At Home in Pleasant Valley

by Marta Perry

  “Are you still on English time, Anna Beiler? Still rushing to do things by the clock?”

  “No.” She looked a bit nettled. “I just thought, from what Joseph was saying about it, that this was a chance to take a step that could mean success for you.”

  “Success?” It was his turn to raise an eyebrow. She’d moved in the world’s direction, for sure.

  “Well, you know what I mean. If you’re as good a horse trainer as Joseph says, maybe that’s what you ought to be doing.”

  “What I’m doing is working in the machine shop with Joseph,” he said flatly. “That is what I do, and I’m content.”

  Even as he said the word, he wondered. Was he content? He’d made his decision, and he’d abide by it. But whether it had been made with the heart or the head, he still wasn’t sure.

  Star, taking exception to a barn swallow that swooped low over the fence, tossed his head and trotted to the far end of the field, where he pawed at the ground a few times before dropping his head to the grass.

  Anna watched him. “You’ll have your hands full with this one, I think.”

  “Ja, you’re right about that.” He tickled Gracie’s chin. “Gracie won’t be petting Star for a while, that’s certain-sure.” He glanced from the baby’s face to her mother’s. “Are things going all right for you, Anna?”

  “Fine,” she said, clipping off the word. “Don’t I look all right?”

  “You’re looking more Amish every day.” He leaned back against the fence to study her. “I could say you still look a little nervous, but if I did, you might bite my head off.”

  Her lips pressed together for an instant. “Again, you mean. I should apologize for what I said the other day. I was rude. I know you were just trying to help.”

  “It’s not a problem.”

  “You’re kind to say so.” She disentangled Gracie’s fingers from her kapp strings, patting the chubby hand. “Maybe I am a little nervous. Bishop Mose is coming by to talk to me tonight.”

  So. Anna would face the bishop, and it bothered her. “Well, that’s not so bad, is it? You’ve known him since you were born.”

  She nodded, but her gaze slipped away from his. “I guess that’s so.” She was silent for a moment, but her forehead was knotted. “When you came back, what did he say to you?”

  He didn’t especially want to remember that time, but he would, if it helped Anna.

  “We talked. About why I’d left, and what it had been like out there.” He jerked his head, but Anna would know he wasn’t meaning the distant line of trees, but what lay beyond. “He talked about what it meant to come back. Asked me to be sure I was ready before I made the commitment to be baptized.”

  Anna nodded. She didn’t look as if she relished that prospect. “You went before the congregation then.”

  “Ja. Bishop Mose said I could wait for a bit if I wanted, but my mamm was sick, so it was important to do it right away.” His throat thickened. His mother had been dying; they’d all known that. But she’d seen her son restored to the fellowship before she passed.

  “Myra told me about her death. I’m sorry.”

  He nodded, not able to say more. Anna was pushing him down some roads he’d just as soon not take.

  “You’ve seen the rest of it with others. I knelt before the congregation, confessed, was forgiven. And everything was like it had been before.”

  “Like it had been before.” She repeated the words, but they didn’t seem to give her much comfort.

  “Don’t look that way, Anna.” Impulsively he reached out to her, wanting to wipe away that expression. “I came back because I had to, you see. Because of my mamm. It will be easier for you. I’m sure of it. After all, you came back because you wanted to.”

  For a long moment she stared at him, her blue eyes wide with some emotion he couldn’t name. And then her lashes swept down, hiding it from him.

  “Ja,” she said, her voice flat. “I’m sure you’re right.”

  • • •

  “After supper” could mean most anytime, Anna decided as she and Myra washed up the dishes. Bishop Mose could show up soon, and she had to be ready.

  Unfortunately, her mind was a blank.

  Samuel had reminded her that she’d known Bishop Mose from her earliest memories, which was certainly true. She’d loved going to his harness shop with Daadi, and he’d always had a gentle word and a twinkle in his eyes for her. But that had been long ago, and this was now.

  Myra, maybe sensing her discomfort, kept up a gentle flow of chatter that allowed Anna to simply smile and nod from time to time. Behind them, Joseph sat on the floor, playing with the two little girls as naturally as if Gracie had always been a part of their lives.

  Funny, how that thought gave her pause. If she’d come back here with Gracie right after Jannie’s death, how different would the situation have been?

  She didn’t want to think about the answer to that question. She hadn’t wanted to come back then, didn’t really want it now. Her life was out there, in the world, where she could make up her own mind about things.

  You came back because you wanted to, Samuel had said. That will make it easier.

  Her stomach cramped. She hadn’t wanted to. Everyone here seemed to accept that without question, but it wasn’t true. And if Bishop Mose asked her point-blank, how would she answer?

  She looked across the room, her gaze seeking her child. Gracie stood, balanced uncertainly, holding a block in each hand, waving them and laughing at something Joseph said to her.

  Anna’s heart turned over. She would kneel in front of the congregation, beg forgiveness, all to keep Gracie safe. The girl she’d been three years ago wouldn’t have been able to humble herself in that way, but then she hadn’t known what it was to have a child. For Gracie, she would do anything.

  The clop of a horse’s hooves came almost as punctuation to her thought. Bishop Mose must be arriving already.

  He entered smiling, little Sarah running to meet him as if he were another grossdaadi. He scooped her up in his arms and spoke to her in a low voice. Gracie, following her cousin’s lead, looked for a moment as if she’d let go and toddle toward him. Then she plopped down on her bottom and crawled across the floor. She grabbed his pant leg, and he stooped down and picked her up, too.

  “There, little Gracie. What a fine girl you are, and almost about to walk already.”

  Gracie babbled something incomprehensible and patted his snowy beard. Anna’s heart lurched. If only . . .

  She let the thought trail away, not sure what it was she hoped. Just to get through this, maybe.

  “Bishop Mose, you’ll have coffee and peach cobbler, ja?” Myra was already pouring the coffee into a thick white mug.

  “Ach, Myra, you know my weakness.” He sat down at the table, a child in each arm. “Now, what shall I do with these two sweet girls?”

  “Best let me take them, or they’ll be spilling your coffee for you.” Joseph lifted the kinder off Bishop Mose’s lap, plopping them down with their toys. “Komm now,” he said. “A few more minutes to play before bedtime.”

  “Joseph, you’ll have cobbler now, won’t you? And Anna?”

  “I don’t know—” she began, not sure how to respond. She’d expected the bishop to want to talk with her privately, and the living room was tidy as ever, with two chairs pulled together for a quiet talk.

  “Komm, fress.” Bishop Mose waved her to the table, seeming to read her thoughts. “Sit, eat. We can talk together while we have some of Myra’s wonderful-gut cobbler, can’t we?”

  Nodding, she went to take her seat at the table. She probably wouldn’t be able to choke down a bite, but if this was what he wanted . . .

  Apparently it was. He dug into the cobbler with obvious pleasure, all the while sharing the latest news from town and comparing opinions with Joseph on h
ow long the fine fall weather would hold. Myra perched on her chair, one wary eye on the kinder, and Anna knew that at the first sign of fussiness, she’d sweep them away to bed.

  Anna toyed with her cobbler and waited for the moment when she’d have to answer the bishop’s questions.

  When he finally turned to her, his expression was as kindly as ever. “So, Anna, you’ve come back to us. You want to be accepted as part of the community again.”

  She nodded, discovering that her throat was tight. “Ja, I do.” She tried not to think about how soon she might be going away again.

  “And why did you decide to come back?”

  That was the question she feared. She’d made up an elaborate answer she’d thought would convince him without telling any outright lies. And now she couldn’t seem to say any of it.

  She tried to imagine how her friends in the city would react to her fear of trying to deceive him. Classmates in her college seminar would no doubt mutter about outdated superstitions. The other servers at the restaurant would expect her to stand up for herself. If you don’t take care of yourself, who will, they’d wonder.

  Nothing either group thought had anything to do with life as it was lived in an Amish community.

  “I . . . I needed to be home,” she said, staring at the tabletop, her voice choking on the words.

  “Ja,” he said. “Then that is gut.”

  The silence grew between them, and after a moment she raised her eyes to his. “What do I have to do? Will I go before the church then?”

  Her mind filled with the act of kneeling before the congregation to confess. Her wayward imagination presented her with an image of her sociology professor making notes on that, eyebrows raised in disbelief.

  “Ach, we don’t have to rush.” The bishop held out his mug to Myra for a refill.

  She lifted the pot from the stove, filling his mug and topping off Joseph’s.

  “Denke, Myra.” Bishop Mose blew on his coffee and then took a sip before returning his gaze to Anna. “You ask what you should do, Anna, but you are already doing what I would advise, I think. You must sink yourself back into being Amish again. Help Myra and Joseph, come to worship, be a part of the community. Embrace with a whole heart what you rejected when you left. Can you do that?”

  “Ja.” She felt almost let down, as if she’d been prepared to make a grand sacrifice and then was told it wasn’t necessary. “I can.” Although as she thought of it, the “whole heart” part might be a little difficult. “Is that all?”

  He smiled, maybe a little sadly. “Is there nothing you yourself think that you should do, Anna?”

  She blinked, her mind scrambling. Had she forgotten something important?

  “Any wrongs left over from your fence-jumping that need to be righted?” he probed, and she heard a trace of steel in his voice.

  Wrongs she’d committed, in other words, in the passionate desire of her eighteen-year-old self to live her own life.

  Her father, her sister, pained by her actions. Her mother dying while she was gone, and her not even here to say a last good-bye. The family whose buggy she’d hit while driving a car belonging to her English friends. More, probably, that she hadn’t even thought of. She found she was pressing her hand against her heart.

  “Ja,” he said gently. “I see. You might want to do something about that, Anna.”

  She nodded, not able to speak. She’d been intent on hiding the truth from him, thinking herself a hero for being willing to humble herself outwardly before the congregation in order to keep her daughter safe.

  Instead, Bishop Mose had turned her inside out. What does the Lord require of you but a humble and contrite heart? The scripture floated up from her subconscious. Bishop Mose had set her a task far harder than kneeling and confessing.

  CHAPTER SIX

  Samuel swept the floor of the shop, finding the routine chore relaxing. Anna’s arrival had introduced a new element into the flow of their days—not unwelcome, but a bit disturbing, even so. He was one who liked knowing what was coming from one moment to the next, not that anyone but the gut Lord knew that for certain.

  Finishing, he propped the broom in the corner, stepped outside, and pulled the door shut behind him, taking a moment to lock it. Once people in the valley, Amish and English alike, hadn’t bothered to lock anything, but times had changed. He wasn’t as much concerned about thieving as he was that some foolish kid would get into the shop and hurt himself.

  Samuel stood in the afternoon sunshine for a moment, deliberately turning over in his mind his approach to the new horse. Star would be a challenge, no doubt about that. Someone had made the animal wary and defensive where humans were concerned, and it would take time and patience to overcome that.

  And while he was thinking of wary creatures, Anna was in the yard, taking sheets down from the clothesline.

  How had her meeting with Bishop Mose gone? He’d seen the bishop’s buggy arrive last night, and he’d seen it leave again an hour or so later.

  While he hesitated, wondering whether to approach her or not, she turned, caught sight of him, and nodded. He walked over to her, catching the end of a sheet that had drooped close to the grass.

  “Denke.” She took it, shaking the sheet out with a quick flip of her wrists, and started to fold it. “You’re done for the day, are you? Or is my brother still tinkering with a job?”

  “Tinkering, yes, but not on a job.” He couldn’t suppress a grin, knowing how predictable Joseph was on this subject. “Can’t you guess where he is?”

  She blinked, and then glanced toward the barn. “He’s working on my car, isn’t he? I guess it was only a matter of time.”

  “Joseph never met a machine he didn’t want to take apart.” He studied Anna’s face. Was she content over Bishop Mose’s counsel? He couldn’t tell from her expression. “Still, when you sell the car, it would be as well to have it working.”

  “Sell the car.” She stopped, turning her face away from him as she took a white pillowcase from the line. “Ja, I guess you are right.”

  Her reaction raised a few more questions in his mind, in addition to the ones that had been there since the day he’d found her in the barn.

  “How did it go with Bishop Mose?” he asked abruptly. Maybe she’d tell him to mind his own business again.

  Her hands stilled on the fabric for a moment. Then she folded the pillowcase and dropped it into the basket at her feet. “All right, I guess. Not exactly what I expected.”

  “The bishop can be a bit surprising at times.” He waited.

  For a moment it seemed she wouldn’t speak. Then she gave her head a frustrated little shake. “I thought he’d say I must kneel and confess to the church. I’d do it, and then it would be over.”

  “He doesn’t want you to do that?”

  “He says there’s time enough later for that. That I should get used to living Amish again, make things right . . .” She stopped, turning to a row of small sheets that must be from the kinders’ beds.

  Make what things right? “Bishop Mose cares more about what’s in the heart than on outward forms, ain’t so?”

  “I guess so.” She was frowning, her fingers toying with a clothespin. “Kneeling and confessing wouldn’t be easy, but I’d do it.”

  Most folks came to that, sooner or later, when they’d transgressed. The difficult moments were soon past, and the relief at being restored to full fellowship was worth almost anything. But was that driving Anna? He wasn’t sure.

  “People think being Amish is about clothes and electricity. They see only the outside and judge by that. We know it’s more about having a humble and obedient heart.”

  Her mouth tightened at that. “They wouldn’t understand, even if you told them. The people I knew out in the English world didn’t see much value in being humble. You must know that. You lived out there.”<
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  “Ja.” He didn’t want to talk about his time out among the English.

  She seemed to sense that, looking at him with a question in her eyes. “I couldn’t believe it when I heard you’d gone. You were the last one I’d expect to jump the fence. Why did you?”

  “Not for the cars and the clothes, any more than you did.” He tried to turn it back on her.

  “I wanted freedom. I wanted to make decisions for myself, not just accept what other people told me.” She tilted her head to the side, looking like the girl she’d been, full of questions and curiosity. “That wouldn’t be what drove you.”

  “No.” He’d walk away from Anna, but that wouldn’t be fair. He’d been the one to start this conversation. “I went away because of my father.”

  He saw her process that, remembering probably the talk it had caused when a middle-aged man with a growing family had jumped the fence, disappearing into the English world without a word of explanation.

  “You wanted to find him?”

  “Ja, but . . . not only that.” His hands closed into fists, pressing against his legs. He wasn’t ready to go further than that.

  Her blue eyes filled with sudden sympathy. “You wanted to understand.”

  “Ja.” Coward, he told himself. You’re not facing the truth.

  He didn’t want to. And he certainly didn’t want to talk to Anna about his reasons for leaving. Or his reasons for coming back.

  It wasn’t her fault that her return made him think too much about that time in his own life. Made him question too much.

  He cleared his throat. “My daad—”

  A bird cried harshly. He stopped, spinning to look toward the barn. That noise . . . Then he heard it again, and he started running. It wasn’t a bird. It was Joseph, calling for help.

  Anna raced toward the barn, a few steps behind Samuel, fear running with her. Her heart stuttered in an effort to pray.

  Please, God, please, God. The words kept time to her pounding feet. Joseph wouldn’t cry out like that unless it was bad.