Maddie didn’t say a word. She had her face against Eva’s skirt.
Eva patted her head. “This is Maddie Gingrich. She is also a first grader. Is your daughter here?”
Becca shook her head. “She’s gone with my father-in-law to purchase some dairy cows, but they should be back soon. Please come in. I’m afraid I’m out of coffee, but I can offer you some tea.”
Constance walked past Becca into the kitchen and set her basket on the table and pulled out a coffee tin. “I brought some with me. We’re here to tackle the dust so let’s get started, sisters.”
The other women gathered around the table, each one with a basket or pail filled with cleaning supplies.
Becca pressed a hand to her cheek. “I hadn’t expected this much help from the community so quickly.”
Eva carried her pail to the sink and began to fill it with water. “I can start on the windows.”
“I’ll get this food put away,” Bethany said as she opened her basket. She brought out two loaves of bread, butter and a cheese spread and finally a cherry pie with a golden lattice crust. Penelope Miller began unpacking pint jars filled with canned fruits and vegetables.
Becca shook her head. “This is overwhelming. Danki. I’ve already cleaned two bedrooms and this kitchen. If you could help me drag the mattresses outside from the other two bedrooms so I can beat the dust out of them I would appreciate it.”
The house quickly became a flurry of activity as the women attacked the floors, walls and even the ceilings with pine-scented cleaner and elbow grease. Eva was amazed at how quickly the dilapidated farmhouse took on new life as grimy windows were cleaned, rubbish hauled out and the floors scrubbed and polished. Even Maddie was given the task of polishing the kitchen cabinet doors that she could reach.
The group broke for lunch at noon and decided to eat outside. Eva was shocked when Willis walked in the door with the bishop while she was fixing a plate. Willis wrinkled his nose. Eva smiled at him and chuckled. “We are about to eat outside where the scent of real pine trees isn’t as overpowering as the cleaner we have been using. What are you doing here?”
Bishop Schultz smiled at her. “I asked Willis to come take a look at some machinery Mr. Beachy purchased along with this farm. He’s not sure it’s in working order.”
Willis pushed the brim of his straw hat back with one finger. “I can usually make a part for less than what the owner would have to pay to buy one. I won’t know if it’s something I can fix until I get a good look at it.”
“The property has been planted in potatoes and hay,” the bishop added. “The church will help Mr. Beachy get his first crops harvested. I just wanted to know if we should bring our own machinery. Is your father-in-law about?” he asked Becca.
“I think that is him now.” A pickup pulling a silver cattle trailer turned into the drive. An elderly Amish man who walked with a cane got out of the truck and helped a little girl out. She came running over to see her mother. “We have four cows now and Daadi is going to show me how to milk them.”
Becca put her arm around the child. “This is my daughter, Annabeth. These nice women have come to help me clean the house and this is our new bishop. And this little girl will be in the first grade with you when school starts. Her name is Maddie.”
The two girls sized each other up. Annabeth spoke first. “Do you want to come see our new cows?”
Maddie nodded and the two girls started toward the barn. “Stay away from the truck and the trailer until they have the cattle unloaded,” Becca called after them.
“We will,” they replied in unison.
Becca pressed a hand to her chest. “That went better than I was hoping. She hasn’t had anyone her own age to play with for ages.”
Willis raised both eyebrows. “I’m happy to have someone for Maddie to play with, too. She has an imaginary friend if Annabeth should mention meeting someone called Bubble.”
Willis and the bishop went out to speak to Mr. Beachy.
“Tell us a little about yourself,” Constance said as she handed Becca a plate with a sandwich, some grapes and wedges of cheese.
“There isn’t a lot to tell. I’m from Pinecrest, Florida.”
“What?” Dinah looked ready to fall over. “You moved from the beautiful beaches of Florida to the northernmost county in Maine? Are you out of your mind?”
Everyone laughed. “Pay her no attention,” Constance said. “Dinah has been trying to get her husband to take her there for years.”
“I lived in Pinecrest for a short time,” Gemma said. “I worked at the Amish Pie Shop. Do you know it?”
“I do. Perhaps we saw each other there. My husband loved their rhubarb pie.”
The sadness in her eyes told Eva it had been a love match. Eva wondered how the young husband lost his life but she didn’t ask. The Amish rarely spoke of the dead or of their grief. The passing of a loved one was the will of God and not to be questioned.
Becca and Gemma began talking about people and places they both had known in Florida. The beginnings of a new friendship seemed to be flourishing between the two. Eva had been involved in frolics before, but today she felt she truly belonged in the community of New Covenant. She glanced out the kitchen window. The bishop stood beside Mr. Beachy while Willis was on his knees looking under a rusty machine. He lay down on his back and wriggled beneath it. She grinned at the sight. A wife would have trouble keeping his clothes clean. The kids should have added being a good laundress to their list.
“What are you smiling about?” Bethany asked.
Caught off guard, Eva stumbled over her reply. “Am I smiling? I reckon I’m just happy to be useful today.”
Bethany tipped her head to the side. “That was more of a daydreamy smile.”
Eva felt a blush heat her cheeks. She wanted to deny it but she couldn’t.
“Do I detect a hint of romance in the air?” Dinah asked. All the women looked at Eva, waiting for her answer.
“Nee, you are mistaken.” Willis’s affection for her was that of a friend. If hers was something more she was the one who had to deal with that.
Dinah walked over and looked out the window. “It’s Willis Gingrich, I’m guessing.”
“Ah, that makes sense.” Bethany nodded. “A helpful neighbor, adorable children, a strong, hardworking blacksmith. What’s not to like?”
“Has the date been set?” Constance asked and everyone giggled.
Eva shook her head. “Nee, nothing like that. We get along well. We are friends. I look after the children for him sometimes. Don’t make it out to be something that it’s not.”
Dinah let out a long sigh. “This means we’ll be looking for another teacher soon.”
“I fully intend to keep teaching for as long as the good Lord wills.”
Annabeth and Maddie came in together. Annabeth tugged on her mother’s sleeve. “Maddie told me a secret. Can I tell you?”
“I’m sure it involves her imaginary friend Bubble,” Eva said with a smile.
Annabeth shook her head. “Maddie is getting a new mother and it’s her teacher.”
Everyone turned to stare at Eva. She wanted to sink into the ground. “Maddie is mistaken.”
No one looked convinced.
It wasn’t until Willis and Maddie came over with their plates that Eva had a chance to speak to the child. “Maddie, I’m very disappointed in you.”
“What now?” Willis asked, eyeing his sister.
Eva kept her gaze on Maddie, too embarrassed to meet Willis’s eyes. “You can’t make up things that aren’t true. Why would you tell Annabeth such a story?”
Maddie shrugged her small shoulders. “I don’t know.”
“I’m not going to like this, am I?” Willis asked.
“That is not an explanation, Maddie. She told Annabeth that I was going to be her new m
other. Annabeth told everyone else in the room.” Eva could barely get the words out because as upset as she was with the child she was even more upset that it could never be true.
“What?” Willis looked around. “No wonder everyone is staring at us.”
Maddie looked down at her feet. “I said it because you’re so nice. You like me. And you remind me of my mamm. I started wishing it was true and then I started thinking it was true. I’m sorry.”
It was hard to be angry with someone who looked so dejected. “I know you’re sorry for what you did but this storytelling has to stop. You can’t make something come true by wishing for it, or by making up stories about it.”
Maddie started crying and it almost broke Eva’s heart. Willis lifted her onto his lap. “We talked about this, Maddie. I thought you understood that it was wrong to make up stories.”
“Bubble said...”
Eva shook her finger. “None of this can be blamed on Bubble. I just vehemently denied that we were in a romantic relationship, which by the way every one of those women approves of, so what do we do now?”
He rubbed his knuckles on his cheek stubble. “Talk will die down eventually. I’m afraid the more we deny it the more they will think it’s true. That’s the way of human nature. I’m going to take her home. You will spend the rest of the day in your room, Maddie. Go get in the buggy.”
The child walked away with dragging footsteps. When she reached his buggy, she glanced back but she didn’t say anything. After she climbed inside, Eva pressed a hand to her heart. “She looks so sad.”
“Do you think I was too tough on her?”
“I don’t think so. I hope she has learned her lesson. If Samuel Yoder gets wind of this story he could say I’m not fit to teach the children.”
“You don’t think he would take it to heart, do you? She’s just a little kid.”
“Who can say.”
“Well, there is one good thing about this,” he said, rising to his feet with his back to the other women.
“Tell me quickly. I need to know.”
“You check a couple of items off the wife-to-be wish list. You’re only fifty and you’re a good cook.”
“Go away.”
“Guess I’ll see you tomorrow at church. Remember I’m happy to give you and Danny a lift if the weather is bad.”
“I remember. Danki.” She hoped it would rain and she could travel to the Fisher farm seated beside Willis. It wouldn’t stop any gossip about them, but she was willing to risk a few knowing looks and awkward questions in order to spend more time with him. Such brief moments together were all she could expect, but she was rapidly growing to believe they would never be enough.
* * *
It was raining when Eva woke. She sprang from bed and hurried into her best Sunday dress. It was a deep maroon with an apron of the same color. She put up her hair and pinned her kapp in place. Although it was vain, she took a moment to pinch some color into her cheeks. She shook her head sadly. Was she trying to check “being pretty” off the list? That was a hopeless task.
At least Willis didn’t seem to mind her appearance. Would riding to church with him fuel the gossip she was sure would circulate today? If it did, it would be a small price to pay for time spent in his company.
She had to admit she was falling for Willis, but it was a secret she would guard closely lest it ruin their friendship.
Willis pulled his buggy to stop outside her front door. She gathered together the food she had prepared for the noon meal and went to the end of the hallway. “Hurry up, Danny. Willis is here.”
Her brother came out of her guest room dressed in his Sunday best. He wore a black suit coat over a vest, a white shirt and dark pants. He carried his black, flat-crowned hat in his hand. “The rain is letting up. We can take the cart.”
“We will be more comfortable in Willis’s buggy. It might start raining again and I have no wish to arrive at my first church service here looking like a drowned rat.”
She hurried outside. Willis wore a suit almost identical to her brother’s. He looked particularly handsome. She was so used to seeing him with a leather apron and rolled-up sleeves that she almost didn’t recognize him. He helped her into the front seat. Maddie sat quietly in the back, wearing a pretty green dress with a white apron and a white kapp on her head that Eva had finished the night before last. Otto and Harley looked clean and uncomfortable in their Sunday best.
Danny climbed in the back. “Morning, Willis. Boys. Maddie, you seem quiet today. Is something wrong?”
“I got in trouble for telling someone Eva was going to be my new mamm.”
“Which isn’t true,” Eva and Willis said at the same time.
“Good to know,” Danny said with a smirk and a wink at his sister. She turned to stare out the windshield.
The trip to the Fisher farm was less than a mile. It started raining again, and Willis didn’t hurry. What was he thinking about? Was he as happy to ride beside her as she was to be sitting beside him? Their times on the swings together made her believe he was. Good friends enjoying each other’s company. If she was courting a heartache in the future she pushed that thought aside.
He leaned closer. “You smell nice. Like cinnamon and fresh bread. Have you been baking?”
“Check, check,” she said, knowing it would make him laugh to refer to the list. It did.
She turned to the boys in the back. “I hope you enjoy my rolls after the service.”
“What if they are all gone before we get through the line?” Otto asked.
“I kept a second pan at the house in case you wanted some for breakfast tomorrow.”
Willis grinned. “You are spoiling them.”
“Nonsense. I intend to teach Otto how to make them so they can enjoy them whenever they like.”
“You’re going to teach Otto to bake?” Harley moaned. “Argh, I’m never going to eat a cinnamon roll again.”
In spite of their slow place, they soon turned into the Fisher farm. The service was to be held in the barn. Eva and Maddie took the food up to the house where Mrs. Fisher and the older women of the community were preparing to serve the meal when the preaching was done.
After visiting briefly and getting a few sidelong glances but no direct questions about her marriage plans, Eva walked into the barn. The sun had come out and shone brightly beyond the open barn doors at the other end. Rows of wooden benches had already been set up and were filled with worshippers, men on one side, women on the other, all waiting for the church service to begin. The wooden floor had been swept clean of every stray straw.
Eva and Maddie sat with the single women and girls while the married women sat up front. Glancing across the aisle to where the men sat, she caught Willis’s eye. He was near the back among the single men and boys along with his brothers and Danny. He smiled at her and she smiled back shyly.
As everyone waited for the Volsinger to begin leading the first hymn, Eva closed her eyes. She heard the quiet rustle of fabric on wooden benches as the worshippers tried to get comfortable. The songs of the birds in the trees outside came in through the open door. The scent of alfalfa hay mingled with the smells of the animals and fresh pine as a gentle breeze swirled around her.
The song leader started the first hymn with a deep, clear voice. No musical instruments were allowed by their Amish faith. More than fifty voices took up the solemn, slow-paced cadence of the song. The ministers and the bishop were in the farmhouse across the way, agreeing on the order of the service and the preaching that would be done.
Outsiders found it strange that Amish ministers and bishops received no formal training. Instead, they were chosen by lot, accepting that God wanted them to lead the people according to His wishes. They all preached from the heart, without a written sermon. They depended on the Lord to inspire them in their readings from the Bible.
The first song came to an end. After a few minutes of silence, the Volsinger began the second song. It was always Das Loblied, the hymn of praise. When it ended, the ministers and the bishop entered the barn. As they made their way to the minister’s bench, they shook hands with the men they passed.
For the next several hours Eva listened to the sermons delivered first by each of the ministers and then by the bishop interspersed with long hymns. She glanced over at Danny and Willis. Danny had his hymnbook open. Willis didn’t, but he was singing. She wondered how many of the songs in the large Ashbund he had committed to memory. She knew only a few by heart. Maddie was surprisingly quiet.
When the three hours of preaching and singing came to an end, Bishop Schultz announced the school barn raising, and listed what supplies were still needed and then gave a final blessing. The service was over.
The scrabble of the young boys in the back making a quick getaway made a few of the elders scowl in their direction. Harley and Otto were among the first out the door. Eva grinned. She remembered how hard it was to sit still at that age. Although the young girls left with more decorum, they were every bit as anxious to be out taking advantage of the beautiful day. Winter would be upon them all too soon. She let Maddie follow them out.
Eva happened to glance at Willis again and caught him staring at her. All the other men were gone.
Gemma stopped by with her baby in her arms. “You should stop looking at that man like you are a starving mouse and he is a piece of cheese. No point in denying it.”
Eva rose to her feet. “I’m not a starving mouse.”
“You’re doing a good impression of one.” The two of them went out together and soon joined the rest of the women who were setting up the food. The elders were served first. The younger members had to wait their turn. When Willis came inside to eat, Otto and Harley were with him. He walked past Eva without a word. At first she was hurt but she soon realized they were both under an unusual amount of scrutiny. Ignoring each other was one way of putting the rumors to rest. She was thankful for his thoughtfulness. She accepted a ride home from Jesse and Gemma, leaving her brother to return with Willis and his family. She could do her part to limit the gossip as well as he could.
The Amish Teacher's Dilemma and Healing Their Amish Hearts Page 13