His Stolen Bride
Page 35
They shared a private smile. They had a happy secret, one that would be theirs for only a few weeks more.
One at a time she took the mugs from him and passed them down her row to Sisters Retha, Catharina, and Benigna, feeling the blessedness of communion when surrounded by friends old and new. For Abbigail had women friends now, adding her mother-in-law and beautiful sister-in-law’s lively fellowship to her older friend’s wise support. But Sister Benigna would soon be more than a friend. In a twist that had shocked everyone but Catharina Blum, who saw, it seemed, into people’s hearts, the woman who had been a second mother to Abbigail would soon become her stepmother.
“Never say Father went down on his knees!” Abbigail had said, astonished.
Sister Benigna had blushed. “Only after the Elders’ letter came from home that they had cast the Lot for us. And then I had to help him up.”
“But my dear Sister, he is such an old curmudgeon.”
To Abbigail’s further astonishment, Sister Benigna’s eyes had dashed. “You forget, Abbigail, that a daughter may not see the same man as a wife.” Then she had recovered her brief temper. “Besides, perhaps you will soon need a pair of grandmothers.”
It had been Abbigail’s turn to blush. But it was too soon to tell, even her oldest friend.
The coffee warmed her, the sweet roll filled her, and the brass band played a carol which her father-in-law sang. Abbigail’s eyes brimmed with tears at the beauty of Jacob Blum’s singing. She was learning that his heart was like his song, bold and warm and stalwart. He had put his engineering skills behind Nicholas’s latest project, the paper mdl, showing a faith in her husband that made amends for any discord in their past.
She chewed her sweet bread thoughtfully. Gerhard Huber had been cast out of Salem and Bethlehem, his identity discovered by a visitor from the Maine Congregation. The traveler recognized him as a fugitive from their community, his reputation unsavory, his recommendation forged. Apparently he’d thought to find rich pickings among the Southern Brethren, with Abbigad to be the prize for his apprenticeship in her father’s store. Instead he’d been returned to Pennsylvania, tried in public court for theft, and sent to jail.
Abbigad struggled to forgive him and forget, but forgiveness seemed easier than forgetting. She had had nightmares. But she had Nicholas to hold her until the shaking stopped.
The Children’s Love Feast ended, and the quietly joyful crowd spdled out onto the street. Torches lit their procession this Christmas Eve, glinting off the light fresh snow which had dusted yards and trees and rooftops white. Abbigail’s father sought her out to wish her the graces of the season. Under her and Sister Benigna’s persuasion, he was selling his portion of the store back to the Bethlehem community. He and his bride would make Salem their home. Taking a room in the Single Brothers’ house until the wedding, he had become the town’s treasurer, a position that used his talents without taxing his health. He was more at peace than he had been in years.
“Father and Retha expect us for the family supper, LieblingNicholas said, suddenly at her side, immense and utterly comforting.
He greeted her father with reserve. There was still constraint between them, but each strove for courtesy for her sake. She hoped the child who was growing in her belly would ease their rift.
She looked up at her husband, the singing in her blood that he so readily aroused already started. He had not kissed her since morning, and even then tepidly, as d afraid to hurt his newly pregnant wife.
She wanted a better kiss, a Nicholas kiss. “Must we go there straightaway?”
He looked a little puzzled. “No …”
“Can we take a walk? I have not seen the progress on your swamp in days.” Not only did Nicholas have his father’s support, but the Board of Elders endorsed and funded it in part. Their faith in his plan had made Nicholas optimistic about settling in Salem. He had been absolved. Of everything.
“That’s a quarter hour’s walk from here.” He instantly grew concerned. “At night, and in your condition …”
She touched his arm, slightly aware that the crowd was receding around them under a moonlit sky. Even three would seem a crowd if she did not have a few moments alone with him before the evening’s festivities.
“Walking helps my condition. I am no invalid. Else we would not share a bed.”
He grinned the grin that still made her stomach dip, acknowledging the tender love they had shared only just this morning. Too tender. Her joyous news had made him cautious, patient. It was something about the baby, something sweet and vulnerable. This morning in their bed, he had taken too much care of her. She wanted to drag him back, do it over, do it right-hot and messy and wild, just as he had taught her.
But she would settle for a kiss.
He escorted her past the houses of the town, out of sight and sound of Brothers and Sisters celebrating an ancient and redeeming birth. A waxing moon glancing off snow ht their way like day. Pale plumes of clouds raced across the sky. The swamp had been completely drained, and the foundation already laid. The paper mill promised to bring new work and new prosperity to the town and the backcountry.
“Nicky, so far along! Wed done! ‘Twill soon be up and running and you will be a busy mein. ‘Tis such a vindication. Such a tribute.”
He shrugged uneasily. He was not yet used to praise. Her confidence in him made him almost shy. From behind, he put his arms around her, moving a hand to her still flat belly. “This is the tribute that matters.”
She turned in his arms and saw a look of wonder on his face. But neither of them was made to endure such a poignant moment long.
“Ours,” he said.
Her heart soared. “’Twill be a hellion,” she warned.
He shifted her carefully in his arms and took a lighter note. “Hoyden,” he corrected.
Laughing, he turned her toward town. Unkissed. She noted that, and formed a plan. For the evening would be long and public, filled with family fellowship and song and no more privacy. Everyone would be there, brothers, sisters, twins, all. Matthias and Catharina, too, of course. From an air of mystery about them, she suspected that they cherished a secret of their own. She and Nicholas came up behind his father’s house to the alleyway that led to the street.
Still unkissed. She wanted her scandalous Brother Blum back, the one who had kissed all the girls and now kissed her alone.
“Nicky!”
He halted on his heel, his face filling with concern. “Are you ad right? I knew it was too far.”
She could have put her hands on her hips and stamped her feet and fussed, he was so dense. So handsome, standing there, a loving frown marking the golden features of his face beneath a bright December sky.
“Nicky, kiss me,” she commanded.
He looked around furtively. “Here?”
“Were you not the Single Brother who had a knack for stealing kisses?”
His frown deepened. “Now?”
Impatient, she leaned into his massive body, reached up and up, and pulled him down to her. “Now, Nicky. I know you know how.”
With an astonished groan, he took her up on that, and showed her that, yes indeed, a certain Married Brother had not lost his knack for stealing kisses.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
My thanks to Taylor Chase, Sabrina Jeffries, Virginia Kantra, Judy Mills, and my agent Pamela Gray Ahearn for insights, arguments, and epiphanies in the storytelling process. Patricia Rounds at Pittsboro Memorial Library suggested sources tirelessly and tracked them down expediently. The archives of the Moravians and Salem, Inc., their beautifully restored village in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, continue to inspire me. And my husband, Peter Harkins, came to the rescue one more time.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
JUDITH STANTON grew up on a farm in North Carolina. During a successful career as a university professor, she taught writing and feminist theory and also traveled widely in England researching eighteenth-century romance writers. She and her husband live in the co
untry and have two horses and a dozen rescued cats.
She loves to hear from readers. You can contact her by e-mail through her web site at www.catcrossing.com or write to her at P.O. Box 1714, Pittsboro, NC 27312.
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Afterword
In 1796, the thriving Moravian trading communities of Salem, North Carolina, and Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, stayed in as close touch as the weather, the difficult three-hundred mile journey, and the new postal service permitted. Ordinarily it took about two weeks to make the journey or receive a letter. Tradesmen and apprentices moved to one town or the other as need arose, and Single Brothers and Single Sisters who did not fit well in one town were often encouraged to move to the other.
In matters of marriage, Moravians continued to prayerfully cast a lot asking for the Savior’s guidance in selecting mates. Usually, the lot was cast to answer questions: Should Brother Blum propose to Sister Baumgarten? If the reed drawn said Nein, that match was never pursued. If it said Ja, the Elders put the question to the Single Sister, who was then expected to examine her own wishes and conscience and answer accordingly. Catharina Blum’s belief that she should say yes as a matter of faith was somewhat extreme, but on the whole, Moravians had more confidence in God’s will than in romantic love. Romantic love won out, however, a few decades later. The last marriage lot was cast in 1835.
Men and women and boys and girls were divided into ten choirs of Little Girls and Boys, Older Girls and Boys, Single Brothers and Sisters, Married Brothers and Sisters, and Widows and Widowers. By fourteen years of age, Older Girls left their parents’ homes and went to live in the Single Sisters House, and Older Boys in the Single Brothers house. If required by his apprenticeship, however, a boy might five with his master.
Sometimes Older Girls or Single Sisters returned to live at home to help a widowed mother with small children, to stay with a sick parent, or to manage a household. While I found no exact precedent for Abbigail Till’s work for her father, there are several similar instances of Single Sisters returning home to work in some capacity.
The Moravian Church still maintains an active worldwide program of missions. In the late eighteenth century, the two missions most familiar to Salemites were in the Caribbean, where Sister Benigna Rothrock served, and in the North Carolina mountains, where Moravians tried to set up schools for Cherokee children. The Methodists, as it turned out, did rather better with the Cherokee than the highly structured Moravians.
Copyright
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental and beyond the intent of either the author or the publisher
Copyright © 1999 by Judith Stanton.
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
EPub Edition © SEPTEMBER 2010 ISBN: 978-0-062-03499-1
ISBN 0-06-109787-X
HarperCollins®, ®, and HarperPaperbacks™ are trademarks of HarperCollins Publishers Inc.
Cover illustration © 1999 by Jon Paul Ferrara
First printing: December 1999
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