by Ron Hevener
“Look what I found, Mary,” he said, placing the smooth acorn in her hand now. “Doesn’t it look like somebody wearing a hat? Don’t you wonder what he’s thinking under that hat?” He kissed her gently on the head, knowing there would be no answer, but, they met like this so often now, that he imagined they could speak without words. She was the woman he had started life with. She was the cleaning girl and he was the young man so proud of his job as a bank teller and then a trusted loan officer.
Did she know he was finally president of the whole bank now, like she hoped for? He wanted to believe she did. With her now, like this, it was hard to believe she had once been so vibrant. She had once been so alive. It’s just the medicine, he told himself. She can hear me. She still loves me. I know.
She was his silent partner, the one who knew his secrets and wouldn’t ever talk, and he had done everything she really wanted for the people of Steitzburg on their list. Every year, without fail, he made sure Theodore sent the anonymous payments.
“There’s trouble, Mary,” he said to her. “We’re going to be grandparents, you and me,” he said. Her eyes didn’t flicker. “I don’t know the father,” he said. “Ruthie met someone—in New York, I think, but she won’t tell me who. I did meet a young man, a French man and nice looking. Maybe it could be him. I’d like to help him, if it is. But you know how she feels about her own life and running things her own way. And now the church is worried that Ruthie is going to corrupt the members. Not just the members,” he said, “but the whole town.”
He thought a while before going on. Wasn’t a church supposed to be a kind place? Weren’t its members supposed to be thoughtful and encouraging? Hadn’t they learned anything from religious thinkers and historians guiding us into a more spiritually enlightened and tolerant world?
“Everybody is saying she has to make a confession in front of the whole congregation,” he said. “I can’t imagine them this way. They aren’t thinking from their hearts, Mary. When a baby’s born, everyone is so good and so kind. If they know a child is coming into this world—a new life—how can it matter so much how Ruthie’s child comes to be?”
As usual, at the sound of their daughter’s name, there was the merest hint of recognition in Mary’s eyes, but it quickly faded. So different the two women of his life were: Mary, once so organized and Ruthie a mess from the beginning.
“Sometimes, I just want to walk out—knock down that damn church—and never look back!”
She turned away. Walking away, walking anywhere, was something others could do. Not her. Not anymore.
He grew quiet. “There’s something else, Mary.” He hesitated, but knew he must tell her. “There’s a woman I’ve been thinking about. Not much older than Ruthie, if you really want the truth. But her mind—her mind! She knows what she wants and it’s honest, and I think she can do it. The thing holding me back, Mary, is, a man she loved before and probably, no, I’m sure, she loves now. Do you remember the little Martin boy and some other kids taking lessons from a horse trainer named Arden Miller out on The Ridge? Do you remember how they found him out in the field with a horse rope around his neck? Remember that? I’m not saying I could have stopped anything. No, I’m sure I couldn’t have. But just knowing, just wondering about it, makes me ask what’s happening to our Brotherhood. It’s supposed to be a good thing, Mary. The greatest bank ever made! That’s what Fenstamacher always said, when he would talk with me about his ideas. We saved our towns—oh, they’ll never know it. But we do. What would have happened to Steitzburg and the other towns without us?”
He went quiet for a while before saying, “But Theodore Trimble. He’s different now. He spends more time in Steitzburg now,” he said. “I wonder about his family. But I guess we all change, Mary. Don’t we?”
They were both looking out the window now.
“The church elders made a decision, and tonight we know their answer,” he said. “I’m afraid for what’s ahead, Mary.”
She could see birds in those trees outside. She could hear laughter of other patients walking in the carefully manicured lawns, living full lives in their minds no matter where their bodies happened to be. How could she tell him she was still his, no matter what? How could he know she really did hear him?
Slowly…without a word…she leaned against him. For once, her eyes looked into his instead of wandering around the room. And, in his hand, he felt her place the acorn.
Later that night, as they drove to the church together, the smell of Ruthie’s cigarettes long-since cremated and doused by stale perfume stung Ezra’s nose. “The Other Ruthie” is what he called this side of her, having found tickets to New York, Philly and Baltimore in their Buick.
“You’re shivering,” he said to her, as their headlights caught a few other cars driving away from the church beside Phantom Creek. “Don’t worry,” he said. “Whatever they decide, it’s over now.”
Instead of saying anything about what faced them, she asked, “How was Mother today, Daddy?”
He looked at her and thought of the acorn in his pocket before answering. “She’s good,” he said.
“Did she look pretty?”
“She always looks pretty,” he said. “Was that you who brushed her hair and painted her nails?” he asked.
“And her toes,” Ruthie smiled. “She liked it.”
“I’m sure she did,” he said, encouraged by the love still shared by mother and child after so much had stood between them.
“You’re a lot alike, the two of you,” he said.
“I know,” Ruthie said. “She doesn’t say much and neither do I.”
They entered the lobby of the church. Funny how choices in life come in so many ways, Ezra thought, knowing they could either go down a hall to the classrooms and into the preacher’s study, or straight ahead to the sanctum with its wooden pews, pulpit and whoever might be waiting there. Deciding to go straight ahead, they found the preacher waiting, and they found him ignoring Ruthie as if she were nothing. The dreaded shunning had begun.
“Hello, Brother Ezra,” the handsome young preacher said. It was a formality, not a heart-felt greeting that called for a sincere answer.
“Brother John,” Ezra replied with a nod to the young dark-eyed farmer chosen to lead their flock. As he spoke, he couldn’t help sense the preacher shrinking from Ruthie’s unforgiving gaze. “How are you tonight?” Be careful, John, he thought. You know what people think of the preacher when a girl gets pregnant.
The clergyman swallowed before saying, “Not good, Ezra. This is a sad thing. You know the congregation is disturbed.” Carefully, he avoided Ruthie’s accusing eyes as she chewed her gum more fervently than ever and studied her nails. She’d have to do them again after this was over, she decided. Just as soon as she got home. As soon as she was safe again in the house of her Daddy, and not the Lord. There would be lots of time to do her nails now, she figured. She could grow them long and red and beautiful like all the movie stars did. She would be in the movies and make records and be stunningly beautiful. She’d have fancy cars and her house would be the biggest and grandest mansion of them all with lots and lots of rooms.
“Vanity is a sin, Ezra,” the pastor said, referring to Ruthie in her fancy dress and high heels.”You know that.”
“So I’ve been told,” Ezra answered, not impressed.
“Well, I’m sure this isn’t what you wanted to hear tonight,” the preacher said, “but the council just left and it’s been decided. Ruthie,” he almost looked at her now, “must confess to the congregation or leave the church.”
Scratching his beard in the tolerant, well-worn manner of a father who had seen his share of troubles by now, Ezra spoke steadily. “Decided. You don’t even have the courage to say who?”
Preacher John didn’t answer.
“You know,” Ezra said, “this congregation isn’t the only bunch of people who can talk to the Lord. We got a big Lord watching over us. And I can hear him talking, too. He says things lik
e, ‘Ezra, you raised a daughter all by yourself, remember?’ He’s sayin’ ‘When Mary left you and Ruthie, the only one from the church who really stood by you wasn’t the preacher. Or ladies from the church kitchen. It was Esther Kraybill.’ He’s sayin’ ‘You did a lot of favors for these people, Ezra, and some of them never paid you back. But, that’s OK!’ He’s sayin’ ‘You gave the church a whole new roof when the old one was so bad it was like getting baptized all over again every time it rained. And people can only take so many baptisms.’ He says, ‘You and Mary bought the church organ, Ezra, so everybody could sing my praises. You even helped some of the people around here buy their farms and their houses when nobody else would give a penny.’”
The preacher went silent. “Brother Ezra,” he finally said. “The church knows all that. But arrogance and pride are not what our Lord teaches.” He looked at Ruthie now and couldn’t resist adding, “Look at her, Brother Ezra. Why won’t she talk?”
If there had been a holy light in the room, surely it would have gone out.
“This church was built on respect and faith,” Ezra reminded him.
“Faith in the Godly, Brother Ezra. Not in the…”
“In the what? In the what?”
“Sinful!” the young pastor hissed at Ruthie’s belly. “She has to confess her sins! For the good of the whole town, she has to!”
“The whole town?” Ezra said, standing his ground. “The whole town, is it now? I helped build this town, John. The only reason some of the people in this town have anything at all is because of me! Sin? Is love a sin, John? That’s my daughter and my grandchild you’re talking about! That baby is a person—not a thing. You don’t have to know the father—God is the father! The only father who matters! How blind can you be to what is good and right in this world, John? Think! Think! That child could grow up to be wonderful. A doctor. A teacher. A scientist. How do we know what is lost if we just throw away people before they’re even born? That’s what you’re asking me to do—you want me to help destroy my own daughter and grandchild! Well, I won’t do it!”
“This church is no place for sinners!” came the rigid command.
“Sinners!” Ezra’s eyes could have blasted a rock. “Sometimes I think this church is nothing BUT sinners! I think about some of the folks you and the Council have run out of this church and I ask myself what’s got into your heads! John! I’ve known some of those people a long, long time. I saw some of them lose everything they had. I saw this town tighten its belt and put me back in charge of a bank when they could have run me right out of town. They forgave me! And I miss those people in this church. A church and its members can do great things—great things—but it’s getting awful small around here since you took to that pulpit. And, for once, when I say that, I’m not talking about numbers!”
“Then get out!” the pastor said, glaring at Ruthie. “We don’t need your high and mighty pride. Just because you have money and most of us don’t. Ask your daughter who the father of that child is! Ask her right now!”
“What for? Are you scared it’s you, John? The preacher and the choir girl, wouldn’t that be a worn-out, old story? Well, I hate to say it like this, but I think my Ruthie’s a hell of a lot more original than that,” Ezra laughed with deliberate sarcasm. “Beat it out of her? Is that what you want to see?” Such an idea was out of the question. “I don’t have to.”
Shocked to his senses that he was not the only one who could throw around accusations, the preacher’s skin went nearly transparent, and finally, the preacher acknowledged Ruthie’s existence. “He…already knows!” he said.
“I’m the banker, John. I know…everything…in this town.”
The resonance of Ezra’s words in the holy sanctum of that temple, and the chill of Ruthie’s stare, could have blown every member of Phantom Creek Mennonite Church right out of their houses and into the glare of the twenty-first century.
Ruthie and Ezra didn’t say much on the way home. “I’m here for you, Ruthie. You know that.”
“I know,” she said quietly.”
“If there’s anything you want to tell me…”
“No.”
“Anything…” he said.
Her silence filled the air around them.
“Well, I meant what I said back there. You’re my daughter and that’s my grandchild.” He knew she was listening. “And, Ruthie, I want to raise this child.”
“You can’t.”
“Can’t?” Ezra laughed. ”I raised you, didn’t I?” Even in the darkness of the car, he could see a smile starting. “Practice makes perfect, they say.” He was trying.
“You can’t raise the baby,” she said, “because I won’t be here anymore.”
Ezra Hoover knew his daughter. He knew his daughter better than she knew herself. What the little girl on her first train ride wanted from life so long ago hadn’t changed. It had only become crystal clear. “Ruthie…what are you telling me?”
“I’m going to New York, Daddy. I’m going to be a famous singer. And I’ll make everybody in this whole town sorry! Believe me, I will!” Was she crying?
*
At home, Esther had bowls of warm vegetable-noodle soup and freshly baked bread waiting for them. As an extra nice touch, she had cut pink peonies from outside and spiced the bouquet with cuttings from an evergreen tree.
Nobody said much. They didn’t have to. Eyes have a way of saying everything for us. Tonight, the eyes said, Thank-you, Esther, for being so thoughtful. We’re really not hungry, but you knew that. And the flowers are a nice way of saying you’re still with us, even if the rest of the town isn’t.
It wasn’t long before Ruthie was leaving the table and giving Ezra, and even Esther, a kiss. Upstairs, there were fashion magazines to read and the naughty romance novel she had sneaked from Esther’s room. The fact that Esther probably would have given as many books as she wanted and wrapped them in a scarlet ribbon might have surprised her. But for Esther, it wouldn’t have been nearly as fun as knowing how carefully Ruthie must have tried making sure every book was returned precisely as it left the bookshelf…and how often she failed.
With Ruthie safely upstairs, and both of them alone, Esther fidgeted with the apron in her lap. “The father, Ezra,” she managed to ask as delicately as she could. “could he be…I mean…what if…he’s one of us: Mennonite?”
Ezra put down his fork and took a sip of water as he listened. Esther had her ways, but she wasn’t the kind of woman to interfere. If she did, it was for a reason. “From the church, you mean.”
“I mean, that would give a big reason to push Ruthie out,” she said, reaching for her coffee.
“Why do you ask?” he said. “Are you hearing something around town?”
“No,” she said. “But it would make sense, wouldn’t it?”
“Well, ask her,” he said. “Ask Ruthie yourself.”
He knew that wasn’t going to happen. And, he also knew something else.
“Well, I just don’t understand,” Esther said. “Raising one child wasn’t enough? And now you want us to raise another?”
He sat across from her, scribbling; scribbling the way he always did, scribbling trees with branches, branches and branches. “We didn’t do so bad, Esther,” he said, without looking at her.
“We didn’t? Well, I’d like to know what Mary thinks about that!”
“If she could? Isn’t that what you want to say? If she could?”
At the cruelty of his remark, Esther winced and just turned away.
“Nobody has to worry,” Ezra said. “I’ll call Theodore.”
It took the guarantee of a monthly allowance, the promise of a New York City nightclub and a few other perks, but the deal was made. Just like Ruthie said she would, she left town.
Ezra Hoover had bought himself a baby.
CHAPTER 8
Lovers
From the shadows of the kitchen, Sidney Hoover sees the interview unfolding in the living room and pours herself
another wine. Tapping her foot, she says to Sarah, “If that bitch gets any closer to him, I’m gonna go right out there and throw this drink in her face!”
“I’m right with you, sweetie.” It’s Sarah, finishing off her glass and reaching for another bottle. If estrogen could be smelled, the room was wreaking of it.
“I can’t stand it!” Sidney says, pounding her fist on the kitchen counter as everybody on the crew jerks their heads in her direction.
“Sid!”
“Get out of my way!” Sidney shoves her aunt aside. “Did you see how she looked at him just now? I’m gettin’ that bitch!”
Maintaining her dignity and trying to be as graceful as she can, Diane Wallace raises her eyebrows in a question to Ben—who knows nothing—and she pulls back. “What the hell? What’s going on? Who said that?”
“It’s Sidney!” Ben says, astonished, just in time to see his wife making a wild rush from the kitchen and right at them.
“LOOK OUT!” a lighting engineer hollers as he jumps to catch a falling lamp.
“Oh, my GAWD!” yells a cameraman, unable to help himself from aiming at the excitement.
“My stuff!” screams the makeup artist. “Jesus Christ—my MIRRORS!”
“You bitch! I know who you are now! You’ve been after my husband ever since Baltimore!
“What???” Diane says in disbelief. “Did you hear that?” She turns to Ben. “Somebody stop this woman!”
* * *
Bridgeport, Connecticut, 1948
Stopping a woman who wants you out of the way, isn’t for the faint of heart. In Theodore Trimble’s case, stopping his wife, Stacey, from throwing a guilt trip on him, packing his bags and getting custody of the kids was something he wasn’t even going to try. “You lousy, stinking, cradle-robbing, son-of-a-bitch!”
“I’m sorry!” he hollered back, scrambling for something—anything—better to say. Anything that could explain why he had ever thought, even in his wildest dreams, that he could get away with romance—real romance—in a life that had been perfect in every way except for that.
