Finding Hope

by Janice Kay Johnson - His Best Friend's Baby

  Although his former bishop had believed Gideon needed to be less accepting of anyone and anything outside their faith and their small community.

  He was probably frowning by the time Hannah said, “She looks so young.”

  She? It took Gideon a moment to realize Hannah was talking about Tabitha.

  “Only eighteen, I think. Our teachers are usually young women. Once they marry, they’re replaced.”

  “Do you think eight years is enough education for anyone?”

  “Ja, to live as our Lord asks of us. So much that is modern pulls a person away from a life based on faith.” He hesitated. “Many also learn by becoming apprentices, and we allow our youth to take some additional classes.” He studied her. “It’s hard for kinder drawn by a need to serve as a nurse or doctor, or fascinated by computers. Not everyone chooses to keep the faith. But some leave, and come back when they understand what they’ve lost.”

  “Like Luke Bowman.”

  “Ja, he’s one. I always knew I wanted to farm. I didn’t need more school. And you. What use was what you learned in your high school classes once you were in the kitchen?”

  “Probably not much, but I did go to culinary school.” She told him some of what she’d learned, but admitted that much of that was hands-on.

  “Is fancier cooking really better than what you make here?” he asked, genuinely curious.

  “Honestly? I’m not so sure. I like to experiment, but sometimes restaurant critics rave about entrées that are innovative but not necessarily anything I’d want to eat.”

  As he hadn’t wanted to eat that green curry.

  “A lot of chefs are competitive—they live for getting the best reviews, opening their own restaurants where they can make the final decisions—but I’ve come to realize I’ll never make it to the top. I’m glad when diners let the server know that they loved something I made, but . . .” She stopped, appearing bothered, but shaking her head. “It doesn’t matter.”

  He wanted to pursue the subject, but her decisions once she left Tompkin’s Mill didn’t concern him. Even if she returned to visit her grossmammi and daad and his family, Gideon wasn’t likely to see her.

  And that was what they needed to talk about.

  Setting down his fork, he said, “Yesterday morning, I had to remind the kinder that you don’t intend to stay for very long.” He hadn’t meant to sound so brusque, but didn’t apologize.

  Dismay on her face, Hannah said, “That’s why Rebekah was upset.”

  “Ja.”

  “Sometimes I forget . . .”

  When she stayed silent after letting her words trail off, Gideon asked, “What do you forget?”

  “Oh, that I don’t belong.” One shoulder jerked. She wasn’t looking at him. “That I’ll be leaving.”

  He didn’t like knowing that he’d stripped away any joy she’d had in the day. It confused him, too, that she looked sad about leaving.

  “Why do you think you don’t belong?” he asked. “Your family is here.”

  “Because I’m not Amish! They may be, but I’m not.” Her eyes flared with anger, although he wasn’t so sure that’s what he was seeing. She yanked at a ribbon dangling from her kapp. “I’m pretending, and everyone knows it!”

  For the first time, he wondered why she had started to dress plain and given up the technology that had to have been a big part of her life. Was it respect, as he’d assumed? Just an experiment? Fun, maybe, to get a good feel for what her life might have been like if her mother hadn’t taken her away? If she were another woman, he’d have thought she would turn it into a big story she could tell her Englisch friends, except Hannah wouldn’t do that. But now he became aware of an odd drumbeat of hope, an echo of one he’d felt Sunday.

  Was it possible she had been testing the Amish life to find out if it was for her?

  So he said, “You could become Amish, like Julia Bowman did.”

  Hannah’s eyes widened, dilated pupils surrounded by that swirl of green and gold. At last she stuttered, “But . . . but I’d be giving up so much.”

  “What would you be giving up, Hannah?”

  She only blinked at him, seemingly dazed that he’d suggested something so wildly unlikely.

  His appetite vanished. Gideon pushed back his chair. “I need to get back to work.”

  “But . . . there’s pie.”

  “It will be good for dinner.” He clapped his hat on his head and walked out, dodging the clean clothes and sheets hanging on the line outside. He was almost to the barn before he realized he had forgotten to ask his real question: when she expected to leave.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Hannah admired the decision Julia Bowman had made. She did. But there were reasons most American women wouldn’t make the same one. Especially women of their generation.

  Obviously, it had been a mistake to try to blend in with her Amish family and the members of their church district. How many of them were assuming she’d convert? Thinking to themselves, ach, Samuel’s daughter, of course she would.

  As Hannah made the beds with clean sheets, replaced towels on racks and in the cupboards, and folded or hung clean clothes, she was conscious of strange, electric zings beneath her skin.

  Panic. It had to be panic.

  Instead of trying to find the source of the panic, she stayed busy. As she should. This was her job.

  She swept, mopped the kitchen and downstairs bathroom floors, waxed the hardwood floors. Windows—no, it was time for her to leave to fetch Zeb and Rebekah. Windows tomorrow.

  Usually, she’d be walking Jacob and Susan Miller’s boy home, too, but when the schoolhouse door opened, the numbers that spilled out were much diminished.

  Surprised, Hannah joined a couple of mothers to talk to Tabitha.

  “All getting sick,” she told them, resignedly, “only a cold, I think, but it’s spreading fast.”

  “What happens if you get sick?” Hannah asked.

  She looked surprised. “I have an assistant. You haven’t met her? We will hope only one of us catches this cold.”

  “If that’s all it is,” a mother—Mara Eicher—muttered.

  The others chimed in their agreement.

  Hannah expected to have to cull Rebekah and Zeb from their friends, but today the two of them stood apart, as if no other kinder were present. Her instincts sharpened at seeing expressions that were so reserved. That was not natural for either of them.

  She smiled, hugged Rebekah, and briefly touched Zeb on the back, and then looked around for Enoch Miller. When she called to him, he joined her.

  His English, she’d discovered, was inadequate for conversation, so she switched to her less-than-perfect Deitsh. “Did you have a good day?”

  “Ja!” Clearly in a good mood, he said, “We sang my favorite hymn, and Tabitha hung my drawing on the wall. We played baseball, and Mamm sent a big molasses cookie for my lunch.”

  “That does sound like a good day.” She gave him a sidelong hug as they started walking.

  This was Enoch’s first year of school, as it was Rebekah’s. Susan had said that he’d be turning seven in June.

  She turned her attention to Zeb and Rebekah. “How about you two?”

  Zeb shrugged. Rebekah mumbled something Hannah didn’t make out, but she decided not to press the issue until they were alone.

  When they reached the road, Zeb found a rock to kick, and kept kicking with a viciousness that startled her. She’d say something if he left it on the road, since she wasn’t sure what would happen if the narrow wheels of a buggy ran into it, but he obviously needed to vent anger somehow.

  They walked Enoch halfway up his driveway, at which point they could see Susan on the porch of his house waving. Yelling, “Mammi!” Enoch broke into a run, and Hannah waved back. Then she and Gideon’s kinder turned around.

/>   Expecting one or the other of them to start complaining right away, she was surprised by the continuing silence. Zeb all but had a dark storm cloud hanging over his head, while Rebekah’s shoulders were hunched as if in preparation for blows. They might dread going home if they’d done something to stir their father’s temper— But she knew right away that wasn’t it. They’d been cheerful this morning during breakfast and the walk to school. No, whatever had happened was during the day.

  Zeb found his rock again and gave it a huge kick, almost falling down before he regained his balance.

  “Can we talk about why you’re mad?” Hannah ventured.

  “No!” he shouted, and ran up the driveway.

  Rebekah trudged along beside Hannah, never looking up.

  This time, Hannah asked, “Was is letz?” What is wrong?

  After a minute, the little girl said, “They were talking about our mamm today, and they never even knew her! When Zeb told them to shut their traps, he got in trouble with Teacher Tabitha.”

  “I’m sorry. Was it all your classmates?”

  “Mostly some of the girls.” She named several, the names familiar to Hannah but not matching up to faces. Older kinder, then.

  “We should have told them they’re doppicks!”

  “You know what the Lord would say about that,” Hannah said gently.

  Rebekah stole a look at her. “You mean, to turn the other cheek?”

  Zeb had disappeared, Hannah hoped into the house and not off to hide in the woods or the huge, shadowy interior of the barn. “I was thinking of Proverbs,” she said. “ ‘A soft answer turns away wrath, But a harsh word stirs up anger.’ ”

  “Oh. But it’s not fair if we can’t argue!”

  Hannah smiled, even though she didn’t feel like it. “I didn’t say you can’t, but there is a smart way to do it instead of an angry way that only makes the other person mad.”

  Rebekah’s face crumpled. She cried, “I don’t want to go to school tomorrow,” and ran for the house.

  Hannah hesitated only briefly. Longing to find Gideon—he was the one who should be having this talk with his kinder—she wasn’t willing to leave them alone. He’d be in for dinner in only another two hours. Keeping them busy might be a better idea than trying to find out what the older girls had actually said.

  * * *

  * * *

  Both kinder sat at the table, backs to him, when Gideon came in through the mudroom. There was no sign of Hannah. The kitchen smelled enticing, but it puzzled him that neither of the kinder so much as turned a head. Had they gone deaf?

  Zeb appeared to be doing schoolwork. Hunched over it, he kept bouncing the heels of his boots on the legs and rungs of the chair as if he wanted to break them. Intent on her task, Rebekah used the open mouth of a canning jar to cut out dough before dropping the circles onto a cookie sheet. She was only concentrating, he hoped, but had a bad feeling.

  “It wonders me that nobody wants to say hello to their daadi,” he said.

  Zeb gave him a sullen look. “I have to finish this.”

  “I’m helping Hannah,” his daughter said.

  After hanging up his hat, he went to her and kissed the top of her head. “Where is she?”

  “The cellar.”

  Fortunately, Hannah appeared just then, two jars in her hands. Was that relief flooding her face? What could be so wrong?

  “Gideon. We’re a little behind on dinner.”

  “So I see.”

  “I’m sor—”

  “I can wait.”

  He thought she might be trying to send him a message with her eyes, but he didn’t understand it.

  She set the jars on the counter and faced the rest of them. “This might be a good time to talk to your daad,” she said quietly.

  Alarm brought Zeb’s head up. “It was just dumb girls! Daad doesn’t have to hear about it!”

  Rebekah kept her head down.

  “Do you think the girls made up what they whispered about?” Hannah waited. Neither of the kind responded. “Or were they repeating something they heard at home?”

  Now both Zeb and Rebekah gaped at her.

  “If adults are gossiping, too, your father does need to know.”

  “But . . . Daadi won’t like it,” Rebekah said.

  “It’s his job to protect you, not yours to protect him.” She knotted her fingers together in front of her.

  Thinking about her mother, Gideon guessed. The mother who hadn’t always protected her.

  But he had to concentrate on his kinder, who had heard whispers today they thought might hurt him. Already suspecting the topic, he circled the table and pulled out a chair so that he could look into their faces.

  “If people are saying bad things, we can’t hide from it,” he said. “It’s better to set them right.”

  “I wanted to tell them they’re doppicks!” Rebekah burst out.

  Zeb’s expression grew rebellious.

  Behind him, Hannah asked, “Would you rather I leave early so you can talk alone?”

  He should say yes. She was an auslander. But his kinder showed renewed alarm . . . and she spent so much time with them these days, keeping disturbing rumors making their way around at school from her wasn’t practical.

  “Denke for offering, but it would be good of you to stay.” He turned in his seat. “Unless you’d rather—?”

  “No. I’ll keep working on supper. Are you done there?” she asked Rebekah.

  “Except there’s more dough.”

  She spoke as kindly as always. “Let me ball it up and flatten it out.”

  “I hope you didn’t call anyone a doppick,” Gideon said to his small daughter.

  “Uh-uh. But Zeb said—”

  Her brother knocked into her with his shoulder. “You’re a big fat blabbermaul!”

  “I am not! Daadi, tell him!”

  “You don’t talk to your sister like that,” Gideon said sternly. “You know better than that.”

  “She’s just trying to get me into trouble.”

  “You already got in trouble,” Rebekah retorted, glaring at Zeb.

  “You don’t have to tell everything!”

  “Quiet,” Gideon snapped. “Both of you.”

  Expressions sullen, they both shut their mouths.

  His gaze went first to Zeb. “How did you get into trouble?”

  He shot an evil look at his sister. “I told those girls they didn’t know what they were talking about, and they should shut up! Only, they went running to Teacher. She made me sit by myself facing the wall.”

  Gideon shook his head. He had been in more trouble than that as a schoolboy. He wouldn’t make an issue of this, since Tabitha had already dealt with Zeb’s behavior in the way that seemed best to her at the time. This was one of those times when Gideon refused to follow his own father’s example of wielding a leather strap on his son’s bared back.

  Tears springing into her eyes, Rebekah said, “Hannah told me . . .” She looked an appeal at the Englisch woman. “What was it you said?”

  “It was a quote from Proverbs.” In a gentle voice, she said, “ ‘A soft answer turns away wrath, But a harsh word stirs up anger.’ I’ve always found that to be true.”

  Surprised that she’d turned to the Bible, although he didn’t know why as it wasn’t the first time she’d done so, Gideon only nodded. “Ja, I, too, have found it so.” He was ashamed to have erupted in anger a couple of times after Leah’s death, his grief eroding his self-control. That anger, as much as grief and bewilderment, played a part in setting him and his kinder apart from their brethren. Now, he was able to continue calmly, “And nobody likes to be called names. Did these girls tell you what they’d heard to your face? Or were they gossiping and didn’t mean you to overhear?”

  “Half the
students were out sick today,” Hannah put it. “The group was small.”

  “They saw us,” Rebekah said. “And they were talking loud.”

  Gideon nodded meaninglessly. Dread filled his chest until he felt as if he might be sick, too. But avoiding a problem never did any good.

  “What was it that these girls said?” he asked.

  Zeb and Rebekah exchanged a glance, the squabbling between them set aside.

  Rebekah answered. “I heard Bernice telling her friends that our mamm was running away from us when she was killed. That she was going and wouldn’t come back, and she was always at the bottle.” Her tone suggested she didn’t know what that meant, but it was obvious from Zeb’s fierce scowl that he did.

  “And Zillah told Yonnie that mammi was in the car with a man.” Zeb threw his pencil across the room. “And he was Englisch!”

  Gideon closed his eyes. He didn’t bother asking himself how such stories had reached their settlement in Missouri from so far away. The Amish were noted correspondents. All it would have taken was for one of the local women, writing to a cousin or friend, to mention that a Gideon Lantz and his two kinder had moved from New York to join their church district not that long ago. The surprise was that this hadn’t happened sooner.

  He liked his neighbors and sisters and brothers in the church. He called several men friends. But if two of the girls at school were talking, that made it likely these hateful stories had already spread locally. Why had no one come to him? Although, with the exception of Jake Miller, whose boy was in his first year, none of Gideon’s closest friends had kinder of school age and might well not have heard this talk.

  Had somebody in his old settlement actually written such vicious untruths? Or did the recipient enjoy adding nasty detail to an already hurtful truth?

  And what was he to say to Zeb and Rebekah? They had been so young when their mother was killed in a car accident, he hadn’t told them everything. They didn’t need to know more than the basics. He’d believed he didn’t need to find out whether his own wife had been drinking alcohol. He wouldn’t permit himself to doubt her. Now, he thought maybe he should have agreed to allow the authorities to check her blood-alcohol level, too. If nothing else, that might have silenced some of the most poisonous talk.