The Tempted Soul

by Adina Senft

  “Grant has been married before, and knows that a wife’s help includes sensible suggestions.”

  Carrie wished she could speak so calmly when it was clear that Joshua—for some reason that eluded her—was itching to stir someone up. And the little dig about his single state hadn’t got past her, either.

  “But you’re not his wife yet,” Joshua said.

  “You’re right. I should have said a fiancée’s help.”

  Unexpectedly, he grinned at her. “I can’t get under your skin, can I?”

  “I don’t know why you’d want to.” Emma poured a glass of water and set it in front of him. “The thing about mosquitoes getting under your skin is that nine times out of ten, they get slapped.”

  He threw back his head and laughed. “Now, you see? This is what I miss about the old times. No matter what I did, you always had an answer for me—whether I liked it or not.” He sobered a little. “Sure you won’t change your mind?”

  Good heavens. Carrie hoped she didn’t look as shocked as she felt. And with the invitations already going out!

  “My mind was made up long before you ever had a chance to change it,” Emma told him. A smile of perfect contentment made her face glow. “So never mind your teasing.”

  That’s all it was—teasing between two childhood friends. Carrie shook her head at herself for being so gullible. Of course she knew that Emma had had a talk with Joshua and told him there could never be anything between them. And now that wedding plans were in motion, the idea that anyone could come between her and Grant was ludicrous.

  Especially Joshua…who was not the best marital prospect to begin with.

  Carrie bent to check the casserole. It was bubbling hot and nicely browned, so she pulled it out and set it on the table. Joshua seemed to have recovered his good humor, and told stories of his life in Indiana that had them laughing and joking—as though all three of them had been childhood friends.

  At length he pushed his dessert plate away and waved off her offer of another cup of coffee. “No, thanks, Carrie. That was a fine piece of cake.”

  “Carrie is going to make me a wedding cake just like it,” Emma said. “She has a talent for them.”

  “Why don’t you work in a bakery, then?” he asked Carrie.

  It had honestly never occurred to her. “I don’t know. When would I have the time?”

  “If you found a couple of hours a day, you could put a little money by.”

  “Cakes like this take more than a couple of hours, Joshua,” Emma reminded him. “A wedding cake takes a couple of days.”

  “Besides,” Carrie said, “the bakeries around here already have enough people. Most of them are family operations. If they needed an extra person, they would hire a sister or a cousin, not me.”

  Emma began to stack the plates, and Carrie ran hot water into the sink.

  “Joshua, are you going out to the orchard to pick?” Carrie asked. “I know it’s nearly dark, but there’s time enough to get in a bushel, I think. Emma and I have a good two or three hours of work here.”

  “No, I think I’d best be getting home.”

  “I was hoping to catch a ride with you,” Emma said.

  “You’re welcome to come. I’d be glad of the company.”

  “I didn’t mean now, Joshua, I meant later, when we had these apples done. You could pick another couple of baskets—it won’t be dark for a while yet.”

  “I have some things to do. Sorry about that, Emma. Thanks for dinner, Carrie. See you tomorrow afternoon. When’s Melvin getting back?”

  “I’m expecting him for supper.”

  “Then maybe you won’t mind if I stay again? I’d like to talk the work over with him, and since I’ll already be here…”

  “Ja, fine.”

  “Gut Nacht.”

  “Hatge, Joshua.”

  The door closed behind him and the sound of his boots thumped down the steps. Emma looked at her and raised a brow. “So much for a ride home. I hope you don’t mind hitching Jimsy up for me.”

  “Of course not. But what on earth has gotten into him? I’m not sure what shocks me most—that he wouldn’t stick around to give you a ride after dark, or his complete lack of concern about leaving you stranded on the other side of the settlement.”

  “Not stranded. If you couldn’t take me, I’d just walk. Someone would be along to give me a ride.”

  “That’s not the point.” At last Carrie figured out what it was about Joshua that had been bothering her since he’d come to work on their place. “The point is that he didn’t put you first, like a brother would a sister in the family of God. He put himself first.”

  She scrubbed the plates vigorously while Emma fetched the first bushel of apples and a knife. She sat at the table and began to peel. “I’m sad to say you’re not the first person who has had that thought. I think it’s the root of his troubles, even back when we were children.”

  “But did his parents not see it and take steps to check it?”

  “I’m sure they did, but you remember how big their family was. He was the youngest of eleven, and his parents were older by the time he came along. Sometimes you can depend on the older siblings to take a hand in the bringing-up, but maybe it wasn’t quite so successful in his case.”

  “That’s right. He was the baby of the family,” Carrie said. “That explains a lot.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “He wasn’t very kind when he got here this afternoon. He said some things that…well, that were meant to make me feel bad about having you girls here and forgetting that he was to come.”

  “Poor baby.” Emma finished one long spiral of peel and picked up another apple. “Not getting your undivided attention. I hope you stood up to him. He needs that.”

  “So I saw. You really know how to handle him.”

  “It feels strange, standing up to a man like that, but it’s the only way with Joshua. Jesus intended that we should be humble, walking beside our man, not ahead of him. But I don’t think He meant we should lie down so he could walk on us, either.”

  Humility was a battle a woman chose to fight every day, obedience a decision she made every morning—and sometimes more often than that. But in most cases, your man would meet you halfway. It was a joy to be humble with a man who put you first, and no sacrifice to obey a man who included you in his decisions.

  “Maybe that’s Joshua’s trouble,” she mused aloud. “He’s gone too long only making decisions for himself. It’s an adjustment to take your partner into account every time you go to do something.”

  “Yes, well, he could take his sisters in the faith into account and get some practice at it,” Emma said.

  “We’re fortunate in our men,” Carrie said as she dried the last plate and put it away.

  “God has been good to us,” Emma agreed. “I thank Him every day on my knees, believe me. Now, look here. I’m already three apples ahead of you. Don’t cut yourself catching up to me.”

  The drying boxes would be full tonight, and so would her soul, Carrie thought as the long peels curled away from her own knife. An evening of Emma’s company was just the thing to heal up the scrapes and cuts from her hired man.

  * * *

  The running lights glowed on the buggy as Emma climbed in next to Carrie. “You really don’t have to do this. I can walk.”

  Carrie shook the reins and Jimsy started forward. “Don’t be silly. You’re wearing dark colors, and with your coat and bonnet, even a car with headlights would have a hard time picking you out.”

  “I’m glad I wore a coat.” Emma settled on the bench and wrapped her arms around her carry basket, which now contained several jars of freshly made applesauce. “Winter is definitely around the corner. And just three weeks from now…”

  Carrie could practically feel the happiness and anticipation filling Emma’s side of the buggy. “The time will flash by. Remember when we were planning my wedding? Even that morning there were things that hadn’t got
ten done, and I had nearly a year to prepare.”

  Emma was silent for a moment. “Would you have still made the choice you did, knowing what you know now?”

  “You mean, about children?”

  “That, and other things. Like Melvin’s struggle to find work he’s truly happy with.”

  Those things might have made another woman answer differently. But Carrie knew her answer even before Emma had finished speaking. “Ja. Ja, I would have married him still, even knowing how hard it would be. He has been the only man for me ever since we met, that night at the band hop.”

  “Love is a strange thing,” Emma mused. “Or maybe I should say the will of God is sometimes beyond what our poor brains can imagine. Who would have thought it would be His will that I marry a man who married someone else first?”

  “Maybe that time of waiting had its purpose,” Carrie suggested. “Because I wouldn’t want to think that poor Lavina’s death was part of God’s plan to bring you and Grant together.”

  “That’s the part my brain can’t comprehend,” Emma said. “And I’m glad it doesn’t have to. My part is to say yes, and I have. And will.” A few minutes passed, the seconds clopped out by Jimsy’s hooves on the asphalt. Then Emma said, “I can’t regret these twelve years with Mamm, though. They’ve been very precious years, and I’ll look back on them with gratitude.”

  “There you are, then.” Carrie made the left turn off the county highway onto Edgeware Road.

  They hadn’t gone more than a hundred yards when the front lamps illuminated a figure wearing a white shirt. Tall, skinny, and coming from the Grohl place around the corner, maybe? That made it—

  “Alvin Esch?” Emma called. “Is that you?”

  The teenager turned and waited for them to draw up next to him. “Hallo, Emma. Hi, Carrie.”

  “This is awfully late for you to be walking,” Carrie said. “I’m just going to drop Emma at the farm. I can give you a ride down to your folks’ place if you like.” It would take her back around to the county highway the long way, but it wasn’t like she had anyone waiting for her at home, was it? Melvin wasn’t coming back until tomorrow.

  “Denki.” Emma jumped down and he folded himself into the back. Then she climbed in again. “I wanted to ask you something anyway, Emma.” His voice sounded muffled, as though he were hiding his mouth with his hand. “Has any mail come to you lately?”

  Carrie peered out into the dark ahead of them and kept her mouth firmly shut. It would not do for him to know that Emma had told her and Amelia all about his correspondence courses—and her part in it. She would let Emma herself break that to him if she chose.

  “You don’t need to be so vague, Alvin,” Emma said matter-of-factly. “Carrie knows. She knows what you and I and Aaron King were up to last year, and she knows that your packets were coming to my house.”

  “Oh,” he said faintly. “I thought we agreed…”

  “We did. They found out another way. And anyhow, it’s all water under the bridge, because I told you when the school year ended that I would not be getting the packets anymore.”

  “But I’m starting the first term of junior year this week. I don’t know where else to have the people send them.”

  “General Delivery at the post office?”

  “You know Janelle would blab.”

  “I thought the post office was supposed to keep people’s mail confidential?” Carrie couldn’t resist speaking up.

  “We’re talking about Janelle Baum,” Emma reminded her, as if that explained everything. “She gave me a package for John once when I was in there. I could have been living in Strasburg for all she knew, and carried away his baler parts to sell at the flea market.”

  “Please, Emma,” Alvin begged. “You’ve helped me this long.”

  “And I was wrong to do it,” she said. “Besides, what good will it do you to have them sent to me for only a month? Come November, I’ll be living over on the other side of Whinburg.”

  “You could get them there. I can send them a change of address.”

  Emma turned on the seat to look at him as though she could see in the dark. Maybe she could. “It’s one thing to deceive Mamm for your sake, Alvin. But I will not deceive the man who will be my husband.”

  A long breath went out of him, and Carrie could almost feel sorry for the boy. Almost, but not quite. Because all three of them knew that he was disobeying the Ordnung and had been for two years. On top of that, it was just the run-up for something even worse. He could not go on with his education and join church at the same time. One precluded the other.

  “Alvin, you have two choices,” Emma said gently. “Either you stop here and be thankful for the two years you have more than everybody else, or you move to a district whose Ordnung allows its young men to finish high school.”

  “I want more than high school,” he said stubbornly. “I want to be more than a farmer, or a harness maker, or a builder. I want to be a scientist, or an engineer.”

  Carrie supposed there were college graduates among other Amish groups, maybe, but she’d never heard of any. “Are you saying you will leave your family and friends, then, Alvin?” she asked softly. “Is it worth it? Besides counting the cost of such losses, how will you pay for it in actual money?”

  “I’ll work my way through, somehow,” he said, ignoring the first part and going straight to the second. “I’ll talk to a counselor at the correspondence school. They’ll know.”

  “And what about Sarah Grohl?” Carrie persisted. “Does she know about your plans?”

  “No.” The word sounded as though it had been dragged out of him against his will.

  “Then you have her to think of as well,” Emma said. “Do you really want to deceive an innocent girl like that? Because you will have to give her up if you go ahead with this.”

  “Maybe she’ll come with me.”

  “And maybe it isn’t fair to ask that of her. While you’re going to college and working your way through, what is she going to do with her eighth-grade education? Stay alone in your one-room apartment and mend your socks?”

  Silence hung in the shadows of the back of the buggy, which rocked as Carrie turned into the lane of the Stolzfus farm. She drew Jimsy to a halt in front of the path under the trees that led to the Daadi Haus.

  Emma climbed down. “Gut Nacht, Alvin. I pray God will help you with your choice. Denki, Carrie. Tell Melvin we’re all anxious to hear about his trip to Philadelphia.”

  Carrie waited until the lamp in the sitting-room window dimmed and brightened to signify that Emma was safely inside, and then she turned the buggy. Alvin climbed into the front as she headed for the road.

  “I’m not a fool,” he muttered. “I’m just not cut out to be Amish.”

  “We all have to make our own decisions,” Carrie said. “But it’s when we involve other people in the actions we take that it gets dangerous.”

  “Correspondence courses never hurt anybody.”

  “No, probably not. But the attitude behind them, the deception, can hurt any number of people. Emma, your parents, Sarah. Think of them and how your unwillingness and disobedience can hurt them.”

  He propped his elbows on his knees and let his hands dangle between them, head down. Carrie knew when to plant a word in season, and when to let it rest in the soil. She made up her mind to enjoy the silence of the evening for the rest of the ride.

  Alvin didn’t speak again until she drew level with the lane to the Esch place. “Just drop me here,” he said. “If they hear a buggy, everyone will come out to see who it is, and Mamm will have a hundred questions.”

  Giving a brother a ride didn’t seem to Carrie worthy of a hundred questions, but she brought Jimsy to a halt anyway. “Gut Nacht, Alvin.”

  He mumbled something and jogged up the lane, keeping to the grass on the wayside so his boots didn’t crunch in the gravel. Carrie shook her head and started Jimsy for home.

  Choices.

  In the end, weren’
t they what created a happy life or a miserable one? And the problem with being sixteen was that sometimes you couldn’t tell the difference.

  Chapter 7

  The next day, Joshua arrived after lunch, put away his horse, and got to work painting the equipment shed like the very model of a hired man. It was as though last night’s brush-off of poor Emma had never happened…or since it had, he wasn’t allowing it to bother him.

  Carrie had often thought how lucky she was to be Melvin’s wife. A man like Joshua just proved how right she was to feel that way. And now with Melvin coming home tonight, she wanted everything in the house to be perfect. She’d been up cleaning since six a.m. The house’s inside sparkled, at least. There wasn’t much she could do about its shabby exterior, but if Joshua pitched in to help them, maybe they’d get it painted before the rain started.

  At five, she put a casserole in the oven, closed the chickens into their coop for the night, and hitched up Jimsy. She was leading him out of the barn door when Joshua came around the corner with a bucket of scraping tools and brushes.

  “Where are you off to? I was hoping we could pick some apples.”

  “Melvin and your cousins will be getting into the bus station at quarter to six. I’m going to meet them.”

  “That’s right. I forgot they were coming back today. You’ll be glad to see him.”

  “Yes, I will.” Carrie climbed into the buggy and gathered up the reins. “We should be back at quarter past, and the casserole will be ready to come out. Are you still planning to stay for dinner?”

  “If you don’t mind.” He grinned at her as though her reaction to his presence ought to mean something.

  Honestly. Melvin was an hour away and any man with a brain in his head would know Melvin’s wife would be looking forward to seeing him, not Joshua. “Of course I don’t. It’s what we had planned.”

  “Do you want company for the ride?”

  “Nei. You’d do better to spend the time cleaning those tools.”

  The mischief in his face seemed to increase at her tone. “You’d do better not to tell a man how to do his work. I’d like to come.”