Hannah's Choice

by Jan Drexler

  Josef nodded his agreement and followed the others to the house. Pleasing his wife was the perfect way to start a marriage. Whatever she asked, he would give her if he was able.

  All through the simple supper, Josef kept staring at her. Hannah kept herself busy with caring for William or Margli, but every time she looked up, Josef’s eyes were on her.

  She had seen very little of him since their talk in the cemetery. He had spent his days in the barn with Daed and Jacob, working as fast as they could to finish the new wagon before their departure to Indiana next week. She and Mamm had been just as busy, storing linens in boxes, dismantling the loom and getting it ready for travel, preparing food to last them for the journey. And through it all, in spite of the nearness of Liesbet’s death, she had felt a curious lightness in her heart, as if she was looking forward to leaving the Conestoga . . .

  Ne, not leaving, but an anticipation of her unfolding future. As light and daring as a spring breeze, the far mountains beckoned her. It was an adventure to look forward to.

  And then there was Josef. He had said the love grew, but how far? And how fast?

  She looked across the table at him and caught him staring again. She smiled as he grinned at her. How far would their road together last? Into the future. Warmth spread through her at the pleasant thought.

  After family prayers and the younger children were in bed, Josef leaned close to her as she sat on the bench by the fire, knitting.

  “Would you come for a walk with me?”

  She looked up from her knitting. “Tonight? In the dark?”

  He took her hand. “Ja, it’s a beautiful night—warm, pleasant—there is no moon, but the stars are bright.”

  He stood, pulling her up after him. He helped her put on her shawl, and they stepped out into the night.

  Hannah let him choose their route. The ground was too wet to try to walk down by the creek in the dark, so he stayed on the farm lane and walked toward the orchard.

  “Do you remember the first time we talked?”

  “Ja. It was here, in the orchard.” So long ago, and so much had happened since that day.

  “You kept trying to get me to notice your sister.”

  “And you seemed determined to keep Adam out of my life.”

  Josef stopped her, turning her toward him. “I think I loved you from the first moment I saw you.”

  “You didn’t even know me.”

  He cupped her cheek in his hand. “Ne, but I started knowing you then. Do you remember what I said?”

  She smiled. He had been so serious that day, and his accent had intrigued her. “You said you wanted to court me. That you were looking for a wife.”

  His thumb stroked her cheek. “I know your heart lies here, Hannah, on this land, along the Conestoga.”

  She started to shake her head, to protest, but he raised his other hand to hold her face between them. “I want to make you happy, and I want you to be my wife. I think we should settle in Indiana, with your family. You will need them and they will need you. But more than that, I want to marry you. Will you, Hannah? Will you marry me?”

  “Mamm told me once that when I married, my heart would lie with my husband.” She looked into Josef’s eyes, gray in the starlight. “She was right.” She laid her hands on his coat, above his heart. “This is where my heart truly lies, with you. We will live wherever you think is right.”

  “And you will be my wife?”

  She smiled, all doubt gone. “Ja, Josef Bender. I will be your wife.”

  He bent down to kiss her, enfolding her in his arms and drawing her close. But he didn’t stop with one kiss. He shifted and drew her closer. “This is my promise, Hannah Yoder. I will love you as long as I have breath.” He smiled and kissed her nose, her cheeks, and then kissed her lips again.

  34

  The day of the wedding, the Monday before the families were to leave for the west, was warm and clear. Hannah rose early to help Mamm with the last of the packing before the elder and other church members arrived.

  “Hannah,” said Mamm as they filled a barrel with bedding, “with all the preparation for the move, we have no time to do anything special for your wedding.”

  “We don’t need to.” Hannah rolled a coverlet up and tucked it between a stack of blankets and the side of the barrel. “The ones who are coming won’t expect any more than what we usually do for a church service—even less, since they know we are leaving tomorrow.”

  “But I wanted it to be a special day for you.”

  “It will be.” Hannah smiled as she took the barrel’s lid from Mamm. “I’m marrying the most wonderful man in the world, and what could be more special than that?” She laid the lid on the barrel and nailed it down.

  Mamm looked around them at the empty parlor. “I think that was the last barrel to pack. The rest are things we’ll be using along the way, and we won’t need to pack them until this afternoon.” She winced as she stretched, leaning back with her hands supporting her back.

  “Are you all right?” Hannah eyed Mamm’s growing middle. She had said the baby wouldn’t come until summer, but could she be wrong?

  “It’s just the extra work that strains my back. Soon enough, I’ll have nothing to keep me busy except riding in the wagon and watching the world go by.”

  “I’m glad Daed thought to make a place to sit in the wagon. It would have been a long walk to Indiana.” Hannah caught sight of movement out the front window. “It’s the Hertzlers.” She ran out to meet Johanna.

  “Are you ready for your wedding?” Johanna’s face looked happier than her own.

  “For sure I am. There’s nothing to get ready for, as long as I have Josef.”

  Magdalena shooed the girls away. “You two go off and talk and let me help Annalise.”

  “Come, Johanna.” Hannah pulled at her friend’s hand. “You can help me pack Margli’s things.”

  They ran up the stairs to Hannah’s room. All her things were packed in her chest already, but Margli’s new chest, made by Josef after the wagon was finished, stood open and empty. Johanna picked up a coverlet and started folding it.

  “Where will you and Josef spend your first night together? Here?”

  Hannah felt her face turning red. “Ne. If we stayed here, we’d have to sleep in the parlor with Daniel and Mary.”

  “The Nafsingers? When did they arrive?”

  “On Saturday. Josef drove our wagon up to Ephrata to load their things into it and drove them back here to spend the Sabbath and then be here for the wedding.”

  “I suppose you could just sleep in your own bed, and Josef with the boys, just as you have been doing.”

  She glanced at her friend just in time to see her face break into a smile.

  “You know I’m teasing you. But what do you have planned?”

  “Josef and I will start on the road to Indiana right after the wedding. He said we’ll go as far as the ferry and cross the Susquehanna, and then find a place to camp for the night. We’ll wait there for the rest of you to catch up with us in the morning.”

  Johanna grabbed her hand and pulled her down to sit on Margli’s bed next to her. “What is it like?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “To be in love. You barely know Josef, and now you’re marrying him. Is it wonderful?”

  Hannah laced her hands around her knees. “Wonderful? Ja, but it’s so much more than that.” She stared out the window at the blue sky. “You know how in the Good Book it says that when two people marry, they become one flesh?”

  Johanna nodded.

  She held her hands in front of her, separating the laced fingers, and then joining them again. “It’s like this. Once Josef and I were two separate people. But as we learned to know each other and our love grew, we became closer and closer, until today we’ll be joined together forever.”

  “You mean, you didn’t fall in love with him all at once?” Johanna’s voice sounded disappointed and Hannah laughed.

 
“Ne. At first, I didn’t like him very much. I thought he was a little forward, talking about courting the first time we met.”

  “And there was Adam.”

  “Ja, there was Adam.” Hannah had talked to Hilda last Friday. She said Adam had left Philadelphia and gone to Massachusetts where the abolitionist movement was even stronger. Their lives had taken different paths so quickly, and now Adam was gone. She still missed the boy he had been.

  “So, what made you fall in love with Josef?”

  Hannah lay back on the bed, staring at the ceiling. “It was little things. Bit by bit, our love grew, until I couldn’t imagine my life without him in it.”

  Johanna lay back next to her. “Maybe that’s what will happen with Jacob.”

  “You’re still hoping he’ll notice you?”

  “Don’t you think he could learn to love me?”

  Hannah sat back up. “I guess. I’ve never thought of Jacob that way—as a husband to someone.”

  Mamm called from downstairs. “Hannah! It’s nearly time. Are you ready?”

  “We need to get Margli’s box packed and I need to put my best dress on.”

  “You get dressed.” Johanna stood up and started folding Margli’s extra clothes. “I’ll do this, and we’ll be downstairs in time.”

  Hannah hurried to put on her blue dress and white apron, folding her brown dress and her everyday black apron in her box. She paused as she lowered the lid. When she opened it again, she would be Josef’s wife.

  Almost the entire congregation had come to the wedding, even those from the far side of Pequea Creek. Since today was Monday, rather than the Sabbath, families drove their wagons, making the trip easier. Neighbors had been invited to come also, and the Metzlers were there, with a few other Mennonite and Brethren families from along the Conestoga.

  There was a festive air, with makeshift tables being set up for the dinner afterward, and people visiting in the warm spring air, but Hannah didn’t notice any of it. Josef stood at the side of the yard, talking with Daniel and Jacob, and he was the only person she cared to look at.

  Finally the ministers called them all into the house where benches had been set up. Hannah sat between Mamm and Johanna, listening to the sermons exhorting the congregation to take marriage as a sacred trust. She heard again the stories of Isaac and Rebecca, of Ruth and Boaz. She and Josef were entering a stream that had flowed from Adam and Eve until now, and would flow into the future. Two people, marrying in the sight of God, starting a family dedicated to him.

  She glanced across the room to Josef and found him watching her. He grinned, and then turned back to the minister. Suddenly, the preaching seemed very long.

  But then it was time. She and Josef stood before the congregation and took their vows. They promised to love each other, to bear with each other patiently, to help each other.

  After their vows, they returned to their seats and knelt for the final prayer. As she knelt on the hard floor, Hannah’s heart seemed like it would burst within her. She and Josef were wed, and they would soon start on their life together. What would the future bring? Her parents had known heartache, his mother had been widowed when he was a young boy. They had no guarantees theirs would be a happy life. But whatever happened, they would face it together.

  Soon after the noon meal had been eaten, Josef found her in a crowd of women.

  “If we are to make it across the Susquehanna today, we must be going.”

  Hannah said goodbye to the people of the congregation, but for her best friend and her family, she only needed quick hugs. They would see each other the next day. Josef had already finished loading the wagon and had hitched a four-horse team to it. These were new horses, ones Hannah didn’t know, but it wouldn’t take long to learn each one’s name.

  They started walking down the farm lane toward the road, and Hannah stopped, looking back.

  Josef stopped and put his arm around her. “What is it?”

  “I had forgotten, with the wedding and the busyness of the last week, this is the last time I’ll ever see this farm.”

  “Do you regret leaving?”

  Hannah took in the smokehouse, the old cabin, the big limestone house, the chicken coop, the large barn, and off by itself, the cemetery where Liesbet and the little ones lay. She shook her head. “Ne, I don’t regret it, but . . .”

  “But you’ll miss this place.”

  “Not just the place, but the way things were. I miss when Liesbet and Fanny and I used to play together in the orchard. I miss the long afternoons watching the creek flow by. I miss it all.” Hannah turned to look at Josef and stroked his cheek. “But those things are of the past, and I’ll always have them in my memory. You are my future.”

  Josef bent to kiss her, a kiss of promise, and then they turned and started down the road toward the west.

  1

  BROTHERS VALLEY, PENNSYLVANIA

  APRIL 1843

  “Mattie.”

  Mattie Schrock ignored Naomi, intent on the flutter of wings she spied through the branches of the tree, pulling her attention from wringing the water out of Daed’s shirt. She leaned as far toward the edge of the covered porch as she could, her toes clinging to the worn wooden planks. The bird wouldn’t hold still. What kind was it?

  “It’s your turn to hang the laundry. I have to help Mamm get dinner ready.” Naomi shoved the basket of wet clothes toward the porch steps with her foot.

  Mattie gave up on identifying the bird. Hanging laundry wasn’t Mattie’s favorite chore, even though it meant she was able to be in the yard instead of in the hot kitchen. She picked up the heavy basket and rested it on her hip as she took the bag of clothes pegs from the hook next to the porch steps. “Your turn is next week, then.”

  Naomi pulled the stopper from the washtub and let the water drain onto the flower bed in the yard below the porch. “I’d rather hang clothes than work inside today. The weather is so lovely and warm after the days of rain we’ve had.”

  Mattie stopped with one foot on the bottom step. “Why did you insist I take my turn, then? You can hang the laundry if you want to.”

  “Ne.” Naomi shook her head and wiped out the empty tub with a rag. “Fair is fair. It’s your turn.” She gave Mattie a smile. “I know how much you like to be outside.”

  She hung the washtub on the wall and turned to the rinse tub. Naomi was tall and slender, the opposite of Mattie’s own short stockiness. Her hair, which had turned to a soft brown during the winter months, was beginning to lighten to its summer blond where it peeked out from under her kapp. Naomi worked with a spare efficiency that wasted no motions. She hung the rinse tub on the wall next to its mate, draped the rag over its hook, and started toward the back door, but stopped when she saw Mattie.

  “You haven’t even begun yet. What are you doing, standing there? Daydreaming again?”

  “You’ll be a wonderful wife someday.”

  Naomi turned her face away. “Are you sure God’s plan isn’t for me to remain single? A maidle caring for Mamm and Daed in their old age?”

  Mattie pulled her bottom lip between her teeth. She shouldn’t have said anything. “There is someone for you. Someone wonderful.”

  “You’re kind to say so. But don’t worry about me.” Naomi fingered the door latch. “I’ll be content, no matter what happens.” She slipped inside the door.

  Mattie shifted the heavy basket on her hip and crossed the yard to the line strung between the porch roof and the big oak tree. Naomi had never had a beau. The boys who vied for Mattie’s attention never noticed Naomi except to eat her pies. They never teased her to join their games or asked her to go for a buggy ride on a spring evening. She never said so, but the slights bothered her. Mattie had heard her crying in the middle of the night when Naomi thought no one would hear, especially after Mattie had been for a buggy ride with Andrew Bontrager or Hiram Mast. There must be someone for Naomi.

  Lowering the basket to the ground, Mattie picked up the first shirt, sho
ok it to release the wrinkles, then pegged it to the line.

  If the boys ignored her, she wouldn’t be as calm as Naomi. At eighteen years old, Naomi should be planning her wedding. She should be filling her wedding chest with quilts and bedding, but Naomi never made anything for herself.

  Mattie stopped, a peg halfway onto the line, an apron forgotten in her hands. Why not make something for Naomi’s wedding chest herself? Because she could never sit still enough to finish any needlework. Her own quilt was barely started.

  She finished hanging the apron and reached for a dress wadded in the basket as an idea swirled through her mind. She could finish that quilt for Naomi. That would show her sister she had faith that there would be a husband for her. That she wouldn’t remain a maidle forever.

  As she hung the last few items of laundry, Mattie tried to remember where the pieces for her quilt might be. Not in her own chest. She had packed it yesterday for their coming move to Indiana.

  At that thought, she looked toward the west. Even though the barn blocked her view, she could see the western mountains in her imagination. Any day now the folks from the Conestoga in Lancaster County would arrive in Brothers Valley, and then they would leave on their journey.

  Now she remembered. The quilt had been packed. It was in the barrel, the one with the blue lid, where she had packed her winter shawl and heavy comforter. Daed had already taken it to the barn. If she looked for it now, she could start working on it this afternoon. Naomi needn’t know the quilt was for her, she would think Mattie was continuing to sew her own neglected quilt.

  Mattie took the basket and bag of clothes pegs back to the porch and hung them in their places. If only she could slip away to the barn before Mamm saw her. With her sister Annie, her husband, and their family coming to share dinner, Mamm would want Mattie’s help. But she could find her quilt and be back to help before she was needed.