She threw back the sheets, fairly jumped out of bed, and dressed. She was downstairs, flipping pancakes on the stove, when her mudder walked into the room yawning.
“Well, you’re up early.” Sarah said as she walked to the stove to pour a cup of coffee from the percolator. She tilted her head and studied her. “And looking pretty happy. I can guess why.”
“Ya.”
Sarah sat at the table. “He came back, but we don’t know for how long.”
“Nee.” Miriam flipped pancakes onto a plate and set it on the stove. She poured more batter into the pan before she turned to her mudder. “I know he’ll be leaving again. But it’s nice to have him here for as long as he can stay. It’s gut for John and I think it’s gut for Mark, too. He’s worked so hard for such a long time and not been able to visit as much as in the past.”
“I just don’t want you to be hurt.”
“I know. But I’m not going to be. Honest.” Liar! she chided herself. You’ve already been hurt by loving a man you can’t have.
She stared at the bubbles forming around the edges of the pancakes, then, judging it time to flip them over, did so expertly with the spatula. “Want to eat now?” she asked her mudder.
Feet hit the floor above them. They heard a scuffle, a cry of outrage, a toilet flush.
“I think I’ll wait,” Sarah said with a rueful grin.
Kinner ran down the stairs dressed in thin summer pajamas and nightgowns, hair mussed.
“No breakfast looking like that,” Miriam teased. “You know the rules.”
They turned to look at their mudder.
“You know the rules,” she echoed.
Pouting, they filed out of the room and ran back up the stairs, pushing and shoving as they went.
“My kinner are so well behaved,” Sarah said as she watched them go.
Miriam just laughed. “Well, at least I’m well behaved.”
Daniel came in the back door. “You’re well behaved? Since when?”
“Daed!”
He washed his hands at the sink, then looked over Miriam’s shoulder. “Hmm. Pancakes. Maybe you’re allrecht after all.”
She laughed as she stacked several pancakes on a plate.
“Danki,” he said, reaching for the plate.
“Nee, these are for Mamm. She was here first.”
He sank into his chair at the head of the table and pulled a long face as he watched his fraa pour syrup on her pancakes. Then he brightened as Miriam set a plate with an even higher stack of pancakes before him. He ate quickly, then went back outside to do chores.
The kinner came down the stairs with a noisy clatter and found their seats. Miriam served them and monitored how much syrup was poured so there wouldn’t be a lake on any plate.
She shook Jacob’s shoulder. “What?” he muttered sleepily. “I’m awake.”
“Barely.”
“There’s one in every family,” Sarah observed. “My youngest bruder was like that in the morning.”
Jacob shoved a bite of pancake into his mouth and his eyes closed in bliss. Miriam watched him carefully. He’d fallen asleep eating more than once. She vividly remembered the time he’d drifted off and his face had landed in his bowl of oatmeal.
Once again, she wondered how Mark had he felt when he woke this morning. Pancakes were a favorite breakfast here in the Troyer house, and this morning was no exception. Miriam was kept busy moving from stove to table and back again, but finally the hungry kinner were full.
“Sit and eat,” Sarah insisted.
Miriam did as she was told, and enjoyed her pancakes with an unusually good appetite. Her mind drifted as she planned what she’d make for supper for John and Mark. She couldn’t wait to see him again. Mark, that is.
“So I guess we’ll get started weeding the garden and then do some canning,” her mudder said as she supervised her dochders doing the washing up.
“Mmm hmm.”
“We might be able to can a hundred jars today.”
“Mmm hmm.”
“Then we can scrub all the floors.”
Miriam glanced up. “Huh? Scrub all the floors?”
“So you’re back from whatever planet you visited?”
She chuckled. “Ya. Just thinking.” She picked up her plate, took it to the sink, and looked out the kitchen window. “Looks like another warm one.”
The kinner went outside to do chores and Miriam washed up her plate and fork.
Daniel came in the back door looking grim. “I’m going over to Abraham Miller’s. His fraa left a message on the machine in the phone shanty. He needs my help today.” He put his hands on his hips. “The Millers were hurt last night when their buggy was run off the road.”
Sarah’s hand flew to her throat. “Mein Gott! Are they allrecht?”
“Abraham’s arm was broken, but Lovina and their kinner just got a bunch of bumps and bruises. But he won’t be able to do his chores or any harvesting. I called some of the men to help.”
“We’ll get some food together and meet you there,” Sarah said.
Miriam dried her plate and fork and put them away. She and her mudder worked quickly to put together sandwiches and snacks. The men would need food to sustain them during a long day helping their neighbor.
“Why would anyone want to hurt the Millers?”
Sarah shook her head. “Let’s not get ahead of ourselves. It may have been an accident.”
Miriam wanted to say that’s not the way her dat had made it sound, but she subsided. They’d know soon enough when they got to the Miller farm.
John set a cup of coffee before Mark. “So, I’m glad you’re back.”
“Thanks.” He wasn’t really happy to be here, but it seemed unkind to say so when his grandfather was beaming at him. He took a sip of coffee.
“So, it’s back to work.” He spooned scrambled eggs onto plates and set them on the table. “Miriam brought cinnamon rolls over yesterday. I managed not to eat them all.” He pushed the basket of rolls toward Mark.
Mark bit into one and rolled his eyes. “Must have been hard. I can’t say I could have done the same for you if I’d gotten them first.”
“Some man is going to be lucky to get her for a fraa.”
“Seems to me you’ve told me that before.”
He just smiled. “Bears repeating.” He shoveled a bite of eggs into his mouth.
There was a knock on the back door a moment before Samuel stuck his head in. “Guder mariye.”
“Samuel, kumm,” John invited. “Have some coffee.”
He shook his head. “Nee, danki. I came to ask if you and Mark could help at the Millers today. Abraham broke his arm. His buggy got run off the road.”
“Schur. Is the family allrecht?”
“Will be. But he won’t be able to do his chores or any field work for a while.”
“We’ll be there as soon as we finish eating.”
Samuel left, and Mark and his grandfather hurriedly finished their breakfast, grabbed their straw hats, and headed out to hitch up the buggy.
This was community, Mark thought. Dropping everything to help a neighbor in need. He barely knew his neighbors back in Philly, and those he did know had never asked for his help.
Abraham was sitting on his back porch when they arrived. He looked wan and in pain, but insisted on greeting those who came to help.
“What happened?” John asked as they stepped up onto the porch. “Samuel said there was an accident with your buggy.”
“It was no accident.” Lovina walked out onto the porch. “It was no accident.”
“Lovina!”
She burst into a spate of Pennsylvania Dietsch so fast Mark couldn’t decipher it. He glanced at his grandfather, but he just shook his head, signaling silence.
Mark saw movement behind Lovina. Miriam stood watching her friend and looked visibly upset.
Abraham’s fraa turned on her heel and went back into the house. Miriam cast Mark a look he couldn’t interpret before she follow
ed Lovina.
A group of men had arrived and chores were divvied up. They set about working to get as much done as possible before the heat intensified.
Miriam came out with several other women to serve the men cold drinks and cookies.
“I need to talk to you,” she whispered, glancing over her shoulder so that she wasn’t overheard.
“Sure. What’s up?”
“Later. I’ll give you a ride home?”
He nodded and went back to work, wondering what the mystery was.
The men were quieter than they’d been during other days harvesting and doing chores. Mark could see that the incident had affected them. Buggy accidents were more common in Lancaster County than some other Amish areas because of so much tourism traffic. What brought prosperity to the area often brought car-buggy encounters that sometimes proved fatal to the buggy occupants.
The Miller family had sustained injuries and property damage, but it could have been worse.
“Lovina says it was no accident,” Miriam said the minute they got inside the buggy after the work day. “They were run off the road by a couple of Englisch teenagers she thinks had been drinking.”
“Did they contact the police?”
“Have you learned nothing about us?”
“Okay, dumb question.”
Miriam stared into the distance, her expression grim. “Their buggy was badly damaged. Their horse was seriously injured and may have to be put down. Do you have any idea how much buggy repairs cost? How expensive vet bills can be?” She took a deep, shaky breath. “And that’s not the worst of it. This wasn’t the first time this same group of teenagers harassed them on the road.”
“I’m sorry.” Mark waited, unsure how to proceed. “Why are you telling me this, Miriam?” he asked her finally.
“We don’t press charges,” she told him. “That’s man’s law, not God’s.”
“I’d be broke if we did that back in Philly,” he joked, then bit his tongue at the look she gave him. “Sorry.”
“Right now I’m having trouble with it,” she admitted. “Things have been rough for the Millers this year. Very rough. I don’t want to betray their privacy but this . . .” she trailed off. “Lovina looks so worried. She’s not just concerned about the buggy and the injuries. She’s worried the teenagers won’t stop.”
“So what do you want me to do?”
“Talk to Abraham. You’re good at talking.”
“But if they won’t press charges, what will that accomplish?”
She bit her lip. “Maybe you can persuade him to let you talk to the teenagers who did this, get them to pay for the buggy repairs and the medical bills for Abraham and the horse. I mean, talking’s not pressing charges or suing, right?”
He nodded. “It’s what most attorneys do. They don’t all immediately go to court. My specialty is where we do, though.”
She pulled into the drive of John’s farm house then turned to him. “So you’ll think about it?”
Mark gazed into her eyes. Her concern for her friends, her passion to help them, touched him. “I’ll think about it.”
His grandfather was already home and dozing in the recliner in the living room. Mark tiptoed past him and went out to the barn to do evening chores.
What a change in daily routine, he couldn’t help thinking. Back home, he’d park his car and not think about it again until morning. Here there were actual animals that depended on them for food and water and care.
On the other hand, he’d never had a neigh or a nuzzle from his car in thanks for caring for it. He chuckled as he fed his grandfather’s horses some quartered apples.
He thought about what Miriam had said about the Millers and their horse being gravely injured. Horses powered buggies here and helped with the farming. A farm couldn’t survive without its livestock, and like she’d said, the vet bills would be a burden.
When he returned to the house, his grandfather was still snoozing. Mark was exhausted and he wasn’t anywhere near the old man’s age. He went upstairs, showered, and dressed in clean clothes. Then he poked in the refrigerator for something for supper. He felt too tired to eat, but knew a man couldn’t expect to work his body without refueling it.
“Dozed off for a few minutes there,” his grandfather said when he wandered into the kitchen a little while later.
He’d been sleeping for an hour, but Mark decided not to point that out. “You want to eat now or after you clean up?”
John sighed. “I suppose I should shower first. No point putting you off your appetite catching a sniff of me downwind as you eat.”
He chuckled. “I don’t think anything will put me off some food. Hurry up or nothing may be left by the time you come back down.” He watched him trudge up the stairs and worried about how old he was looking.
Back home, Mark would have picked up takeout on the way home or called his favorite Italian restaurant for delivery. And he’d have eaten alone in front of the television set or before his computer as he worked.
Tonight there was just enough leftover cold chicken from the previous night’s meal. Miriam and other women from the community left jars of chow chow, bread and butter, summer squash, and pickled baby beets. John sliced the loaf of bread and they sat down to the simple but filling cold supper.
“Danki for doing the chores,” John said as he helped himself to a couple of thick slices of ripe tomato. “I was tuckered out when I came home.”
“No thanks needed. “ Mark sliced chicken and passed the platter to him. “Miriam wants me to talk to Abraham about the accident. If you can really call it that.”
“Ya?”
He nodded and related what she’d said. John listened as he ate.
“You thinking about setting up shop here in Lancaster County?”
Mark started to shake his head, then stopped. It would be a way to be closer to his grandfather and help with the farm. And he didn’t have a job right now . . .
“No. Mr. Miller won’t want to have me sue or help him press charges anyway, from what I know of your ways. But Miriam thinks I could put pressure on the teenagers to make restitution and reform their ways.”
“Humph.” John finished eating and pushed his plate aside. “It’s going to take some persuading.”
“I’m good at that.”
“You are,” he acknowledged. “I’m pretty gut at it, too.”
“You thinking of talking to Abraham about it?”
“Nee.” John went to the refrigerator and drew out a plastic container. “I’m thinking you should give a tired old man the piece of strawberry icebox pie you brought home last night.”
Mark chuckled and leaned forward to rest his elbows on the table. “Let’s hear you present your case.”
Eighteen
“I spoke to Mark about what happened,” Miriam told Lovina as they worked in Lovina’s kitchen a few days later.
She didn’t like the way Lovina looked today. If anything, she looked paler and more tired than she had the day after the accident.
Lovina paused in the act of grating a head of cabbage for cole slaw. “What did he say?”
“He told me he’d think about talking to Abraham.”
“Gut!” Lovina went back to grating the cabbage. “It’s not right what happened. We weren’t doing anything to those teenagers when they ran us off the road. I heard them laughing as they did it.” She stopped suddenly, pressed her hand against her mouth.
“What’s the matter?”
Lovina held out her hand and showed two scraped knuckles. “I wasn’t paying attention. The grater got me.” She walked to the sink, rinsed the small cut off, patted it dry with a paper towel, then applied a bandage to her abraded knuckle.
When she returned to the table, she sank into a chair and burst into tears.
“Lovina! Oh my, please, don’t cry.” Miriam rushed to her side and hugged her. “Everything will work out.”
But Lovina just sobbed harder. Miriam patted her back
and let her cry it out. When finally her friend’s tears subsided, Miriam handed her some paper napkins from the napkin holder on the table.
“I lost the boppli I was carrying the night of the accident,” Lovina said through trembling lips. “I was three months along. I’m grateful that I still have my three kinner, but I lost my precious little boppli I carried under my heart for such a brief time.”
Miriam’s own heart broke at her words. “Oh, my, Lovina, I am so sorry.”
The kitchen door opened and Mark appeared. He took in the scene and looked at Miriam. She shook her head. He backed out and quietly shut the door.
“Abraham says we have to forgive. I say, why can’t the ones responsible pay for what they’ve done?” She reached into her apron pocket and withdrew a ragged piece of paper. “I got the license plate number that night.” She held the paper out with shaking fingers. “Please, give this to Mark.”
Miriam took the paper and put it in the pocket of her apron. “I will. Lovina, please, go lie down and let me finish here. You need to rest. You need to stay strong for your family.”
Lovina’s sigh was weary. “A few minutes only. The other women will be along soon.”
“Do you want me to get Abraham?”
“Nee, danki.” She rose and climbed the stairs to her bedroom.
She listened to her friend’s slow, steady footsteps and her heart ached. Then, because the men would be needing a meal, she reached for a paper napkin and wiped her own eyes.
Women crowded into the kitchen a few minutes later, bearing containers of food. Their smiles faded when Miriam quietly told them that Lovina was upstairs resting. She didn’t say why—that was Lovina’s personal business—but the women nodded and said they were glad she was resting.
“She looked so pale and shaky the other day,” Miriam’s mudder said. “Are the kinner allrecht?”
Miriam nodded. “They’re spending the day with one of their grossmudders.”
“And Abraham?”
“He’s sitting on the back porch supervising.”
The women bustled about preparing the meal, chatting quietly, long years of experience putting them at ease in the kitchen of another woman.
The atmosphere was quiet as the meal was served at the long wooden table beneath the shade of a tree in the back yard. Miriam wasn’t sure if it was because of the reason they had gathered, or because everyone was just so tired this time of year.
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