The Bishop's Daughter

by Patricia Johns

  The screen door banged shut behind her, and Sadie headed across the yard and down toward the chicken house. The afternoon sunlight blazed overhead, and down the path, coming from the cow barn, she could see Elijah walking, a toolbelt full of tools slung over one shoulder. She felt a rush of frustration. They hired several seasonal employees for harvest and planting, as well as calving and branding . . . but to have Elijah walking this farm like he belonged here.... He had been almost like family once, but those days were long past. While the hole her brother left behind had never healed over, she’d stopped missing Elijah.

  At least, she’d thought she had until she saw him again, and she found her heart speeding up when she saw him from across the barn yard. She’d been a stupid girl nine years ago, allowing herself to toy with emotions she had no business playing with, and she wouldn’t do that again.

  “Good afternoon,” Elijah called as he approached. His sleeves were pushed up past his elbows, revealing strong forearms. He had certainly hardened into a man in the years he’d been gone, and she hated that she was noticing that.

  “Hello.” She slowed as they approached each other. They stopped on the path, and Elijah looked down at her in a way that made her feel self-conscious.

  “You okay?” he asked, narrowing his eyes. He’d always been rather intuitive when it came to her feelings.

  “I’m fine. I’m getting the eggs.”

  “About yesterday—” he began.

  “Elijah, I don’t want to talk about that,” she cut in. “It was a long time ago—a lifetime. I was fifteen, and my father got protective. I hardly blame him. You weren’t so mature yourself. Let’s just leave it.”

  “Okay.” Those dark eyes met hers, and a small smile came to his lips. “If that makes you happy.”

  “It doesn’t make me happy,” she snapped. “It makes having you here less awkward if we don’t have to rehash a childhood mistake.”

  “We weren’t exactly kinder,” he replied.

  “We weren’t old enough to court, either,” she retorted. “It was . . . playing with fire. Let’s just let it go.”

  Elijah lifted his hat, wiped his forehead with a handkerchief. “Fair enough. I’m going to fix those loose rails on the fence by the house.”

  “Did Daet ask you to?” she asked.

  “I saw it and decided to get it done,” he replied. “Is there a reason I shouldn’t?”

  She paused, eyeing him irritably. Because this isn’t your home, she wanted to say. Because going above and beyond won’t change what you did to us. But she couldn’t say those things, so instead she said, “I can do it myself later.”

  “It’s a man’s job, Sadie.” He caught her eye. Was that reproach she saw? Was he sensitive about a woman staying in her place? How about a man staying in his—and keeping to the Amish world?

  “It’s my family’s farm,” she retorted. “With Daet ill, I do what I must.”

  “Then give me a hand with it,” he said, heading past her and shooting her a wry look. “I wouldn’t turn you down.”

  So English of him, these quips. Elijah didn’t talk between the lines like the Amish tended to do, and it left her feeling uncomfortable. Distanced language gave people a sense of personal space, and his direct way of talking felt . . . invasive. He may have come back to his people, but he was still different from his time with the Englishers.

  Sadie wasn’t about to shout anything after him, even if she could think of how to answer that, so she strode on toward the chicken house instead. She had other things to worry about besides Elijah Fisher’s return to their community. If only he could find some other place to belong—somewhere far away from her—so that she could let the past rest more easily. Some memories, sweet as they had been, were only an embarrassment when exposed to the light of day.

  * * *

  Elijah dropped his toolbelt onto the grass and gave the first loose rail a shake. The rail beneath had already fallen on one side, and it wouldn’t take much for a half-grown cow to push through. This wasn’t a field—this was the fence that blocked off the barn and chicken coop from the house, but still, a solid fence was a necessity. As much as he hated working on the bishop’s farm, he was honor bound to work for the hours he was paid.

  He glanced in the direction Sadie had gone. She was in the chicken house. When he’d seen her on the porch, he’d felt the resentment radiating off of her like heat from a coal. He shouldn’t care—not this much, at least. And he wasn’t about to explain to her exactly why her father’s words had cut as deep as they had. Her father was right, and he’d been wounded when he saw it, but his feelings didn’t change facts. Sadie would never have been for him. He’d been a foolish kid sneaking off to kiss a girl he had no right to, and stupider still to fall in love with her.

  But where it came to Absolom, perhaps he did still owe her a guilt offering. Elijah had pressured his friend to come with him—pointed out that they could finally have a bit of freedom, reminded Absolom of all the irritations he’d complained about. It was their Rumspringa, so it was forgivable. That had been his argument, at least. He’d never counted on Absolom changing so much once he was out in the Englisher world. Still—Absolom had made the choice to stay with the Englishers, and for that, Elijah couldn’t blame himself. Every man had to choose his path.

  Elijah picked up his hammer and started prying loose nails out of the post. For the next half hour, he pulled loose rails from the fence, putting his own frustration into the work.

  The side door to the house opened, and Elijah ignored it. The family had their own jobs to do around here, and he had his. He was fairly paid, and that was why he was here—the money, crude as that sounded, even in his own mind. The Englishers admitted to that more easily than the Amish. Money wasn’t supposed to matter for the plain people. It was a stumbling block. But it also bought food and paid bills, so it was only the well-off, like the bishop, who got to piously think of other things.

  “Elijah!” It was Rosmanda’s voice, and he looked up to see her standing on the step with a tall glass of lemonade in her hand. “Are you thirsty?”

  “Yah.” He was, actually, and he put down his hammer and met Rosmanda halfway across the grass to accept the glass. Sadie’s little boy followed after his aunt, and Elijah smiled down at the boy.

  “Hi there,” Elijah said. The boy looked a lot like Sadie, the same blue eyes, the same shape to his lips. Samuel blinked up at him in silence, so Elijah accepted the drink, downed it, then wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and gave the glass back.

  “Thank you,” he said.

  Rosmanda nodded, and turned back toward the house. Duty done, apparently, but Samuel didn’t follow her.

  “Sammie,” Rosmanda called. “Come on.”

  Instead, the boy headed toward the fence and clambered up the half-dismantled rungs. It wouldn’t hold the boy’s weight—and Elijah reached out and caught Samuel just as the board gave way. The boy blinked into Elijah’s face in surprise.

  “Careful,” Elijah said.

  “Sammie!” Rosmanda swept back across the grass and held out her arms for her nephew. “I’ll take him.”

  Samuel was looking in the other direction, toward the barn, and sure enough, striding down the path with a plastic bucket of eggs in each hand, was Sadie. When she arrived at the fence, she put down the eggs and rubbed her hands where the handles had bit into her flesh.

  “Daet’s sleeping,” Rosmanda said. “Mamm says it’s the pills the doctor gave him, and we need to let him rest.”

  “Yah, of course,” Sadie replied. “I’ll keep Sammie out here for a bit.”

  “I’ll take the eggs in to Mamm,” Rosmanda said. She exchanged a look with her sister, then picked up the buckets and headed back toward the house. Sadie’s gaze followed Rosmanda’s retreat.

  “So, are you going to give me a hand?” he asked.

  Sadie looked toward the house once more, then back at him. “I suppose I’d better.”

  Samuel hea
ded off for the garden—a safer direction by far—and Elijah picked up a rail and held it against the post where it needed to be nailed.

  “Hold this, would you?”

  Sadie grasped the board and held it in place while Elijah hammered. She was strong, and she put her back into the work, but she wouldn’t look at him. When the board was nailed into place with one nail, he headed over to the other side and pulled the board level.

  “And here . . .” he said. Sadie came over and held the board as he asked.

  “Do you miss it?” she asked after a moment.

  “Miss what?” With four hard thwacks, the nail bit deep into the post.

  “Life with the Englishers.”

  “Yah, I guess I do. There’s a certain amount of freedom out there. No one cares what you wear, or what kind of hoe you buy. There’s no judgment about the stuff we get judged on here. Things are faster, too. Cooking, shopping, traveling. Everything is so quick. A man has a chance at building something for himself—putting some money away, getting ahead.”

  “A man can do well in Morinville,” she replied.

  “Not all of us.”

  Absolom had adjusted to Englisher life better than Elijah had. He’d figured out the Englisher ways to slow things down, like staying in and watching TV for hours in the evenings after work. It took the place of farming, in a way. It used up the time.

  “Did you have a girlfriend?” Sadie asked, looking over at him directly for the first time, and he felt heat rise in his cheeks.

  “Yah. I dated a bit.” Elijah picked up another nail and set back to work securing the rail.

  “Anyone special?” Sadie asked after a moment.

  “No one I married,” he shot back, and color tinged her cheeks—not in a bashful way, though. She looked more annoyed.

  “And my brother doesn’t feel guilty for . . . for . . . living in sin like an Englisher?”

  “What do you mean, like an Englisher?” He straightened and fixed her with a stare.

  “You should know.” She looked less sure of herself now, however. “No self-discipline.”

  He spun a nail between his fingers. “Do you really know what the Englishers do?”

  “I’ve heard the stories. They have no morals,” she shot back. “They have no rudder.”

  He was tired of her haughtiness. She was only spouting back what she’d been taught all her life, but he’d lived with Englishers who had shown more Christian charity than he’d encountered in Morinville. His own daet had never come out to see him—to find out what had entangled him outside of their community. In the city, at least parents had the freedom to do as they thought right with their own children. The fact that his parents had done nothing but write religious letters had hurt on a deeper level than he admitted to anyone.

  “When we first arrived in the city, we slept on a park bench,” Elijah said. “Volunteers in a church van came by and brought us food. They brought us back to their church and set us up with a Mennonite family who helped us figure things out. Those people had morals. They had a rudder. You have no idea what you’re talking about.”

  “Maybe I don’t know any Englishers,” she said, lowering her voice. “But I can see what that life did to my brother. He’s on his own out there. I don’t know why he chose that woman over his family, but—”

  “Like your marriage.” Elijah crossed his arms over his chest. “To Mervin Hochstetler. That was a better choice?”

  “Mervin was a good man.”

  “Old enough to be your daet,” he added. “I still don’t get it, Sadie. You weren’t some homely girl with a good heart who would need to settle like that. You were the bishop’s daughter, and you had both looks and intelligence. You didn’t need to marry him.”

  “Is it impossible to believe that I loved him?” she demanded.

  Elijah looked her over. She didn’t meet his eye, then she glanced away irritably.

  “Did you?” he asked.

  “I learned to. At least I knew he’d never go English on me.”

  Like Elijah and Absolom had. He winced, but he wouldn’t be put off, either.

  “You had men you knew a whole lot better than Mervin Hochstetler,” Elijah replied. “I knew you better than he did!”

  After years of hanging out with her brother, afternoons at the creek, evenings in the Graber front yard, meals eaten with her family, and teasing her like he teased his own sisters . . . and then when his feelings changed, and he saw her as much less of a sister . . . Elijah knew Sadie rather well.

  “And you weren’t here, were you?”

  “I’m not saying your father would have allowed it,” he muttered, picking up another rail.

  “Don’t flatter yourself, Elijah Fisher,” she interrupted curtly. “All I’m saying is that a girl has to wait to be courted. Yes, I knew other men, but they weren’t stepping up. Mervin did, and he was a decent man and a kind husband. I could have done worse.”

  “Yah,” he agreed reluctantly. “You could have.”

  “And you’re right—my father did approve of that match,” she went on. “He knew Mervin well, and he said that he would be a good husband—loyal and honest. He’d been very attentive to his first wife.”

  Something crossed her face then, a flicker of irritation, and Elijah couldn’t help but wonder what that was.

  “Was he as good to you as your father promised?” Elijah asked.

  “That isn’t your business,” she retorted. “It isn’t right to ask about private matters between a man and wife.”

  He dropped his gaze and gave a quick nod. It was an inappropriate question, but he wanted to know. Her reaction was too defensive to reassure him.

  “You wrote to Absolom when you got engaged,” Elijah said. “He was worried about you. He thought you deserved a younger man—someone where you could be the first.”

  Sadie was silent for a moment. “Absolom was worried?”

  “Yah. You’re his sister. He wanted you to be happy.”

  So had Elijah, for that matter, but they were too far away to ensure any of it themselves. Elijah had gotten himself his high school diploma, and he was starting to feel in control of his life at long last, but he felt utterly helpless when it came to Sadie. She was out of reach.

  “I don’t need protecting, Elijah. I’m safer here in Morinville than either of you ever were out there.”

  Who was he to argue? He was checking in to make sure she was okay. That was all. Absolom had asked that much of him.

  “Hold this,” he said gruffly, and Sadie complied, holding the rail against the post as he pounded the nail through the wood.

  In a way, his time with the Englishers had ruined him. There had been a time when he’d been as sure of himself as Sadie seemed to be—as confident in his own rightness. But he’d seen too much, and he was left with more questions than answers. So while Sadie’s naivety annoyed him, he was also a little envious. She’d stayed at home, kept the community’s respect, and had never been faced with the confusing world outside of their farm life.

  “Elijah, I don’t know why my father hired you,” Sadie said, as he hammered another nail into place. “It makes no sense to me. But here you are. I could continue to fight this, but my displeasure isn’t about to change my daet’s mind. Here’s the truth—we need you here to keep my daet from working himself into a heart attack.”

  Elijah positioned the last nail and sent it through the wood with two hard thwacks. “Yah. He told me.”

  “So, is it possible for us to set aside our differences and work together to keep this farm running without burdening my father?” Sadie asked.

  Elijah nodded slowly. “Sure. I’ll do the job, Sadie.”

  “No, I want more than that.” She fixed him with that direct stare of hers. “When he says something harsh, or pushes you too far, I want you to stay on. Don’t quit.”

  Perhaps she knew her father’s capabilities better than she’d been letting on.

  “He could find someone else,”
Elijah said. “He probably should, for that matter.”

  “In the time it would take, Daet would go out there and push it too hard. He’s not well, Elijah. I’m worried. If you can’t do it for Daet, do it for my brother.”

  For Absolom. Yes, he could put up with punishment for his friend, but he could also do it for Sadie—the woman he’d loved back when they were barely more than kinder, according to her.

  “All right,” he said cautiously.

  “Promise me, Elijah. I’ve lost a husband, a brother . . . I can’t lose my daet.” She was no longer the angry woman in control—she looked almost desperate, and he felt a wave of protectiveness. She was scared.

  “Yah, Sadie. I promise. For as long as I’m here in Morinville, or until your daet finds another worker. I can promise that much.”

  “What do you mean, for as long as you’re here in Morinville?” she asked, a frown creasing her brow.

  She hadn’t put it all together yet—and he hadn’t been terribly forthcoming about his reasons for returning. He wasn’t a contrite man returning to the faith—he was a son who couldn’t let his parents sink into poverty.

  “I’m here to help out my daet. I’m not staying. Once he’s on his feet again, I’m going back to Chicago.”

  “You’re—” The color drained from her face, then she licked her lips. “What’s wrong with your daet? I thought you were back for good.”

  So no one had noticed? His daet had been working himself ragged. His mother had been hemming up the same three dresses for two years, and not one woman had noticed? It was frustrating, because his mamm had always been vigilant for the needy in their community. She’d notice some small detail—threadbare dresses, some lost weight—and she’d deftly put together a basket of food, or a roll of fabric, and leave it on a doorstep. But when his mamm was going without, no one noticed or intervened.