Promise Lodge

by Charlotte Hubbard

  You’ll have to be better organized if you’re to keep track of your renters, she chided herself. What if one of them gets ill and you need to contact their—

  When the phone rang, Rosetta nearly dropped the percolator in the sink. She rushed over to answer it before the ringing awakened anybody, wondering who would be calling at this hour. “Jah? Hello?” she asked in a loud whisper.

  “Rosetta! Didn’t mean to startle you, calling so early, but when I saw a light in your kitchen window—well, I couldn’t help hoping it would be you.”

  Rosetta stepped into the mudroom so her voice wouldn’t carry up the stairway. “Truman! Gut morning,” she murmured into the phone. “I’m so glad you’re not somebody calling about an emergency, or—”

  “Truth be told, I’ve gone too long without your smile or the sound of your voice,” he cut in with a chuckle. “So that feels like an emergency, of sorts. Work has been crazy-busy this week, late into the evenings. It’s often that way in the summer. I suppose it’s a gut problem to have.”

  Rosetta grinned like a giddy schoolgirl, holding the receiver close and keeping her voice low. She felt better already. Less anxious and more relaxed. “We’ve been going nonstop here, as well,” she replied. “A family from Ohio visited this week—and they’ve decided to move to Promise Lodge. Then Deborah’s family surprised us by showing up yesterday, as well.”

  “And what about those two gals I met last weekend?” he asked. “One reason for my call was to invite them to our Mennonite church service this morning. My mother and I will be leaving around nine, if they’d like to ride with us.”

  “That’s very thoughtful of you.” Rosetta sighed. “Ruby and Beulah put down six months’ rent and had big plans for selling their honey and homemade cheese, but their brother took them back home last Sunday. I was just realizing I had no way to contact them when you called.”

  “Ah.” The sound of Truman releasing his breath tickled Rosetta’s ear. “Where are they from? I have projects and clients all over northern Missouri, so I might be able to hunt down a phone number.”

  Rosetta’s eyes widened. “Oh, could you? Their brother’s name is Delbert—Delbert Kuhn. Hmm . . . I think they live near a place called Versailles, but I have no idea where that is.”

  “It’s south of here quite a ways, near Lake of the Ozarks. Lots of Mennonite folks live in that area, so I’ll see what I can find for contact information, all right?”

  “That would be wonderful. Denki so much, Truman,” she replied. “I’m really glad you called.”

  “Me too. Makes me happy to make you happy.”

  Once again Rosetta reminded herself not to get caught up in the melody of his voice, or in the way his romantic words made her tingle. Through the window she noticed that the wind had picked up, splattering heavier rain against the glass, yet the dreary weather didn’t bother her. “We’ll have to set a time for that fish fry soon, or the summer will fly past us. Hard to believe we’re more than halfway through June already.”

  “I’ll ask my mother today when she’d like to meet you—and your family and friends, of course,” he added quickly. Truman paused. “I hear her walking across the floor above me now, so I should be sure she’s off to a steady start. Don’t be a stranger, Rosetta.”

  “You know where to find me.”

  Rosetta hung up the phone, feeling happier than she had all week. What could possibly be wrong with exchanging some pleasant flirtation with her attractive neighbor? As long as her sisters and the men were around, her friendship with Truman Wickey would remain perfectly safe and proper. None of those entanglements he’d mentioned the other night.

  You know better than that.

  Rosetta returned to the kitchen to finish making the coffee. This being Sunday, she decided to focus on making the Peterscheims feel at home, and on making the Lord welcome in her heart during church this morning, too . . . even if it was Truman’s handsome face she saw in her imagination.

  * * *

  Despite the steady rain and rumbles of thunder that awoke them Sunday morning, Deborah felt hopeful. After she and Lily and Mamma got dressed, she and her sister held umbrellas over their heads while Mamma walked between them on her crutches. “This moisture will make your gardens grow,” her mother remarked cheerfully. “How did you girls do at the produce stand yesterday?”

  “We had to restock at noon, and we nearly sold out,” Deborah replied. “All told, with the veggies, eggs, and my goodies, we brought in nearly four hundred dollars. I could hardly believe it!”

  “Wow!” Lily murmured. “Maybe I could make pies to sell at the stand—if we move here,” she added wistfully.

  Deborah smiled. “Your crusts always turn out better than mine, so that might be a gut idea. Once word gets around, I think we’ll do a steady business. We figure to keep the stand open as long as we’ve got fresh produce—although we have a couple of other gals who’re hoping to sell honey and cheese made from our cows’ and goats’ milk,” she added. “We might be able to stay open later into the fall than Mattie had planned. Pies and breads and goodies will sell no matter what the season.”

  Queenie raced around them, barking, until Noah opened the back door for them. He smiled as the three of them wiped their feet on the rug. “Did everyone rest well?” he asked, holding Deborah’s gaze for an extra moment.

  “Snug as a bug in a rug,” Lily replied.

  “Nothing like the patter of rain on the roof to lull you to sleep,” Mamma remarked.

  As they entered the kitchen, Deborah’s stomach rumbled. They did minimal cooking on Sundays, so breakfast would consist of the banana bread and oatmeal-plum bars she and Lily had baked yesterday evening with ajar of Mamma’s plum preserves. Pitchers of milk and boxes of cold cereal sat on the table, as well. The aroma of freshly perked coffee filled the kitchen.

  “And how did you fellows like camping in your cabin last night?” Mattie asked as Deborah’s dat and her three brothers hurried in out of the rain.

  Menno and Johnny’s hair appeared uncombed and their shirttails stuck out around their suspenders, but they wore wide smiles. “The coyotes sounded so cool!” the eight-year-old said.

  “And close to our cabin, too,” Menno chimed in. “Lavern says he saw a couple of them in the woods, but Dat thought they were probably the neighbors’ dogs.”

  “Needless to say, it was a busy night,” Dat remarked as he joined Amos and the Schwartz brothers at the table. “Hope you lock your chickens and goats up tight.”

  “We do, and Noah’s keeping the coyotes in line with his shotgun, too,” Amos replied. “Let’s have our prayer. Looks like the ladies have outdone themselves baking for us.”

  Deborah smiled at Lily and bowed her head. It was a pleasure to be around Preacher Amos because he expressed his appreciation for the food they prepared. Like most Amish men, her father tended to compliment the cooks by eating more of what they prepared—expecting the pies, breads, and other foods to be made to his liking. He’d told Mamma early in their marriage that he considered store-bought cereal to be a waste of good money, so she wasn’t surprised when her father passed those boxes along to Roman. He crumbled four oatmeal-plum bars in his bowl and doused them with milk.

  “Raisin Bran!” Menno exclaimed when the box got to him. He opened it and gleefully filled a bowl.

  “And Shredded Wheat with blueberry filling,” Johnny said with a grin. “Can we have breakfast here all the time, Dat?”

  While most of the folks around the long table chuckled, Deborah noticed that her father’s expression remained serious. Surely he won’t lecture Mattie and Rosetta about what they’ve set out for breakfast, she hoped. It would be a long day if her father began it on a sour note.

  After he’d eaten a large spoonful of his milk-saturated plum bars, however, Dat looked at his two younger sons. “You might get your wish,” he replied. “But there’s another matter to attend to first.”

  When her father set down his spoon and gazed dir
ectly at her, Deborah’s heart thudded. His hair looked shaggy, and he had a red spot beneath his nose where he’d nicked himself shaving. Was it her imagination, or did Dat seem older than when she’d left home a few weeks ago?

  “Deborah, when I sent you away after the Bender barn fire, I misjudged the situation. I apologize.”

  She squeezed her slice of banana bread so tightly that it crumbled to her plate. Everyone around her grew quiet, yet it was a different sort of silence from the one they’d endured during her parents’ confrontation at supper last night.

  “Seems Noah has gotten chattier since he’s moved here, and he gave me a pretty stiff earful last night,” her father continued. He cleared his throat, still holding her gaze. “I jumped to the wrong conclusion when I saw that your hair was hanging loose and your kapp was missing. I hope you can forgive me.”

  Deborah’s throat was so dry it clicked when she swallowed. Although she’d heard her father deliver more Sunday sermons than she could count, she couldn’t recall him ever looking so uncertain, as though his salvation—his standing with God—depended upon her response. “I—I can do that, jah,” she whispered.

  “Glory be to God,” Mamma murmured. “Our prayers have been answered.”

  Around the table, their friends nodded their encouragement, but the situation wasn’t entirely tidied up. Deborah inhaled deeply, hoping her voice wouldn’t crack. “And now you must forgive me, Dat,” she began nervously. “I went against the Ordnung when I called the police that night, and I—I got into an English kid’s car, foolishly thinking he would drive me home. I should’ve run the other way when I first saw those boys drinking in the barn—but I just couldn’t let it burn down.”

  Her father’s face remained absolutely still. Unreadable. Once again Deborah felt the clock ticking away untold moments. Was he unable to forgive her mistakes? Would he let her wipe his slate clean without granting her the same gift?

  Preacher Amos cleared his throat. “Deborah has already made this confession before us, Eli,” he said. “I think it’s commendable that she’s taking this extra step, so no further barriers remain between the two of you.”

  Her father closed his eyes. Was he praying—or shutting out the beseeching gazes the others around the table were giving him?

  “I appreciate the way you went to the sheriff, Dat,” Deborah continued urgently. Her pulse was pounding so loudly she could barely hear what she was saying, but her father deserved a fuller acknowledgment of his sacrifices. “You’re the one who had to bear Obadiah’s objections to doing that—especially after you’d named Isaac as the one who’d most likely caused the fire. You did protect me from the bishop’s backlash and the sheriff’s interrogation by sending me away,” she insisted in a halting voice. “I’m grateful for all you’ve done for me, Dat . . . grateful to God that everything has worked out, and that we’re all safe and together again.”

  “Amen to that,” Mattie whispered.

  “God’s will be done,” Rosetta murmured as she clasped her sisters’ hands.

  Dat’s eyes remained closed. Beneath his dark beard, his jaw clenched and unclenched.

  Deborah sighed. Begging Noah’s forgiveness for breaking their engagement had been very difficult, but her father’s silence hung so heavily, she bowed her head beneath its weight. She’d expressed her appreciation as best she could, yet again the seconds ticked by while she and her friends and family endured this agonizing impasse.

  A sob made her glance up.

  Dat hastily wiped his eyes on his shirtsleeve and exhaled loudly. “It scared the living daylights out of me, Deborah, seeing my little girl with her clothes torn . . . that purple handprint on your neck,” he rasped. “I lost all sense of perspective—wanted to kill whoever had done that to you. I did what I thought was right at the time—sending you away—but cutting off my own arm with a hacksaw couldn’t have hurt me any worse.” He yanked his handkerchief from his pocket and blew his nose loudly.

  Amos gripped her father’s shoulder, nodding. “Had to be one of the most difficult days of your life, Eli.”

  “Jah, but it’s behind us now.” Dat blinked a few times and then focused on Deborah with pink-rimmed eyes. “I forgive you, Daughter. Let’s don’t ever go through such a separation again, all right?”

  Sweet relief washed over Deborah’s soul. It had cost her father a great deal—had humbled him, indeed—to allow his emotions to override his usual stoic control of them. “I plan to stay away from any more of such trouble, jah.”

  “And I figure to help by keeping Deborah with me,” Noah chimed in. His earnest gaze suggested that he badly wanted to talk to her, sometime when they could be alone.

  “If we move to Promise Lodge, we can all keep an eye on her!” Johnny crowed. “Let’s do it, Dat!”

  “Jah, you ask us every now and again if we’re gonna fish or cut bait,” Menno remarked as he snatched another slice of banana bread from the plate. “And the answer’s plain as day! There’s a lake right here, so what’re we waiting for?”

  Mamma was chuckling, looking as happy and relieved as the rest of the women at the table. “We’re waiting for your dat to make that decision, boys,” she reminded them. “Let’s not pester him about it—even if all of us do want to come here to be with Deborah and these gut friends we’ve been missing.”

  Deborah saw her father fighting a smile. Eli Peterscheim wasn’t a man who’d allow outspoken sons or a wishful wife to sway him, yet she sensed his mind had been made up once he’d gotten a look at the Promise Lodge property.

  “I had serious reservations when you left Coldstream, Amos, because I believed you were shirking your responsibilities to our church district,” Dat said. “But if any gut’s to come of Deborah’s ordeal with Isaac Chupp, we should see this visit to Promise Lodge as God’s taking us by the hand and leading us . . . to our new home.”

  Christine nodded, smiling at her girls. “That’s how we felt when we came here, too, Eli.”

  “No regrets,” Rosetta said firmly.

  “You can stake out your property and it’ll be waiting for you whenever you’re ready to move,” Mattie added as she smiled at Mamma and Dat. “We’d be so happy to have you folks here!”

  The expression on her father’s face made Deborah hold her breath. Had Eli Peterscheim ever beamed this way? “I’ll put the Coldstream farm up for sale when we get back,” he stated. “It’s time to move our family forward. Thank the Lord we don’t have to wander through the wilderness for forty years like the Israelites did, to find where we belong.”

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  After church—when both Eli and Amos had preached about the blessings of forgiveness—and their simple noon meal, Noah stood on the lodge porch. Once again the grass was dotted with raindrops and the rows of vegetables glowed green against the dark, wet soil of the garden plots. Hummingbirds buzzed around him, darting in to sip the nectar from the trumpet vine flowers. Was there any prettier picture than black-and-white Holsteins grazing in a green pasture beside a red barn?

  The clatter of dishes and the women’s pleasant chatter drifting through the screen door was interrupted by the ringing of the phone. Noah hoped this call brought more good news. Now that the Peterscheims had resolved their problems, a burden had been lifted from his heart. He was eager to proceed with everyone’s plans for Promise Lodge—and his future with Deborah. Aunt Rosetta’s happy voice made him smile.

  “Ruby Kuhn!” she exclaimed. “Just this morning I was wondering how to call you to . . . oh, my, I’m so sorry . . . but what a blessing that you and Beulah are willing and able to live elsewhere. We’re all so glad you’re coming back to Promise Lodge!”

  Noah chuckled. He looked forward to helping the Kuhn sisters set up their beehives and the cheese factory, which would provide an income for others who moved to their colony. He sensed that with Ruby and Beulah around, life at Promise Lodge would never be boring.

  “It seems that Delbert had every intention of keeping Ru
by and Beulah in Versailles,” Rosetta recounted to the others after she’d hung up. “But their youngest sister lost her husband this week, and she’ll be moving in with her four kids—which makes a total of a dozen youngsters under their roof. So Delbert will be bringing our friends back—with their bees—in a couple of days.”

  “Twelve kids and three adults sharing the one bathroom, as I recall,” Christine murmured. “Five adults, if Ruby and Beulah stayed there. Oh, my.”

  “God works out His will in ways we don’t always understand,” Noah heard his mother respond. “It’s a gut thing Ruby and Beulah can accommodate their family’s need for more space by coming here.”

  “And what a blessing that you’re setting up apartments for maidels and widows, Rosetta,” Deborah’s mother remarked. “I’m sure Delbert would’ve done right by Beulah and Ruby, but you’ve saved him the expense of building on to his house on very short notice, it seems.”

  “They need a couple of those portable toilets like you see in parks,” Lily remarked.

  Noah chuckled along with the ladies. As he waited patiently on the porch, he saw Amos and Roman walking beyond the orchard with Eli, pointing out the proposed layout of roads and lots. It had been good to hear both preachers leading their worship service this morning. Noah looked forward to living near the Peterscheims again—and to working alongside Eli as a welder in his own right now. Preacher Eli wasn’t as good-natured as Amos, but he was solid in his faith—a leader they could count on as the Promise Lodge colony grew into the future.

  At the sound of Deborah’s footsteps, Noah turned. She came to stand beside him, smiling sweetly. Now that she and her father had made their peace, her face glowed with an inner beauty he’d always loved. “I’m glad you and your dat have settled your differences,” he murmured. “I gave him the what-for yesterday—and Amos did, too. Told him if he wanted to see his grandkids, he’d better practice the forgiveness he preaches—”

  “You’re a wise man, Noah Schwartz,” Deborah said. “Denki for your patience with him.”