The Amish Midwife's Hope

by Barbara Cameron

  The afternoon sped by quickly. The closer it got to Christmas, the more the sewing projects the women made were gifts. It was hard to get them done at home when a mann or a kind could walk into a room unexpectedly. Rebecca found herself smiling when she remembered the story Samuel had told her about his mudder trying to find out what his dat was making for her.

  Today Lovina was sewing a new Sunday shirt for her mann. Lillian finished up a warm flannel nightgown for her oldest dochder. And Katie Ann tried on a beautiful midnight-blue dress she’d been working on and had their mudder help her pin the hem to the right length.

  Katie Ann glanced over as Miriam knelt with her pincushion, and though her eyes gleamed with mischief, she didn’t tease Rebecca again about who the dress she was hemming was intended for.

  As much as she usually enjoyed the sewing circle, Rebecca felt relief when the afternoon was over and she said goodbye to her guests.

  “You’re schur you don’t mind me leaving you and Mamm to wash up?” Katie Ann asked as she moved toward the door.

  “Nee, you go on.”

  “I think you want to take off, too,” her mudder said as she filled the sink with water and added dish detergent.

  “I don’t have a date like Katie Ann.”

  “It’s not hard to guess you’re worried about Leah.”

  Rebecca nodded. “I’m going to go by later to see her.”

  “Why don’t you just go now? I can finish up here.”

  “It’s allrecht. I wanted to talk to you anyway.” She watched her mudder begin washing cups. “Mamm, remember when I told you I miscarried?”

  She nodded. “It was such a sad time.”

  “I remember you told me that you had miscarried twice but still went on to have a big familye.”

  Miriam rinsed a cup and gave it to Rebecca to dry.

  “It helped to hear that.” She put the dry cup in the cupboard.

  “We’re not usually alone in having troubling times.”

  “I know.” She took another cup and dried it. “But women don’t often talk about miscarrying a boppli, and that makes it hard for a woman to not feel alone and unsupported in their loss.” She fell silent for a long moment. “I remember how you didn’t tell me that sometimes when it happens it means there was something wrong with the boppli. You didn’t try to make me feel better by saying God would send me another boppli.”

  “Because no one can promise that.”

  “True.” She sighed as she dried and stored the last cup. “What I remember the most was that you sat and listened.” She leaned her head on her mudder’s shoulder. “That’s what helped the most. You just sat and listened to me when I needed it.”

  She lifted her head and smiled at her mudder. “I need to go visit someone. See if I can sit with her and listen.”

  Miriam pulled the plug and let the water drain. “I’ll say a prayer for her.”

  Minutes later Rebecca hitched the buggy and set off to see her freund. When she got there, she knocked at the kitchen door, then opened it. “Leah?”

  No one answered. She bit her lip. Maybe Leah had actually gotten out of the house and gone somewhere today. Maybe she was worrying for nothing. She turned, went down the stairs, and walked out to the barn. When she opened the doors, she was surprised to see Mark, Leah’s mann, sitting on a bale of hay repairing a harness.

  She greeted him before saying, “I was looking for Leah.”

  “She’s in the house.”

  Rebecca shook her head. “I knocked and called.”

  “Go on up to her sewing room. She’s been spending a lot of time in there lately.”

  Was she working on Christmas surprises? Rebecca wondered.

  But when she returned to the house, climbed the stairs, and walked into the sewing room, the blinds were drawn and it was dim. Leah sat on a chair in the corner, her hands lying motionless in her lap.

  “Leah? Are you allrecht?”

  “I’m sorry, Rebecca. I’m not up for company.”

  Rebecca opened the blinds and drew up a chair. She sat and reached for her hand. “Talk to me. I want to help you.”

  * * *

  Samuel took a break from working on the latest orders for the furniture store and headed inside for lunch.

  The walk from the barn to the house was short but long enough to thoroughly chill him. He brewed a fresh cup of coffee and pulled ham and cheese from the refrigerator to make himself a sandwich. There was only about a fourth of a loaf of bread in the bread box. Hannah kept him supplied with fresh bread, but he needed to pick up a loaf or two at the store. With her delivery date approaching in the next few weeks, he really needed to not be dependent on her for it. She had enough on her hands.

  The kitchen door opened and Hannah stepped inside.

  He turned and smiled at her. “I was just thinking about you.”

  She eyed the loaf in his hands. “I can guess why.” She handed him the basket she was carrying. “Two loaves. Stick one in the freezer.”

  “Danki.” He set the basket on the table, helped her take off her coat, and hung it on a peg by the door.

  She sniffed the air as she took off her bonnet and handed it to him. “I miss coffee.”

  “Sit. I’ll fix you a cup of tea.”

  “It’s just not the same.” She sighed. “I made Levi promise he’ll see that I get a cup the moment I give birth.”

  Samuel chuckled and then frowned. “You’re looking a little pale. You allrecht?”

  She promptly burst into tears.

  He patted her shoulder. “Hanny? What’s wrong?” he asked, using the nickname he’d called her when they were children.

  “Levi has to go back home,” she wailed, reaching for a paper napkin on the table and wiping her eyes. “His mudder is very ill.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “He won’t let me go. Says…says I’m too far along.”

  She swayed, and he grabbed her and pushed her into a chair. “Hannah? What’s the matter?”

  “Dizzy. Just got dizzy for a minute.”

  He could hardly tell her to put her head down between her knees with her enormous stomach in the way. “Should I call Rebecca?”

  She shook her head. “I’m fine. Don’t fuss. I’m just upset, and I’ve been rushing around this morning helping Levi pack.”

  “Let me get that tea.”

  As he set the kettle on to boil he watched her uneasily. She’d been pale when she walked in and now there was even less color in her cheeks.

  “I’m just upset,” she told him again. “Levi doesn’t want to leave me, but I insisted. He’s afraid I’ll deliver while he’s gone, but this is more important. His mudder is very ill.”

  “You know I’ll help you with whatever you need.” But he couldn’t help praying Levi would return before she delivered.

  “I told him that.” She sighed. “Oh, I’m just wondering now why we had to move here. If we were still in Indiana, we’d all be together. I could be helping with his mudder.” She made a soft kind of hiccupping sound and shook her head.

  The teakettle whistled. Samuel rose, poured hot water into a mug, and dunked one of her favorite tea bags in it. He set the mug before her, fetched a carton of milk, and pulled on his jacket.

  “I’m going to unhitch Brownie and put him in the barn to stay warm.”

  “But I was just about to go.”

  “Nee,” he said firmly. “You’re going to have some tea and calm down.”

  It was a sign that she was upset that she stayed where she was, stirring the tea around and around with a spoon.

  “You sound like Mamm,” she complained. “She used to act like tea would fix everything.”

  “Or chicken soup.”

  Hannah gave him a watery smile. “Her soup does heal.” She gazed off into the distance for a long moment. “I wish I’d thought to make some and send it with Levi for his mudder.”

  “When does he leave?”

  “He’s already gone.” She sipped
her tea. “She wasn’t the easiest woman to get along with when we were living near each other, but I feel terrible that I couldn’t go with Levi.”

  He made a sympathetic sound. “I’ll be right back.”

  He made quick work of unhitching the buggy and putting Brownie in the barn. When he returned, Hannah was still sitting there sipping her tea.

  “I was about to have a sandwich. Can I fix you one?”

  “I’m not hungerich.”

  “Have you eaten today?”

  She shook her head. “Too upset. We got the call as I was getting Jacob off to schul.”

  This was one thing he could do. “You need to eat for the boppli.” He put together two sandwiches, added a pile of potato chips to each plate, and served them. Then he sat and joined her.

  She had less appetite than usual, but at least she ate most of her sandwich and a few of her chips.

  “Why don’t you lie down for a while and I’ll get the kinner from schul? Rebecca is coming for supper. The two of you can join us.”

  “I’m schur you and Rebecca don’t want me to be a third wheel—”

  “It’s not an intimate dinner for two, Hannah. Lizzie will be eating with us. C’mon, it’ll do you gut to have a night off from cooking and not sit in the house feeling lonely without Levi.”

  “I’ve been alone before, Samuel. Remember Jacob and I were here for weeks before Levi joined us.”

  “And you weren’t as far along with your pregnancy as you are now. Besides, you don’t have to be alone tonight. And Lizzie will enjoy having Jacob here.”

  She threw up her hands. “Fine. Enough.”

  “So go lie down. Take a nap. You look tired.”

  “You’re exhausting,” she muttered as she got up. “Just like you were when you were a kind.”

  He grinned. “And you’re just as stubborn. I’ll be in the barn working if you need me.”

  Relieved that she seemed less upset, he cleared the table, pulled on his jacket, and went back out to work in the barn.

  It must have been the talk of Hannah lying down that did it. Samuel suddenly had an idea of what he could make for Rebecca for Christmas. Well, one of the gifts anyway.

  It wouldn’t do for family and friends to know what it was he wanted to make. It wouldn’t do at all.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Rebecca bundled up and trudged through the snow to check the mail a few days later.

  She found the usual sales circulars, some bills, and a stack of what looked like Christmas cards. Carrying the pile back inside, she shed her outerwear, fixed a cup of tea, and took the mail into the living room to read before the fire. The Christmas cards gave her a pang of guilt. She hadn’t had time to address and send any.

  One that was postmarked Goshen, Indiana, drew her attention first. She drew the card out. It had a painting of the Nativity. There was a mark near the Baby Jesus that looked like a drop of water had wet the card. When she opened it, a letter fell out. It was from Emma.

  I’m sorry I didn’t write you the first day I arrived, she wrote. I was exhausted from the bus ride and had a bit of a cold. My freund welcomed me, and I have a nice room at her house. I met the midwife you told me to look up, and she said the boppli and I are doing well. Danki, Rebecca. I don’t know what I would have done if I couldn’t talk to you. I’ll write you soon. Have a merry Christmas. All my best, Emma.

  Rebecca couldn’t imagine a more difficult time to be away from family than Christmas. But Emma had felt she couldn’t tell her parents about her pregnancy, so perhaps it was best that she’d gone to be with someone who would support her.

  She sighed. Emma faced a difficult time in the months ahead—especially since she’d chosen to raise the boppli alone.

  Rebecca folded the letter and slipped it into her apron pocket. The card would join others on the mantel, but the letter needed to be torn up and thrown away to keep Emma’s secret.

  The other cards were from her schweschder who’d moved to Indiana with her mann and some of the midwives around the country that she wrote to during the year. She rose and set the cards amidst the greenery on the mantel, took the envelopes into the kitchen, and set them and the box of cards she’d bought on the table. She’d address them after supper.

  But first she was going to start on Samuel’s shirt. She’d dug out a pattern for a man’s shirt from her sewing basket and was grateful she hadn’t gotten rid of it after Amos died. She pinned the pattern to the fabric and decided to add two inches to each piece to accommodate Samuel’s more muscular build. It was a week of firsts: the first dress she’d sew for her new dochder and the first shirt she’d sew for a new mann.

  The thought made her heart beat a little faster as she cut. She took the pieces up to her sewing room and used the treadle machine to begin putting the shirt together. If she didn’t get interrupted by a call for a delivery, she had a gut chance of getting most of it done today.

  She sang a hymn as she worked and the shirt went together quickly. She’d always enjoyed sewing and knitting clothing for herself and Amos. Since he’d been gone and more of the chores of caring for the house fell to her, she hadn’t had a chance to sew as much. Now that she thought about it, she wished she’d bought fabric to make herself a new dress for the holidays. She shrugged. If she found the time and there was money in the month’s budget, perhaps she’d go into town and look for some new fabric.

  Two hours later, hunger drove her downstairs to find something to eat for supper. She’d eaten many a solitary meal after Amos had died, but ever since she’d enjoyed meals with Samuel and Lizzie, it felt too quiet, too lonely eating alone. She smiled ruefully. She’d gotten spoiled. Alone had never meant lonely to her, but tonight she felt a little lonely for Samuel and Lizzie.

  Suddenly harvest season seemed so very far away…

  Schur, an occasional wedding took place after harvest from October to early March here, but that would have felt like rushing into things and she hadn’t felt comfortable with that. Marriage was forever.

  It was a gut night to have a soup-and-sandwich supper. She warmed soup made from the last tomatoes from her garden and remembered picking them plump and ripe from the vine this past summer. It was a nice memory on a night when a bad snowstorm had everyone tucked in for the night. She made a grilled cheese sandwich and sat down, feeling grateful for a simple, comforting supper while a cold wind blew snow against the kitchen window.

  She was washing the few dishes when her cellphone rang.

  “Rebecca? It’s Hannah. My water broke, and I’m having contractions. They’re five minutes apart.”

  She was two weeks early but that wasn’t unusual. “I’ll leave now.”

  “I’m sorry to get you out on such a night.”

  “Don’t think anything of it. Bopplin come when they want. I’ll head out now.”

  “I called Samuel. He said he’s picking you up.”

  “Oh, he didn’t have to do that.”

  “You’re on the way, and besides, he’s concerned about how bad the storm is getting.”

  “Then I’d better get my things and be ready when he gets here. Try to relax, allrecht?”

  Rebecca disconnected the call, pulled on her coat and bonnet, and was ready with her medical bag when Samuel arrived.

  “I appreciate you stopping by for me,” she said as she climbed into the buggy.

  “No problem,” he said, handing her a buggy blanket to tuck around her legs. “No point getting two horses out in weather like this. I guess we should be grateful that we weren’t called out in the middle of the night.”

  “I’ve had that happen in weather like this,” she told him. “It’s part of the job.”

  Lizzie popped up in the back seat. “Hi, Rebecca!”

  “Lizzie!”

  “I couldn’t leave her home alone,” Samuel explained. “I told her she’s to go straight to bed when we get to her Aenti Hannah’s.”

  “But I want to see the new boppli!”

  �
��They don’t come right away,” Rebecca explained. “Sometimes it takes hours. I promise we’ll wake you when it’s here.”

  “Promise?”

  “Promise.”

  Rebecca tensed when a car suddenly zoomed around them and swerved back into the lane in front of them, skidding before gaining control on the icy road. The backwash of air rocked the buggy, but Willow plodded on without shying.

  “Oh my!” she breathed in alarm.

  Samuel nodded. “Going too fast and likely didn’t see us until they were upon us.”

  “Daedi?” Lizzie’s voice quavered.

  “We’re allrecht,” he said in a soothing tone. “Sit down. We’re almost there.”

  A few minutes later, Samuel dropped them off at Hannah’s kitchen door, then drove the buggy on to the barn so he could unhitch the horse and put it in a stall.

  Rebecca and Lizzie hurried inside. Lizzie was carrying a tote bag that was stuffed with books and her baby doll. It looked heavy, but Lizzie insisted she didn’t need help.

  Hannah was sitting at the kitchen table, one hand pressed to her abdomen.

  “Jacob’s already in bed,” she told Lizzie as she held out her arms for a hug. “You go on up to the room you sleep in when you visit.”

  Lizzie nodded, took off her coat and bonnet and hung them on a peg. Then she climbed the steps, dragging the tote bag she’d brought.

  Hannah winced as a contraction swept over her. Rebecca glanced at the kitchen clock and noted the time as she took off her coat and bonnet.

  “They’re still about five minutes apart,” Hannah told her.

  “Let’s get you settled in bed.” Rebecca held out a hand to help her from the chair.

  “You need a crane,” Hannah said, shaking her head as she stood. “I’ll be glad when this is over. I feel big as a cow.”

  Rebecca chuckled. “You aren’t big as a cow. Kumm, let’s go welcome this boppli into the world.”

  * * *

  Samuel took his time unhitching the buggy and leading Willow into the barn.

  He couldn’t help it—he was feeling a little nervous about being present for the birth of Hannah’s boppli. It was bringing back the memory of that last night with Ruth. He pressed his face against Willow’s neck.