When Levi left for his Mennonite college, I said good-bye with only a touch of sadness. It won’t be long—he’ll be back for spring break. And there’ll be letters…plenty of them from each of us.
Chelsea remembered to take her puppy, Secrets, for a visit to his cocker spaniel mama. Little Susie Zook was tickled to see the beautiful gold-haired pup again.
Mrs. Davis is acclimating to her own home and surroundings surprisingly well. According to Chelsea, she hopes to plant an extra-large flower garden come spring.
As for Jon, the way I view him has begun to change. A brush with death often alters things between friends. For the better, I believe. He’s asked me to show him some of the features on my 35-millimeter camera—the same as his. He could probably figure it out if he read the instruction booklet, but maybe this is the start of a new kind of bond between us.
And Ashley Horton? She and I are planning a big sleepover on Valentine’s Day with Chelsea and Lissa—complete with a lesson in alliteration-eze. It’s about time the women of SummerHill unite.
Speaking of the neighborhood, Miss Spindler might be pleased to know that I’m offering my services to house-sit the next time she leaves town. The way I see it, someone’s got to get to the bottom of things over there. I mean, how does she do it—keeping track of everything and everyone?
Chelsea’s offered to help me snoop around—that is, if I ever get inside Old Hawk Eyes’ house. Meanwhile, I may have to be content with my imagination. Not an easy task. Especially for a girl who hears echoes in the wind.
For Larissa
with love.
“There’s all the difference in the world, you know,
between being inside looking out and
outside looking in.”
—FROM ANNE OF WINDY POPLARS
by L. M. MONTGOMERY
Chapter
1
“Shh! We daresn’t be heard,” whispered Rachel Zook, my Amish girl friend. Silently, she leaned over the old attic trunk and pulled open the heavy lid. Her eyes were filled with glee.
“I can’t believe I let you talk me into this,” I said, looking around at our creepy surroundings. “Cobwebs aren’t exactly my cup of tea.”
She stifled a giggle. “Ach, leave it to you, Merry Hanson. You ain’t scared, now, are ya?”
The musty darkness stretched all the way under the attic eaves in both directions. Rachel’s kerosene lantern swayed back and forth from the rafters, casting lively shadows over wooden crates and old canning jars.
“So this is what an Amish attic’s supposed to look like,” I teased. “Thought it’d be more organized.”
“It’s about as ret up as it can be. Besides, lookee here, I think I might’ve found somethin’. ” She stood up, brushing the dust off the sleeves of her purple dress and long black apron, staring at the dilapidated-looking stationery box in her hand.
I inched closer, very curious. “You sure it’s such a good idea to snoop like this?”
Rachel’s blue eyes were serious, determined. “I’m getting warmer,” she said. “I can feel it in my bones.”
“Well, I’m cold. It’s freezing up here.” I waited for her to take the hint, but she kept rummaging through the box, searching for what, I didn’t know exactly.
“I’m almost positive there’re some old poems up here,” she muttered to herself.
“Well, they can wait, right? Till summer, maybe?”
“But we’re here now…and Dat and Mam are gone for a bit. Jah, I think we best go ahead and keep lookin’. ”
Rachel motioned for me to come over to help, so I did. After all, besides being sixteen like me, she was one of my dearest friends in all of Lancaster County. SummerHill, to be exact.
Oh, she’d gotten this hare-brained notion that there was a strain of writing talent in her family somewhere, and she just had to prove it to her English friend, namely me. English meaning I wasn’t Amish. Or as Rachel often said, “You’re my English cousin.”
Technically, I was related to her. My Swiss ancestors and Rachel’s had arrived in America back in 1737 on the same boat—The Charming Nancy. We shared a common relative—Joseph Lapp, one of my great-great grandfathers—which made us distant cousins.
“Here’s another big box,” I said, pulling it out of a hodgepodge of quilts and linens and things. “Looks like a diary.”
“Let’s have a look-see,” she said.
I sat on another dusty trunk near the lantern’s eerie circle of light, observing as she opened the oblong wooden box.
She rummaged through some loose papers inside, but nothing seemed to catch her interest. “Nah, nothin’ much here.”
Growing impatient, I asked, “Isn’t it about time to be making doughnuts again?” I wanted to get her mind off her present pursuit and start her contemplating sweets, one of her weaknesses.
“Jah, this Saturday we’ll be making some,” she replied, still nosing around in the trunk.
“Well, am I invited?”
She stopped her searching, glancing over at me. “Of course you’re invited. What’sa matter with ya, askin’ something so foolish?”
I just smiled, watching her bend over and remove several more boxes from the seemingly bottomless trunk.
“Better put everything back the way you found it,” I told her.
“Ach, as if I ain’t smart enough to know that.”
I sat there a few minutes longer, itching to get back to the warmth of the Zooks’ kitchen, just below us.
Then without warning, she jerked up. Stood right up and stared at something small and square in her hands. “Himmel, what’s this?” she sputtered.
I hurried over to see what great treasure she’d uncovered. “Looks like…is it a picture?” I asked, amazed.
“Well, goodness me, I don’t rightly know.” She rushed over to the lantern, and I followed.
There under the light, she held up a photograph of an Amishman. It was old and tattered. Where it had come from, I had no idea, because Amish folk don’t believe in such things as taking pictures of themselves. Especially the Old Order Amish, which Rachel’s family certainly was.
“Who is this?” she whispered, eyes wide with wonder.
“Maybe your parents could tell you.”
She turned to look at me, worry creasing her brow. “Now, don’tcha breathe a word of this to Dat or Mam, ya hear?”
I was startled. This was one of the few times she’d ever spoken so frankly to me.
“Okay,” I replied. “We’ll keep it secret.”
She nodded, lowering the picture. “We hafta zip up our lips about this, honest we do. ’Cause I think I’ve stumbled onto someone. Someone who ain’t too fondly remembered in these parts.” I knew by the scowl on her face she meant business about not spilling the beans.
Still, I was dying to know. “Who do you think it is?”
“I think this here’s Joseph Lapp…perty sure ’tis.”
I inhaled sharply. “Our ancestor? The man who got himself shunned for marrying outside the Amish church?”
“It’s beyond me why he thought he had to go off and marry his English sweetheart” was all she said.
“Count on me to keep it quiet,” I said. “Nobody’ll hear it from my lips.”
So it was settled. We had a secret between us. A big, juicy one.
“Why do you think your parents kept this photo all these years?”
Rachel shrugged her shoulders. “Dat probably knows nothing of it. Mam must’ve hid it, I’d guess.” She shook her head, puzzled. “Looks to me like it’s been passed down for generations. Really odd, though.”
It was peculiar, to say the least. But even more intriguing was the inquisitive look on Rachel’s face. Why her sudden interest in a shunned man, one who’d left the Amish church?
Chapter
2
Esther Zook, Rachel’s mother, was a devout and energetic woman who derived great satisfaction from the simple things: cooking, baking, caring for her chil
dren, and cleaning house.
Nearly every year, long as I could remember, she would throw a doughnut-making party, usually in mid-February. After all, it was the dullest, bleakest time of year, smack-dab in the dead of winter. Of course, Esther would never admit to calling it a party. Amish folk didn’t engage in such “fancy” things. Still, it was a major event all the same.
Often on Valentine’s Day—an icy Saturday morning this year—she liked to fill up her kitchen with close friends and her married sisters. Rachel and her younger sisters—Nancy, Ella Mae, and little Susie—were the ones most encouraged to join in the fun. And today was the annual doughnut-making day at the Zooks’ old farmhouse, just across the meadow from my house.
This time of year, it was fairly easy to see the Zooks’ place through the bare branches of the willow grove. The trees ran along the dividing line between our property and theirs. Only an occasional dried-up leaf clung to the wispy limbs.
I made my way down snow-packed SummerHill Lane, glad for fur-lined boots and gloves and my warm earmuffs. Pennsylvania winters weren’t anything to scoff at. The sting in the wind was enough to turn my cheeks numb by the time I made the turn onto our neighbor’s private lane.
Gray carriages galore were already parked in the side yard, their tops glistening with a hint of snow. The horses had been led to the barn for warmth and watering by Rachel’s father, Abe, and her younger brother, Aaron.
“Come in, come in,” my friend greeted me as the back door swung wide.
“Br-r, it’s cold,” I said, closing the door quickly and slapping my gloved hands together.
“Warm yourself by the stove,” she offered.
“Thanks,” I said, hurrying over to the large black wood-stove, where Rachel’s mother was keeping a watchful eye on the fryer.
“Glad you could come over and help.” A dimple appeared in her cheek as she smiled.
“Nice to be here,” I said, grinning back.
The kitchen smelled heavenly, of yeast and dough. My mouth watered at the aroma. “Mm-m, I can’t wait for a bite,” I told Rachel.
“Me neither.” She took her mother’s place at the stove, monitoring the oil in the fryer, making sure that it did not exceed the temperature needed to begin cooking the doughnuts.
Nancy, Rachel’s thirteen-year-old sister, scurried about taking my coat and hanging it on one of the wooden pegs in the outer utility room, just off the kitchen. “Now we hafta find you a spot to work,” she said.
“Ready when you are,” I said, tying on the long Amish apron handed to me by one of the women.
“There,” Nancy said, stepping back to have a look at me. “Don’t you look perty…and Amish.”
I curtsied comically, and she laughed. Glancing around, I looked for Susie, the youngest Zook.
“If it’s Susie ya want, she’s kneading dough over there.” Nancy motioned for me to follow her to the long wooden table.
Little Susie, now seven but still quite petite, was squeezing and punching at a big mound of dough. “Come and take a poke, Merry,” she said, eyes sparkling.
I noticed her pretty blond hair, wound around her head in braids, and her long rose-colored dress and white smock-style apron. She was the cutest young Amish girl in all of Lancaster County!
I rolled up my sweater sleeves and folded Susie’s piece of dough over and over. “How am I doing?”
She giggled sweetly. “Ya must’ve remembered from last year.”
“Guess you’re right,” I said, looking up.
Across the enormous kitchen, Rachel was chattering in Pennsylvania Dutch. When she caught my eye, she waved at me, wiggling her fingers in midair.
“Have ya heard anything from Levi lately?” Susie asked.
I didn’t respond immediately, thinking what I should say about her big brother’s most recent letters. “He’s been writing me every now and then. You have to remember, your brother keeps very busy with his classes during the semester.”
She nodded. “I miss him around here. Wish he’d come home for gut.”
“I know you do.”
“Maybe if ya say you’ll marry him someday…maybe then he’ll come back to SummerHill and stay put.”
I had to chuckle. What she didn’t know was that no amount of pleading from me or anyone could bring Levi Zook back to SummerHill. He was right where he believed God wanted him to be—in Virginia, attending a Mennonite Bible college.
Besides, Levi and I had sort of come to an agreement about our friendship. That didn’t mean he wasn’t still “sweet” on me, as he would say, but we knew where we stood as far as dating. At sixteen, I was in no way ready to be thinking of settling on a steady boyfriend. Especially one who was bound and determined to be either a preacher or a missionary.
Sure, someday that could change if I received a “call” to be a minister’s wife. I was open to it. That is, if the Lord had something like that planned for my future. Still, I had all the time in the world—one of my mother’s all-time favorite expressions when it came to guys and romance. None of that kept me from answering Levi’s wonderful letters.
“When’s my brother coming home for a visit next?” Susie asked.
“He hasn’t said,” I replied. “Honestly, I think you’ll hear about that long before I do.”
I sighed, thankful that Rachel was heading our way in time to interrupt this awkward conversation.
She and her sisters and the other women began shaping the dough for frying, but nobody felt the need to stop talking. No, the chatter and the work seemed to flow effortlessly, as smooth and easy as the feel of the dough beneath my fingers.
In a matter of minutes, the deep-frying stage was complete. The youngest Zook girls were called on to create the creamy, rich frosting that would fill up the doughnut holes.
Susie and Ella Mae squealed with delight. They’d been given the honor of having the first taste test. I watched them smack their lips and lick their fingers.
“It’s Merry’s turn,” Susie said. The adorable little girl stood in the middle of the kitchen, waiting for me to have a sample.
“Oh, it melts in your mouth,” I said after my initial bite. And it did, literally. The deep-fried doughy treat and the gooey filling dissolved on my tongue.
Rachel came up behind me and whispered in my ear. “Still keeping our secret?”
“My lips are sealed,” I replied.
“Gut, then. If ya keep that secret, there’s another one forthcoming.”
I turned to face her. “About you-know-who?” I was referring to Joseph Lapp.
“No.” She shook her head. “I’ll tell ya later.”
Her eyes shone, not so much with excitement as with a hint of apprehension. About what, I had no idea.
Chapter
3
I was still wondering about Rachel’s comment as I hurried home around noon, arms laden with a box of delicious homemade doughnuts. “You won’t believe how truly amazing these are,” I boasted to my mother.
“I’ll be the judge of that,” she said with a grin, opening the box lid.
I watched her munch on the first bite, her brown eyes popping. “What do you think?”
“Mm-m. Out of this world!”
“How’d we get them down here?” I teased, parroting one of the fun-loving phrases my father liked to say.
She went to rinse her sticky fingers at the sink while I placed the box of doughnuts on the kitchen counter. “Save some for Dad, okay?” I said.
“If we don’t, we’ll never hear the end of it,” Mom said with a twinkle in her eyes. She reminded me that Dad had already been informed of today’s Amish get-together. “He’ll be thinking ‘doughnut heaven’ all day long, most likely.”
“You’re right,” I said, pitying the poor emergency-room patients who might have to put up with his distraction.
Mom went to tend her African violets in the sunny corner of the kitchen. She pinched off an occasional leaf, commenting on the special plans I had for the afternoon and
evening. “What time are your girl friends coming for the Valentine’s sleepover?” she asked.
“Around four. But don’t worry, we won’t need a meal or entertainment.”
“No supper?” She looked startled. “How can that possibly be?”
“Oh, we’ll eat later on, for sure. It’s just that Ashley and I have an agenda.”
“I see,” she said, without inquiring as to our plans.
Relieved, I picked up Lily White, my smallest cat, and carried her upstairs to my bedroom. As usual, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego followed on my heels.
“What have you been doing all morning, little boys?” I asked as the male cat trio made themselves at home on my bed.
Abednego had something to say. His eyes did the talking, and it seemed to me that he wasn’t one bit pleased. Disgruntled was more like it.
“Okay, okay, I confess I enjoyed myself over at the Zooks’ making doughnuts, but you know you’re not supposed to be eating fattening, icky sweet things. S’not good for your health.”
That didn’t cut it. Shadrach got up and went over, plopping himself down next to Abednego. As if to say, We’re united on this sweets thing.
“What can I say?” I shot back. “Cats as fat and sassy as you have to cut back somewhere.”
Nobody was listening. Especially not Abednego, the fattest of the group.
Lily White, petite and demure, seemed to agree with me, however. But that was par for the course—she was always taking my side when it came to ganging up on the masculine animals in the Hanson household.
“Okay, if that’s all there is to it, I’ve got work to do.” I told them about the sleepover. “There’ll be four young ladies here in this room tonight, so it will be a bit cramped with all of you hanging out. I want everyone on his best behavior. Hear?”
Abednego, the feistiest cat God ever made, closed his eyes slowly, deliberately. We’ll see about that, I could almost hear him say.
SummerHill Secrets, Volume 2 Page 19