Rosemary Opens Her Heart: Home at Cedar Creek, Book Two

by Naomi King

  “I can’t imagine what it must be like, movin’ your mother-in-law’s belongings out and startin’ fresh in a whole new town,” Eunice chimed in. “Been livin’ in the same house we built when Merle and I hitched up more than fifty years ago.”

  Treva placed her roaster in the oven. “I came along because it’s a lot more fun to clear out somebody else’s closets than to work on my own!”

  “Jah, I know all about that,” Mamm agreed. “Malinda and I have filled up a house where a family of nine used to live. I pity the poor soul who cleans it out after we’re gone.”

  For the rest of the morning, they worked and chatted in a way that made Rosemary very grateful. How many weeks would it have taken her to complete such a daunting job? Even with Beth Ann’s help, it would have been an overwhelming challenge to decide the fate of Alma Yutzy’s belongings. But these ladies knew of benefit projects sponsored by other church groups or places to donate items.

  Zanna Ropp had asked for fabric and old clothing for making her rag rugs, so Rosemary and Emma tackled the closets upstairs where Alma had kept her craft supplies. They tugged boxes and plastic bags of all sizes into the room that had been Joe’s.

  “Beth Ann doesn’t want these lengths of fabric?” Emma asked as she emptied a box onto the bed. “Abby says she’s a gut seamstress.”

  “Jah,” Rosemary replied as they sorted through the musty twills and cottons. “But most of these fabrics have to be ironed, and she’s not one for doing that when polyester blends can be hung on hangers straight from the washer.”

  “Gut point.” Emma emptied another bag of fabric onto the bed. “Oh, now these look promising—dresses that were cut out but never sewn together, and they’re a nice summer-weight crepe. Abby’s made Mamm and me a slew of dresses from this fabric, and you can’t find anything easier to care for.”

  As Rosemary held up the cut-out pieces, something about the shade of green whispered to her heart…and the purple made her soul sing. Wouldn’t it be perfect timing, to wear these dresses when she moved to the new house? The one color reminded her of the cedar trees growing at the bottom of Matt’s pasture, while the other—well, the iris along the side of the house were this same shade of purple. “Wouldn’t take Beth Ann but a couple of hours to whip up these dresses, fast as she sews,” she said. “Why donate such nice pieces when one of us can surely wear them?”

  “That’s what I was thinking.” Emma held the back of the green dress against Rosemary’s shoulder blades. “This is just the shade of your eyes, you know. And it’s big enough that you can cut it to your size.”

  “Jah, Alma was heavier than I am…at least before the cancer caught her,” Rosemary added sadly. It tugged at her heart to be handling Alma’s unfinished dresses, yet wouldn’t it be a tribute to Joe’s mamm to wear them as she came out of mourning? She put a determined smile on her face and neatly folded all the purple pieces together, and all the green. Then she and Emma headed downstairs to see how the kitchen crew was doing.

  The rich aroma of Mamm’s sausage-and-bean casserole made Rosemary realize how hungry she was. Malinda and Barbara were carting loaded boxes to their rigs while Mamm and Treva were setting cookies and sticky buns on plates.

  “Would you look at this?” her mother said as she opened the lower cabinets. “We did right well this morning.”

  “My stars, Mamm! They’re clean as a whistle—and I’ve never seen this set of dishes,” Rosemary remarked as she looked at the table, which was set for their noon meal. “What a pretty pattern of pink roses.”

  “Found them tucked away behind a bunch of old cottage cheese cartons.” She smiled ruefully. “This gives me the bug to clear out my own cabinets. No telling what treasures I might find.”

  “Same here,” Matt’s grandmother replied. “We figured to work in the cellar after dinner. The men won’t have patience enough to pack those crocks and canning jars right, let alone wash them so’s they’re ready to use again.”

  Rosemary’s heart throbbed with gratitude. “I can’t thank you enough,” she murmured. “What with keeping track of Katie and—well, I just haven’t found the time to redd up those cellar shelves.”

  Both women smiled as though they shared a secret. “Consider it our housewarming gift to you, Rosemary,” Treva remarked. “Happy to help.”

  “Jah,” her mother added. “You’ll have plenty to do, getting that new place settled in. If you think of us when you see all those shiny-clean jars and these rose dishes on your shelves in Cedar Creek, that’s thanks enough.”

  Rosemary broke a slice of Barbara’s fresh bread into soft chunks and put them on Katie’s high chair tray. As Titus and Matt washed up in the mudroom, she dished up the sausage-and-bean casserole. Wasn’t it nice to have such a bunch of people around this table, where they would eat only a few more meals?

  Titus sat down and ran a gnarled finger around the rim of his dinner plate. “Can’t recall the last time I saw these dishes. Alma’s sisters gave us this set for a wedding present,” he murmured. “A little frilly, to my way of thinking. And once the kids came along, she put them away and got that set of Melmac.”

  As his eyes misted over, everyone got quiet. They bowed and prayed.

  Treva passed the casserole to Titus. “We thought these dishes were too pretty to hide away, but if you’d rather we packed them—”

  “No, that’s not what I mean.” Titus looked again at the rose pattern on his plate and then focused on Rosemary. “Alma was real happy you married into our family, so if you like these dishes we’ll use them. The Melmac’s pretty well shot after thirty years, if I say so myself.”

  Rosemary chuckled. “Denki, Titus. That’s a wonderful-gut way to remember her every time we eat.”

  As the bread basket went around, Matt shot her a secretive smile from across the table. “Dat says your new cookstove and oven arrived from Lehman’s,” he remarked in a purposeful voice.

  “Jah, I was amazed at how fast they got there.” Rosemary bit into a chunk of sausage simmered in Mamm’s colorful mixture of seasoned beans. How long might it be before she tasted this favorite casserole again? When Katie squealed and pounded her high chair tray, Rosemary put more of the casserole on her plate and then pressed her tiny fork into her hand. “Use this,” she instructed gently. “You’ll need to eat like a big girl at the new house.”

  Titus cleared his throat. “I’m mighty grateful that you’re moving to Cedar Creek, willing to cook and clean for me, Rosemary. And glad you’ll be baking for Lois, too. So I’ll be the one paying Sam for your new appliances. Least I can do.”

  Rosemary nearly dropped her fork. “But I can use the money from selling my property. You were gut enough to find me a buyer—”

  “Nope. My mind’s made up.” Her father-in-law’s expression went crooked when he realized every woman at the table was gazing at him. “Hasn’t been easy for you, looking after Beth Ann and me. Least I can do,” he insisted again. Then he focused on his food, as though this show of gratitude hadn’t come easily to him.

  Rosemary stole a glance at Matt. Had he given Titus this idea? And wasn’t that a thoughtful way to make her happier in the new house? Indeed, she felt surrounded by warmth and friendship as she considered how many folks within sight of the new place would be there when she needed a helping hand.

  By the time Beth Ann got home from visiting the Schlabach girls, the canning jars in the cellar were packed and Matt had a load of hay bales ready to haul to Titus’s new farm. The young girl gaped when Rosemary opened the kitchen cabinets and recounted how much packing and recycling they’d accomplished during their frolic. As the Grabers and the Lambrights loaded up to go home, Beth Ann thanked them all. “And tell Ruthie I said hullo!”

  “I’ll do that,” Matt’s mamm replied. After their final good-byes, the women headed for the carriage.

  Rosemary waved one last time at Matt and at the carriage that followed him. Then she looked at Beth Ann, hoping the idea she’d been cogitating on
would appeal to her. “You’ll want to see what Emma and I found while we were clearing out those cabinets upstairs—the ones where your mamm kept her fabric and whatnot.”

  Beth Ann wrinkled her nose. “I’ve pawed through them a time or two. Those cottons would make for a lot of work if I sewed dresses from them.”

  “But now that you’re making rugs—” Beth Ann’s wide-eyed reaction made Rosemary laugh as she led the way upstairs.

  “Well, jah! I wasn’t needing strips to crochet those other times I went through Mamm’s boxes.”

  “We saved you a nice stack of colorful fabric and gave the older clothing to Zanna for her rug making. And then there’s a favor I’d like to ask.” Rosemary stepped into Beth Ann’s room and gave the girl a moment to exclaim over the colorful florals, calicos, and ginghams for her rug…waited for her to find the dresses that were already cut out.

  “I can recall when Mamm started these, way last year before she got so sick.” As she held them up, Beth Ann seemed a little sad—until she looked slyly at Rosemary. “Why am I thinking you’d like to wear these instead of your black dresses? Maybe someday real soon—like, once you move across the road from Matt?”

  Rosemary blushed. It seemed everyone had ideas about how she and Matt should be together, sooner rather than later. “You’ll be busy packing up your room, but—”

  “It’ll be a snap to make these, Rosemary. If you’ll redd up the supper dishes,” she suggested slyly, “I could have them all sewn up for you by tomorrow.” Dish duty wasn’t Beth Ann’s favorite chore.

  “I can do that, jah! You’re so much better at sewing than I am.”

  Beth Ann got a faraway look on her face. “It’s like Abby told me,” she mused as she restacked the fabric. “I knew my best talent early on, so it’s up to me to do some gut with it. If I can help with her Stitch in Time orders while she runs the mercantile for Sam, I’ll be doing worthwhile work for Abby and her customers, too. It seems a fine way to start out our new life, ain’t so?”

  Rosemary felt a rush of goose bumps. “That’s a wonderful-gut way to look at it,” she murmured as she hugged Beth Ann. “Your mamm would be so pleased—and so am I.”

  Chapter 26

  Matt polished off his French toast and sausage on Tuesday morning and excused himself from the table. “Titus is bringing a load of sheep first thing, so I’d better get to my chores,” he said. Everyone in his family was watching him with knowing expressions, so he added, “He’s paying an English fellow with a truck and a big stock trailer to drive the sheep over today and then move the furniture tomorrow. Meanwhile, Rosemary’s still packing in Queen City.”

  Ruthie snickered as though she saw through his attempt to keep Rosemary out of the picture for the day. She stabbed another slice of golden-brown French toast. “To hear Beth Ann tell it, they’ll be all out of that house in a day or so. I can’t wait!”

  Matt liked the sound of this. It meant the move was going more smoothly than Titus or Rosemary had anticipated. “We’ll be starting Titus’s flock in the alfalfa field that cuts in behind the Graber place, as that’s the best grass to get them through the summer.”

  “It’ll take a couple years to convert those fields to gut grazing land,” his dat remarked as he sopped up the syrup on his plate with his last bite of French toast.

  “Jah. Titus is keeping Carl Byler on as his farmer, to overseed a lot of that place with timothy and canary grass—including our pastures, so his sheep can graze here some of the time while his new pastures get established.” Matt rose and scooted his chair under the table. “It’ll take some planning and rethinking, considering how that farm has been worked before, but Titus and I are convinced it’ll benefit the both of us.”

  His grandmother filled the sink with dishwater and then pointed out the window. “If that big red stock trailer coming down the road has sheep in it, your day’s off to an early start, Matt. It’s wonderful-gut, the way things are working out for you.”

  “Mostly, Grandma thinks it’s wonderful-gut that Titus is moving into the Bontrager place,” Ruthie teased. “Preacher Paul wasn’t her cup of tea, but—”

  “Ruthie, you’d best watch your smart remarks,” Dat warned her with a stern look. “It’s one thing to be excited about Beth Ann coming, but there’s no call to let your tongue wag out of turn. Folks’ll be paying attention to such details, now that you’re a preacher’s daughter.”

  Matt headed outside, glad to leave the kitchen. While their father had always been mindful of talk that went astray, lately he’d been lecturing Gail and Phoebe along these same lines; they should be wearing their kapps farther forward to cover more of their hair and should be hemming their skirts longer, too. Now that they spent their days in the mercantile, where the locals could monitor their behavior and where they would come in contact with more English, Dat was making them all toe a higher line. Mamm was already wearing black capes and aprons in public, as a preacher’s wife, and Dat was telling her to limit her midwifery to emergency situations. He expected her to ease herself out of it altogether by the time he started preaching sermons later in the summer.

  In short, a lot of Lambrights were silently gnashing at the bit, like retired racehorses feeling the reins tighten while they were being trained to pull Amish carriages.

  Matt called to his dogs, who loped up from the barn to trot alongside him. He felt fortunate that English ways had never been a temptation to him. Broadfall trousers, suspenders, and home-cut hair were no stigma to a fellow who spent most of his time with sheep. However, just to be sure none of his kids jumped the fence, Dat had insisted it was time for him and Phoebe and Gail to commit to the Old Order Amish church. But then, a certain someone more compelling than his dat was incentive for him to take his vows so he’d be ready to marry.

  As the shiny red pickup truck and stock trailer pulled into the lane down the road and stopped, that certain someone stepped out of the back door of the cab and looked right at him.

  Rosemary!

  Matt broke into a jog, his heart thumping. While Titus and his English driver came out of the truck’s front doors, the dogs raced ahead to check out the sheep that were blathering in the trailer. But Matt was focused on Rosemary’s dress, which was the same deep green as her eyes. He entered the lane looking like a man lost in love, no doubt, but he didn’t much care what Titus and the other fellow thought.

  Rosemary turned to lift her daughter out of the truck’s cab, and Katie threw her arms out toward him. “Puppies!” she crowed as she kicked to get down. “Katie play with the puppies all day!”

  “It’s gut to see you, Rosemary,” he said in a breathless voice. “Didn’t think you were coming along today.”

  Rosemary’s gaze didn’t waver as she set her wiggly daughter on the ground. “I’m nearly done with the packing, thanks to you folks coming out yesterday. I wanted to see about my new cookstove and oven at the mercantile, and figure out what’ll go in which cabinets before we move the furniture tomorrow.”

  Those were her words, anyway. She was thinking of her new business, but her shining eyes told Matt she had also come to see him—and when had anything ever made him so happy? Rosemary’s brown hair shimmered in the sunlight, tucked beneath a fresh white pleated kapp, and the green dress made her eyes look ever so large and pretty as she gazed at him.

  “And Matt here’s gonna be my new partner,” Titus was saying as he and his driver approached. “Matt Lambright, this is Dylan McGrew from over west of Queen City—and I’ve gotta tell you the trip was a whole lot shorter by truck than it is by buggy!” he added with a laugh. “We’ll unload these sheep out in that back pasture and then fetch the rest of them so’s they’re all here together, getting used to their new place before nightfall.”

  “Jah, that’ll work,” Matt said as he shook Dylan’s hand. “We’ve got the new troughs filled and the mineral blocks out, and Mose and Carl have helped me reinforce the fences. Panda and Pearl will get those sheep unloaded for you and tell th
em exactly where they’re to go.”

  “Nothing like border collies to keep livestock—and their people—moving where they’re supposed to,” Dylan agreed. “Better than having a hired man, for a lot of things.”

  “That’s the way I’ve always seen it, too,” Matt replied. “And they don’t ask for time off or pay raises, either, ain’t so?”

  He winked at Katie, who was stroking both dogs’ heads as they sat patiently accepting her attention. Then he focused on her mother again. “I’ll ride back to that pasture with these fellows and the dogs, but we’ll not be gone long. If you need any help in the house, let me know when I get back—and then I’ll tell Mamm to set more places for dinner,” he added happily. “She’s already figuring on Titus and Dylan, so you two girls will be a nice surprise.”

  Rosemary’s eyes widened. “I brought along a basket of sandwiches and a pie for us, but—”

  “Pie?” Matt’s grin widened. “We’ll add your lunch to Mamm’s menu, then. The more the merrier, ain’t so?”

  Her cheeks bloomed as she playfully lifted Katie to her hip. Had there ever been a prettier woman? A more devoted mother? Surely God had created Rosemary just for him! Something inside him glowed, just being near her today.

  Charity suffereth long and is kind…charity envieth not; charity vaunteth not itself, is not puffed up…

  The familiar Scripture passage came to him, most recently from Zanna’s wedding. Aunt Abby had suggested to him when he was younger, struggling to understand the Bible, that he could substitute the word “love” for “charity”—so the passage described Rosemary perfectly. Didn’t it? Love was patient and kind, just as she was.

  “See you in a few,” he murmured as he followed Titus and Dylan toward the truck.

  “I’ll be here, Matt.”

  Along toward noon, Abby’s head began to throb. Only Tuesday it was, and already she felt she was running behind for the week. All morning she’d tried to focus on filling out the order form for bulk spices, cereals, and baking staples from their supplier in Lancaster County, but every time she had a moment, Gail would have a question or a customer came in wanting her to sew. Vernon Gingerich had ordered four new summer dresses for his aunts this morning and curtains to go with the rag rugs Zanna had just completed for their room. Amos Coblentz had bought a new set of dishes for Nell’s birthday next week, so Mary and Martha wanted two long tablecloths made from a sturdy, no-wrinkle cotton-polyester blend as a present to their mother.