Jacob squeezed Cassie’s hand. “I’d prefer to return to my work here instead.”
“Chicago is home for you, ja?”
“Not anymore.”
“You are a hard worker, Jacob, and we’ve appreciated your contribution to dredging the Mill Race. And we’ve enjoyed getting to know your delightful daughter as well. I believe she’s stolen the heart of every woman in Homestead.”
Cassie stood up on her toes and grinned at the men, but Jacob’s stomach started to sink. They weren’t going to let him return to the Amanas.
Niklas turned to his wife. “Hilga, could you show Cassie one of our puzzles upstairs?”
Hilga stepped toward his daughter. “Certainly.”
As Cassie walked out of the room, Jacob clutched his hands in front of him. It felt as if his wrists were tied to the railroad tracks and he was about to beg this man to save his life. “I’d like to stay in the Amanas, Niklas. I’ve been faithful with my work here, and I will continue to do so.”
“Jacob…”
“My name is cleared,” he persisted. “Adam can tell you that the accusations were false.”
“The embezzlement charges no longer concern us.”
“I thought you needed someone to work on the dredge boat.”
“Right now we are most concerned about your friendship with Liesel Strauss.”
Jacob looked over at Adam, but the man wouldn’t meet his eye. Had the Elder told them about his stop at the jewelry store?
“I have treated Liesel like a sister.”
“You’ve been honorable, Jacob, and we commend you for it…but you must understand, it is our position to protect her and the others in our community. Many of us worry that if you stay much longer, you will take Liesel with you when you leave.”
“I wanted to speak with you about that….”
“There are better places for you and your daughter to live, Jacob. If you don’t want to go back to Chicago, perhaps it is time for you to travel on to Spokane.”
“I don’t want to leave the Amanas.”
Niklas ignored him. “We are asking you to leave right away, before you see Liesel again.”
“But…”
Niklas held out a small canvas bag. “We will give you your unearned wages for the remainder of the summer.”
Jacob stuck his hands in his pockets. “It’s not about the money.”
“Our Society exists because we have strict faith in God and in each other. We pray and work to keep evil at bay and those vices that tempt our young people to long for the world.”
“I’m not a vice, Niklas.”
“Perhaps not, but you will take Liesel out to the world with you.”
“I don’t want to take her away. I want to stay here.”
“It will never work,” Niklas interrupted, holding the money in front of Jacob’s face.
He didn’t take the bag. “You can’t pay me to leave.”
“There is no place for you to live in the Amanas.”
“No…but I could live over in Marengo or Iowa City. You can’t stop me from seeing her, Niklas.”
Niklas sighed. “I guess you will have to hear it directly from her.”
His heart sank. “Does Liesel want me to leave?”
Niklas pulled the money bag back to his chest. “She…”
The faint toll of a bell rang out in the distance, interrupting his words. The room grew quiet, and Jacob listened as Adam counted each successive ring. Two. Three. Four.
Adam reached for his coat and hustled toward the door.
“Hilga?” Niklas called out—but his wife was already there, Cassie beside her.
“What is wrong?” she asked.
“The emergency bells are ringing in Amana.” Niklas looked out at the dark clouds. “The river must be rising.”
Jacob pulled his slicker back over his arms. “How do you know they’re ringing in Amana?”
“Those are the only bells we can hear.”
Jacob kissed Cassie on the head again. “Can you stay with Mrs. Keller?”
She grabbed his arm. “The storm, Papa.”
“I’ll be all right.”
“You can’t go out in the storm.”
The tears on her face almost made him change his mind, but Liesel was in Amana. He had to go help her and the others. “Please, Papa.”
“Pray for us, Cassie,” he said. “God hears your prayers.”
Niklas stepped in front of him. “You’re not coming with us, Jacob.”
Jacob didn’t stop buttoning his slicker. “Yes, I am.”
“No—”
Jacob looked over at him. “How are you going to cross the river?”
“I—I don’t know.”
“I can get you across.”
A resigned look replaced the worry in Niklas’s eyes as the man thought for a moment and then waved him forward. “Come along.”
Her father was napping when Liesel crept out of the room and down the hallway to find a lantern. She could hear the Faber children playing in their room, but other than their laughter, the hall was quiet. The kerosene in her lantern was gone, and she didn’t want to risk going out in the storm to refill it at the general store. There were at least two other lanterns down in the sitting room filled with kerosene. No one would mind if she borrowed one until she could refill hers.
The bucket brigade hadn’t been able to get the water out of the Schmidts’ cellar, but they’d moved most of the stored food to a higher level. Now Emil and the other men were at the church—or at least they had been three hours ago when Emil brought food for her and her father.
As she stepped onto the first floor, her boot sank into the soaked rug. She jumped back onto the step and looked across the entryway in the dim light. Had someone left a window open, or was the water seeping through the bottom of the door?
Stepping onto the drenched floor, she crossed the room and snagged a lantern, but before rushing back to her father’s room, she lit the lantern and held it out toward the front door. Water trickled underneath the wood, pooling in the entryway.
Rushing into her father’s room, she grabbed several sheets and towels and stuffed them into the base of the doorway. Then she gathered a stack of the Society’s ledgers into her arms and hurried back upstairs. Thankfully, her father was still asleep, oblivious to the rising water. She set the books on the dresser and rushed back down the steps to rescue the Inspirations-Historie from the rising water.
She had stayed as far away as possible from the river, but now the river was coming to her.
The rowboat was exactly where Jacob remembered it. He pushed back the overgrowth and tugged the boat out by its rope handle. Below him the Iowa River spilled over her banks and rushed through the trees, toward Main Amana. The bridge at the river’s bend was submerged under the flooding.
Picking up a paddle from the grass, Jacob held it up to the eight men who’d ridden with him from Homestead. “Who wants to ride with me?”
Niklas slipped off his horse and handed the reins to the man next to him. “I will go.”
Adam got off his horse next. “Me as well.”
Another man started to dismount, but Jacob stopped him. “The boat can’t hold more than three of us.”
“Can it even hold three of us?” Niklas asked.
Jacob patted the wood. “We will hope.”
Adam pulled his hat closer to his eyes. “And we will pray.”
The four bells rang out again from across the river, pleading with their fellow brothers and sisters for help.
“Let’s hurry,” Niklas said. The men along the bank helped them carry the boat down to the river. The current raced past their feet, but the river wasn’t raging yet.
“Do you know how to swim, Niklas?”
The man shook his head, and Adam did the same. “If we capsize, you need to hang on to the side of the boat until we get back to shore.”
“You think we can make it across?” Adam asked.
“If we p
addle hard.” He handed Niklas a paddle. “Paddle with everything inside you.”
Adam’s lips were moving when Jacob handed Niklas the paddle. He hoped the man was praying for all of them.
Several Elders attempted to steady the bow of the boat in the current while they climbed aboard. When the Elders released the boat, Jacob lunged his oar into the swirling waters.
“Paddle!” he yelled, and Niklas’s oar thrust into the river on the other side of the boat. Rain doused Jacob’s head, water whipping into his face, as he tried to direct the boat across the river. Behind him, Adam pleaded with God in prayer, asking Him to shelter them and their families in this storm and praying for protection over their brotherhood on the other side of the river.
Niklas and Jacob paddled together in unison, and Adam dug his hands into the river to paddle against the current, trying to steer them toward the submerged bridge. The wind drove against them like Triton himself was conspiring to sink their boat. It may have seemed that the Greek gods were battling against them, but he could hear Adam praying to the one true God—the only one who could guide them safely to Amana.
Jacob plunged his oar into the water again, his arms burning and his lungs screaming for air. But he wouldn’t stop now. Over and over he and Niklas paddled until their boat crept over the flooded banks.
The current surged them forward now, through the trees. Jacob ducked under a branch and shoved the boat away from a gnarled trunk with his oar. Seconds later, the boat slipped out of the forest and into the valley.
Niklas gasped when he saw the swamped field in front of them. The river had turned the pastures and farmlands into a lake, the water already a good foot deep and rising. The current swept them steadily toward Amana, and as they drew closer to the village, the bottom of the boat skimmed across the mud.
“We should walk from here,” Niklas said, as he set his paddle in the boat. “Well done, Jacob.”
Jacob nodded his head as he stepped out of the boat. Water crept up to his knees, soaking through his trousers. The bells rang out again, and Niklas and Adam ran on ahead of him. Jacob hauled their boat up to a tree and tied the rope handle onto a sturdy branch.
Heaven and earth can be moved, but My Word is firm.
Barbara Heinemann, 1822
Chapter Thirty-Four
The water rose rapidly around Jacob’s ankles—it wouldn’t be long before it was too deep to wade through. A group of men passed him with leather buckets in hand, and Jacob saw the dredge boat captain leading the charge. As the other men ran past them, Michael stopped and clapped Jacob on the back. “A fine time for you to return.”
“Give me a job.”
“We’re moving the food and supplies out of the basements and trying to get our elderly up onto the higher floors.”
“It may be days before the water goes back down.”
Michael shook his head. “There are no other options.”
Jacob glanced up at the smaller village of East Amana, perched above the town. Perhaps they could get the elderly up there until the water subsided.
“If I could get a boat out here, I could take them to the edge of the village. Someone from East Amana could drive them up to their village.”
Michael glanced up at the village on the hillside. “Ja, but where are you going to get a boat?”
Jacob wiped the rain off his face. He could retrieve the rowboat at the edge of town, but they’d waste precious minutes getting it into town. A canoe would be faster—and easier—to push through the streets, and he knew exactly where to find one.
“Have you seen Emil Hahn?”
“Last I heard, he was with Albert and Lie…” Michael stopped himself before he finished saying her name, but the damage was done.
Jacob braced himself. “Where does Albert live?”
Michael pointed to a brick house on their left, and Jacob stepped back. “I’m going to find a boat.”
Michael nodded. “I’ll find a buggy to drive them up to East Amana.”
Jacob swung open the heavy door where Albert Strauss lived and trekked across the wet floor. Emil was spread across the settee, asleep.
Jacob pushed the man’s arm. “Wake up.”
Emil’s sleepy eyes grew wide when he saw Jacob. “What are you doing here?”
“Didn’t you hear the bells?”
“Of course I heard them.” Emil edged up on his elbows. “I was up all night battling the water.”
“I need your help.”
Emil rubbed his eyes and reached for his slicker. “What do you need?”
“your canoe.”
Emil left his coat on the hook, turning slowly instead. “Canoe?”
“This is not the time to play dumb, Emil.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about….”
“Your canoe, Emil. The one you secretly paddle up the Mill Race.”
Emil glanced toward the doorway like he was afraid someone was eavesdropping on their conversation. “We’re not supposed to have boats in Amana.”
“I know you have a canoe, Emil, and so do the men on the dredge boat. We need to borrow it to get some of your older people out of town.”
Emil lowered his voice. “The Elders will wonder where you got the boat…and who you saw on it.”
“I won’t tell anyone where I got the boat, but I already told one woman who I saw on it.”
The color drained from Emil’s face. “Liesel knows….”
Jacob nodded. “I thought she was with you that day.”
“I didn’t want to hurt her,” he said. “But I didn’t know how to tell her either.”
“You can talk to her later, Emil. Right now, we have to evacuate this town.”
The bells rang out again as Emil reached for his coat. “Follow me,” he said.
The ringing bells had awakened her father an hour ago, and Liesel couldn’t console him. The Elders were calling out to the other six villages for help, but instead of joining the other men in the streets, her father was fretting in his bed because his body wouldn’t cooperate. She didn’t know why the Elders were ringing the bells, but in this weather it would be hard for anyone to travel across the valley to assist them.
Even though it was still afternoon, the sun had long ago hidden behind the dark clouds, and her father was hungry, which made him all the grumpier. Emil had brought them breakfast early this morning, but she hadn’t seen him since. Her stomach rolled as she glanced out at the flooded lawn and streets of Amana that had turned into a maze of rivers. There was no way she was stepping outside.
As she listened to her father moan beside her, she chided herself for her childish fears. A good daughter would ignore the rain and retrieve dinner for her father. He needed his strength, and going without food would only exacerbate his weak condition.
If the rain didn’t subside—or if Emil didn’t return soon—she would have no choice but to go get some food.
She opened the book of testimonies and began to read to him, but the bells chimed out again. Why didn’t Emil or someone else come and tell them what was happening outside?
As the bells faded, her father slid to the side of the bed. “I will find out what is wrong.”
“You can’t, Vater.”
“I must go.”
He tried to step onto the floor, but his legs collapsed under him again, and she rushed to his side. He shook his head, angry at his weakness, and she didn’t have the words to comfort him. Albert Strauss had spent his life fighting against evil in their community and fighting for the good of those he loved. Today, however, his body was his greatest enemy.
She kissed his warm forehead as she helped him back into bed. “You must rest.”
“Rest will not come,” he said. “Not until I know what is happening.”
She looked back at the rain again. Der Struwwelpeter was only a silly collection of fairy tales, just as she’d told Cassie. The wind wouldn’t carry her away on a red umbrella, nor was she going to drown in a couple of inches
of water. She would pay attention to where she was going, and she would get her father some food. And she would find out why the Elders were ringing the bells.
The carpentry shop was located south of the village, by the Mill Race. In the cellar of the shop, Emil and Jacob pulled back a large canvas and carried the canoe upstairs. Emil steered the boat through the watery streets, and Jacob walked behind it, pushing it toward a stone house where an invalid couple lived.
Emil went inside the house and minutes later walked back outside with an elderly woman huddled under a black umbrella. Jacob helped the woman step into the canoe while Emil went back for the woman’s husband and a younger woman with a baby.
Together, Emil and Jacob sloshed through the water to guide the canoe east of town. Michael was waiting at the base of the hill along with a buggy and driver from East Amana. They helped the women, man, and baby into the buggy, and then Emil and Jacob went back into town. The task before them seemed daunting, but if the rain didn’t stop them, they would be able to get dozens of children and elderly out of town.
Emil knocked on another door, and they loaded the canoe again with three children and their grandparents. As they floated the canoe back to the east of town, Jacob looked over and saw another boat drifting toward them. Niklas and Adam were pushing the rowboat with three other people inside.
Jacob waved at them, and as the men waved back, hope rose within him. Together they could evacuate all those who needed to get to a safer place.
Women and older children waded through the high water beside them with loads of clothing tied to their backs. Men helped the children who were struggling to walk, carrying them on their shoulders until they got to dry ground. Then, instead of climbing to dry ground themselves, the men turned back to help others.
The railroad strike in Chicago flashed through Jacob’s mind—all those men yelling and banging against the trains, destroying property and injuring people, because they were angry with George Pullman and his company.
Yes, the Amana people were much different than the outside world. They bonded together to protect and care for each other, young and old. They didn’t fight for themselves, only for the good of those around them.
Love Finds You in Homestead, Iowa Page 23