The Roll of the Drums

by Jan Drexler

  Abraham’s eyes narrowed. Now they were getting to the point. “I suppose I would wait until you did marry, either Gideon or someone else.”

  She kicked at a stray dandelion plant with her toe.

  “What is wrong with Gideon? I thought the two of you were getting along very well.”

  “Nothing is wrong with him. It’s just that—” She bit her bottom lip. “Neither one of us is interested in marriage.”

  “What about the children? Who will care for them?”

  “I will.” She met his gaze. “Here’s my idea. If you give me the land now, I can let Gideon live in the house. I’ll still live at Elizabeth’s but take care of the children and Gideon’s house during the day.”

  Abraham combed his fingers through his beard. The fragrance of bacon frying drifted through the open kitchen window, reminding him that Lydia would have breakfast ready soon, but this problem needed to be resolved first, and in a way that would be pleasing to him and to God. This scheme of Ruby’s might be the path toward her marriage.

  Of course, he could just let Gideon live in the house and not involve Ruby at all. He owned the land and could do anything he wanted with it until he actually gave it to her. That gift would be an unnecessary extra step.

  But if he gave the land to her, he wouldn’t need to be involved in the arrangements between the young folks. And the two of them would have to work together in that arrangement, and that could lead to their eventual marriage.

  “Daed, what are you thinking about?”

  He smiled. “I was thinking of Caleb’s daughter in the Bible. She asked her father for land also, and he gave it to her. Could I do any less?”

  Ruby blushed again, then kissed him on the cheek. “Thank you, Daed.” She squeezed his arm, her eyes shining again. “I must go in to get the children ready for the day.”

  “And tell Gideon the news?”

  She grinned, nodding. “For sure. I think he’ll be happy about it, don’t you?”

  She didn’t wait for an answer but ran into the house. Abraham picked up the milk pail, a smile still on his face as he carried it inside.

  As he set the pail on the sideboard, Lydia glanced at him.

  “What has Ruby so excited this morning? She came in and ran upstairs without even a good morning for me.” She looked at him again. “And what has you grinning like that?”

  “We may be having a wedding soon.”

  She had been turning the bacon strips in the skillet, but now her hand paused in midair, a slice of bacon hanging from her tongs. “Ruby?”

  He nodded, coming close to her as she continued turning the bacon.

  “I was going to give Gideon and Ruby the homestead for a wedding present, but both of them said they weren’t getting married.”

  “That’s what I thought. So why do you think they will change their minds?”

  Abraham picked a piece of bacon from the plate of cooked slices keeping warm on the back of the stove. “I gave the land to Ruby, and she’ll let Gideon live in the house. She said she’ll keep house for him and care for the children.”

  “How will that change things?”

  “Remember the days after our wedding? We worked together to get that old house ready for us to live in it, and you told me that there is nothing like her own kitchen to make a woman feel like a wife.”

  Lydia put the spatula down and turned to him. “You think that Ruby will change her mind as she spends her days cooking for Gideon and caring for the children in that old house?”

  “For sure, I do.”

  She smiled and tugged on his beard. “You are a crafty man, you know that, don’t you?”

  Abraham brought her closer, wrapping his arms around her waist.

  “Do you think it will work?” He nuzzled her ear.

  “If it doesn’t, I don’t know what else will.”

  The next Tuesday morning, after more than a week of working on the old house, Ruby was exhausted but pleased with the progress. Gideon had the idea of covering the old dry and warped logs with board siding rather than trying to rechink the walls, and the result was a house that looked new. At least on the outside.

  Samuel and his boys had cleaned out the inside of the house, ridding it of old mouse nests and some newer ones that were occupied. Ruby’s job was to scrub the walls, ceilings, and floors with Mamm’s help, and she was glad they didn’t need to worry about being surprised by vermin.

  “I can’t get over how much dirt has accumulated in only ten years,” Mamm said. “I left it clean when we moved out, but the years do take their toll.”

  “If I remember right,” Ruby said, “you didn’t think anyone else would live in this old house again.”

  “For sure. It was old, and we were certain that you children would want to build your own houses and start fresh.”

  “That’s what Samuel did, and what Jonas is planning. But Gideon doesn’t have time to wait for a new house. He says this one will be as good as new when we get done with it.”

  Mamm sprinkled sand on the wet wooden kitchen shelf, then started scrubbing it with a brush, leaning into each stroke.

  “I’m glad your daed thought of using the boards Jonas had cut for his house to use for the siding,” she said. “He has been worried about the lumber deteriorating while Jonas is away.”

  “Gideon wasn’t sure he should use it, but Daed said he could replace the boards.”

  “I think the children are going to like it here.” Mamm rested from her scrubbing. “Just listen to them playing in the attic upstairs.”

  Ruby listened as she wrung her rag out in the bucket of water at her feet. Roseanna’s and Sophia’s voices shouted as they ran from one end of the big empty room to the other. But there were only two sets of feet. She walked around the main floor of the house, looking into the rooms.

  “What are you looking for?” Mamm asked.

  “Ezra.” Ruby stood in the center of the kitchen, her hands on her hips. “Daniel is here, and the girls are upstairs. I thought Ezra was with them, but I don’t hear him.”

  “He’s probably just watching his sisters. Do you want me to go check?”

  Ruby shook her head. “I’ll do it. I need to take a break after scrubbing the bedroom floor.”

  She climbed the steep, narrow steps until her head rose above the level of the attic floor. She only saw the girls. “Is Ezra here with you?”

  Roseanna stopped her progress across the attic floor, crawling this time instead of running. “He said he was going outside to help Daed work.”

  “How long ago?”

  “Not long. He went downstairs while we were playing house.”

  Ruby backed down the steps. The little boy must have gone out the front door without being seen. She stepped out onto the wooden porch and walked around the house to where Gideon was on a ladder, applying whitewash to the new siding.

  “Did Ezra come find you?”

  “Ne, I haven’t seen him.” He stopped painting and looked at her. “Isn’t he in the house with you?”

  Ruby’s lungs were tight, as if they wouldn’t allow her to get a breath. “He told Roseanna and Sophia he was coming out here to help you, but I didn’t see him leave the house.”

  Gideon climbed down the ladder. “He couldn’t have gotten far. You look around the house, and I’ll check the barn and the other buildings.” He stopped, looking into her face. “Don’t worry. Little boys wander off all the time. We’ll find him.”

  As Gideon headed for the barn, Ruby walked around the house, trying to peer into the woods around it, but the underbrush was too thick. By the time she reached Gideon’s ladder again, she was sweating, but she shivered. She had lost Ezra. She was responsible for him and she had lost him. Where could he be?

  Suddenly she remembered the well. What if the wooden cover had rotted . . . She ran to the spot, just a few yards from the back door. The strong cover Daed had made years ago was weathered but still solid. When she tried to lift it, she knew Ezra could nev
er have lifted it on his own. She sat down on the cover, her hands over her face. Where could he be?

  The woods behind the house were silent except for the drone of insects. No sound of a boy playing or scared or calling. Her knees quivered. Who had given her this responsibility? Didn’t they know she wasn’t the person to take charge of four children? Lovinia should have known better. Mamm should have stopped her.

  Ruby swallowed and wiped a tear from her cheek. She wasn’t the person Lovinia thought she was. She wasn’t the person anyone thought she was. She wasn’t strong enough or smart enough to take care of others . . . she could barely take care of herself. Look what had happened with Ned. She hugged her knees and rocked as she sat on the well cover. It all started with Ned. And now Ezra was the one to pay. She knew she shouldn’t have offered to care for the children, and now Ezra was lost. She dashed away another tear.

  Suddenly, Gideon appeared around the corner of the house, Ezra in his arms.

  “Look who I found,” he said.

  Ruby turned away. Her face must be blotchy, and she hadn’t been able to stop the tears.

  Gideon opened the back door and sent Ezra inside to play with his sisters, then came and sat next to her on the well cover. “What is wrong? Ezra hadn’t gotten far, he was down by the old chicken coop.”

  Ruby shook her head. “I’m glad you found him.” She turned so her back was to him. “This isn’t going to work, Gideon. Elizabeth will have to help you with the children. I can’t do it.”

  “I told you, little boys wander off all the time. It isn’t anything to cry about.”

  She shrugged his hand off her shoulder. “I’m not crying. I’m just not the person for this task. It’s too much responsibility.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean that I can’t do anything to help. Everything I try turns out wrong. Roseanna barely tolerates my presence, and Sophia has started sucking her thumb again. Ezra . . .” She waved a hand toward the outbuildings. “Who knows what Ezra is doing? He used to talk, but now he never says anything.”

  “That isn’t true, and you know it. He talks all the time.”

  “Not as much as he used to. Not as much as before . . . before he lost his mother.” Gideon was silent, and she turned toward him again. “Even Daniel cries all the time.”

  “He’s getting new teeth. It doesn’t have anything to do with you.” Gideon took her hand. “The children miss Lovinia, but they’re young. This is the first time they have lost someone important to them, and they don’t know how they’re supposed to act.”

  “I thought . . . I hoped they would learn to love me. Lovinia said they would, but—”

  “They do love you. They just haven’t been able to show it yet.”

  Ruby pressed her lips together. Gideon was wrong. The children didn’t love her because she was unlovable. She was hard and brash, too quick to act and too slow to think. And she wasn’t worthy of any man’s . . . anyone’s love.

  Gideon tugged at the hand he was holding. “Lovinia was a wise woman. She could see into people’s hearts and tell what they were like on the inside. That’s why she loved you so much. She saw the Ruby that you don’t show anyone else.”

  Looking into his eyes, Ruby saw that Gideon believed what he said.

  “Don’t give up on us,” he said. “We need you. The children need you.” He looked down at her hand, then released it. “Not many people around here knew Lovinia, but you were her friend. You, more than anyone else, understand what I—” He cleared his throat. “What the children lost when Lovinia passed away. You loved their mother, and you love them because of her. No one can take care of them better than you can.”

  Gideon leaned his forearms on his knees, lacing his fingers together.

  “What if I lose Ezra again? What if Sophia never stops sucking her thumb?” Ruby took a deep breath. “What if I’m not the right person?” She didn’t ask him what she was truly afraid of, that they would never learn to love her.

  “I’ve been confused about many things over the past several months, but there’s one thing I’m sure of.” He looked at her. “You are the woman the Good Lord has provided to care for my children. Never doubt that.”

  He went back to his ladder on the other side of the house, but his words rang hollow in Ruby’s heart. Gideon was wrong. God would never have chosen her for this task.

  By the end of Wednesday afternoon, Ruby and Lydia had finished readying the house and had taken the children back to the farm while Gideon put the last coat of whitewash on the new siding. As he stood back to see if there were any spots he had missed, Ruby came walking along the lane from the road. He could hardly see her in the shadowed dusk under the trees.

  “Did you finish painting?”

  Gideon turned his head sideways, trying to see any imperfections. “It’s hard to tell with the light fading so quickly.”

  She laughed. “It’s nearly dark and I’ve already put the children to bed. I came to see if you were ready for your supper.”

  “Is it that late already?” Gideon sloshed the brush around in the bucket of water he set aside for cleanup.

  “That late and past. It’s after nine o’clock.”

  Suddenly Gideon’s stomach rumbled. He left the brush in the water to soak until morning and placed a board on top of the pail of leftover whitewash to protect it until he needed it again. “Then I guess I’m ready for supper.”

  He started toward the road and Ruby fell into step beside him.

  “Is the house done? Are you ready to move in?”

  As they reached the end of the lane, they came out into the twilight of late evening. The sun had set, and the first stars were shining in the eastern sky. This was where Ruby would turn up the hill to Elizabeth’s house and he would go down to Abraham and Lydia’s home.

  Gideon stopped, thinking of her question. “Not until I make some furniture. We need beds and a table, at least.”

  “I think Daed has some things stored in their attic. We’ll have to look through them and see what you can use.”

  Gideon rubbed his right arm. The muscles were sore after painting all day. “We’ll need some supplies too. Food, some kitchenwares. Things like that.”

  He said the words before he thought. He had so little money. Not enough for a doctor, and certainly not enough to furnish a house.

  “It sounds like you need to take a trip into Millersburg. Daed was saying at supper that he hoped someone was going soon. He needs a tool repaired before harvesttime.”

  “Never mind,” he said, turning away. “It will have to wait.”

  “Wait for what?” She circled him until he had to look at her again. “If you’re going to live here, you need to have food and other supplies for your family.”

  “We’ll have to make do until I can afford store-bought things.” He tried to smile. “I have only a few coins.”

  “But you still need to buy some food. Bacon, oats, flour, beans . . .” She listed the items off on her fingers, then glanced up at him. “How much money do you have?”

  She was just as brash and nosy as ever.

  “I have enough to buy a sack of beans, and maybe some flour.”

  “Then I’ll buy the bacon and oats. I have some money left. And I know where there is a bee tree. We can use honey for sweetener.”

  “I can’t let you do that.” Gideon felt his face heat.

  “Why not? Honey is the best sweetener there is. I like it better than sugar.”

  “I meant that I can’t let you buy food for my family. It isn’t right.”

  She crossed her arms. “I won’t let the children starve. Not when I have the means to buy food for them. You can pay me back later, if you think you need to.”

  “All right.” Gideon gave up the argument. He had a feeling he would lose many arguments if he spent much time with Ruby. “Is Millersburg far away? Can I make the trip in one day?”

  “It’s about twelve miles, so it’s a long day, but that’s how we
usually do it.”

  Gideon took a deep breath and let it out slowly. The last time he had gone to town, he hadn’t come home for weeks. But this was Ohio. Perhaps the war hadn’t reached its greedy fingers this far. “You’ll have to tell me how to get there.”

  “I’ll do better than that. I’ll go along to show you the way. We can take the children and make it a fun trip for all of us.”

  “We’ll have to leave early in the morning.” Gideon watched her upturned face in the starlight. Her smile told how much she looked forward to the day away from her usual routine.

  “I’ll go to Mamm’s house early, before Daed goes out to do the chores, and make sure the children are ready to go. And I’ll pack a dinner for us to eat in town tomorrow. There is a nice grassy spot by the courthouse.”

  Gideon shrugged, amazed again at Ruby’s energy. “We’ll leave at first light, then.”

  She waved and ran up the hill. Her white kapp was all he could see, but he waited until she had turned off the road toward Elizabeth’s cabin. Only Ruby would be so pleased at the thought of a trip to town. For him it was only an unwanted chore.

  The next morning, Gideon woke in time to help Abraham with the barn work. Every night before he went to bed, he told the older man to wake him in the morning, but Abraham never did. Today though, he woke as soon as he heard Abraham stirring downstairs. Or perhaps he never really slept.

  As Gideon milked the cows, he thought through the few coins he had brought with him from Maryland. There was enough to buy basic food, like salt and flour, but nothing extra. Meanwhile, he was grateful that Ruby had offered to buy some things. The children had endured enough privations over the past year.

  They ate a quick breakfast, not wanting to wait for Lydia to fix a big meal. Ruby had gotten to the house while he had been out doing chores, so the children were awake and dressed. Sleepy, but excited about the day’s plans.

  “Leave Daniel here with me,” Lydia said. “I’ll enjoy having him around, and he won’t enjoy the trip as much as the older children will.”

  She gave Gideon a list of her own, and Abraham handed him a scythe blade.