground. He scanned the sky and then raised his binoculars to his eyes.
“Do you see something?”
He lowered his glasses. “Clouds. Aren’t you going to sketch flowers?”
“I was until the thought of a snake falling on my head was mentioned.”
He chuckled. “I never thought of you as someone who would be scared of snakes.”
“They give me the creeps.” She scanned the ground around them and looked over the tree again. “Now you know what frightens me. What scares you?”
“Seeing a woman step in front of a speeding truck. That took a few years off my life.”
“I am sorry about that. And thank you again for your quick thinking and quick action. What else?”
“Spiders, mice, the usual.”
“I don’t believe you.” She continued to stare at him waiting for his answer.
“I reckon I’m most afraid of failure.”
“How so?”
“I’m concerned that my business venture will fail and make things worse for my family instead of better.”
“That I can believe. You seem to be a driven person. So what makes you that way?”
“Failures in the past.”
“Like what? Business failures?”
He wasn’t sure he wanted to dredge up his past mistakes, but Esther was staring at him with such an open and honest expression. Somehow he knew she would understand. “I was engaged to be married once.”
“Waneta mentioned it in passing.”
“I’m not surprised. She had a lot to say about it back then. The girl was the daughter of her close friend.”
“I can imagine she had strong opinions on the subject. What went wrong or do you mind my asking?”
He shook his head. “It was years ago. I fell head over heels for a woman named Gwen, but she secretly wanted someone else. Most Amish couples date quietly and their engagement isn’t announced publicly until the banns are read in church. After I proposed and she said yes, Gwen told a lot of people including the fellow she hoped to make jealous. It worked. A month before the banns were to be read she told me it was over between us. She was going to marry the man she truly loved. They were wed on the date she and I had chosen for our ceremony. Did you understand all that?”
It didn’t hurt to talk about it as much as he thought it would. Maybe because Esther was such a good listener in spite of being unable to hear.
She nodded. “I got most of it. I understand it must have been a painful time, but why do you consider it your failure?”
“Because I couldn’t win her love, nor could I see that she didn’t love me. Now I realize it was the best thing for both of us.” He had forgiven Gwen long ago but now he could let go of the hurt.
“I was in love once, too,” Esther said quietly. “So I understand a little of what you went through.”
Gabe saw the pain in her eyes and reached over to cover her hand with his. “Do you want to talk about it?”
* * *
Unexpected tears filled Esther’s eyes at his compassion. She looked down at his hand where it rested on hers. He was a good man. “There isn’t much to tell. Barnabas King didn’t want a deaf wife.”
He had seen her as broken, not as a whole person who was simply different. He wanted her to be fixed before he would consider marrying her. This was the life God had chosen for her. She wasn’t broken. She wasn’t!
Gabe lifted her chin with his fingers so she had to look at him. “Barnabas King sounds like a fool.”
She managed a wry smile. “Perhaps I’ll think of him that way from now on.”
“If I were you, I wouldn’t give him a second thought. I know that’s easier said than done. But try. You will make some man a fine wife one day.”
It would have to be a deaf fellow because no hearing man could understand the way she truly was. She smiled at Gabe’s attempt to comfort her. “You aren’t getting much bird-watching done.”
“And you haven’t drawn a single flower.” He sat back and raised the binoculars to his eyes.
Esther got out her sketch pad, but it wasn’t flowers that interested her. She wanted to draw Gabe. She started with the part of him she liked the best, his mouth. It took her several tries to get it right. It wasn’t perfect but she thought she had captured the feeling of his laughter waiting to break free.
What did his voice sound like? She could imagine it a little from the voices she remembered from before she lost her hearing. She recalled her father and her grandfather’s voice and the bishop who had preached on Sundays. Gabe’s would be different. Softer maybe? Or did he have a gruff growling voice to match his large frame? It was something she would never know.
She rubbed the scar behind her left ear where a cochlear implant had been surgically placed when she was fifteen. Five years after she lost her hearing. It hadn’t been the cure her parents prayed for. Even with therapy and multiple visits to the doctor, the device didn’t allow her to hear normally. While she could hear voices and sounds, they were distorted and hard to make sense of no matter how hard she tried. She heard everything through a ringing noise that she finally couldn’t cope with. She stopped wearing the external processor after a year and refused to put it back on. She couldn’t remove the parts inside her head, but it didn’t cause her discomfort. Her father never understood why she wanted to remain deaf. Neither had Barnabas.
She had met him when he came to help repair the special-needs school roof along with a number of young volunteers following a damaging hailstorm. She had been flattered by his interest and had started using her CI again because she wanted to please him. It had been as awful as her first attempts. She only turned it on when they were together. She thought once he learned sign language she would be able to leave it off for good.
He had listed all the reasons why he was a good catch for someone with her problem as if that somehow made up for the fact that he saw her as defective. He couldn’t believe it when she turned down his proposal. He had appealed to her father and her new stepmother to pressure Esther into changing her mind. It had driven a wedge between her and Waneta that hadn’t yet healed.
Being deaf wasn’t always easy, but when she was with other Deaf people it didn’t matter. She had a happy and productive life. If she had someone to share her life with, someone who accepted her the way she was, she would be the happiest woman in the world. Her gaze was drawn to Gabe. Someone like him.
Which was a foolish thought. She looked down at her drawing. Gabe was turning out to be a good friend. Something she hadn’t expected to find on this trip or ever with a hearing man. She chewed on the end of her pencil for a moment and then drew him smiling with a sparkle in his eyes and tiny crow’s feet at their corners. She added the scar to his eyebrow and wondered how he had gotten it.
Gabe lowered his binoculars. She quickly closed her sketch pad. “No sign of the bird you were hoping to see?” she asked.
He shook his head and turned to her. “I saw many species, but not the swallow-tailed kite. I didn’t really expect him to remain in this area. Northern Maine is far outside the kite’s normal range. Have you found something interesting to draw?”
“Not really.”
“Are you wanting to start back?”
“I’m in no hurry. There is enough of a breeze to keep the bugs down and the bog is pretty in its own way.” She spied a dark shape moving through a stand of bushes toward them. “Is that my friend the moose again?”
He lifted his glasses briefly and quickly lowered them. He stood up and offered his hand. “We should go.”
“Why?”
“Because that is a black bear coming this way.”
“What?” She surged
to her feet and gripped his arm dropping her sketchbook in the process. “Should we climb a tree or something?”
“It wouldn’t do any good. Black bears are excellent climbers. The best thing is to walk, not run, away from them. Bears are more frightened of people than we are of them.”
“I doubt that.” Her heart hammered in her throat.
Gabe started walking back the way they had come still gripping her hand. She hurried to keep up with him, glancing over her shoulder frequently expecting to see the bear charging toward them. How fast could a bear run?
Gabe glanced at her, squeezed her hand reassuringly but kept walking. If he said anything she couldn’t tell. It wasn’t until they reached the fence that he stopped and faced her. “He isn’t following. I think we’re fine.”
“Praise the Lord for His mercy.”
“Amen.”
“That was the first bear I’ve ever seen. Please don’t tell Jonah about this. He’ll be out here trying to find him or her in a heartbeat.”
“Okay. It will be our secret.” He smiled at her, and she realized he was still holding her hand.
His touch was comforting. She managed a smile. “You always seem to be pulling me out of danger. It must be getting old.”
“We weren’t truly in danger.”
“This time.” She eased loose from his grip and slipped her hands in the pockets of her apron. “I’m ready to get back to the house.”
“Agreed.”
She climbed over the fence without his help and together they walked along the edge of the cornfield. When they reached the potato field, he turned into the woods. She thought it was the same path they had been on before but couldn’t be sure. Other paths and game trails intersected it. The sun was still high in the sky, pouring in light. The lack of shadows made things look different. When they reached a small pond with the delicate violet growing along the shore she knew where she was. “May I rest a moment?”
He nodded. She sat on a fallen log and tucked a few tentacles of loose hair back under her kapp. “I can see how easy it would be to become lost.” She smiled at him. “I’m glad you know the way so well.”
Someone to Trust Page 9
