by Jan Drexler
Bethany met his gaze over Rose’s head and he tried to give her a reassuring smile. “Mari will get better soon. You know how fevers are in children—they come and go so quickly.”
He glanced at his daughter’s face again. She had to get better soon. He tried not to think about how dangerous a child’s fever could be, and how quickly she could be taken from them.
* * *
Bethany didn’t think she would sleep at all when she lay on her bed. The room was warm, but a breeze had come up and blown through the house.
Mari was sick, but how sick? Rose was clearly worried, and that made Bethany worry. Would they know when it was time to call the doctor?
She woke when her door slammed shut in the rapidly rising wind. She closed her windows against the black sky just as a lightning bolt flashed against the rolling clouds. When she opened her door, Andrew was coming up the stairway.
“I closed all the windows downstairs, but this is a bad storm. I think we had better go to the cellar.”
“What about Mari?”
Andrew ushered her into Mari’s room, where Rose was closing her windows, too. “You two get anything Mari needs and go down to the cellar. I’ll carry her downstairs.” He flinched as a crack of thunder sounded almost overhead.
Rose gathered blankets and started down the stairway while Bethany found Mari’s favorite doll.
“Mamma—” Interrupted by a cough, Mari’s voice was hoarse. “I don’t like the storm.”
Bethany took a deep breath. She needed to help Mari stay calm. Sitting on the edge of Mari’s bed, she pushed the little girl’s damp hair off her forehead. “I know you don’t. But it won’t last long, and then you’ll be up and playing again.”
Another crack of thunder sounded just as Andrew came in the room. Mari grabbed Bethany’s hand as she moved to let Andrew pick up his daughter. “Don’t leave me alone.”
“We won’t, little one.” Bethany smiled as lightning flashed outside the window once more. “We’ll never leave you. We’re just going downstairs.”
Mari closed her eyes as Andrew lifted her into his arms. Bethany took Mari’s pillow and the doll and led the way down the staircase. By the time they reached the kitchen, hailstones pelted the windows. The noise was deafening as Bethany went out on the washing porch to the trapdoor leading to the cellar. Rose had left it propped open, and a light shone from the darkness below. Andrew carried Mari down the steep stairs, then Bethany followed, closing the door on the chaos outside as she went. The noise muted suddenly.
Andrew sat on a box with Mari on his lap. She was crying as he rocked back and forth, trying to comfort her. In her cries, Bethany heard her call “Mamma, Mamma” in a weak voice.
Bethany kneeled on the dirt floor and stroked Mari’s cheek. “I’m here, Mari.”
Mari shook her head and clung to Andrew, still sobbing.
Bethany looked at Andrew. The lamplight shone on his stricken face. He stared into the blackness of the far corner as if he was living in a nightmare and flinched with every crack of thunder.
Laying her hand on his knee, Bethany felt his leg quivering. She spoke softly. “Andrew, what is it?”
He turned toward her as if he had forgotten she was there. “This storm... Lily was killed in a storm like this. It came up suddenly, with lightning everywhere and thunder splitting the air...” He closed his eyes. “Lightning followed by the wall of dust.” He held Mari close as she cried, her voice hoarse. “She ran out to take care of the hens, to shut them in before the storm hit, but a bolt of lightning came out of nowhere, and she was gone.”
Sinking back, Bethany was helpless. As the storm forced Andrew to relive Lily’s death, he comforted Mari. What memories did the little girl have of that day? Did she understand that the thunder and lightning had caused her loss? Bethany wanted to comfort Andrew, but she felt like an intruder. An outsider witnessing something that was private, shared only by the man she was married to and his daughter.
The muffled sound of the storm outside lessened, so she went up the steps and lifted the trapdoor. A gentle rain was falling, following the first violent outburst that had passed on to the east. To the west, the clouds were darker, as if this rain was only a calm peace as the storm gathered itself for another blast. She propped open the door to let fresh air into the cellar and went back down the steps.
“It looks like another storm is coming, but it doesn’t look as severe as the last one.”
Andrew still held Mari, but her crying had stopped. “She’s so hot. Is her fever going up?”
Rose felt Mari’s arm, then her cheeks. “For sure, it has gone up.”
“We need to get her out of this damp cellar,” Andrew said. “But I don’t want to take her all the way to her room in case we need to come down here again.”
“We’ll make a bed for her on the kitchen table,” Rose said. She handed Bethany the pile of blankets she had brought from Mari’s room and from the closet at the top of the stairs. “She’ll be comfortable there, and it’s close to the cellar.”
Bethany followed Rose’s instructions, making a soft bed for the little girl. Andrew laid her down and Rose covered her with a sheet. Bethany tucked Mari’s doll in next to the sleeping girl. She was lying too still. Sleeping too deeply.
Rose felt Mari’s forehead. “We need to bring the fever down, but not too quickly. Look here.” She ran her finger along Mari’s brow. “She’s getting a rash. It looks like it might be measles.”
“Do I need to go for the doctor?” Andrew pumped cold water into a basin and put it near Mari’s head.
Rose wrung out a cloth in the water, then laid it on Mari’s forehead. “You can’t go if there’s another storm coming.”
“I can if Mari is sick.”
Rose dipped the cloth in the water again. “If it’s measles, then we’re already doing as much as we can.”
“But what if you’re wrong? What if it’s something even worse? I’d rather have the doctor look at her.”
Rose pressed her lips together. “Then go now, before the next storm comes.”
Andrew hesitated, his hand on Mari’s small body as if he was afraid to leave her. “If the storm gets bad again, will you be able to carry her down?”
Bethany nodded. “Don’t worry about us. We’ll head down to the cellar again if we need to.”
Andrew backed away from the table with reluctant steps, his eyes on Mari’s flushed face.
He glanced at Bethany. “You be careful, and don’t risk your safety or hers.”
“I could say the same to you. Be careful. You’ll borrow Daed’s buggy?”
Nodding, Andrew grabbed his hat and started toward the door. “I’ll be back as soon as I can.”
After the door slammed shut, Bethany put her hand where Andrew’s had been, holding on to Mari’s fragile life. What if he didn’t come home? What if the storm swallowed him up and he never came home again?
As Rose started bathing Mari’s forehead and cheeks again, Bethany glanced out the window. Rain still fell lightly, but in the west, dark clouds flashed with lightning. To her surprise, it was still afternoon. She felt like it was the middle of the night.
“You’re worried,” Rose said as she pumped fresh water into the basin.
“Aren’t you?” Bethany took a damp cloth from Rose and laid it on Mari’s hot chest. Her skin was covered with a red rash.
“For sure, I’m worried about Mari. And about Andrew.” Rose sighed. “But I also know that the outcome of this is in the Good Lord’s hands.”
“Andrew said that Mari’s illness could be worse than measles, but I can’t imagine anything worse.”
“Scarlet fever is much worse. But either one could be deadly.” Rose wrung out another cloth and laid in on Mari’s forehead. “If we can bring the fever down, then we have hope.”
“And if we don’t?�
�
Rose didn’t answer, and she didn’t meet Bethany’s eyes.
Chapter Thirteen
Jonah’s horse trotted patiently through the downpour, not even flicking his ears at the rumbles of thunder.
“That was some storm that passed through earlier, wasn’t it?” Jonah asked.
Andrew stared at the horse, willing him to trot faster. “For sure it was.”
“Did you get any damage at your place?”
“I didn’t take the time to look. Once Rose said that Mari needed the doctor, I went straight to your house.”
“And we’ll get to Shipshewana as quickly as we can. The doctor has an automobile, so the trip home will be much faster.”
Andrew rubbed his cold arms. The temperature had dropped when the storm came through, and now it was chilly. “I’m just worried about Mari. You didn’t see how still she was. She’s very sick.”
“Children get sick. You know that. If Rose had been too worried, she would have had us take Mari to the doctor to save time.” Jonah pulled the horse to a halt at the intersection with the state highway and looked both ways before turning onto the paved road. “Mari is in good hands. Rose knows what she’s doing.”
“I wish I could be as certain as you are. I can’t bear the thought of losing her.”
Jonah grunted. “One of the benefits of growing older is that you have more experience trusting the Good Lord to take care of the things that are beyond your reach. You do your best but leave the outcome to the Lord.”
Andrew whooshed out a breath. “Do you think He knows how much Mari means to me?”
“Not only that, but that little girl means even more to Him. You need to trust that no matter what the outcome of this illness is, God cares.”
The rain let up a little as the thunder faded in the distance.
“Do you think He cared when my Lily passed away?”
Jonah studied his face. “Is that what you’re worried about?”
Andrew nodded. “I just can’t believe that God cares when he let Lily die. Why should I trust Him to keep Mari from dying, too?”
The horse’s hooves beat against the pavement in a steady rhythm while Jonah stared ahead.
“When my wife passed away, I had similar thoughts. I was afraid for my children, thinking that they might be taken from me, too.” Jonah’s voice broke and he cleared his throat before going on. “But then I met a man from Millersburg whose wife is dying of cancer. She was bedridden and in much pain. Horrible pain. This man cared for her every need, but it was so hard for him to watch her suffer. He asked me why the Good Lord saw fit to prolong her agony. Why she didn’t die so she could be free of the pain that is part of every single hour of her day.”
“What did you tell him?”
“God’s ways are not ours. Sometimes death comes quickly, almost easily. A sudden accident, or an illness that strikes quickly. Sometimes death is drawn out and painful. We can’t choose, and we can’t know why God chooses the way He does.” Jonah pulled the horse to a stop at the intersection in the middle of town. They were in Shipshewana. He turned to the right and drove past the grain elevator. “But we can trust that God’s ways are right.”
“So it isn’t any use to pray for God to spare Mari?”
Jonah turned onto a side street and stopped in front of the doctor’s house and office. He turned to Andrew before they went in. “God tells us to pray, and the Lord Jesus showed us how to pray. So we must pray always. I don’t know how God uses our prayers, but He does.”
Andrew climbed out of the buggy, almost afraid to ask the next question. “What if God’s answer to our prayer is ‘no’?”
“Then we trust that it is the right answer. The best answer,” Jonah said as they walked up the gravel walk to the front door. “And when we face hard times and hard decisions, He is right beside us, facing them with us.”
Jonah knocked on the door.
Once Dr. Hoover heard why they had come, he grabbed his hat and bag.
On the way out the door, he turned to Andrew. “You’ll ride with me, won’t you? We’ll be there in about ten minutes.”
Leaving Jonah to drive the buggy home, Andrew got into the car. He had never ridden in an automobile before, but he found that it wasn’t much different than riding on a train. Even so, it was the longest ten minutes he had ever experienced.
When they reached the farm, the doctor strode ahead of Andrew into the house, ignoring Jenny’s barking. Mari was still on her makeshift bed on the kitchen table and Rose and Bethany were sponging her with wet cloths.
The doctor took Mari’s temperature and looked at the thermometer with a grunt. He used a tiny light to look into Mari’s eyes, ears and down her throat. He listened to her chest with a stethoscope. Then he examined the rash that had spread across her face and body while Andrew had been away.
He looked at Bethany. “It is definitely measles. How long has she been ill?”
“We noticed the fever today, but she has been out of sorts since yesterday or the day before. I thought she might be coming down with something, but I hoped it was only the heat.”
The doctor nodded. “That sounds about right. It takes about three days for the rash to show, so she was probably already ill on Friday.” He felt Mari’s shoulders and elbows, then uncovered her and did the same to her knees and feet. “How long has she been asleep like this?”
“All afternoon,” Rose said. “Her fever rose, and we couldn’t get her to wake up. That’s why we sent Andrew to get you.”
“You did the right thing.” The doctor put his equipment back in his bag but handed the thermometer to Bethany. “Now, Mother, you must take her temperature every hour, just like you saw me do. If it goes much above one hundred four degrees, send someone for me right away. It is right at that temperature now. Continue what you’ve been doing to reduce her fever and keep her comfortable. When she wakes up, give her some cool beef or chicken broth and let her drink as much water as she desires. You should begin to see some improvement in a day or two but keep her inside until the spots are gone.” He zipped up his bag. “And keep her from coming into contact with anyone who has never had the measles until then. We don’t want this to spread any further.”
Andrew met Bethany’s eyes and nodded. She had insisted that she keep Mari home from church yesterday, and he was glad he had listened to her.
As he walked with the doctor out to his car, the clouds were clearing away and the sun was setting in a wash of orange and pink.
“Thank you for coming. I know I need to pay you, but...”
The doctor grasped Andrew’s shoulder. “I know. No one has any money. You recently moved here from Iowa, didn’t you?”
“How did you know?”
Dr. Hoover chuckled. “I hear things. I was called to the Smith house a few days ago to look at their boy. He has measles, too. Mr. Smith was telling me how he gave you one of his dogs.”
“Do you really think Mari is going to be all right?”
“Don’t worry, son. As long as the fever stays down, she’ll be fine.”
“How can I pay you?”
The doctor rubbed his chin. “Folks have been paying me in food, since no one has cash, but our larder is about full. I need new posts on my porch, though. The old ones are about rotted through. Can you do that kind of carpentry work?”
“For sure I can. Will that be a fair trade, though?”
“I’m satisfied if you are.” The doctor shook Andrew’s hand. “Whenever you can get to it, but I’d like it done before the end of the summer.”
Andrew nodded. “It will be done before the end of the summer.”
He waved as the doctor drove away, and then leaned down to scratch Jenny’s ears. “Why didn’t you bark at him that time? Because you knew he was leaving?”
Jenny grinned at him, her tail wagging.
In spite of the doctor’s encouraging words, Mari’s fever remained high. Andrew had carried his daughter back to her own bedroom, and Bethany prepared to spend the night watching over her. She brought her rocking chair from her room and set the doctor’s thermometer on the small table beside the bed, along with a glass of water. The ever-present basin and towels were at her feet, ready for the constant bathing to keep Mari’s temperature from going too high.
Andrew came into Mari’s room with Bethany’s supper of cottage cheese and canned peaches in a bowl.
“Rose went to bed right after she finished her supper,” he said, sitting on the edge of Mari’s bed across from her. “She said to call her if you can’t stay awake.”
Bethany shook her head. “Rose will take her turn tomorrow while I sleep. She needs to get as much rest as she can.” Andrew’s face was sculpted with lines of worry. “You need to get some rest, too. Morning will be here before you know it.”
“I can’t sleep. Not until she wakes up. I don’t like to see her like this.”
“The doctor didn’t seem too worried.”
“He was worried enough.” He rubbed the back of his neck. “Have you taken her temperature? Is she all right?”
“I was going to take it at ten o’clock.” Bethany pointed to the clock she had set on the table next to the water glass. “She doesn’t feel any warmer to me, but I thought I’d check it every hour.”
Andrew sighed. “Hand me one of those towels. I can help you as long as I’m here.”
Bethany wrung out a fresh towel and handed it to him, then folded a second one and laid it across Mari’s forehead. She ate her supper, then sponged Mari’s chest and arms. The towels dried quickly in the heat from Mari’s body. She and Andrew worked together without talking. After the long and exhausting day, Bethany didn’t have the energy to do more than refresh the towels, one after another.
When the little alarm clock said ten, Bethany took the thermometer and shook the mercury down the way the doctor had shown her. Then she slipped the glass tube under Mari’s tongue and waited while the clock ticked. Andrew watched the mercury in the thermometer, as if it could tell him if Mari was well or not.