The Shunning

by Beverly Lewis

  “I know you aren’t allowed to speak a word to me because of the Meinding,” she went on, “and I understand all that. But if you could say something, if you could speak to me and tell me good-bye—The Lord be with ya, Katie—well, I know you’d mean it . . . you’d mean it with all your hearts.”

  She turned away so they wouldn’t see her sudden tears and began to clear off her little table. The tears dripped into the rinse water as she stood over the sink, realizing it was to be the last time she would wash dishes for her family. She was truly leaving, and the process of bidding farewell was more painful than she’d ever imagined it would be.

  When the rest of the family had finished, she offered to clean up the kitchen so they could be on their way. Of course, no one said anything. And minutes later, after Katie had assumed she was alone, she was surprised to see her mother, scurrying back into the kitchen as if she’d forgotten something.

  “Here, Katie,” she said, all out of breath. “I want ya to have this.” She pushed an envelope into her daughter’s wet hand.

  When Katie looked down, she knew instantly that it was the dowry money. “Ach, no, Mamma, I can’t take this. It wouldn’t be right.”

  “Nonsense. You’ll be needin’ to buy some different clothes if you’re going up to New York to find your . . . your first Mam. Now, take it and don’t breathe a word to anyone, promise?”

  Before Katie could refuse again or thank her mother, Rebecca had spun around and rushed toward the back door.

  “Mamma . . . wait!” Katie ran to her, flung her arms wide, catching her mother in a warm embrace. “I love ya, Mam. Honest I do. And . . . no matter what you may think, I’ll always be missing you.”

  Rebecca nodded, tears filling her eyes. “You can’t stay on here, Katie . . . I know that.”

  “Oh, thank you,” she whispered as her mother turned to go. “Thank you for loving me so.”

  ————

  Katie was determined to leave her bedroom tidy—the kitchen, too. So a good portion of the morning was spent mopping, washing up, and dusting. When she was packed to her satisfaction—leaving several old dresses and capes hanging on their wooden pegs—she located the satin infant gown in her dresser drawer and carried it to the window. There she inspected it carefully, lovingly, once more.

  With her fingers she lightly traced the tiny stitches spelling out Katherine Mayfield, and in the sunlight, she noticed a tiny spot on the dress. A closer look—and she decided that Mam must have come into the room, found the little dress, and wept. The spot looked, for all the world, like a teardrop.

  Waves of emotion washed over her, carrying her along on an undulating tide—sadness . . . joy; confidence . . . uncertainty. Was she doing the right thing? Mary had drilled the question into her so often during their growing-up years. But now? Was leaving Hickory Hollow “the right thing”?

  Hours later, with suitcase packed, guitar case in hand, and the contents of her cedar chest stored away neatly in attic boxes, Katie went out to the barn. Her pony seemed restless as she stood beside him. “I wish I could take you with me, Satin Boy, really I do. But you’ll be much happier here with the other animals.”

  She set the guitar down and went to get his brush. She talked to him as she brushed his mane with long, sweeping strokes. Then she let her tears fall unchecked as she began to hum one of her favorite songs. “Maybe someday I’ll come back for you, boy, and take you home to live with me—wherever home ends up to be.”

  She hand-fed him some hay and patted his nose. “Don’t grow up too fast, and don’t look so sad. It’s not such a bad thing, really. Eli and Benjamin will take good care of you . . . Dat, too.” Speaking her brothers’ names and her father’s familiar nickname aloud brought a lump that seemed to stick in her throat. She knew she should walk away without looking back—the way she had at Mary’s. Maybe then she wouldn’t break down completely.

  She took a deep breath and kissed the white marking below Satin Boy’s right eye. Then, picking up her guitar case, she hurried straight to the door and out into the barnyard.

  ———— The house seemed much too quiet to Rebecca when she stepped into her kitchen after the wedding. And while the men prepared the cows for milking, she headed upstairs to Katie’s room, hoping she’d find a final note from her. Some keepsake to read over and over again.

  Katie’s room looked the same as always. The only items missing were a few dresses; she hadn’t taken many of them. All the old choring clothes still hung on their wooden pegs, along with the organdy head coverings.

  Searching the top of the dresser, Rebecca saw that the hand mirror was gone, along with Katie’s brush and comb. The lilac sachets were also missing from the drawers.

  Lydia’s spare room will soon smell wonderful-gut, I’m thinkin’. The notion brought a pain to her chest, and she put her hand to her heart and held it there as she made her way down the hall to the bedroom she shared with Samuel.

  There on the bed, she spied the little satin dress lying on her pillow. Oh, Katie, you did leave me something. You left the little dress.

  Her heart swelled with love for her daughter, her precious but unyielding Katie. She leaned down and picked up the small garment, lifting it to her face and noticing, as she did, the faint scent of lilac.

  ————

  Lydia Miller slowed the car as she approached the shady cemetery. “I’ll be glad to take you all the way,” she offered. “No need for you to walk so far.”

  Katie shook her head. “Thanks, but it’s not that far from here, really. And I need the exercise.” She got out of the car on the passenger’s side and walked up the slight incline, the sloping area that led to Dan Fisher’s wooden grave marking.

  What do ya see when ya look into your future? he’d asked her years ago.

  “Not this,” she muttered to herself. “Never this.”

  Dan had gone to heaven, she could only hope. And soon she, too, would be leaving Hickory Hollow for good. Things just never seem to work out the way you plan, she thought.

  Katie approached the flat area reserved for Dan’s body. The spot lay cold and empty now as she stared down at the dry, dead grass. “I’m going away,” she whispered. “Can’t stay Amish. But maybe you already know about that.” She glanced up at the blustery, gray clouds high overhead. “You see, I’m fancy inside—and soon will be on the outside, too. And the music—our music . . . well, I’ll be able to sing and play as much as I want to from now on.”

  She didn’t cry on this visit, but bent down and knelt on the spot where Dan’s body would’ve been buried if they’d ever found it. “I’ll take good care of your guitar for you,” she said, leaning her head close to the ground. “I promise you that.”

  Twenty-Three

  Katie rode into town with Lydia the next morning to make a deposit in her checking account, then accompanied Lydia to market. Because of her mother’s generous gift, Katie had decided to postpone her housekeeping jobs in hopes of finding some good leads on her birth mother’s whereabouts.

  “Before I do anything, there’s one more place I must go,” Katie told Lydia. “Will it be too much bother?”

  “You say the word.” Lydia was smiling. “Happy to help out a relative in a pinch.”

  Katie nodded. Her situation was more desperate than a “pinch,” but she said nothing and kept watching for the turn-off to Mattie’s place.

  The fancy blue car stopped in the barnyard behind the main house, and Katie got out. This time to bid farewell to the Wise Woman.

  When Ella Mae appeared at the window, there was no cheerful greeting, no welcoming smile. Only a glassy blank stare.

  Katie’s heart sank. The Meinding and its practices had caught up with Ella Mae, too. Either that or the old woman had gone daft for sure.

  A shadowy motion alerted her to the real reason for the vacant look in the faded hazel eyes. Behind her stood Mattie Beiler, shaking her head solemnly.

  “I just came to say good-bye,” Katie called lou
dly enough to be heard through the door. “I’m leaving Hickory Hollow.” She turned and pointed toward the car. “That’s my Mam’s cousin, Lydia Miller. You probably remember her. . . .” Her voice trailed off when she looked back at the window and saw that Mattie was still standing there, glaring at her through the windowpane.

  But it was the single tear tracking a path down the wrinkled lines of Ella Mae’s face that broke Katie’s heart. Reassured her, too. She was not alone in the world, after all.

  “I’ll miss ya forever,” Katie blurted, choking back the blinding tears.

  The Wise Woman blinked slowly, deliberately, then smiled the faintest smile, creating the familiar dimples. One of the family traits Katie had always loved.

  One last, long look, and Katie turned and walked toward the waiting car.

  ————

  Samuel pulled up his rocking chair near the cookstove, removed his socks and wiggled his toes, warming them as he waited for the noon meal. Rebecca felt the emptiness anew without Katie to help with the table setting, and she glanced over at her husband, who seemed to be settling easily into his daily routine.

  Wonder how’s he managing, really? she thought, turning her gaze to Samuel several times before announcing that dinner was ready.

  The spot that had always been Katie’s at the big table seemed exceptionally bare in the light of day, even in spite of the fact that she had not sat there for the past ten days—since the shunning began. Still, Rebecca could not get used to it. She never would.

  Casting a quick look over her shoulder, she fully expected to see the small table in the corner and was disturbed that she had not remembered seeing Samuel remove it—sometime last evening, maybe. Had she been so caught up in her own despair that she’d blocked it out of her mind?

  “When did ya put away Katie’s table?” she asked Samuel, who was busy forking up the beef stew.

  “Didn’t do anything with it,” he answered, stretching his neck to have a look at the vacant space.

  Rebecca pondered the situation while she cut the meat on her plate. Was she losing her mind?

  Then the answer came to her, and she knew precisely what had happened. Katie herself had taken on the chore of folding up the table and putting it away in the cellar. A loving gesture for sure—one that Katie knew might soften the blow for her mother.

  Rebecca started to tell Samuel what she was thinking, but her husband stopped her abruptly. “From this day on, there is not to be one word spoken about Katie in this house. We will not be speaking her name—not ever again!”

  Startled and hurt, Rebecca jerked her head down. Her hands flew up over her eyes, hiding the quick tears. It was then that she felt Samuel’s warm hand on her arm. His hand remained there long after she’d regained her composure. And because of it, she felt comforted.

  ————

  Annie was tending to baby Daniel on a frigid January morning when there was a knock at the front door. She tucked the baby into his cradle in the warm kitchen and hurried to the front room to open the door.

  A round-faced postman was standing on the porch. “I have a letter here for Annie Lapp,” he said, reading the name off the envelope marked Priority Mail.

  “I’m Annie Lapp,” she said hesitantly, wondering who on earth would pay so much money for a piece of mail—and why they felt they needed to send it so fast.

  “Here you are, ma’am.” He handed her the envelope. “Have a good day.”

  She closed the door against the biting wind and sat down in the living room, turning her attention to the large, cardboard envelope. A small arrow pointed to a perforated strip, and when she pulled on it, she was surprised at how easily it opened.

  Before reaching inside, she turned the envelope over and searched for a return address, but there was none. “That’s odd,” she said aloud.

  The idea that it might be a belated New Year’s greeting from Katie excited her, and quickly she pulled out the smaller envelope inside, hoping she was right. Dropping the outer covering, Annie read her name on the front of the small envelope. This didn’t look like Katie’s handwriting, but then again, she could be wrong; after all, she hadn’t had reason to see her sister-in-law’s handwriting all that often. But this . . . this writing seemed strangely familiar. Where had she seen it before?

  She opened the envelope and pulled out a letter written on lined paper, much like the paper she’d learned to write on at the one-room Amish school, many years ago.

  Curious, she began to read:

  My dear Annie,

  For several years now, I have wanted to contact you secretly. I trust this letter will not startle you unduly. If you are not sitting down, maybe you should be, because, you see, I, your brother Daniel, am alive.

  Annie leaped out of her chair, trembling, still holding the letter. “Ach, how can this be?” She paced frantically, going to stand in front of the window, staring out but seeing nothing, then sat down again to read the next line.

  Indeed, there was an accident at sea, but I did not drown on my nineteenth birthday, as you may have believed all these years.

  She rushed into the kitchen, past the cradle holding her sleeping son, and out the kitchen door to find her husband. “Elam! Come quick!”

  When she did not find him in the barn, she hurried to the milk house. “Elam, where are you?”

  She felt her heart thumping hard and her breath coming in short, panicky gasps. When her husband was nowhere to be found, she stood there in the barnyard, shivering from the cold and her inner confusion, reading the letter from her long-deceased brother.

  Now, however, I wish to come to Hickory Hollow for a visit. I must do the Christian thing and make amends, starting with Father, because it is he who I have most sorely wronged.

  If it is not too presumptuous, I will contact you again by mail in a few days, and later, if you agree, I want to speak with you— face-to-face—about approaching our father with this news.

  And Katie Lapp. I am wondering how she is, and hoping that she has not already married, although I cannot imagine that she has waited for a dead man all these years.

  If I am to be allowed to come to the Hollow, it is Katie I want to see first of all. . . .

  Annie’s head was swimming with her brother’s brief explanation. So much had been left unsaid. Still, her heart was breaking—for Katie. Poor, dear girl. Even if someone wanted to risk being shunned to tell her about this unexpected turn of events—even so, Katie had already left for New York.

  She shook her head mournfully as she walked toward the house. Feelings of anticipation—the possibility of a reunion with her darling brother—stirred within.

  When her little one began to squirm and fuss, she picked him up and walked around the kitchen. Thoughtfully, she began to tell him the story of a handsome uncle who had been dead and now was alive, and a stubborn aunt who was as good as dead because of the shunning— and how they had loved each other.

  She put her lips to the top of his sweet head and kissed the warm, pulsing soft spot. Such a frightening thing to ponder—this sad love story—its end so unlike its simple beginning.

  “Some things just ain’t very simple, really,” she heard herself saying. “Some things just ain’t.”

  She turned toward the kitchen window, facing west. And holding baby Daniel close, she looked out over the wide stretch of pastureland that bordered the woods. The sun had slipped below the horizon, leaving long, trailing tendrils of red in the sky—like a woman’s hair floating out over the trees, free and unrestrained.

  Epilogue

  How swiftly my life has changed, though I ’spect things in the Hollow plod along, same as always. Tongues are forever wagging these days, but all I really know is hearsay.

  Talk is cheap, but rumor has it that Mam has stopped her storytelling. My heart is awful pained over what she must surely be going through. Still, I don’t know how I could’ve stayed on, not with the Meinding and all. I’d have become a yoke around my family’s neck. Ev
entually, the People would’ve ousted me anyway. Bidding a sorrowful farewell was my only hope.

  They say Mary Stoltzfus’s uncle—her father’s youngest brother— is interested in moving out to Indiana somewhere. Most likely to look for available farmland. I only hope my leaving hasn’t stirred up unrest among the People.

  One thing is for sure and for certain. I am free now. No more Ordnung hanging over my head. No more bishop telling me how to dress, how to pin up my bun, how not to sing or hum.

  But freedom’s come with a terrible high price tag—leaving my family and turning my back on the only life I’ve ever known. Honestly, sometimes I have to reassure myself, and it’s at those times that I stop and pray: O God, help me to be of good courage.

  Still, I remember the shunning, and if the truth be known, I realize it’s a grievous blessing—a springboard to freedom. Freedom to experience what the dear Wise Woman could only begin to imagine. Freedom to search, and hopefully, find my roots.

  Yet more than any of that, I’ve been cut loose to discover who I truly am . . . who I was meant to be. And for the part of me that is Katherine Mayfield, it is a wonderful-good thing.

  Acknowledgments

  It is a myth that writers work alone. In the matter of this particular book, I wish to thank the following people:

  The Lancaster County Historical Society, The Mennonite Information Center, The Lancaster Public Library, and The People’s Place; Fay Landis, John and Ada Reba Bachman, Kathy Torley, and Dorothy Brosey.

  During the course of my research, as well as my growing-up years in Lancaster County, I have been blessed with Amish friends and contacts, most of whom choose to remain anonymous. A heart-felt Denki! for your warm hospitality and many kindnesses.