“I just washed the floor. Now look at it. Just look at the dirt those shoes have left. Do you think I have nothing better to do than to clean up after the likes of you?” Fern must have carried on about those shoes for nearly an hour before diverting her attention to M.K.’s rumpled bed. M.K. had sat on it to tie her shoes. The way Fern set to caterwauling, you would have thought she had committed a murder. It seemed the tiniest mishap could set Fern off.
Personally, M.K. thought Fern’s irritable behavior was directly attributable to consuming too much roughage. Fern took everything seriously, especially food, and since Amos and Sadie were on a low-to-no-sodium diet, the entire family was put on it. It was steamed rice and vegetables, broth or tofu, and enough bean sprouts to keep a small barnyard well fed.
At the end of the school day, M.K. burst out of the door to find Fern scowling at her, waiting by the door with arms crossed against her thin chest. M.K.’s mind flipped through the week, trying to narrow down which particular misstep had traveled straight from the schoolhouse to Fern’s ears.
Fern pointed to Menno, waiting in the buggy, and told M.K. to wait while she talked to the teacher.
“What did you do now?” Menno asked as she climbed into the backseat.
“Never mind,” M.K. grumbled.
Ten minutes later, Fern joined them and told Menno to head home.
From the backseat of the buggy M.K.’s voice welled up. “It was Jimmy Fisher’s fault! He said something I took exception to—”
“I got that part of it,” Fern said. “You always have your knickers in a twist over something that boy said or did. But I can’t be running to that school every whipstitch. And school’s just about out for the summer. There’s limits on what I can do.” She swiveled her head to the backseat and gave M.K. a long look.
“I’ll keep a closer eye on her,” Menno said.
M.K. glared at him.
At the turnoff to Windmill Farm, Fern pointed to the side of the road. “Menno, you go up to the house and find Sadie. She’s got a list of chores for you. I want them finished by suppertime. I want to see that list checked off.”
Menno hopped off. “Where are you two going?”
“M.K. and I have an errand,” Fern said.
“What kind of an errand?” M.K. waved a sad goodbye to Menno.
Fern slid over to the driver’s side and flicked the horse’s reins. “Mind telling me why you had a pile of Seventeen magazines under your bed?”
M.K. rolled her eyes and rested her chin on her hand, caught red-handed. Of course, she thought. In this house, Fern knew everything. “I got ’em when Julia and I went to town last week to sell cherries and peaches at the farmer’s market.”
“And just why did you buy them?”
“Someone was selling the whole pile for one dollar.”
“So you bought them because they were cheap?”
M.K. shrugged. “I just like to read. And we keep running out of things to read at the house. I’ve read the Martyrs’ Mirror a dozen times. I’ve read Young Companions so often I have them memorized.”
Fern gave up a rare smile. “And that is why we are going to the public library.”
They spent time getting a library card set up for M.K. Then Fern walked around the bookshelves like she owned the place, piling up books in her arms. Every time M.K. pointed to a book that looked interesting, Fern gave off a clucking sound. She had titles in mind.
On the way home, Fern pulled the top book off the pile and handed it to M.K. “There’s no time like the present. Start with this one.”
M.K. picked up the book: Keeping Bees by John Vivian.
“Rome said you’ve been pestering him to harvest honey.”
“He won’t let me. Nobody takes me seriously!”
“Well, maybe you need to learn something first. Maybe then he might be inclined to take you seriously.” Fern tapped the cover of the book. “And I want a one-page summary of the book when you’re done with it. Mind your penmanship too.”
Fern! So bossy! M.K. silently fumed, but then she opened the book and her eyes caught on this paragraph:
A hostile colony will warn you in unmistakable terms. The hum becomes loud, shrill and strident, a high-pitched beeeeeeeeeeeee sound—possibly where they got their name in the old days; our word is Old English beo, or bia in Old (High) German. The vibration rate is unpleasant bordering on fearsome to humans, high enough to cause inner ear discomfort in many animals. It is an adrenalin-generating alarm signal that strikes a primordial chord in humans, the same as a rattlesnake’s burrrrr or a dog’s grrrrr or an infant’s high keening wail. Bees usually will give you enough time to think better, to close up and return another day. But they may not.
Danger! She was hooked.
Rome had just finished checking on his hives. He moved some brood frames in the center—combs nearly filled with honey—to the back so the bees would start filling the empty frames. He closed the lid, picked up the smoker, and turned to leave, startled to see M.K. running toward him, spewing news like a popcorn popper. Menno trailed behind her, like he always did, and caught up with them in his own slow pace.
“Rome! Am I glad to see you! You’ll never guess what’s happened. I’m going to be a beekeeper!”
“Slow down, M.K. Start from the beginning,” he said, pulling her away from the hives before she got too close to them. As they walked back to the cottage, he yanked his beekeeper helmet off and slipped it under his arm.
“Fern got me a book about beekeeping. So I can help you!” She was ecstatic.
Oh no. Rome wished Fern would have asked him first. If it were Menno who were interested in beekeeping, Rome would have been happy to start training him. Menno had the temperament for beekeeping—calm, unflappable. Menno was never in a hurry. But M.K.? She was overly blessed with enthusiasm and energy. Never still, never quiet. Yet how could he refuse her? She was waiting for him to respond, an earnest look on her small face. “So, you want to be an apiarist.”
“No,” she said. “I want to be a beekeeper.”
Rome sighed. “M.K., bees are wild creatures. You’re going to have to first develop a respect for them.”
“I have a great respect for bees. I love honey!”
He shook his head. “That’s not what I mean. There’s much more to bees than honey.”
“Well, they can sting. I know that for sure.”
“Honeybees are engineers. Brilliant ones. They build homes for themselves that are identical in measurements.”
“That’s like me,” Menno said. “I’m an engineer.”
“Huh?” M.K. said.
“I build homes for birds. Each one is identical.” Menno looked pleased with himself.
“That’s true, Menno,” Rome said. “You know how important it is to be precise so the birds will return to nest their young. That’s what bees do, M.K. They are constantly working to help the next generation.” He glanced at her. “M.K., do you know why bees produce honey?”
“For people to eat.”
“Not really. Honey is bee’s food. A honeycomb is a bee’s pantry. They store up food for the winter. Good beekeepers always leave enough honey for the bees. The bees come first.” By the look on her face, Rome could tell M.K. hadn’t given any thought to bees other than eating honey.
What had Fern gotten him into?
M.K. jumped up to leave and suddenly reached her hand into her apron pocket. “I forgot! Fern said the mailman delivered this to you.” She handed him a letter addressed to The Bee Man at Windmill Farm and dashed up the hill.
Dear Roman,
I have no evil intentions in buying the farm; I am only trying to right the wrongs I’ve done in my life.
Sincerely,
R.W.
As soon as it was dusk, Rome moved four of his hives onto the bee wagon. It would take him most of the night to get to those pecan orchards, so he wanted to get going while there was still some light left. He had one foot hitched up on the wagon when he heard
a familiar voice calling to him.
Fern.
Rome stepped back off of the wagon and walked out to meet her. He had only met Fern a handful of times when his uncle Tom had courted her. He didn’t know much about her, other than she was a spinster who worked as a housekeeper for families. As he saw the determined look on her face, he knew the moment he had dreaded had arrived.
“Have you made any decision about the farm?” she asked, when they met on the path that led to the farmhouse.
One thing he had to hand to her, Fern Graber didn’t beat around the bush. “No, Fern, I haven’t.” He tried to sound neutral, unaffected.
“You knew this, Rome. You knew the farm couldn’t be ignored forever. I told you to do some thinking.”
“You did,” Rome said. “You surely did.”
“But you haven’t done the thinking.”
“No. Not really.”
Fern crossed her arms against her thin chest. “It’s time, Roman. It’s past time.”
“You mean, put it up for sale?”
“Yes.”
“I don’t think I can do that,” Rome said.
“If you’re not going to sell it, then you ought to go home and work the farm. You’ve been gone a long time. Long enough.”
“Six years.”
“Six years.” Fern shook her head in disbelief. For the briefest of moments, sadness flitted through her eyes. Then it was gone. It happened so fast that Rome thought he might have imagined it. “This isn’t what your father would have wanted you to do with his land. I think he’d rather see you sell it than let it fall to pieces.”
How dare she assume she would know what his father would think, would feel. How audacious! But he kept his face unreadable.
“Give it some serious thought, Roman,” Fern said, before spinning around and marching back to the house.
He wanted to shout out: Did she think he hadn’t given the farm serious thought over the last six years? Did she think he didn’t care about his family? But he stayed silent. Instead, he went to the bee wagon, hopped up on the seat, and slapped the mule’s reins to get it moving.
Sell his family’s farm?
Rome couldn’t imagine selling it. The farm was the last place he’d kissed his mother’s cheek, worked side by side with his father, played with his sisters. He was born and raised there. Sell the farm? Or return to it and leave his migratory life? An impossible decision.
12
Julia found it amusing that Fern took M.K.’s grand idea of a birthday for Menno and Sadie and turned it into a way to keep her little sister busy and out of trouble. Fern and M.K. cleaned the house together, made a grocery list together, shopped together, cooked together. Well, Fern did the cooking and M.K. did the dishwashing.
M.K. invited very specific people to come to the party and wouldn’t say who. Julia hoped Paul was on the list but didn’t want to ask. M.K. didn’t know when to say things and when not to, and the last thing Julia wanted was for Paul to hear from his brother Jimmy that Julia was pining for him. She was not pining. Well, maybe she was, but Paul didn’t need to know.
On the evening of the party, Gideon Smucker volunteered to arrive early to help barbecue chicken on the grill. Sadie looked annoyed with M.K. for inviting Gideon. Julia couldn’t understand why Sadie didn’t see how wonderful Gideon was. He clearly was sweet on Sadie, yet she was smitten with Roman Troyer . . . who hadn’t shown up yet. On the other hand, M.K. seemed to glow like a lightning bug around Gideon. Maybe that’s the way things always were. Maybe love was always mixed up.
When Paul arrived, Julia’s heart skipped a beat, then two beats. Paul had come! There was still hope.
From the window up above, Amos sat by the windowsill, a look of longing on his face as he watched Gideon at the grill, slathering tangy barbecue sauce on the chickens. “A fellow could starve to death waiting on his meal up here!”
“Then come down and join the party,” Fern called up to him. But Julia knew he wouldn’t leave his room tonight. He said he would get pecked to death by well-meaning neighbors, asking questions he couldn’t answer.
Uncle Hank emerged from the house, eating a cupcake. “Uncle Hank, be on your best behavior,” Julia warned, but she knew he was pretty much on the same kind of behavior regardless of the company he was in.
“Men are all alike. Grown-up children,” Fern muttered as she went past Julia with a bowl of strawberries. “There’s more in the kitchen to bring out.”
Julia went back inside and grabbed a bowl of potato salad from the kitchen. She crossed the yard to put the bowl on the picnic table with the rest of the food. Paul was standing by Gideon at the smoky grill. When he saw her, he made his way over to her.
“Is that German potato salad?” he asked her pleasantly, peering into the bowl. “Sure do love potato salad.” He scratched his neck and shyly added, “Jules, I was hoping we could have a talk—”
“I’m sure hoping we can get dinner started.” Roman Troyer appeared out of nowhere. “It looks like it’s going to rain soon.” He put a hand on Julia’s elbow and steered her over to the picnic table.
“What are you doing?” Julia hissed. “I thought you’d left town.”
His mouth curved faintly. “What, and miss all the fun?”
Julia searched in her mind for a snappy retort, but she was never good at those. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Menno and Annie slip into the barn. “Oh no. That isn’t good.”
Rome saw it too. “Who’s to say whether it’s good or not? Menno isn’t like us.”
“Exactly.”
“I don’t mean that the way you’re thinking. He doesn’t worry about the future like you do, he doesn’t trouble himself about endless responsibilities like you do. He views the world as a place of wonder.”
“He can barely take care of himself.”
Rome took the bowl of potato salad from Julia and placed it on the table. “He’s seventeen and he’s got a crush on a girl. Why do you have to spoil this for him? Maybe you should try to be more like Menno. Maybe we all should.”
She stared at him, astounded. What did Roman Troyer know about her brother, her family? She planted her fists on her hips. “Why did you pull me away from Paul? He wanted to talk to me!”
“Not looking like that.” He pointed to his mouth. “You have something in your teeth.”
She bolted for the house and hurried into the bathroom. Sure enough, a parsley leaf was wedged between her two front teeth.
Over on the side yard, Sadie was watching M.K. play volleyball with her school friends when she noticed one of the girls, Alice Esh, look like she was about to cry. When the ball rolled toward Sadie, she tossed it to M.K. to continue playing and went over to Alice, steering her to a bench to sit down. Alice’s face was red and blotchy. “What’s wrong?”
“I don’t know,” Alice said, taking deep breaths.
Sadie noticed that Alice’s skin was starting to look strange—like giant hives were forming, making her skin look pebbly and rough. “Were you stung by anything? Or bitten?”
Alice shook her head. “I don’t know what’s the matter with me!” She was turning redder and redder but not perspiring, though it was a warm evening.
“M.K.!” Sadie yelled. “Go get some rags from the barn and drench them in cool water. Dummel!” Hurry!
M.K. ran off on her toothpick legs and returned with wet rags. Sadie draped them over Alice’s hot neck and arms and legs.
“Go get more,” she ordered M.K.
A crowd started to gather, but Sadie was so focused on cooling Alice down that she didn’t notice. Sadie knew she had to remain calm, for Alice’s sake, and tried to let that calmness flow out of her hands. Little by little, with numerous trips to the water pump by M.K., Alice started to breathe normally. Her skin lost that fire-engine-red color and returned to a healthy pink.
“What was wrong with her?” M.K. said.
“Heat rash, I think,” Sadie said. “She was getting overheated.”
“I don’t think so,” Sadie said, helping Alice stand up.
“You did, Sadie,” said Gideon, who had been watching the entire episode. Someone shouted to him that the chickens were on fire, so he ran back to the grill.
Fern had been watching too. As the crowd dispersed, Fern walked up to Sadie and took hold of her hands. She looked at the palms. “Sadie girl, we have finally found what you were born for. I don’t know how I missed it before. You are a healer.”
Sadie peered at her hands. “I am?” she asked, amazed.
“You are,” Fern said confidently.
When the time came for birthday cake, Julia noticed Menno carry over a piece of cake to Annie. It bothered her, seeing her brother act so smitten with a girl. But everything bothered her tonight. The wistful look on her dad’s face as he watched the festivities from his window. Rome and his assumptions that he knew what was best for everyone was particularly annoying tonight, but that was nothing new. Rome always annoyed her.
But what topped the list of annoyances tonight was seeing Paul hover near Lizzie. Lizzie was her friend. How could things have gone so terribly wrong? Why couldn’t life remain simple? She wanted to be where people stayed in place, where only good things happened, where fathers didn’t have heart problems, where boyfriends didn’t cancel weddings, and where she would feel as if her future was safe.
Suddenly, Rome appeared at the bottom porch step. He extended his hand to draw Julia to her feet. “Let’s go someplace where we can talk.”
“We already talked. I don’t want to talk anymore.”
“Too late. Let’s go.” He pulled her to a standing position. “I want to tell you what I learned at the hospital.”
The bumpy path they were walking along abruptly ended at a rusted barbed wire fence bordering an overgrown pasture. Rome stopped and turned to her. “There was a doctor who overheard me trying to get some information out of the hospital administrator. Later, that doctor found me walking in the lobby and said he would help me. He’s a Mennonite and seemed to understand the situation. He got me on the phone with the transplant coordinator over at Hershey Medical. That’s where the heart transplants are done. The coordinator said that if Amos is willing, his doctor has already qualified him to be placed on the national transplant list. There’s no guarantee as to when a heart will turn up—the priority list is based on need, not how long a person has been on the list. They said the list turns over quickly because patients die. But he also said that hearts come in a lot—mostly from motorcycle accidents, and mostly right after holidays like the fourth of July. They call them donorcycles.”
The Keeper Page 14