by Jan Drexler
Liesbet hadn’t mentioned George McIvey at all the last few days. Hannah had caught her staring toward the clearing near the creek several times, but Liesbet hadn’t gone out there at all. Hannah bit down on the clothes peg she held between her teeth. All that meant was that Liesbet didn’t expect the outsider to be there. He was probably on another trip to Philadelphia.
The rattle of a wagon coming down the lane from the road made Hannah freeze. She peered around the sheets. The wagon was unfamiliar, but it was a farm wagon, not a freight wagon. The two men were Amish. The driver, the older man, looked to be about ten years older than Daed, with a long, full, gray beard. He pulled his team of horses up next to the barn and wrapped the reins around the brake.
Hannah looked from him to the younger man. He had turned on the high seat to look at her. When he saw that she had noticed him, he smiled and lifted his hand in a small wave. Hannah ducked behind the sheets.
Daed came out of the barn, and Hannah took advantage of the distraction to run inside the house.
“Mamm?” Hannah looked in the kitchen, but it was empty. The trap door to the cellar stood open, and Hannah looked down into the earthen hole. A lamp shone in the dark, and Mamm appeared at the bottom of the ladder.
“Hannah, hand me that crock of pickles on the table.” She came two steps up the ladder and reached for the crock as Hannah handed it down to her.
“There’s company outside.”
Mamm turned and put the crock on the wide shelf cut into the earth and lined with whitewashed boards. “Is it the Hertzlers? We haven’t had a good visit in a long time.”
“Ne, it’s two men. They’re Amish, but I’ve never seen them before.”
Mamm looked up at Hannah. “Two men?” She picked up the lamp next to her feet and blew it out before climbing the ladder. Hannah took the lamp from her and then helped close the trap door.
“We had better cook a fine dinner, then. They must be bringing news of some kind, and your daed will want to talk.” She straightened her kapp as she thought out loud. “The Schnitz und Knepp will have to do for the main course, but we’ll fix some biscuits and pie to go with it.”
“There are still some apples on the trees.”
“Ja, ja, ja. That will be good. You go pick the apples.” Mamm continued to talk as she got out her bread board and the jar of sourdough starter from the back of the counter. “We’ll do a cobbler instead of a pie, I think. That will stretch farther.”
Hannah turned to go out to get the apples, and Mamm called after her. “If you see Liesbet, tell her to look after the young ones awhile longer.”
“Ja, Mamm.”
As Hannah passed the sheepfold on the way to the orchard, she glanced toward the barn. Both men stood outside the barn door with Daed and Jacob. None of them looked her way. Windfall apples were scattered everywhere under the trees, good for making cider or feeding the animals, but not for company cobbler. There weren’t many apples left on the bare branches, but enough. She gathered up her apron to hold the apples as she picked them.
She had finished picking all the apples she could reach from one tree when she heard someone behind her.
“Liesbet, Mamm wants you to—” Hannah had turned as she spoke, but Liesbet wasn’t behind her. It was the young man from the wagon.
“I wondered if you needed some help. I can reach the taller branches.”
His accent was strange, but he spoke Deitsch, the Pennsylvania Dutch, just like all the Amish. His cheeks turned pink when she didn’t answer right away, and he pointed to the apples clinging to the branches above her head.
“Ach, ja.” Hannah felt her face turn as pink as his. She had never seen eyes quite the color of his. They were blue, but when he tilted his head down to look at her, they turned gray. He smiled again—a slow, gentle smile that made his eyes crinkle. Light brown hair curled around his ears.
He stepped around her and climbed up into the fork of the tree, reaching from that higher perch to pick the apples and toss them down to her. He worked without a word, but smiled at her as he jumped down from one tree and climbed the next, every motion effortless. He continued until Hannah’s apron was full.
“I have enough now,” Hannah said as he climbed down from the last tree. “Denki . . .”
“Josef.” He leaned against the tree, gazing at her. “Josef Bender.” He walked with her as she turned toward the house. “And you are Hannah, your vater said.”
“Ja, I am Hannah.” Her mind raced. If this young man stayed to dinner, perhaps Liesbet would take a liking to him and forget about George McIvey. “Have you met the rest of the family yet? My sister Liesbet?”
“Nein, I have not met any but you and your bruder, Jacob, and your vater.”
That accent again, but a pleasant voice. They had reached the porch and Hannah went up the steps.
“You must stay to dinner, you and your daed.”
“Not mein daed. My friend.” He stood, continuing to look at her until she began to wish she had a free hand to check her kapp. “We will be friends, Hannah Yoder, ja?”
He stepped up on the porch to open the door for her.
“Ja.” Hannah slipped inside the door. “Ja, we can be friends.”
“Josef.”
She felt her cheeks heating again and tried to turn her eyes away from his face. She swallowed and nodded. “Josef.”
He let the door close behind her and turned toward the barn. Hannah took the apples to the table and set them, two by two, into the waiting bowl.
Josef Bender. What a strange man he was. Hannah held her bottom lip between her teeth to keep from smiling at the memory of his eyes on her. Liesbet should fall in love with this one. That would solve all their problems.
Josef looked around the farm as he waited for Daniel to finish his conversation with Christian Yoder. The barn was old and small compared to some he had seen on their journey here, but was in good repair. The quiet sheep in the fold and the sleek horses in the pasture showed the kind of farmer Christian was. Daniel would do well to go west with this man.
The young man, Jacob, joined him as he leaned against the fence.
“It’s good to meet other Amish,” he said, picking a brown stalk of grass and rubbing the seed head between his fingers. “You’re from up Ephrata way?”
“Ja.” Josef picked his own grass and fiddled with the brown leaf clinging to the stalk. “Daniel’s farm is northeast of the city about three miles.”
Jacob was silent for a few minutes as he let the grass seeds fall between his fingers. “You’re not his son?”
“Ne. I work for Daniel on his farm. When I came from Germany six years ago, he agreed to pay my passage if I worked for him. We had set the term for seven years, but if he goes west, I guess I’ll be done sooner.”
“You’re a redemptioner, then.”
“Daniel redeemed me, ja? I owe him more than the money he paid. He’s like a vater to me. When I arrived from Rheinland-Pfalz, he welcomed me like a son.”
Jacob looked at him, measuring. “You must have been very young when you came here. Were you alone?”
Josef nodded. “It’s a long story.”
“I’d like to hear it sometime.”
Josef looked at the younger man. Some men treated him little better than a slave when they learned he was a redemptioner, working off the cost of his passage across the ocean, but Jacob’s face was friendly. He was only curious.
“Ja, I will tell you sometime.”
A bell rang from the house and Jacob dropped his blade of grass. “Dinnertime. I’ll show you where you can wash up.”
Jacob let the older men lead the way, with the two of them falling in behind. Josef wished they would walk faster. Hannah was in the house, and he couldn’t wait to see her again.
From his first glimpse of her behind the clothesline when Daniel had driven in, Josef hadn’t thought of anything else. He had never seen such a beautiful girl before, and she had seemed to accept his offer of friendship.<
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After washing up on the porch, the men filed into the kitchen and took their places around the big table. Josef tried to sit next to Hannah but had to be satisfied sitting across from her and next to her younger sister. Liesbet was pretty enough, with blond curls under her kapp, but her face looked tired and worn. Unusual for one so young.
Christian sat at the head of the table and led the prayer of blessing for the meal. Josef kept his eyes on Hannah as he waited for his plate to be filled with the Schnitz und Knepp. A basket of sourdough biscuits was passed and the ever-present pickles. He had his choice of pickled cauliflower, beans, cucumbers, and Brussels sprouts. If he closed his eyes, he could pretend he was eating at his mutti’s table once more.
Once Christian had filled all the plates, he turned to Daniel, sitting at his right. “You said you wanted to talk business over the meal. What brings you all this way?”
Daniel took a bite of the Schnitz as the family waited for him to speak. Josef almost smiled at this. Daniel knew how to keep his listeners anticipating.
“I heard you might be going west in the spring.”
“Ja,” Christian said, nodding. “We have decided to move to Indiana.”
Beside Josef, Liesbet stiffened. He looked at her, but she only looked at her plate. He glanced at Hannah and caught her looking at him. She blushed and turned her face away, listening to the men.
“Nearly ten years ago, my three children all went west. They settled in Ohio. My wife and I, we thought we could make do at home without them, especially since we have Josef here to help out.” He nodded toward Josef.
The whole family turned to look at him, and he was glad when Christian spoke again, turning their attention away from him.
“But now you want to join them?”
“Ja. My wife, she misses the children. We received a letter. There are grandchildren now, and the sons are doing well with big, prosperous farms. They want us to sell our farm and move to Ohio.”
“You think we can travel together?”
“That’s what I hoped.” Daniel nodded toward Josef again. “A group traveling together is always safer.”
Christian nodded his head and sat back with a biscuit in his hand. “That’s true. It would be safer. There would be three families, if our neighbors agreed to join us.”
Daniel smiled. “That would be fine, then.” He nodded, satisfied. “Three families. Ja.”
Christian turned to Josef. “And you’ll be coming too?”
Daniel waved his hand in the air. “Josef hasn’t decided yet. I say he should come with us, but he says he’d rather be settled.”
“Ja, I would like to be settled in my own home, with my own land.” Josef made his decision as he spoke. His own home and land wouldn’t be worth much without a partner, a wife, alongside. “But that land will be less expensive in the west, ja?” He risked a glance at Hannah. She met his eyes, and then looked down at her meal. “I would like to go with you to Indiana, if I may.”
Christian nodded his agreement. “Another young man on the journey will lighten everyone’s load, I think. This is a good thing.”
The older man held Josef’s gaze for a long minute, and then looked at his daughter. So, he hadn’t missed Josef’s interest and he approved. Good.
Josef finished the last bites of his meal just as Hannah brought a hot apple cobbler to the table. Ja, it would be good to have a partner like Hannah.
Dinner was redd up quickly after the men went back out to the barn. Hannah put a dish of sauerkraut and sausage in the oven for supper while Mamm took William into the bedroom for his nap. Hannah had just put more wood on the slow fire when she came back into the kitchen.
“I’m going to lie down with him, I think.”
She looked tired.
“Is everything all right?”
“Ja, but I didn’t sleep well last night.” Mamm reached back to untie her apron as she talked. “There is so much to think about with this move west, and it’s happening so fast.”
“Daed doesn’t let the grass grow once he makes a decision, does he?”
Mamm smiled, looking out the window toward the barn. “Ne, he doesn’t.” She folded her apron and draped it over one arm. “It may take a while for him to get to that decision, but when he does, he’s sure about it.” She started toward the bedroom behind the stairway, and then turned back. “Liesbet went upstairs to rest, also. Will you keep an eye on Peter and Margareta?”
“Ja, for sure. We’ll get the next bag of fleece from the barn and start the carding.”
Mamm nodded and went into the room while Hannah reached for her shawl. Hannah found Margli quickly enough, sitting in the lilac bushes with her pet hen on her lap. She let her play while she went into the barn. The men were inspecting Daed’s old, green Conestoga wagon and didn’t notice Hannah as she mounted the ladder to the loft that was just inside the door. Sure enough, there was Peter, lying on his stomach, looking down through the chute above the horse’s mangers. When he saw her, he made a shushing motion and then waved her over. She lay down on her stomach next to him and found she had a good view of the tops of the men’s hats.
“It’s been a good wagon, all right, one of the last ones my daed and I built together.” Daed patted the high rear wheel as he spoke. “But it’s just too small to move our family that distance. I’ve started sorting the wood, and I’m ready to start building a larger one. Jacob can help me and learn the skills my daed taught me.”
Daniel nodded his head, his broad-brimmed hat rocking up and down. “And this wagon? What will you do with it?”
Daed hesitated, and then slowly ran his hand down one wheel spoke. “I’ll need to sell it, I guess. I hate to give it up, but we’ll have no way to take it with us.”
The older man jutted his thumb toward Josef. “If this one is going to Indiana with you, why doesn’t he drive it? He doesn’t have much of his own tools and furnishings to take with him, but he could haul our goods as far as Ohio.”
Daed turned to Josef. “A good idea. What do you think?”
Josef nodded. “Ja, it would be a good thing. But are there enough horses to pull so many wagons?”
“Horses, or oxen.” Daed scratched his beard. “My cousin John has a team of mules he might sell too. The big wagon will need a team of four. Six would be better.”
The men walked out the back door of the barn to where Beppli and Blitz were pastured.
“Did you hear that, Hannah?” Peter’s face was flushed as he sat up on the loft floor. “Daed’s making a new wagon, and we’re getting new horses.”
“Or oxen, or even mules.” Hannah stood up, brushing the hay from her skirt.
A voice sounded from behind her. “Which ones would you prefer?”
Josef? He was standing at the top of the ladder.
“I saw you come up here earlier.” He smiled at her, and then spoke to Peter. “So, you were listening to the men talk. Which would you prefer to pull the big wagon your vater is planning to make?”
“Horses. Horses are better than oxen.” Peter stood with his legs spread wide, facing Josef.
“But mules do a better day’s work.”
“Ja,” Peter said, drawing out the word. He would never say any animal was better than his beloved horses. “Maybe mules would be all right. But not oxen. Their noses are too slimy.”
Josef laughed as he nodded his head in agreement. “You’re right. I vote we don’t get oxen, but the final decision is up to your vater.” He turned to Hannah, the laughter still showing in his eyes. “And what do you think, Hannah?”
“I think I need to fetch the bundle of fleece I came up here for.” She could stand here all day talking to this man, but work needed to be done.
“I’ll get it for you.”
Josef picked up a bundle from the pile in the corner of the loft and tossed it down the ladder. He stood back while Hannah went down after it, and then followed her.
Lifting the fleece up to his shoulder, he smiled at her again
, his eyes blue in the sunny open doorway. “Where should I take it?”
“On the porch, in the sun. Margli and Peter are going to help me sort through it to get it ready for carding.”
“I’ll help you until Daniel is ready to go. Let the kinder play, ja?”
Hannah couldn’t help but smile back at him. His accent put a charming turn on his words, and it was tempting to let him help her with her work just to listen to him talk. “Well, you can help for a few minutes.”
“Daniel may take more than a few minutes.” Josef’s voice had a warning note as they walked toward the house. “He loves to tell stories, and he has a new audience with your vater.”
Hannah glanced up at her bedroom window. If Liesbet got up from her rest in time, she could sit with them on the porch and get better acquainted with Josef.
Josef set the heavy bundle down with an easy motion, and she hurried to join him.
14
Josef settled himself on the edge of the porch next to Hannah with the bundle of fleece between them. She had brought a large basket from the house, and as she pulled bits of twigs and other debris from the washed wool, she dropped the fiber into the basket. He watched, fascinated, as her fingers searched through the wool, pulling the foreign pieces out and leaving only the soft fleece.
“Liesbet really is a nice girl,” Hannah said again as she pulled more wool from the bundle. “She can be a little shy around strangers, though.”
“Who?”
Hannah’s fingers stopped and she looked at his face. “Liesbet. My sister. That’s who we’re talking about, isn’t it?”
“I’d rather talk about you.”
“Me?”
“There isn’t anyone already interested in you, is there?”
She went back to sorting through the fleece on her lap, her face bright red. “I’m sure it doesn’t matter if there is or not. However, Liesbet is—”
Josef laid one hand over Hannah’s, stopping her. “I didn’t ask about Liesbet. I asked about you.”
She raised her eyes to his, holding her lower lip between her teeth. She glanced past him, as if the answer to his question lay in the woods behind him, and then down at his hand still covering hers. “I . . . I guess you could say there is someone who is interested in me.”
