The Nanny's Amish Family

by Patricia Johns

  “I do. I’ve gone back to the Bible and looked at the teachings all over again,” she said earnestly. “It was having Rue come back to the family that gave me a good mental shake. Tina died so unexpectedly, and I realized that we don’t always have the time we think we do.”

  She wanted to help with Rue, and while he could never turn his own mamm away, he couldn’t be sure that a mammi who’d jumped the fence was the answer for his daughter, either. What he needed most desperately was a deeply devoted Amish wife, and to begin growing the family that would give Rue her roots.

  Coming back... Would his mother really do it? Would she come back to the life she found so stifling? Because ten years ago, she’d left this life for the rest of her Englisher family that she’d missed just as desperately. She missed being a “modern woman” with cultured interests and other opportunities. Even if Mamm did come back in earnest, Thomas didn’t know how she’d ever find a balance.

  Would Rue have any more success than her grandmother?

  Chapter Ten

  The next day was service Sunday. It was a more leisurely morning than usual. Samuel went out to tend to the horses and chickens, but the regular work would wait until Monday and the family would get a semblance of a break.

  Patience helped Hannah clean up the kitchen after breakfast, and they put some salad fixings aside to bring along for their contribution to the light meal served after worship was done. Last night, Patience and Hannah had baked cinnamon buns, some tarts and oatmeal cookies, and this morning they packed them into tubs to carry with them.

  Patience couldn’t help but think about Thomas, though. She’d waited to see if he’d ask for her to come back and help with Rue, but he hadn’t, and she didn’t dare go back. It wasn’t her place to insert herself into their family problems, but she was concerned all the same. Thomas had been through more than most men had, and she suspected that his mother’s visit was an emotional confusion.

  News of Rachel Wiebe’s visit had already spread. Samuel saw her waiting for a cab at the end of Thomas’s drive, and while he hadn’t spoken to her, they had exchanged a silent look.

  “Will the Wiebe boys tell the bishop that their mother was here, I wonder?” Hannah said, closing a plastic container. She’d been talking about it all morning.

  “I don’t know,” Patience replied. “Do they need to?”

  “She didn’t do anything bad enough to get excommunicated from the church, but she’s not exactly Amish anymore, either, is she? All after she was baptized.”

  “Yah, there is that...” Patience sighed. “But we’re talking about a mamm and her kinner.”

  “A mamm who certainly knew better.” Hannah didn’t look inclined to feel much pity. “There are consequences to everything we do in life, and we need to face them. As does she. I think the bishop should have shunned her—for leaving like she did. Mary Lapp took over with those boys when their mamm left—and I know that Mary did her best by them. But Rachel was the one who left them in a difficult position. She was their mamm—she owed them better than that!”

  “Yah...” Patience wasn’t adding much to the conversation. She didn’t know any more than Hannah did—that Rachel had arrived, Thomas had most certainly seen her, and then...silence.

  “Rachel was a good woman,” Hannah went on, her voice softening. “I didn’t see the tendency to jump the fence in her. She seemed so...proper. But there is no saying how grief will affect some people, I suppose.”

  “She had a more complicated situation, though,” Patience added.

  “Yah. We found that out too late, didn’t we?” Hannah shook her head. “And if we all just abandoned our faith and our kinner when we faced loss, what would be the point of even having our community? What is your faith if it crumbles at the point of testing? There are vows we take in marriage, and they are similar to the vows we take at baptism—we vow to be faithful. She broke hers.”

  “Not in her marriage,” Patience qualified. She felt the need to defend Thomas’s mother, if she could. She was his mamm, after all.

  Samuel pulled the buggy up to the side door, and Patience heard the nicker of horses. She’d be attending service this morning with her landlords, but she wasn’t sure if she’d even see Thomas today. Would he skip service Sunday? Samuel came inside, and Hannah looked up at her husband with a smile.

  “Carry that, would you, Daet?” Hannah said, gesturing to a cloth bag filled with vegetables for salad.

  Samuel took the bag, and a stack of treat-filled plastic containers, too. He tramped back out to the buggy, and Patience and Hannah grabbed the last of the food and followed him out.

  Service Sunday—the time when everyone gathered together, worshipped Gott as a community and got to see everyone after two weeks. Patience had always looked forward to it, but this Sunday seemed to be a reminder that she needed to keep an emotional distance from Thomas and Rue. There was no future there for her with the handsome carpenter—and he needed a wife.

  * * *

  The services were being held at the bishop’s farm, and when they arrived, the buggy field was already nearly filled. A large tent had been erected for the service, and the young men were busy arranging the benches beneath it from the Sunday service wagon. Every Amish community did things in a similar way, but each gathering of a community felt a little different. These were new families with new challenges, and her mamm had asked her rather pointedly to keep her eyes open for any single men with kinner. Mamm was absolutely convinced that a happy marriage was possible for Patience, and she dearly wished that she shared her mother’s optimism there.

  After helping Hannah to carry the food to the refrigerated wagon—a community investment that came in handy when keeping food from spoiling during weddings and church services—Patience scanned the unfamiliar faces for a familiar one. She spotted Thomas over by the horse corral in a pair of black pants, a white shirt rolled up to his elbows and his black suspenders and hat. Rue clung to the side of a fence, and Thomas leaned against the top rail, both of them looking out at the horses.

  “Yah, he’s over there,” Hannah said with a knowing look.

  “It isn’t like that,” Patience said.

  “No?” Hannah’s eyebrows went up, but she didn’t look convinced.

  “I should go say hello,” Patience said.

  “Yah... But don’t be locking yourself to one man in the public eye just yet, my dear,” Hannah said meaningfully. “You’re young and attractive. We have a few single men who will want to meet you.”

  Patience forced a smile. “I’m more concerned about how Rue is doing after seeing her Englisher grandmother.”

  “Ah.” Hannah sobered. “That’s understandable.”

  Patience nodded to a few different families as she made her way across the farmyard and toward the horses. Thomas seemed to be deep in thought; neither he nor Rue heard her approach until she was right behind them, and then Thomas startled and turned.

  “Hi,” she said with a hesitant smile.

  “Hi.” Thomas relaxed at the sight of her. “How are you?”

  Rue grinned up at Patience. “Patience, there’s horses. But you can’t hug them. That’s very dangerous.”

  Patience chuckled. “It is very dangerous. I see you’ve been listening to your daet.”

  “I want a horse,” Rue said seriously.

  “You have horses. Your daet has horses that pull the buggy,” Patience replied.

  “No, I want a horse of my own,” she said.

  Patience looked over at Thomas and he gave a tired shrug. “Another battle for another day.”

  “Is everything okay?” Patience asked. “With your mamm, I mean. Samuel saw her waiting on a cab, so we know she left, but...”

  Thomas licked his lips. “She...says she wants to return to the community.”

  Patience started to smile. “That’s good news!” But wh
en he didn’t match her smile, she let it fall. “Isn’t it?”

  “Rue, do you see those girls at the pump?” Thomas said, pointing. “Why don’t you go get some water to drink? I’m sure they’d help you.”

  Rue ambled off in the direction her father had indicated, and Thomas stood there, his eyes glued to the back of his daughter. She got to the pump and the older girls looked down at her in stunned curiosity—they’d likely just realized this little girl was speaking English, not German. There would be many, many introductions just like that one for little Rue. She’d get used to the initial shock she caused.

  “What happened?” Patience asked. “And I won’t tell anyone what you tell me, if that’s what you’re thinking.”

  “No, I trust you,” he said, his gaze flickering down toward her. “The problem is, I don’t know what’s a good outcome anymore. Two weeks ago, I would have been thanking Gott for my mother’s return, and now? I’m worried. She’ll be a major influence in my daughter’s life—an Englisher mammi. Am I raising my daughter just to have her jump the fence the minute she’s old enough? Will she stay? If she has a grandmother who did the same...”

  “But who came back,” she countered.

  “But she’s still English, and only now do we realize how English she really is...” Thomas stepped a little closer, lowering his voice further. “She’s coming back because she misses us, and because she has a granddaughter now.”

  “Not only for Rue, though,” Patience said hopefully.

  “No, but Rue factors in rather heavily,” Thomas replied seriously. “She wants to help.”

  They exchanged a meaningful look. She understood his worries very well.

  “Oh...” Patience leaned back against the sun-warmed fence, and Thomas did the same, leaving a proper six inches between them. He looked over at her, his dark gaze filled with misery.

  “My mamm missed the English life so much,” he said.

  Patience frowned. “People come back when they see the error in their way, and she came back. So she must have seen that the English life was empty and...” Her voice trailed off.

  “I don’t think it was empty, actually. She’s coming back because she realized life is short, and you don’t always have the time to repent that you think you do.” Thomas sighed. “When she left the first time, it was because she didn’t like the restrictions in an Amish life. She said she didn’t think Gott requires that, that it only cuts us off from the rest of the believers.”

  Patience didn’t know how to answer that. She rolled the words around in her mind. “But she came back...”

  “And if my daughter says something to her about the Amish way not being Gott’s will—one day when she’s old enough to think she knows it all—what will my mamm say to her?” Thomas eyed her for a moment, then shrugged. “I know she’s repented and she wants to come back to the narrow path, but will my mother harbor some of those dangerous views still? I might not have cared before I had Rue in my life, but now—”

  “Will you turn her away?” Patience asked softly.

  “Oh, Patience...” he sighed. “She’s my mamm! I love her too much to turn her away. But we’ll be the ones to pay for it.”

  “Gott is still working,” she said.

  “Yah...”

  “You have to trust that.”

  “But the right thing to do is often the hard thing, isn’t it?” he said.

  Was he thinking that the right thing would be to turn away his mamm? He didn’t elaborate. Right now, the easy thing would be to reach out and take his hand. It would be to lean into his strong shoulder, to comfort him... The easy thing was not the right thing to do.

  “But you’re good for Rue,” he added. “She’s doing as well as she is because of you. You’re...really good for her.”

  “I’m not good for you, though,” she said.

  Thomas dropped his gaze, then shrugged. “You’re comforting for me.”

  Tears misted Patience’s eyes. She longed to be his comfort right now, but she knew where that would go. It wasn’t only him who was feeling this strong attraction; she was, too, and last night she’d lain awake thinking not of his mamm and the drama that had unfolded before him, but of his kiss. His arms around her had felt so warm and safe, and she’d never been kissed quite like that before. She’d never had the experience of feeling heady and grounded all at the same time...

  Over at the pump, Amos and Noah stopped for some water, then took Rue’s hand. People were moving toward the tent now. It would be time for service to start soon.

  “Where will Rue sit?” Patience asked.

  Thomas looked toward the tent, then shrugged.

  “With me,” Thomas replied. “Mary can’t chase her down, and she’s mine. She’ll sit with me.”

  There was no mamm to take her to the women’s side of the tent, so one little girl would sit on her daet’s knee on the men’s side—a fair-haired little ray of sunshine amid a sea of males clad in black Sunday clothes. Patience felt a well of compassion for this man and his little girl. They were doing their best together, and she couldn’t overstep. She must be available for other men, just in case there was a widower who wanted a wife but no more kinner. And Thomas must be available to find a good Amish mamm for his daughter.

  It was time for service.

  * * *

  Thomas wasn’t sure what he expected from his daughter during her very first Amish service. From what he’d gathered already, Rue had never gone to church in her life. Tina had told her a little bit about Gott, a confusing tangle of information that included Heaven for those who had died, but that was the extent of Rue’s spiritual education thus far.

  Every night, Thomas had been telling her Bible stories, tricking her into listening with rapt attention by beginning each one with “Once upon a time...” It worked. And whenever she asked for another story, he never said no, because she was finally getting the foundation that she so desperately needed.

  There was a Bible verse that guided much of Amish parenting: Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it. At least he could give her a reason for her faith—the stories from scripture that could be a bedrock for every choice she made in the future. And if his prayers were answered, those stories would keep her rooted in their faith—here.

  The raising of a child was such a deep commitment, and he was only now appreciating how much lay on his shoulders as Rue’s daet.

  Thomas sat next to his brother and Amos on the very edge of the bench. If he had to get away from the service for whatever reason, he’d need an exit that didn’t cause disruption. Other daets sat with their young sons next to them, and he caught their eyes on him. Word would have traveled by now, and he’d already fielded a few questions when they first arrived, but people seemed to know enough from the spread of gossip that they weren’t coming forward with more curiosity.

  Across the tent, the women’s side of the service faced the men’s. A couple of single women were looking at him with undisguised interest. He was in need of a wife, and that little detail would have made it into many a kitchen in their community before anyone ever spotted him at service. But he couldn’t summon up any interest in other women. The only one he was looking for as he scanned the familiar faces was Patience, and he finally spotted her sitting next to Hannah Kauffman near the front.

  Patience caught him looking at her and smiled slightly. What was it about her that made him feel better just by a tiny smile like that one?

  “Daddy,” Rue said, her voice rising loudly above the murmuring of settling people.

  “Shh.” Thomas winced and bent his lips down to her ears. “You have to whisper and be very quiet. And please... Call me daet.”

  “That boy has a feather,” Rue whispered loudly.

  “Rue.” He tapped her leg. “Shh.”

  Rue settled in quietly,
but the boy in question turned around, looking at her in open curiosity. His own daet tapped his shoulder and he turned back. The feather was confiscated.

  The singing started, and Rue was amply drowned out by several hymns, but by the time an elder stood up to pray, Rue was drumming her feet against Thomas’s shins and wriggling to get a more comfortable position. She wasn’t used to this, and he couldn’t blame her, but compared with all the other kinner sitting quietly next to their parents on either side of the service, her unruliness stood out.

  Would it be appropriate to bring her over to Patience? Would Patience be any better at calming this child than he was? But Rue wasn’t Patience’s obligation. She was just the teacher next door... And he was Rue’s daet. She was his to raise and guide, and to figure out.

  Noah tapped Rue’s leg and then passed her a hard candy. Noah had thought of pocketing a few candies? Even Thomas hadn’t thought of that. He shot his brother a grateful smile as Rue noisily unwrapped the candy and popped it into her mouth.

  By the time the first preacher stood up to speak in German, Thomas knew he was beat. She couldn’t understand anything that was being said, and even if she could, it would all be far too complicated for a four-year-old to grasp.

  He caught Patience’s gaze on him, and he shook his head slightly, letting her know all was well. He couldn’t keep leaning on her—it wasn’t fair to either of them.

  “Come, Rue,” he whispered, and he eased off the bench and carried her out of the tent. When he looked back, Noah and Amos were watching him, but they both looked as helpless as he felt.

  He was a single daet to an Englisher... How was he going to do this?

  A few women had some small children playing on a blanket outside the tent.

  “Would she like to come play here?” one of the women asked in German.

  But Rue didn’t speak German, and she didn’t obey terribly swiftly, either. Suddenly, leaving her to play with other Amish children felt like it was setting her up for failure. The women would talk about her afterward—the little girl who spoke only English and didn’t obey. He didn’t want that. Things had already gone wrong with the Smoker family.