Huckleberry Hill

by Jennifer Beckstrand

Tears pooled in Rachel’s eyes. “And what am I supposed to do, clean toilets all day? How can you feel good about leaving me to do all the work?”

  One corner of Mammi’s mouth curled upward. “I think it would be wonderful gute to let Rachel tag along. You can all get to know each other better.”

  Rachel squealed in elation and threw her arms around Mammi. “You see? Anna wants me to go.”

  Moses fully expected Lia to protest. Instead, her creamy cheeks lost all their color, and she stared at Mammi with an undecipherable look in her eyes. “I’ll finish the bathroom tonight if I don’t get home too late.” She turned and plodded down the hall as if her best friend had abandoned her.

  Moses shook his head. “Mammi, I don’t think—”

  “Now, Moses, take her with you.” Mammi didn’t seem concerned at all. “It will be a very educational trip.”

  Rachel had not stopped talking since she climbed daintily into Moses’s buggy. “And I told him plain-as-day, I won’t marry you, John Petersheim. Just because I let him drive me home from gatherings did not mean I wanted to mar-ry-him. Dat said I could do better. Much better.”

  Moses didn’t even make an effort to listen to the steady stream of words coming from Rachel’s mouth. He hadn’t wanted her along in the first place. He shouldn’t have to pay her any attention.

  Lia sat like a statue in the backseat of the buggy clutching Sarah’s book to her chest like a security blanket. Moses glanced at her periodically, but she kept her posture stiff and fixed her eyes on the road ahead as if she were trying to be invisible.

  “The boys who ask me to marry them do such a shoddy job of it. Clemens asked me on the day of my aunt’s fun-er-al. Paul got down on one knee and sang me a song he wrote himself. He didn’t have the voice for it.”

  Moses jiggled the reins to pick up the horse’s pace. He couldn’t stand much more of this chatter. Right now, he wished he were Paul or Clemens, whoever they were, blessedly living their lives free of Rachel Shetler.

  The directions Sarah had given Moses took them four miles out of Bonduel where they turned onto a dirt road marked by a red piece of yarn tied to a weathered fence post. The road skirted an orchard that turned into a forest of pines on a seldom-traveled path to a cabin made of rough-hewn logs with a tin roof.

  Moses secured the reins and turned to look at Lia. For the first time since she got into the buggy, Moses saw an honest emotion, as excitement intermingled with anxiety on her face. She gazed at the book in her hands as if seeing it for the first time. “I shouldn’t have brought this. Can I leave it here?”

  Moses nodded and offered his hand to help her from the buggy. She waved it away. “You’ll want to help Rachel, no doubt.”

  He would? Lia was always so mindful of her sister, but Moses couldn’t muster that level of consideration.

  As Moses expected, Rachel sat in her seat as if frozen in place until Moses came around to her side and gave her his hand.

  “Oh, thank you. My foot still aches something awful.”

  Filtered light peeked from between the trees and danced along the walls of the cabin. A rusty plow grown over with weeds rested against the rough-hewn log walls, and an unruly bush with tiny yellow flowers grew next to the door with branches stretching several feet in every direction along the ground. A hundred feet behind the cabin stood an outhouse with deep green ivy spreading its tentacles up one side.

  Lia trudged to the cabin, hesitated while Moses and Rachel caught up to her, and knocked softly.

  A loud creak greeted them as Sarah opened the door. She looked Lia up and down as if deciding if she were healthy enough to enter. “Good, you’re here. Moses, you can come back to fetch her at noon.”

  Rachel stepped forward. Lia’s face turned pale, and she lowered her eyes. Moses wondered if she might be sick.

  “I’m here to help,” Rachel said.

  Sarah knitted her brows together and glanced at Moses. “Who are you?”

  “I’m Lia’s sister Rachel. I want to help deliver the baby too.”

  “Do you know anything about birthing babies?”

  “Jah, a bit.”

  Moses could have sworn Lia held her breath.

  Sarah narrowed her eyes and frowned unapologetically. “Why did you bring this girl, Moses?”

  “Mammi wanted her to come.”

  Sarah’s hard expression gave way to puzzlement before her frown deepened, and she shook her head vigorously. “I don’t know you and Mattie don’t know you, and you are not setting foot in this house.”

  Moses smiled to himself. Rachel wouldn’t be able to walk all over Sarah like she had Mammi.

  Rachel pursed her lips and batted her lashes. “Anna said I should—”

  “I will speak with my mammi another day, but you are absolutely not allowed in here.” Sarah took Lia by the shoulders and guided her into the cabin.

  Moses heard Lia breathe a pent-up sigh as she relaxed and went eagerly in.

  Rachel balled her hands into fists and stomped her foot. “Lia is my sister. I should be able to come in if I want.”

  Sarah propped her hand on her hip and eyed Rachel. “I’m sorry you came all the way out here.” She shut the door more quickly than Moses could say “oy anyhow.”

  Rachel stomped her foot again and crushed one of the dainty yellow flowers at her feet. Growling, she turned on her heels and marched to the buggy, showing no signs of her critical injury of the day before. She deftly pounced into the buggy and sat with her arms folded tightly across her chest glaring at the front door of the cabin.

  Moses chuckled quietly. He adored his cousin Sarah.

  He hauled himself into the buggy, took up the reins, and prodded the horse forward. The trip back to Huckleberry Hill would be more pleasant, only because he would be getting rid of Rachel at the end of it.

  Rachel still held her arms clamped around her waist as she turned up her pretty little nose. “Can you believe how she treated me? I can guess she sleeps through church services instead of learning how to do unto others as she would have done unto her.”

  Moses didn’t feel a bit sorry for her. “Lia warned you.”

  “What does Lia know? She didn’t want me to come, that’s all. Did you see how smug she looked when Sarah slammed the door in my face? Dat is going to give Lia what for. She is supposed to watch out for me.”

  “She was watching out for you. She knew if you came that you’d be embarrassed when Sarah said no.”

  “Whose side are you on? Do I look like I’m embarrassed? I’m not embarrassed. I’m irritated.”

  Moses knew there was no point arguing with her, but if she made it out to her father to be worse than it was, he might not let Lia stay for the rest of the summer. Could he think of anything to say to appease her?

  “I would have worried if you had stayed. You are so delicate, I’m afraid of how the experience might have frightened you.” A more apt description for Rachel would be touchy or high-strung or downright cranky, but Moses wasn’t going to say that.

  Rachel studied Moses’s face, and he could tell she was deciding how to react.

  He smiled sympathetically.

  She cracked a weak grin that soon bloomed into a full-fledged smile. “Thank you for caring about my well-being.”

  Moses hadn’t forgotten that Rachel expected to marry him, and he hadn’t had the chance to set her straight. But he could have that conversation with her another time. Right now, she must be placated so Lia wouldn’t feel the brunt of her father’s disapproval.

  Rachel relaxed her back against the seat and seemed to notice her surroundings for the first time. “The woods are pretty. This would be a fine place for a picnic.”

  “Jah, and I saw a little stream flowing near the path where we came in.”

  Rachel took in her breath sharply. “I know why Anna wanted me to come with you. She didn’t mean for me to help with the baby at all.” Rachel smiled as if she knew a terrific secret.

  Moses’s heart sank. He kne
w precisely what she thought the secret was, and he wouldn’t spend a minute more with Rachel than he had to. Mammi made it plain that she wanted Moses to marry Lia, not Rachel. She wouldn’t think of suggesting that Rachel come along so they could spend time together. Would she? Had Mammi changed her mind about which Shetler girl she wanted Moses to marry?

  Well, if he married any Shetler girl, it would not be Rachel.

  Any man would be a fool not to choose Lia, with her eyes as rich as melted chocolate and a certain curve of her lips that took his breath away. Moses rubbed his thumb and index finger together as he thought of caressing Lia’s silky cheek.

  He tightened his fingers around the reins and sat up straight.

  Barbara, not Lia, was the girl he wanted.

  “What should we do while we wait for Lia?” Rachel said.

  “I’ll take you back to Huckleberry Hill.”

  Rachel leaned toward Moses. “Oh, Anna doesn’t expect either of us back for hours.”

  Moses ground his teeth together in an effort to keep from growling like a bear. He was taking her straight home, no debate. “I really need to get back to the factory.”

  “The factory? I would love to see your factory. Is it far from here?”

  “Pretty far.”

  Rachel clapped her hands. “You must take me. I want to see how you make cheese.”

  Moses reluctantly considered her request. He and Adam had started a batch of cheese that morning. It would be about time to separate the curds. They could always use another pair of hands. Studying Rachel out of the corner of his eye, he had a feeling she’d be useless, but maybe she would decide cheese wasn’t all that exciting and make up her mind that she didn’t want to marry him after all.

  “We could separate curds.”

  “Is it hard?”

  “My ten-year-old cousin can do it.”

  Rachel playfully twirled an errant lock of hair with her finger. “I want to know everything about you, and if I can be of service to you by learning to make cheese, then I would be so happy.”

  They arrived just in time. Moses’s cousin, Adam, met them at the back door. “Good thing you come when you did, Moses. Lonnie went home sick, and we only just transferred the curds to the curd sink.”

  Moses led Rachel to the small hand-washing station where they both scrubbed their hands thoroughly.

  Adam, his wife Rose, and Moses’s cousin, Alfy, stood at the curd sink up to their elbows in curds and whey. All three eyed Rachel curiously, and Alfy couldn’t seem to take his eyes off her. Alfy, at eighteen, was the right age to be taken in by a pretty face.

  They stirred and sifted the curds around and around, making certain that the fresh curds didn’t form into clumps and breaking up the curds that wanted to stick together. It took a good deal of arm strength, and Moses always felt as if he’d run a mile or two by the time all the curds were pressed into molds.

  “Am I supposed to stick my hands in?” Rachel asked. “Without gloves?”

  Adam motioned to the shelf. “In that box, if you want.”

  Rachel went to the shelf and glanced doubtfully at Moses before pulling every glove out of the box on the top shelf.

  “They’re all the same size,” Moses said.

  “Smaller sizes on the next shelf down,” Adam added.

  “Oh, I didn’t see those.” Rachel stuffed the gloves back into the box as best she could. Three or four gloves fell onto the floor.

  She took five minutes trying on three different sizes of gloves before finding the perfect fit. After being properly equipped, she sidled next to Moses and eyed him doubtfully. “Should I put my hands in now?”

  “Jah, move the curds around like this so they don’t clump.”

  Rachel stuck her hands in an inch from the top of her gloves.

  Moses plunged his hands and arms into the mix to show her how to do it. “You have to go deeper or you won’t get enough leverage to move the curds around.”

  Rachel disregarded his advice and basically smoothed over the top of the curds like she was frosting a cake. Moses didn’t try to correct her again. He hadn’t planned on her being much help anyway.

  Adam watched Rachel’s feeble attempts and raised an eyebrow to Moses before lowering his head and attending to his work.

  After barely a minute, Rachel wiped her brow with her forearm. “My muscles feel like they are burning. How long does this take?”

  “A few minutes. We have to mix in the salt and let the whey drain out before we put it into the hoops.”

  After what must have been three grueling minutes, Rachel began breathing heavily. She rested one hand on the edge of the sink while working the other hand more and more slowly through the curds. “No wonder you have such big muscles, Moses. This is heavy work.”

  Finally, with a sigh, she rested both elbows on the edge of the sink. “My arms are shaking. I can’t move them far enough to do it anymore.”

  Moses pointed to a chair in the corner. “You can sit over there if you want.”

  She smiled weakly and snapped her gloves off with haste. “I’m sorry I can’t help you finish, but you know how delicate I am.” She ambled to the chair, limping slightly. Moses gritted his teeth. Yesterday’s injury must be flaring up.

  He forced his mind back to his work. It wasn’t Christian to think harshly of Rachel. As Lia’s sister, she deserved his kindness, not his judgment. But right or not, he sincerely dreaded having to drive her home.

  Rachel perched expectantly on her chair looking out the window until the cheese sat in the molds and Moses felt comfortable leaving Adam and Alfy to press.

  Moses rinsed his hands in the sink and got Rachel’s attention. “Cum. I will take you back to Mammi’s.”

  Rachel walked toward him, smoothing her hand along the stainless steel sink as she came. “Will you show me the rest of your factory? We haven’t spent near enough time together.”

  Nope. He’d put up with enough for one day. “Another time. I have to get Lia at noon.”

  Wrong thing to say. “I’ll go with you. I’ll have to clean the toilet if I go back to Huckleberry Hill.”

  Moses knew he would have to put his foot down or Rachel might arrange things so he’d be stuck with her the rest of the day. She was clever that way.

  “What a nice surprise for Lia if the toilet was clean when she came home. I know how kindhearted you are to your sister.”

  Rachel bit her bottom lip, and Moses could see the wheels turning in her head. “Thank you for noticing. I would never sing my own praises.”

  What a blessing that Huckleberry Hill was only fifteen minutes from the cheese factory! By the time he turned the buggy up the hill, Moses swore he would never let Mammi talk him into such an outing again. Rachel loved to hear the sound of her own voice, and she seemed intent on listing every one of her good qualities in case they weren’t evident to Moses. He didn’t want to hear it anymore.

  When the buggy finally crested the hill and the house came in sight, Moses didn’t unhitch the horse. Jumping out of the buggy, he motioned for Rachel to slide out. Her hands lingered on his arms as he helped her down. They walked to the porch with Rachel nearly glued to his side.

  Moses stood on the welcome mat that Mammi had knitted out of double-thickness yarn. “Rachel, I must tell you something.”

  Rachel’s eyes sparkled in anticipation as she stepped close enough to be kissed. She lifted her face to his and smiled shyly.

  He took a giant step backward and found himself up against the door. “I’ve already told Lia. I am not looking to marry.”

  To his surprise, Rachel widened her smile and took a step closer. He was trapped between her and the front door. Luckily, she wouldn’t be able to kiss him unless he bent over. He squared his shoulders so he stood taller.

  “I know what you told Lia,” Rachel said. “We can let her go on believing whatever you want her to believe, but there is no point sparing her feelings. She’s already accepted the fact that she won’t marry.�
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  Moses tried not to let his eyes pop out of his head in surprise. “You misunderstand me. I am not ready to get married—”

  “I’ll be patient.” She clasped her hands together behind her back. “But remember, I’ll only be here until September, and there is plenty of competition back home. You will want to make your intentions known sooner than later. And Lia won’t mind at all. Dat gave her specific instructions about her responsibilities while we are here on Huckleberry Hill.”

  Moses slid to his left, scooted away from the door, and put some space between them. He didn’t want to be rude, or he would have come right out and told her that the thought of marrying her sent him into a full panic. “Rachel, I do not want to marry you.”

  Surprise flashed in her eyes only to be replaced by amusement. “You can keep me guessing if you want. I do that with boys all the time.” She got on her tiptoes as if trying to be as close as possible to him. “But don’t make me wait too long, or I might get bored and refuse to have you.”

  “I don’t want to marry you.”

  Rachel grinned, raised her eyebrows, and slipped into the house before Moses could say another word. He stood looking stupidly at the door. And Lia thought he was arrogant?

  Lia followed Sarah into the small cabin. The knobbly wooden floor creaked under her feet. To her right, a water pump stuck right up through the floor and drained into a white plastic basin that served as a sink. Shelves against the wall were lined with cans and bottles of every kind of food. A cookstove stood in the corner with a pot of water bubbling on top.

  A double bed covered with a gray blanket stood at the other end of the room. The girl in the bed, with her lips pressed together in pain, looked younger than Rachel. Another woman, probably the girl’s mother, pressed her fists into the girl’s back as the girl panted feverishly.

  Sarah held Lia’s gaze for a second before grabbing her arm and pulling her forward. “This is Lia. She has come to help with the baby.”

  Expressionless, the mother eyed Lia while keeping up her pressure on the girl’s back.

  Sarah gave Lia another pointed look. Lia knew without having to be told that she must appear completely comfortable and confident in front of these women. Any hesitation or uncertainty she showed would make both mother and daughter uneasy.