Balm of Gilead

by Adina Senft

  She knew very well what Simon was thinking. But it wasn’t his place to bring it up—he might be the man of the house, but she was still his mother, and there were certain things that respect taught a young man not to say. But she had a thing or two to say to him, and this seemed like a God-given opportunity.

  “You seem concerned about Jesse, and that’s gut,” she told him. “I wish you had as much concern for your friend Joe, after all you’ve been through together this summer, and after he did so much for you, helping you with your hurt foot.”

  “Concern for him?” Simon looked honestly lost. “What do you mean, Mamm?”

  “I mean Priscilla,” she said gently.

  He said nothing, only took another big bite of his sandwich. On purpose, it seemed to her. But his face reddened a little, and she took encouragement from a sign that his conscience might be bothering him.

  “How do you know about that?” he asked at last.

  “I had a little talk with Joe. It’s only by God’s grace and his own humility that you haven’t lost that boy as a friend, Simon. I think you owe him an apology for making free with his girl.”

  “It was just a little kiss, Mamm. Don’t blow it out of proportion.”

  “Just a little kiss…like just a little bit of fabric off the brim of a Kapp, like just a little radio under the buggy seat. It’s not the size of the sin that matters, it’s the attitude and unwillingness behind it. And Simon, you and I both know that you have a little struggle with pride. You thought she’d leave Joe and start dating you, just because you changed your mind and decided you wanted her after all.”

  “That’s not it,” he mumbled. “You weren’t there.”

  But Sarah suspected that it was. “Maybe not, but you had no right to step between your friend and the girl he likes. If God has purposed the two of them to be together, you don’t want to get in the way of His will.”

  Simon’s cheeks were scarlet now. “The way you keep stepping in between Englisch Henry and his Ginny?”

  If he had picked up his plate and tossed it across the room, she couldn’t have been more shocked. “What? I’m doing no such thing. I’m treating him.”

  “I’ve seen how you look at him when you think no one is looking.”

  And here she thought he wouldn’t set foot on forbidden ground. “Have you, now?” Oh, surely she couldn’t be the one blushing. Sarah took a long sip from her glass of water.

  Simon’s tone softened, as though he realized the footing was uncertain. “I’ve seen the way he looks at you, too. I’ve seen it…and never liked it, right from the beginning.”

  “Simon, believe me, no one knows better than I that it’s impossible. I’m very much aware that God is not in this—this—in my own struggle. The two cases aren’t similar. But the heart is desperately wicked—isn’t that what the prophet says? Who can know it? We can only do our best to recognize our sin and ask der Herr for help to overcome it.”

  “Maybe we can help each other do that, Mamm.” He rose, bent down to kiss the top of her head, and took his plate over to the sink. “If Jesse comes, I’ll be out in the barn.”

  And he left her there, shaken with the knowledge that her boy had spoken as much truth to her as she had to him. Because hadn’t she done all she could to put it in Henry’s mind that he was marrying the wrong woman? To step between them in the guise of a friend, saying that it was for the sake of his return to the church, when all along…

  Sarah put down her sandwich and went into the bathroom and closed the door, gazing at the reflection in the small mirror over the sink. The reflection of a woman who looked almost like a stranger.

  Tuesday morning at breakfast, she passed Caleb a plate of bacon and eggs and said, “Maybe Jesse’s busy working on his car. Once I’m back from Ruth’s, I’ll take his stomach cure over there and see what’s going on.”

  “He seemed all excited about the sprout frame on Sunday,” Caleb said through a mouthful of biscuit. “It’s funny he wouldn’t have come over already. Maybe Henry got in a new crate of clay and he’s earning his keep. It would take a couple of days to wedge it all.”

  Sarah hoped so. The long drive to Ruth’s was a relief—with no one to talk to but Dulcie, she could think, and pray, and try to gain the strength to do what she must do, which was to distance herself from Henry. It was all very well to admit that her heart was wicked and to pray, Lead me not into temptation, but it was asking a lot of God to do that when she kept running over to it of her own free will.

  What kind of example was she to Simon? Had he seen her with Henry and decided that it might just be all right to trifle with Joe’s feelings in the way Sarah might be trifling with Ginny’s? Oh, how she hoped not. And how glad she was that with truth and openness between them, they had been able to pray together last night without the scent of disturbance that had been hanging over them like wood smoke since his return.

  The simple truth was that God had given her a good, useful life. She had everything she needed, a family next door whom she dearly loved, and two strong sons who were her joy. She must put her craving for a man she could not have on the altar of sacrifice and walk away from it forever. She must put her hand in that of the Shepherd, and trust Him to lead her in the way she should go.

  There was a relief in having made a choice, she thought as she passed through Whinburg and turned down the county road where the Lehman farm lay. With the sacrifice firmly tied to the altar with strong cords, she could move forward and be grateful for the peace that lay ahead beside the still waters.

  When she and Ruth had closeted themselves in Ruth’s compiling room, she brought up the subject of Jesse and told her what she wanted to make, which was an easy recipe if you had all the right ingredients. Thank goodness Ruth was well stocked with coneflower.

  “Jesse Riehl? Is he one of the Riehls from over west of Strasburg?”

  “I think so. I understand that he left his family over getting a driver’s license and a car.”

  Ruth’s gray eyebrows rose. “Ah. We heard about the accident—the gut Gott surely had our Amanda in the palm of His hand. I know the boy’s family. Very conservative. I used to treat Lame Saul Riehl for nerve pain many years ago—I suppose Jesse would have been a baby then. They lived here, you know.”

  “Are Lame Saul and his wife still living?”

  “As far as I know. But I can’t see that man having a boy with a car about the place. Jesse would have to get rid of it, put aside his Englisch ways, and ask forgiveness before Saul would be convinced to restore the relationship.”

  This was not unusual, and Sarah would likely hold the same standard if Simon were to do such a thing. But oh, how hard it would be! It would almost be worse than a death to know that sheer unwillingness had driven a wedge between you and the child you loved, and you had to separate yourself from him. This was the purpose of die Meinding, after all—to cause the wayward one to realize all that he had lost, and to come back asking to be restored. Many people looked at shunning as punishment, but it wasn’t. It was simply to let the person see how much they had given up to take their own way.

  Thank you, dear Father, that of all the things You have sent into my life, You have not given this experience to me. But Thy will be done.

  Simon’s disobedience and rebellion this past summer had done enough to reveal to them both just what the price would be for such a separation. Sarah thanked God that Simon had had a heart soft enough to count the cost of the loss of his family and realize it would be too high to pay. She hoped that now his heart would be generous enough to let him apologize to Joe for what he’d done, and restore the friendship that she knew he valued.

  “Nausea still, hey?” Ruth said, pulling down a couple of the bins in which she kept dried leaf. “Let’s increase the concentration of one or two ingredients and see what we can do about that.”

  When Sarah drove home, she had several packets of tea, a couple of bottles of tincture, and an herb journal with five new pages of notes abo
ut lowering blood pressure, treating allergies, and two more recipes for the elderberries on the trees along the road now that cold and flu season seemed to have begun.

  Simon met her when she drove into the yard, and after he’d carried in her parcels, he took Dulcie into the barn for a well-deserved curry and some oats. It was late—she needed to start supper—but Jesse was stuck in her mind like a burr on the inside of a stocking. Tuesdays were usually a pickup supper anyway, because after driving twelve miles and back to Whinburg, and several hours stuffing her brain full of information, she was usually too tired to start a full meal from scratch.

  She took out the half pan of yesterday’s casserole and put it in the oven to warm slowly, then put her jacket back on and went out to the barn.

  “Simon, I’m going to take this tea mixture over to Jesse. I should be back in a few minutes.”

  “Want me to come with you?” He turned from Dulcie’s glossy flank and leaned companionably on the mare, who braced herself almost as though she were leaning right back.

  “Neh. I won’t be long.” And while he might not know of the decision she had made, she was grateful he’d asked. To know he wanted to walk beside her in the valley of temptation. “I’ve got the casserole warming in the oven.”

  Because they ate so early, there was still plenty of daylight. The air was still and damp, as though it had just rained, which meant that it carried the scent of the fields around her. Corn stalks, earth, manure. And above the heavy smells of farming, lighter notes—apples fallen under the trees and left for the hens to eat, the crisp scent of laurel hedges and grass, a whiff of mint and lemon from the beds by the back steps.

  The moist air also carried sounds—the kind that weren’t so easy to identify—as she climbed the hill. Crunching, as though something were being dragged. A metallic buzz that sounded almost like the old generator Henry used to run his kiln. And above it all, a jagged current of voices, slapping against one another, rising and falling.

  Sarah crested the hill between her place and Henry’s and hurried down the path. There was a van in the yard between the house and barn—and there was another one, along with a big SUV with windows you couldn’t see through. The back doors of both vans were open and someone was unloading big black boxes—the source of the crunching sound in the gravel.

  Now she could see what was causing the angry voices. Henry stood with his hands on his hips, facing a young man in skinny black jeans whose back was toward her, looking like he was trying to either placate or convince him. Behind them stood a burly man holding a thick coil of cable, waiting patiently for a break in the conversation, if it could be called that.

  Sarah hesitated. Everything she’d ever been taught urged her to turn and go home before anyone saw her. Whatever was going on here was worldly, Englisch business and none of hers. True, she had come to see Jesse, not Henry—and speaking of, where was the boy in all this? His old car sat with its hood up where it had since the tow truck had dropped it off, and a young man not much older than Simon bent in the driver’s side window, showing something to the girl with him, who kept looking anxiously at the man with the cable, as though she didn’t want to get caught not doing what she was supposed to. Jesse backed out from under the hood and said something to the young man. He was holding a wrench in one hand and a shop rag in the other.

  No matter how she looked at it, this was obviously a bad time to try to treat him. She’d just go home and try again lat—

  “Dude! Check out the Amish lady,” the girl said.

  The young man in the black jeans spun around, his white teeth flashing, and with a jolt, she recognized him. And then she realized what all this was.

  A film crew—much bigger than the one that had come to shoot the video. They were here to film Shunning Amish.

  Her stomach dipped and steadied as her whole body seemed to chill and stiffen. He had decided to do the television show. To put the final barrier between himself and his community.

  His marriage to Ginny would separate him forever from Sarah and the church.

  But this show would separate him forever from his family.

  Oh, Henry, how could you? Father, forgive him. Doesn’t he know what this will mean?

  Maybe not. Or maybe he did, and he didn’t care. Blindly, she turned away, her eyes already welling up with tears.

  Chapter 25

  Sarah!”

  Absolutely nothing but the note of relief in Henry’s voice at seeing her could have induced Sarah to turn back and venture down into the foreign landscape that the old yard had become. His voice told her two things—one, that he needed help, and two, that he didn’t want to ask it of her and drag her into his troubles.

  Both those things combined in a moment and she made up her mind. She dashed the tears from her lashes with the heel of her hand. Was this how Moses felt when he walked into the dry path the Lord had made through the Red Sea? Confident that He would provide, yet all too aware of the towering walls of water on either side that could collapse at any moment?

  She took a deep breath, skirted the van nearest her, and emerged from behind it to join Henry. “Hallo,” she said to him. “I came over to bring Jesse some tea, and saw you had company.” She gave Matt a smile and hoped it looked braver than she felt. “Hello, Matt. It is nice to see you again.”

  “Mrs. Yoder.” The young man’s smile was every bit as brilliant, but not so wide and sincere as it had been last time. “Nice to see you, too. I’m afraid we’re having a business discussion here. I’m not sure it’ll be very interesting for you.”

  “It looks very interesting. Henry, did you want to speak with me?”

  “Matt’s right,” Henry said, raking one hand through his hair. “I don’t know what I was thinking. The last thing I need to do is drag you into this. Hey!” He raised his voice, and Matt and Sarah turned to look at a man with a big camera on his shoulder, aimed at Jesse. Oblivious to it, Jesse was showing the Englisch boy something in the wheel well of his car. The girl now leaned on the rear fender with an air of desperate boredom. “Get that camera away from him,” Henry called. “He’s Amish.”

  “An Amish with a car?” The cameraman grinned. “Trust me, I’ve seen enough of these folks to know he’s not that Amish.”

  Henry’s lips thinned and he turned back to Matt. “See? This is exactly what I’m talking about. Intrusion without asking permission. I’m telling you, I can’t allow you to send people to Ohio to film the home place. There’s nothing in this contract”—he waggled the packet of papers in his hand—“to prevent members of my family from being in these so-called establishing shots.”

  “No faces or recognizable characteristics, Henry,” Matt told him, sounding as if it wasn’t the first time. “We’ve had a lot of practice at this, remember. Especially around Sugarcreek. Some of the Amish there even recognize the crew when it goes by on the highway. They wave.”

  Henry didn’t look as if he’d heard. “I told you how I want the story slanted. I want it to be about art—with the Amish focus on community over individuals being the reason I left the church. About how my art has its roots in a focus on the land.”

  “That’s great. You saw the draft shot summary, right? We’ll touch on it, but you know, that’s not really what Shunning Amish is all about.”

  “What is it about?” Sarah asked.

  “That’s right, you’ve never seen an episode.” Matt laughed, though Sarah couldn’t see where there was a joke. “Basically, Mrs. Yoder, it’s about people becoming who they’re meant to be.”

  “Exactly what I’m trying to convey,” Henry said in exasperation.

  “But isn’t life about becoming who God wants you to be?” Sarah asked of no one in particular.

  “That depends on whether you’re planning on staying in the church, I guess,” Matt said. “The people whose stories we tell or reenact have decided to take their lives into their own hands. The show is about empowerment. Agency, not blind obedience to tradition—no offens
e. Acting on your own behalf to make a life for yourself. Exactly what we want to show with Henry here.”

  “That’s not what this shot summary says.” He pulled a paper from the stack and handed it to Sarah.

  Surprised that he would share it with her, and even more surprised that he would think she knew what a shot summary was, she put her basket handle over one arm and took it.

  MINUTES: 1–4

  BYLER V/O est. shots Willow Creek scenery, buggies, barns, etc. ending at his farm.

  Studio, process of making pottery.

  PETERSEN D.W. Frith interview and why they chose his work.

  MINUTES: 5–18

  BYLER V/O on family farm in Ohio. Reasons why he left. Check abusive father?

  2 interviews ex-Amish friends. Try for family member?

  BYLER life in Denver, tragic death of fiancée. Interview fiancée family members.

  MINUTES: 19–22

  BYLER V/O driven by his demons back to farm, start over with nothing, underdog makes good.

  END BYLER V/O satisfying new life with HOCHSTETLER

  CLOSING IMAGE Rose Arbor Inn and wedding.

  “Wedding?” Sarah didn’t understand half the shorthand on the paper, but she did know what that word meant. Her stomach pitched and her skin seemed to prickle as she reluctantly handed the paper back. The urge to rip it into little pieces was not only childish, but futile. There was probably another one in Matt’s pocket.

  “Great idea, huh?” Matt looked pleased with himself. “Audiences love a happy ending, so every three episodes we give them one. This is perfect—man leaves home and family, loses everything including his first love, then gains it all back in spades. Kinda biblical, even—you know, the whole notion of things coming back to you tenfold. The episode isn’t scheduled to air until January, so if we get everything else shot by Thanksgiving and wind up with the wedding, it’ll go straight to post-production and be on the air right on time.”