I joined them, listening as they discussed selling Amish-made quilts, wooden toys, and other fine crafts. Daniel had his laptop open and was clicking from site to site, showing the others examples.
“These sell well in the U.S.?” Oskar asked.
“Oh, yes,” Daniel said. “The Amish are known for their craftsmanship. These things sell like wildfire.”
I was glad to hear of their plans, and I knew several Amish craftsmen back home who would be happy to have a new outlet for their work.
After a while the conversation waned, and Oskar said he had work in the kitchen to finish up. Herr Lauten said he needed a cup of tea and followed his son. Morgan swiped a strand of hair away from her face and smiled. “I’ll leave you two alone,” she said, standing. “I think I’ll see what’s going on down at the cottage.” She yawned. “Or maybe just go to bed early.” Her hand fluttered in a quick wave as she left.
“We should talk,” Daniel said to me, looking me in the eye. “Have you spoken to Giselle about coming back and living with her for a while?”
“Not yet.”
“But you still intend to do it?”
“I’m not sure.”
His face fell. “Will you tell me tomorrow, before you go?”
I nodded. I owed him that, at least.
He didn’t seem distraught for long but was soon talking about the tours. “George has some great ideas about how to incorporate you.” Daniel went on to explain that they intended to market their business to high school trips and to families as I suggested. “You could do the children’s programs,” he said. “You’d be so good at that.”
I loved the idea of it. I imagined preparing the scholars before we visited different sites. Having handouts and coloring pages for them, that sort of thing. All the while, traveling all over Switzerland and maybe to Germany and Italy too. It sounded like a dream come true. And yet much of my yearning for adventure had been satisfied by this trip. What if I returned home and realized I didn’t want to leave ever again? “I’ll think about it,” I said. “I’ll talk with Giselle.”
Daniel went on a little while longer in his excited way, but soon he was yawning too. I said I was going to head back down to the cottage and would see him in the morning before we left.
I prayed as I made my way down the pathway, asking God what I should do. Back in Lancaster County I would become an old maid. In Switzerland I would have adventures and excitement and the possibility of marriage. It wasn’t that I was in love with Daniel—although I definitely liked him—but there was the possibility I would come to love him.
Even if I did, though, chances were we would never have children of our own. I would enjoy teaching the children on the tours, but I would only be acquainted with them for a week, not part of their lives for years and years.
When I reached the cottage, Will and Christy were just leaving. “Morgan will give us a ride to the airport tomorrow,” he said. “Be ready by ten.” He paused, and for a moment I thought he had more to say, but then he blurted out, “Thanks again, Ada. Good night.”
Christy gave me a quick hug and in no time the two were hurrying up the pathway.
Though it was early evening, it had been a very long day, and all of us were tired and ready to settle in for the night. But first I had to speak with Giselle. I couldn’t wait any longer. There was no guarantee I’d have the time or the opportunity to talk to her in the morning.
When I knocked on her door, she beckoned me in. She was sitting up in bed on top of her quilt, her foot propped up on a stack of pillows. She wore her bathrobe and her hair lay flat on her head, as if she’d had a shower. She had a sketchbook and a pencil in her hand.
I told her I needed to talk with her, and she motioned for me to sit down.
“George and Daniel want me to come back to Switzerland and help with the tours,” I said.
“That’s what I heard.” She placed the sketchbook between herself and the wall.
I gave her a questioning look.
“Morgan told me,” she said. “Just now.”
I nodded, feeling relieved. The fact that she already knew made it easier for me to press on.
“I’m not sure what I’ll do,” I said. “But if I did come back, could I stay with you?”
She squinted and the lines around her eyes became more pronounced. “It depends.”
“On?” I expected her to bring up Mamm and Daed and their wishes. Or maybe Mammi.
She continued. “On how honest you’re being with yourself.”
“Pardon?”
“Morgan also said Daniel wants to court you. She seems to think that’s a great idea, but I’m not so sure.”
I knew I was blushing.
“Have you heard this saying?” Giselle shifted a little, sitting up straighter. “Enjoy today because it won’t come back.”
Mammi used to say that to me. I nodded.
“There’s nothing wrong with studying the past, but you’re someone who embraces the present. I see that in you. The way you interact with Christy. The way you’ve made friends with Morgan. I think Daniel’s obsession with history might weigh you down.” She took a deep breath. “And I know I’m meddling, which I never do, but I have to this time. Ada, I saw love last night coming across the creek, and it wasn’t between you and Daniel.”
I was sure my face was beet red now. “Will’s courting someone else,” I stammered.
“I’m not just talking about your feelings for him. I saw love in his eyes too.”
“No,” I said. “He loves Leah.” Giselle was in excruciating pain last night. She had no idea what she’d seen.
Her face softened. “Well, believe me, I know what love isn’t. Regardless of what is going on with Will, please promise me you’ll never commit to someone you don’t love.”
I wrinkled my nose. How could I promise her that?
“I have one more thing to ask.” My heart began to race. “I…I need to know the state of your soul.”
She chuckled and then said, “Mamm put you up to this, right? ’Cause she’s asked me that in nearly every letter she’s ever written to me.”
I nodded and then added, “But I’d like to know too.”
Her face grew more serious. “Day before yesterday, the answer would have been that it was the same as it’d been for the last twenty-six years. But yesterday in the cave, I prayed for the first time, I think, since I left Lancaster County. And God answered me.” She paused for a moment, her eyes meeting mine. “I prayed again, as I watched Will carry you across the creek. And, Ada, I’ll keep praying for you. Tell Mamm that. Tell her…” She shrugged. “Tell her I’m better.”
She picked up her sketchbook again. Clearly it was time for me to leave. But I sat there still. After a moment, I asked if I could see what she was drawing. I wanted it to be me and Will in the middle of the creek, the snow coming down on top of us. That was the drawing I saw in my own head, that one I wanted to see on paper.
Giselle turned the pad toward me. It was obviously a self-portrait, but she was much younger. She was dressed Amish and was holding a tiny baby in front of the cascade of a waterfall, but the background was my flower garden back home with the windmill to one side.
Tears filled my eyes, but before I could say anything she waved me away and said, “Let me know in the morning what you decide.”
I rose early, slipping out of the futon bed next to Alice and dressing quickly. The morning was overcast but much warmer. There would be no snow today. I walked toward the creek. The Bernese Alps were hidden in the fog, and a mist lay low across the Kesslers’ property, all the way to the waterfall.
I thought Daniel might be in the dining hall, so I headed up the path, but then I detoured to the pine tree, sinking down against its gnarly trunk to the dry ground beneath its branches, settling in between two roots.
Giselle was right. I didn’t love Daniel and he didn’t love me. Sure, he loved the idea of me. The Amish girl with the historic past, the Amish girl who
could give tours, the Amish girl who could attract more business. But that wasn’t me. As Giselle had said, I lived in the here and now.
Besides, Lancaster County was my home. There was nowhere else I wanted to live. This trip had turned out to be the rumspringa I’d never had and so much more. I’d had to cross the ocean to discover myself, and now I was ready to return in faith, knowing God had something planned for me and I would simply need to trust.
I left the tree and resumed my journey up the path and up the steps of Amielbach.
Daniel was in the dining hall and was so absorbed in what he was doing that when I asked him to come outside with me he hesitated.
“Please, Daniel,” I said, my hand on my hip.
We ended up on a bench in the shade of a willow tree. “I’m not going to come back,” I told him.
His ran his hand through his hair.
“It’s not the right thing for me,” I added.
He nodded a little and then asked what made me decide that.
“Lancaster County is home,” I said. “It’s where I belong.” I had wanted us to talk outside, where we could speak frankly in private, but now I realized there wasn’t much for me to say. I told him how much I had enjoyed spending the last two weeks with him, and I was thankful for everything he had taught me. We said our goodbyes, and I started back toward the cottage, but then I turned. Daniel was walking toward the entrance to Amielbach. His steps were slow, but he didn’t look back.
My gaze rose. There was someone in a second floor window. It was Will, watching me. I only saw him for a second. Perhaps the light changed. Or maybe he stepped back. But in a moment he was gone.
I hugged Giselle goodbye, careful not to bump her crutches. As we stood next to her weathered fence, she glanced toward Will and asked me in a whisper if I was coming back.
“No,” I replied, hoping she could tell just from my expression that I had already broken things off with Daniel. “You’ll have to come see me there. Come see all of us.”
Her eyes glistened a little. “Perhaps.”
We hugged again, and as we pulled apart, I said, “You would really like the woman Lexie has become. I hope you’ll have the chance to meet her someday.”
“Maybe I will,” Giselle said, wiping brusquely at her eyes. After a moment, she added, “Would you give a message to Klara and Alexander for me?”
I nodded, waiting.
“Tell them…” Her voice trailed off for a moment, and I realized how uncomfortable and fidgety she suddenly seemed. She cleared her throat and started again. “Tell your parents they did a wonderful job raising you.”
Startled by her words and deeply touched, I could only nod lest I burst into tears. It wasn’t exactly hearts and flowers and open arms, but it was more than enough for me.
Daniel came down the steps of Amielbach as we all gathered to leave. He shook Will’s hand and then stepped close to me. “Keep in touch,” he said softly.
I nodded and thanked him again for everything.
A moment later he was talking with Morgan, making plans for her return. Seeing the way she looked at him, I realized I needed to let her know that I was completely out of the picture as far as he was concerned. She could deny it all she wanted, but I had no doubt she had feelings for him—and that he could easily learn to love her in return once he admitted to himself that he’d never really been in love with me.
Herr Lauten and even Oskar were sad to see all of us go. Herr Lauten asked that I give Mammi his regards and thanked Alice and me both, yet again, for all we had done to save the inn and to preserve history. In return, we thanked him for his hospitality and for his incredible generosity.
“Oh, and I have a little surprise for you folks before you go,” Herr Lauten said. “Giselle and I do, actually.” He held Giselle’s box in his hand, the one with the Frutigen bakery carved on the top. “We started wondering if it had a false bottom too.” He opened the box. “Sure enough it did.” He took out a few papers. “These.”
I took them in my hand. They were elaborate drawings, obviously done by a very gifted child, of the farm scene from Indiana, of the carving on Mammi’s box. On the top corner of the first sketch was a note.
I looked up at Herr Lauten. “Who’s it from?”
“Elsbeth. She said her daughter Sarah inherited her grandfather’s artistic talent. Elsbeth asked if he could carve a box based on her drawings as a lovely surprise for the girl.”
I held the fragile sheets of paper tenderly, cherishing the thought of my great-grandmother. Abraham hadn’t done the carving merely from the information gleaned from letters. He’d done them based on the renderings of the granddaughter he’d never meet. I turned toward Giselle and blurted out, “May I keep them?”
“Please do,” she replied easily, and I was reminded that no matter how far she had come in the past week, she would probably always choose to distance herself from our family’s history.
Looking down at the drawings, I couldn’t help but wonder why Abraham had hidden them in the bottom of the box in the first place. I was thankful he did—otherwise they might have been lost forever—but it seemed unlikely he put them there for the sole reason of safekeeping. I marveled again at the mysteries in my family.
“Ada,” Giselle said, nodding toward the box in Herr Lauten’s hand. “I would also like you to have the box itself.”
I stepped back, shaking my head. “You should keep it,” I said, a little louder than I meant to.
“No. You’ve seen the Frutigen bakery. It means something to you.”
Herr Lauten extended it to me, and this time I received it graciously. For a little while, until I reached Lancaster County at least, all three of the boxes would be in my possession. I was deeply honored.
Will said he would take one of the boxes onto the plane, and Alice and I each managed to squeeze the other two into our carry-on bags. Then we said our final goodbyes and drove away. Will settled into the front seat beside Morgan while in the back, Christy leaned against me a little. Alice, leaning toward the door to protect her arm, exclaimed over the beautiful countryside. The fog lifted and we could see the mountains. I thought of Elsbeth leaving Switzerland for good and how it must have pained her. I felt a lump growing in my throat.
At least when she left, it had been with the man she loved, the man she was married to. I, on the other hand, was leaving with the man I loved, but I would never marry him. Elsbeth knew she’d be the mother to the children in her care for the rest of her life. I knew I would never be the mother to the children I loved.
I blinked away my burning tears, trying to redirect my thoughts. Outside, a farmer steered an old red tractor over an emerald green field. A creek bubbled along next to the road. Smoke rose from a cottage on the hillside.
I closed my eyes. I was going home.
FORTY
I cried when I told Morgan farewell at the airport.
“We’ll see each other again,” she said. “I’ll come to Lancaster County someday.”
She promised to write letters—the old-fashioned way. I tried to return her copy of Jane Eyre, saying I could get it at the library to finish, but she insisted I keep it. “Finish it,” she said. “And when Christy is older give it to her.”
We couldn’t thank her enough for all of her help.
“You were our rainbow after the storm,” Alice said, alluding to a Plain proverb. “Our true friend, indeed.”
Morgan modestly said it was nothing. As she hugged me, she added, “I’ll be praying for you. Every night. That you’ll soon know God’s plan for your life.”
“Thank you,” I answered, and I assured her of my prayers for her also. Then I told her I wouldn’t be coming back to Switzerland.
“What?” she gasped softly. “What about Daniel?”
“He knows. I told him this morning.”
She studied my eyes for a long moment and then said, “Are you sure?”
“He’s not the man for me,” I answered, shrugging. Then I wi
nked. “Though I do know someone he might be the perfect man for…”
From the shy tilt of her lips and the vivid red splotches on her cheeks, I knew she understood that I was giving my permission—and my blessing.
“We’ll see,” she whispered, hugging me again.
Inside, the airport was incredibly intimidating, but Will acted as though he knew what he was doing. The rest of us simply followed his lead, showing our passports when we checked our bags and then again as we entered the security area.
Alice was scandalized at the thought of giving up her shoes, but Will was patient and gentle with her, explaining that she’d get them back in just a minute, as soon as they’d been X-rayed.
Sure enough, after we’d all passed through a metal doorframe one by one and received an approving nod from the man in uniform there, we returned to the conveyor belt where our things were just emerging from the machine. Christy and I were both wide-eyed at the speed and efficiency of it all.
With Will again taking the lead, we found our gate, sat in a row of chairs, and waited there, much as we’d waited together for the train trip that had marked the beginning of this entire journey. As we did, I couldn’t help but think about how much had changed since then, how far we’d all come in our own ways. Glancing at Will, I realized that our time together in Europe had bonded us somehow and only served to make me love him more. With all we had been through, how was I ever going to get over this man now? I turned away, telling myself that somehow God would give me the strength. Certainly, I would never be able to do it on my own.
When it came time to board the plane, I put thoughts of Will from my mind to focus on this new, final adventure, one I had never dreamed that I would experience in my lifetime. Once I got home, I’d have to be sure and tell the cows, “Flying! Can you believe it? I was flying!”
Soon, we were in our seats, my stomach roiling with butterflies as I buckled up. Will and Christy sat on the left, beside the window, with Alice and me across the aisle, in the center section. As the plane took off, Alice gripped my arm, her face aglow with a broad grin.
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