by Linda Byler
“Yes.”
“Well, this is interesting. Very interesting. We’ll have to talk. But first, let me seat you. Here, Jeremiah, is it?”
“Call me Jerry. Everybody does.”
Timothy grinned an infectious grin. “Tim. Call me Tim.”
He really was a nice-looking young man. Brown hair, cut short in the manner of the English, a thin brown moustache above a wide mouth, a prominent nose and expressive blue eyes, hooded by a wealth of brown eyebrows.
Tim seated them on the sofa, a large, deep davenport upholstered in gray. Expensive, Hannah thought, as she reached back to arrange pillows behind her back. Tim seated himself in an oak rocking chair and stretched his denim-clad legs out before him. Hannah looked around, wondering if he had a wife, children, or parents? Who were all those men, with the white trailers and white horses?
“So,” Tim began. “The reason it is interesting to me that you are of a religious sect is because we are too. Oh, I meant to tell you. My wife is taking a much-needed nap. I told you we’re from Salt Lake City. You probably have heard of the Mormons? The Church of the Latter-day Saints?”
“Yes.” Jerry nodded.
“We are of that religious order.” His voice turned quiet, and his eyes became averted. He lifted both hands to examine his fingernails, as if mentioning his church made him nervous, selfconscious.
There was an awkward silence. Then Tim sighed. “We moved here to begin a new life after leaving our way of life among the … the brethren of the Mormon Church.”
Jerry raised his eyebrows, watched Tim’s face, but said nothing. Tim took a deep breath, a smile appeared on his face, one that showed his white teeth but did not spread to his eyes. “So, here we are. Pioneers on the prairie. North Dakota. Bought this ranch. I raise horses.”
White horses, Hannah thought. She wanted to know what the breed was called but of course, she couldn’t say that in Jerry’s presence.
“Tell me about your … way of life.”
So Jerry outlined the Amish faith briefly, the ordnung, the way of obedience, the journey from Lancaster County, Hannah’s family homesteading the 320 acres, and that now they were the only Amish remaining.
“Why did your brethren return home?” Tim asked.
Hannah spoke up. “The two-year drought.”
“You mean …” Tim looked from Jerry to Hannah and back again.
“It didn’t rain for two years.”
“Oh, come on! I have a hard time believing that.” Tim laughed, slapping his knee at the joke he’d just heard.
“No, I’m serious.” Hannah felt a stab of anger. Boy, did he have a lot to learn.
“You can’t sit there and tell me you had not one drop of rain in two years!” Incredulous, Tim leaned forward, an intensity stabbing the room’s muted yellowish glow.
“Close to it.” Hannah glanced at Jerry, saw his pinched look.
Tim chuckled, a derisive sound that bordered on mockery. The moment was saved by a fluttering sound, a door closing quietly, light footsteps crossing the hallway, followed by the appearance of a vision dressed in white. Almost, Hannah recoiled, thinking a heavenly being was in their midst.
Her hair was blond, an unnatural white blond, unlike anything Hannah had ever seen, surrounding her head like a halo, purely angelic. Her eyes were large, almond-shaped, and blue, her face small and pointed, like porcelain. Doll-like, she appeared to be made of wax.
“I heard visitors,” she trilled, in an unnatural child’s voice.
Hannah drew back, aghast. How old was this wife of Tim’s?
She walked over to Hannah and sat next to her, extending a small, white hand, exclaiming in short sentences how happy she was to see them, and how they would be close friends, how charming her head covering was, and … how had they arrived?
Hannah looked out the window toward the corral and noticed the fading light, the restless horses. She spoke a few words of acknowledgment to the girl’s overtures, listened to Tim’s introduction of his wife, Lila, then rose and said they must be on their way, she believed there would be a change in the weather, but not before Lila mentioned the fact that she was sixteen years old.
CHAPTER 6
THEY WERE SORRY TO SEE THEM LEAVE SO SOON AND URGED THEM TO stay for tea and cakes. But Hannah remained adamant. Jerry told Tim they’d be back as soon as they could, but he’d better follow his wife because she was well-versed in the ways of the weather on the plains.
As soon as they were able to get away from their pleading hosts, Hannah hissed a warning to Jerry. “We have to ride hard.” That was all she said, but Jerry heard the warning in her voice. They weren’t at the first bend in the road before the yellowish cast turned much darker, changed to a leaden, grayish sheen that held no promise of anything gentle or good.
The dogs were flat out, running to the best of their ability, but could not keep up with the horses’ galloping pace. When they fell behind, Hannah slowed the palomino and yelled to Jerry, who turned, and slowed King as well.
Hannah dismounted, pointing a shaking finger to the northeast. “See that?”
Jerry shaded his eyes, his palm turned down, squinting, then shook his head. “What? I don’t see anything.”
“That gray line. It looks like a wall.”
Jerry still didn’t see it.
“We’re in for it. That’s snow. If we ride hard enough, we’ll make it. If not, there’s a real chance we could get lost.”
“Come on, Hannah. Not in October!”
“The dogs can’t keep up. You carry one. I’ll take the other.”
“We can’t, Hannah.”
“We have to.”
“They’ll find their way home.”
Hannah shrugged and got back in the saddle—there wasn’t time to waste arguing. Kicking the stirrups in the palomino’s sides, she rode leaning low across the saddle, listening for King’s hoofbeats behind her.
The wind picked up immediately, followed by the first gritty snowflake. Hannah became wild-eyed, watching as King flashed by, Jerry low on his neck.
She put the end of the leather reins on her horse’s sides, screaming and goading him on. They had not yet reached the crossroads where the barbed wire fence sagged on the right, which meant they had a long way to go after they turned. At least four or five miles.
The dogs were no longer behind them. Hannah twisted her body in the saddle and called their names, but she knew it was futile. They’d find their way home, he’d said. Did he even know how bad snowstorms could be on the plains?
A few hard flakes of snow, and then there were thousands, biting into her face like fierce, sharp teeth. She lowered her head even farther. The horses slowed of their own accord, turned left and increased their speed until Hannah thought she must be rocketing through the air. She gasped for breath and gritted her teeth against the stinging, icy bits of snow that were assaulting her face.
King was still visible, the flying hooves and charging body with Jerry’s dark head so low it appeared to be part of the flowing black mane. Hannah was gasping for breath, wiping her nose on the shoulder of her coat, nose and eyes streaming. Her ears felt as if they were being torched.
Oh for a black, woolen kerchief to tie around her head. The flying bits of snow thickened. Ahead of her, King was turning from a brown horse with a flying black mane and tail to a blob of gray, an undulating blob of non-color with invisible hooves.
Panic rose in her chest. She screamed, trying to get Jerry to slow down. The possibility of being lost in a blizzard on the plains loomed before her, the stark reality a slap in the face, a painful blow that took her breath away. She didn’t realize she was muttering and sobbing, “No no, no. Please God, no.”
Not this way. She didn’t want to die, frozen, on the prairie, blatant evidence of her own dumb choice, unlearned greenhorns without a lick of common sense.
It’s only October. It’s only a squall. Over and over, she told herself this, to keep the terror at bay.
Then
, she couldn’t see King at all. The wind blasted through her thin coat, the snow like knifepoints. The world turned into a gray void with no top or bottom, no left or right, and she had no idea where she was headed.
Give a horse its head, it’ll always find its way home. The thought was a comfort, for a short time at least. When the palomino slowed to a trot, Hannah knew there was no use pushing him faster; he’d set his own pace.
Her teeth chattering, eyes streaming, black hair plastered to her head like a rubber swimming cap, Hannah held on with her knees, shivering so hard her arms raised and lowered of their own accord like a chicken after its head is severed on the chopping block. Grimly, she reminded herself to stay calm, stay reasonable.
Her world was a whiteout now. Everything was obliterated except for the orb of whirling snow and the icy, driving wind.
“He’ll get me home,” Hannah whispered. Over and over. “Home. Home. He’ll get me home.”
A hard bump. A lurch. Hannah grabbed for the saddle horn. Too late! The palomino went down, falling with a grunt, the air expelled from his nostrils as Hannah flew off the saddle, down over the horse’s bent neck, hitting the ground with a crunch on her left shoulder.
A knife edge of pain shot all the way from her fingertips to her neck. A ripping, tearing monster of agony that took away every sensation, the whirling whiteness of the storm, the downed horse, and the cold. Everything.
She slid blissfully into unconsciousness.
Jerry let King have his head, knowing Hannah was on his heels. He didn’t become too concerned until the snow became so thick he had trouble keeping the side of the road in his sight. After that, it was up to King. Trusting his horse was the only way. He had never been so cold in all his life. He turned in the saddle, repeatedly calling Hannah’s name, but the wind tore his words out of his mouth and flung them away. He imagined the wind laughing at him, a hysterical, evil cackle that robbed him of the small amount of confidence he had.
He prayed for God’s deliverance from the grip of this awful storm. He prayed for deliverance if it was God’s will, though, always putting his life in God’s hands.
Whether we live or whether we die, we are the Lord’s. Over and over, this verse coursed through his mind. The pain of his cold hands was almost unbearable. He envisioned black, useless fingers. Hanging the reins across King’s neck, he sat up to tuck his numbed hands under his armpits, but felt only more cold and ice.
He sucked in a lungful of air, blew it out, then shivered uncontrollably. Calm. Calm. Stay with it. He talked to himself repeatedly. King slowed, picked up his head to trot, then slowed again. Each time he slowed, Jerry turned, his eyes boring through the whirling whiteness, hoping for a glimpse of Hannah on the palomino.
He was becoming sleepy, while shivering like a windblown leaf on a tree branch. He released his hands from beneath his armpits, slapped them against his chest, kicked his feet out of the stirrups and pumped them up and down, whacking his knees against the sides of the saddle.
King plodded on, his faithful ears still turning back, then forward, pricking through the whirling, spitting, hissing gray world being flung in Jerry’s face, a cruel reminder that he was a mere mortal who had made a stupid decision, a miscalculation. Why hadn’t he taken Hannah’s warnings more seriously?
Not that she’d ever take his warnings. He winced when something hit his left knee, then shouted weakly, the sound like a mewling kitten.
The corral. Thank God! He stopped, waiting for Hannah.
The realization that she was not directly behind him arrived slowly. Finally, to stave off his rising panic, he dismounted on legs that seemed to be made of liquid. He fell, his bare hands scrabbling in the deepening snow as he righted himself, wobbled to the barn, his stiffened fingers fumbling with the latch like a young child.
Surely Hannah would be here soon. He unsaddled King, rubbed him down, fed him, gave him a small amount of water, his ears tuned for the sound of Hannah’s arrival. Please, please. Over and over he begged. Keep her safe, Lord. Keep her safe.
He made his way to the house by unspooling a long length of hemp rope, missing the house several times by a good one hundred feet each time. First to the right, then to the left, before bumping solidly into the side of the house, cracking his nose until tears ran down his cheeks.
Somehow, he kept enough of his senses to start a fire in the cook stove, open the draught until a roaring fire turned the stove top cherry red. Repeatedly, he went to the window, fighting down the dragon’s fiery panic, the imagined monster that took away his sense of hope, his ability to pray and believe that God would look down with mercy.
Please. Please.
Hannah struggled as if she was under water, bravely fighting to open her mouth and fill her lungs with life-saving air.
She was so cold. So terribly cold. She was a child, playing in the snow, her crocheted mittens soaked, her hands red and wet and freezing. There was Manny. She’d get his mittens. She ran after him, calling, calling, but he seemed never to hear her at all.
She was crying when she regained consciousness. The palomino was down and, by the looks of it, had either broken or otherwise injured his foot. He made no attempt to regain his footing, merely huddled in a heap of golden hide and cream-colored mane and tail, his eyes closed against the whipping wind and snow.
Hannah’s first logical reasoning was to stay where she was. She knew that to wallow about on level land in zero visibility was courting death, and she had no intention of dying this way. She took stock of her situation.
One downed horse. No one to rescue her this time. A saddle and yes, a saddle blanket. Both impossible to remove. If she could somehow loosen the girth strap, she’d be able to use both to try and keep from freezing. Then she’d have to wait out the storm and hope for the best.
She moved, which sent an electric shock through her shoulder. She felt like she might lose consciousness again, which really made her mad.
She took her right hand and grasped her left shoulder, pushing and prodding, squeezing her eyes shut against the pain. Nothing broken, just bumped and bruised.
Hannah got to her feet, crying now, the pain almost unbearable. She slipped a hand beneath the wide girth strap, and pulled. She pushed, working the girth up over the belly of the horse, shaking her numb, red hands over and over, alternately muttering and crying.
When the girth strap would not let loose, she fell on her backside, hard, then went back to tugging the saddle and blanket loose from the horse’s body. She realized the importance of these two items, the difference between life and death. Gritting her teeth, she squeezed her eyes shut and kept pulling, over and over, yanking, urging the palomino to roll just a bit. Just a bit.
Only when the tears froze on her numb cheeks did she realize she was begging, crying, pushing on the horse’s stomach with one hand, yanking on the wide girth strap with the other.
She lifted numb hands to cup her flaming ears and the side of her head. How long could a person expect to survive in these harsh conditions?
She freed the saddle with a mighty heave, then the blanket. Quickly she found the lee side of the horse, away from the driving snow.
She tucked herself in, pulled the fibrous, itching saddle blanket over her body, rolling up in a tight fetal position, then reaching out with one hand to draw the saddle over her head and shoulders. A blessed reprieve, if only for a short time. She felt the absence of the wind’s fury, the stinging of the icy snow. Exhausted, she reveled in the still, dark cocoon of the horse’s body, the blanket, and the saddle.
Thank God for the trousers and boots, the woolen socks on her feet. She was still shaking with the cold, miserable with goose bumps going up and down her spine and across her shoulders, her ears and hands burning with the extreme cold and moisture of the melting snow.
Her teeth clacked together. She put her hands between her knees, rolling and grimacing with the pain. Well, she was here, now. In the biggest mess she’d ever been in. She guessed it wa
s up to her to figure something out, with Jerry on his own and the dogs having gone their way. She hoped he wouldn’t be dumb enough to start out on his own in this storm. Many more people than she cared to admit had died on the plains in a blizzard.
Had they discussed this together? She couldn’t remember. She had no choice, no other option but to stay where she was and hope the storm would soon blow itself out and she could attempt to find her way back home. She would freeze to death if she tried to get to their homestead, if the storm continued through the night.
The horse afforded some heat. Why did he lay here? If his leg was broken, Jerry would have to shoot him. There was no repairing a horse’s leg bone. She regretted not having taken him as a gift. The horse with no name, as she recognized him. If she would have accepted the gift of the beautiful palomino, she would have felt beholden to him, like she owed him the favor of being his friend, which she resisted.
And now she’d gone and married him, to save the homestead, and was in the same unsteady boat in the same swamp of her own will.
Perhaps it would just be easier to die out here on the prairie that she loved. Frozen stiff.
A fierce resistance to her own demise roared through her, leaving her shaken and unable to understand her intense, overwhelming fervor for life.
She would not die. She had this makeshift cave of sorts, the heat from the horse’s body, if he lived through the night.
The sound of the blowing snow scouring the blanket told her the storm was still roaring across the prairie. Like a freight train, this wind. There was no stopping it, no directing it where you wanted it to go, or when you wanted it to cease.
She felt as if God was above the storm, mad at her, teaching her a lesson, like a child being punished. He certainly was not showing any mercy, no matter how much she cried and begged.
Well then, if this was what He thought she needed, then she’d take her punishment, and take it right, without complaint.
Her father had spanked her many times as a child so she figured this was the grown-up version of a “paddling” in the woodshed, where her gentle father would get down on one knee, grasp her shoulders tenderly, and explain to her in great and lengthy detail how she had disobeyed and, in order to correct her for doing wrong, she needed to feel the pain of the thin, flat piece of wood. To disobey made the Lord sad. Children who were left to their own devices, who never learned to submit to their parents, would find it hard to submit to God in later years.