Meek and Mild

by Newport, Olivia

  Priscilla looked unconvinced.

  “One day, Jesus was very tired,” Clara began. “He had been working very hard to tell people messages from God. When He got in a boat with His friends, He fell fast asleep.”

  “Did Jesus have a pillow?”

  Clara pictured the words of the story in the family Bible. “Yes, He did!”

  Priscilla’s shoulders began to relax. Clara continued.

  “A great big windstorm started blowing across the water, and the waves sloshed up over the sides of the boat. Jesus’ friends started to think the boat was going to sink!”

  “And did it?”

  Clara smiled and shook her head. “They woke up Jesus and said, ‘Don’t you care what happens to us?’ Jesus stood right up in the boat and He said to the wind, ‘Peace, be still!’ And the wind stopped. Everything was calm and peaceful again. And Jesus said to His friends, ‘Why are you so afraid?”’

  Priscilla looked at Clara, wide eyed. “Does it make Jesus angry if I’m afraid of the pigs?”

  Clara squeezed the girl’s hand. “We’re all afraid of something. The story reminds us that even when we are most afraid, Jesus is right there with us.”

  Priscilla turned and looked toward the pigpen. “I’m still afraid.”

  “I know. Sometimes it feels like we’re right in the middle of a terrible storm. But Jesus is there with us, and remembering that can help. Do you think you can remember that?”

  Priscilla nodded.

  The rattle of the approaching milk wagon pulled Clara’s gaze up. She intended only to glance, but the two forms on the bench beside Dale Borntrager made her suck in her breath. Meeting Priscilla’s eyes again, Clara smiled.

  “Would you like to do a big job for me?” Clara said.

  Priscilla nodded, and Clara held out the pie.

  “Take this to your mamm and tell her to enjoy the pie!”

  “I’m not afraid to do that.” Priscilla arranged her hands around the rim of the pie plate with great deliberation.

  “I know you’ll do a good job.” Clara watched as the child carefully measured her steps toward the house. She turned her own attention to the little girl leaning out of the clattering milk wagon and waving with vigor.

  Fannie!

  The wagon slowed. Fannie gripped Sadie’s shoulder to keep her from leaping out of the wagon at the sight of Clara.

  “Jump in, Clara,” Dale said. “I’ll take you all to your house.”

  “Yes!” Sadie clapped. “I can meet Hannah.”

  Clara’s heart raced. How could she explain to Sadie that Rhoda’s welcome would be insincere?

  “Thank you, Dale, but I think we’ll get out here.” Fannie dropped her feet to the ground and turned to lift her daughter out of the wagon.

  “But I want to see Hannah,” Sadie protested.

  “Not today.”

  Clara was grateful for the firm tone she heard in her cousin’s voice. Sadie clamped her mouth closed. Dale waved and drove off.

  “Do you see those rocks over there?” Fannie said. “Why don’t you see what kind of bugs live under them?”

  Sadie wandered away.

  “I can’t believe you came.” Clara’s embrace was tight.

  “I only wish I could come to your house,” Fannie said. “But we heard about your bishop’s sermon. Rhoda has never invited us before. I don’t imagine she’d be glad to see us now.”

  “No, not now,” Clara said. Not with tension already scattered around the Kuhn house like hidden tree roots waiting to trip her. It was God’s will for both pie plates to ride home with Rhoda and for Clara to carry a pie to the Schrocks only to discover Priscilla alone. If she had gone straight to Mattie’s kitchen, she would have missed Fannie.

  “Is it true?” Fannie said. “You’re not supposed to see us?”

  “You’re still my family.”

  “Dale said there were no exceptions to the meidung.”

  “It won’t hold,” Clara said.

  “But if it does?”

  “It won’t. You were never in our church. How can Bishop Yoder place you in a ban? That would be like saying the Baptists or the Lutherans are under a ban. He’s only talking about anyone who leaves the church now.” Clara took a deep breath, a whole body prayer that what she said was a right understanding. She would not accept the alternative.

  “So we’ll still see you?”

  “Of course. But I may have to be careful for a while.” Clara glanced at Sadie, refusing to imagine the absence of this wondrous child from her life.

  “We should go,” Fannie said.

  “Find some shade and wait. I’ll come back with a cart and drive you home.”

  Fannie shook her head. “Sadie’s a good walker. You’re right to be careful.”

  Clara kissed Fannie’s cheek. “I’ll see you soon.”

  With her form hidden under the loose-fitting folds of her dress covered with a cape and apron, Clara doubted anyone could see that she did not fill out the dress as much as she had just a few weeks ago. She spent long hours away from the farm now, most of it walking in a manner others would perceive as recreational. Clara knew the truth. The tension at home was less severe if Clara spent most of her day away. She was present for breakfast and supper and the family devotion times that followed, but even Hannah had stopped asking why Clara often was not home for lunch anymore. Even in rising summer temperatures, Clara walked to her housekeeping jobs, to shops where she spent little money, to the homes of childhood friends too busy with their own children for a leisure conversation. Clara could hardly tell them she had too much time and too little to do.

  After days of restlessness, on Saturday Clara wandered along the property line between the Kuhn farm and the adjoining Schrock farm. The crop promised an abundant yield—as long as summer rains followed the pattern all the farmers were accustomed to. Clara’s bare feet sank into pliant dark earth as she ambled through rows of corn rising above her knees. With the sun full in the sky, she was hopeful Andrew was finished with morning chores and might have time to talk to her. The first stop in her inquiry would be the weather-battered Johnson outbuilding. Even if Andrew was not there, Clara could take refuge from the midday heat in its shade.

  When Clara heard giggling and rustling, she paused to judge the source. Three voices still thin in timbre exuded conspiracy.

  “This can be our story place.”

  Clara recognized that voice. It belonged to Priscilla Schrock and evidenced none of her fear of slopping the pigs. Clara crept forward with stealth until she saw three sets of little-girl bonnets nodding in a close circle.

  “This story is about Jesus,” Priscilla said. “Whenever you’re afraid, this story will help. You might still feel afraid, but you won’t feel alone.”

  Clara stilled her breath and gathered her skirts in both fists to keep them from brushing cornstalks. Priscilla’s rendition of Jesus stilling the storm on the Sea of Galilee was earnest and factual. What she added to Clara’s version were the sounds of the roaring wind. The other girls joined her in expelling loud breath and swaying precipitously as if they were in a sinking boat. Suddenly Priscilla popped up, spread her arms wide, and declared, “Peace! Be still!”

  That was the moment Clara met the girl’s confident, clear, green eyes.

  “It’s Hannah’s sister!”

  At Priscilla’s announcement, Naomi Brennerman and Lillian Yutzy broke their concentration and jumped up as well. Clara soaked up three eager gazes.

  “This is God’s will!” Priscilla pushed through the stalks.

  “Careful,” Clara said, “don’t trample the corn.”

  Her warning did not slow the girls.

  “Did God send you to tell us another story from the Bible?” Priscilla’s eyes brimmed with expectation.

  Clara glanced across the field, wondering where the girls’ mothers were and if they knew how far from the house their daughters had wandered.

  “Please,” Priscilla said. “It doesn’t h
ave to be a long one.”

  Naomi gently fingered a silken cornstalk. “Are there any stories in the Bible about crops?”

  Clara swallowed hard, barely believing what she was about to do. “Crops and fields and soil and barns and so many things that are part of our life.”

  “Tell us,” Priscilla said.

  Clara sat on the ground and tucked her skirt around her knees. “This story is about a farmer sowing seed.” Clara dug her hand into the ground and let the black soil run through her fingers. “What difference do you think the soil makes?”

  The girls all lived on Amish farms. Clara described four kinds of soil and four kinds of yields, watching their heads bob in understanding.

  “What kind of soil are you?” she asked. “That’s the question Jesus wants us to think about.”

  Thoughtful silence hung for a few seconds before a mother’s calling voice shattered it. The girls jumped up.

  “We have to go,” Priscilla said. “When can we do this again?”

  Clara hesitated. She loved their attentive faces and little-girl answers to the questions she asked as she navigated through the story. But telling them they could meet like this again would be an unfair, false promise.

  “You’d better go,” she said. “Don’t keep your mothers waiting.”

  The trio scampered down the row calling out to answer the summoning voice. Clara let the responses fade before she stood. It would only be a matter of time before one of the girls told an adult about the story—maybe even before suppertime that day. Most likely they would be admonished not to bother her, to tend to their chores, or to ask their questions about the Bible at home.

  In this moment, though, Clara savored the flush of satisfaction.

  Andrew turned a wrench and asked, “Why do you feel guilty?”

  “I know it’s silly,” Clara said. “It’s not as if I put up a sign to advertise. I found Priscilla frightened in her own yard, and I couldn’t have known she would bring her friends to the field today at the same time I happened to walk through.”

  “Gottes wille.” Andrew ducked into the engine again.

  “That’s what Priscilla said.”

  “She’s an Amish child,” Andrew said. “She probably learned to say ‘God’s will’ before she learned to say her own name.”

  Clara chuckled.

  “Did you tell them anything your father would not say?”

  “My father is not much given to commentary. His method is Bible reading and silent reflection.”

  “There’s a time and a place for that,” Andrew said, rubbing his hands on a rag, “but you have a gift for communicating with children that your daed might not share.”

  “All I’ve done is tell a couple of stories about Jesus. Why do I feel so guilty?”

  “I don’t know. Why do you?” Andrew caught Clara’s gaze.

  She picked at a fingernail. “Perhaps because their parents don’t know.”

  “Did you make the girls promise not to tell their parents?”

  “No, of course not.”

  Andrew turned a palm up as if his point were self-evident.

  “No one but my father ever told me a Bible story, and he sticks to his favorites,” Clara said. “I didn’t understand most of the sermons at church. I had to learn to read High German before I could read the Bible for myself. I still have many, many questions about what everything means.”

  “You don’t have to persuade me,” Andrew said, “but you’re making a pretty good argument that what you did will help those girls.”

  “I suppose it does not feel very much like submission.” Clara studied the back of her hand. “No women in the church are teachers.”

  “Mothers teach their children.” Andrew tossed his rag over a headlamp and stepped closer to Clara.

  “That’s different. They have husbands to help guide them.”

  “You could have a husband,” Andrew said. “And to remove all doubt, let me say that I believe you would do a wonderful job with our children and anyone else’s.”

  She blushed. “Andrew—”

  He held up a hand. “I know. You’re not ready. I’m not rushing you.”

  Clara laid a hand on the Model T. “Do you ever feel guilty about the automobile?”

  “Not especially.”

  “Yonnie doesn’t think you are in submission, either.”

  “I’m not worried about Yonnie.”

  “He might tell the wrong person you have a car,” Clara said, “just like the girls might tell the wrong person about my stories. Bishop Yoder could make us both stand up and confess before the entire congregation.”

  What Clara said was true—and if someone happened upon them together in this remote barn, the list of their transgressions would likely lengthen. But Andrew found fear an unlikely basis for a faithful life.

  “If someone asks you not to speak to their children,” he said, “I am sure you would respect their wishes. And as for Yonnie? I will not borrow tomorrow’s trouble. The Bible tells us each day has enough trouble of its own, right?”

  Clara nodded. She raised her eyes and looked beyond him. “You have a visitor.”

  Andrew pivoted and saw Jurgen Hansen striding into the barn. He’d been so intent on listening to Clara that he hadn’t heard the sound of the vehicle Jurgen must have driven.

  “Am I interrupting something?” Jurgen said.

  “You’re always welcome,” Andrew said. “This is my friend Clara Kuhn. Clara, this is the garage owner I told you about.”

  “Are you also interested in Model Ts?” Jurgen offered a hand to Clara, who shook it awkwardly and glanced at Andrew.

  “She’s interested in my Model T,” Andrew said.

  “I hope she’s not too attached,” Jurgen said, “because I’m here to renew my offer.”

  “It’s only been a few days,” Andrew said. “I thought I had more time to consider the question.”

  “I realize I may be rushing you,” Jurgen said. “I have a customer who wants to buy the car I drive. I’d sell it to him if I knew I could have yours.”

  “But your automobile runs far better than this one.”

  Jurgen ran a hand along a shiny polished fender. “I’ve been enamored of this machine since the first time it came into my shop. Have you thought about my offer at all?”

  “I have,” Andrew said. “How could I not after the number you named? But I’m afraid I’ll have to decline. I’m quite enamored with this Model T myself.”

  Jurgen swung one foot and kicked up a small flurry of dust from the barn floor. “I don’t blame you, but I thought it was worth asking. Consider it a standing offer.”

  “Thank you, Jurgen, but I don’t plan to sell the automobile.”

  Jurgen made polite farewells. Andrew and Clara stood still as they listened to him crank the engine of his own Ford outside the barn.

  “You’re really going to keep the Model T,” Clara said.

  “I am.”

  “And if you’re disciplined?”

  “Mose Beachy will stand with me.”

  “And will that be enough?”

  “Others will be glad to stand with Mose.”

  Clara’s candle burned long after the rest of the Kuhn household was shrouded in rest. She resisted the urge to light an oil lamp for brighter illumination. Her father and Rhoda were just across the hall. If one of them happened to rise in the night, the yellow gleam under her door would launch a battery of questions about what would keep her up when morning was nearer than last evening’s nightfall.

  Andrew’s modern thinking emboldened her. A box tucked deep under her bed held the scribbled first drafts of the stories she copied over and sent to Sadie. Clara had lifted the pages one by one and made a list of all the Bible stories she’d written in words Sadie would understand—or Priscilla or Naomi or Lillian. One day perhaps she could even tell them to Hannah and Mari.

  Until now, Clara had written the stories stirring her own heart. Now she considered where the
gaps were. Had she written enough about the history of Israel and the good kings and the bad kings? What about the prophets? Elijah’s and Elisha’s lives were full of miracles to encourage faith. Had she balanced the miracles and parables of Jesus? What about the book of Acts? She hadn’t begun to try to put the letters of Paul into language for children.

  Clara didn’t know if she would see Priscilla and her friends again for a story, but if she did—Gottes wille—she wanted something ready in her head and heart. Sadie would always be eager for a new story. Clara resolved to copy afresh all the stories she had written up until then, and from now on to make one clean copy to send to Sadie and a second to keep for herself.

  Someday she might also want these stories for her own children—if she could bring herself to marry.

  She thought of the image of little Priscilla standing in the field and announcing, “Peace! Be still!”

  Clara’s own heart craved the assurance she had declared to Priscilla.

  For a week Dale Borntrager did both the morning and afternoon milk runs himself, leaving Yonnie with the dairy employees who bottled milk, kept the butter churns moving, checked on the process of the cheeses, and sorted orders for delivery. In the winter, everyone preferred the indoor work. At this time of year, though, Yonnie relished sitting on the uncovered wagon bench and watching summer’s splendid settling in.

  His exile to bottling had ended, but the route was shorter now. On Monday morning, Yonnie returned to the dairy with about two-thirds of the canisters he would have collected only nine or ten days ago. He steered the wagon tight up against the platform where he and others would unload.

  Dale Borntrager scowled. “Where are the rest?”

  “This is everything.” Yonnie heaved a canister out of the wagon and onto the platform.

  “Cows do not suddenly stop producing milk,” Dale said. “This can’t be right.”

  “There are fewer stops now.” Yonnie puzzled at explaining the obvious.

  Realization broke over Dale’s face. “Do you mean that you didn’t pick up from the Marylander farms?”

  “Of course not.”

  Dale grabbed a canister so forcefully that milk sloshed around the edges of the closed top. “Get these unloaded. Then go back and get the rest before it’s too late.”