Brightest and Best (12 page)

When her vigilance was rewarded and Gideon’s buggy swayed into view, Ella let her breath out. She hadn’t known what to think. They spoke of the question every time they saw each other, yet she hadn’t been sure he would put his children on the bus. His horse clip-clopped toward Ella, and she made sure to have a smile on her face, both for Gideon and for the children.

Gertie and Savilla jumped out of the buggy in matching green dresses, black aprons, and braids securely pinned against their heads under their
kapps.
Tobias took his time. From the buggy bench, Gideon’s eyes settled for a few seconds on each of the assembled children.

Ella approached the buggy.

“David didn’t come,” Gideon said.

“He wanted to.”

“Jed has said all along that he saw no benefit in taking the boy out of the fields when he already finished his book learning.”

“And you,” Ella said. “You’re here with all of your
kinner.
”

The head of every student and adult at the corner turned toward the clattering of an unfamiliar vehicle, all of them curious about the
English
bus. The front end looked like most of the vehicles that rumbled down this road from time to time. A black hood housed the engine, with an open bench behind the steering wheel. The bus stopped in the middle of the intersection.

Mrs. Glick’s girls broke away from the stance they had held so dutifully. Curiosity widened the eyes of all the children. Even the older boys abandoned their pebble tossing.

“It looks like a cage in a wagon,” Gertie pronounced.

The comparison was apt. A sturdy wagon base spanned the wide rear axle, and wooden framing rose from the wagon—where she presumed there were benches—to the roof above. On a fine day like today, canvas flaps were rolled and restrained up against the roof. When winter came, they could easily be let down to offer protection from the elements. It would still be very cold.

Ella had once ridden in an automobile, but she doubted any of the children gawking at the bus had. A few hands pushed out from the interior, followed by faces looking over the horizontal timbers of the wagon’s framing.

The Byler children, Ella noted, and the King children. The Henderson boy, an
English,
grinned as if he had never done anything so exciting in his entire life. Ella recognized a couple of
English
girls who rolled their eyes at the silliness around them. The bus would make one more stop, closer to town, for the last of the children assigned to this bus. At least one other bus would make a separate route picking up children who lived in the opposite direction from town.

The bus driver lumbered off his bench and down the one step to the ground. He consulted a sheet of paper. “Let’s see, Glick?”

“Here,” the two girls chimed.

“Climb aboard.” The driver pulled a pencil from over his ear and made two check marks. “Kaufman?”

Seth raised a hand.

“Should be two,” the driver muttered. “Seth and David.”

“I’m Seth. My brother is not coming.” Seth placed one foot on the step and hoisted himself into the bus.

Ella’s stomach clenched as she watched the
English
cavern swallow the unsuspecting boy.

“The superintendent is not going to like this.” The driver pursed his lips and drew a careful circle around David’s name. “Mast?”

The oldest students of the corner clambered aboard.

“Let’s see,” the driver said. “That leaves Wittmer. Three.”

Ella sucked in a breath and held it.

Gideon bent over and spoke to his young daughters. He had made his peace with this moment. Savilla was a sensible child. Gertie was simply relieved that she did not have to go to the school that had collapsed around her. She was younger and more impulsive than Savilla, and as much as it seemed impossible that his youngest was old enough for school, Gertie was ready.

“Savilla, you are the older one,” he said, looking into their matching green eyes. “You must look after Gertie. Do you understand?”

“Yes,
Daed.
” The girls spoke in unison.

“You do as you’re told. Follow instructions. Remember your manners. Don’t lose your lunch pails.”

“Yes,
Daed
.”

With his hands on their shoulders, Gideon turned his daughters around. They held hands as they got on the bus, Savilla patiently waiting for her small sister to manage the high step into the bus. Gertie immediately stuck her head out and waved.

The driver consulted his list again before looking at Tobias. “You the Wittmer boy?”

Tobias nodded.

“Let’s go, then. We have a schedule to keep.”

Tobias looked at his father.

Gideon cleared his throat. “Tobias will not be attending school. He is needed on the farm.”

The driver tapped his paper. “I can’t do anything about the Kaufman boy who didn’t show up, but Tobias Wittmer is standing right in front of me. He needs to get on the bus.”

“He’s not going. I’m his father, and this is the decision I’ve made.”

“The law says he needs to go to school.”

“The law does not know my boy,” Gideon said. “He was one of the brightest students in our school. Miss Coates said he was doing eighth-grade work two years ago. I need his help, and the consolidated school will not teach him what he needs to know to farm.”

“I’m not in charge of what they teach,” the driver said. “I’m just supposed to get the students to school.”

Gideon looked up at the sun. “As you said, you have a schedule to keep.”

The driver puffed out his cheeks and shook his head while he carefully circled Tobias’s name. “You’ll be hearing from the principal.”

G
ideon.” Ella put a hand on his arm.

“It’s all right.”

His eyes fixed on his little girls, Gertie hanging out of the bus to wave enthusiastically and Savilla trying to tug her sister back to safety. Ella forced herself to wiggle her fingers at the girls. Whatever she felt at their departure into the
English
world, even for a day, must be magnified in Gideon’s heart.

“Not too late to change your mind,” the driver said. “Be a law-abiding citizen.”

Gideon shook his head.

“Are you sure?” Ella asked.

“No. Yes.”

The bus’s engine roared to life and the driver put it in gear. Ella’s vision clouded with the dust the oversized tires thrust into the air, and she covered her mouth to cough.

“Gideon Wittmer, what have you done?”

Mrs. Glick. Ella had nearly forgotten she was there. Simultaneously, she and Gideon turned to face their neighbor’s bulging eyes.

“You stood right here and watched me put my children on that bus.” Mrs. Glick scraped her shoe through the dirt. “My little girls.”

“My little girls are also on the bus,” Gideon said.

Mrs. Glick pointed at Tobias. “The other boys got on, and some of them are older than your son.”

“I cannot cross my conscience,” Gideon said.

“What will the other fathers think?” Mrs. Glick jabbed a finger in Ella’s direction. “And Jed Hilty! Did the two of you decide together to do this?”

“We talked about it,” Gideon said, “but I don’t make another man’s decision.”

“I know Mrs. Mast didn’t want those boys to go on the bus. What are you going to say to her about keeping your boy home?”

“I do not imagine we will discuss it,” Gideon said. “The matter is between Mrs. Mast and her husband.”

“But the law!”

“There are new laws about education,” Gideon said, “but there are also laws about religious freedom. Isn’t that what brought our ancestors to America two hundred years ago?”

Mrs. Glick huffed and tied her bonnet in a firm knot before pivoting and stomping toward her home.

“Maybe she’s right,
Daed.
”

Tobias’s voice surprised Ella, and she riffled through her memories of the last few weeks for any sentence she’d heard him speak on the subject of school or a remark Gideon might have passed on about something his son had said. She came up with nothing.

“It’s all right,” Gideon said.

“But
Daed
…”

Gideon put an arm around his son’s shoulders, as Ella had seen him do countless times in the last few years.

“Are you saying you want to go to school?” Gideon asked.

Tobias hesitated. Ella could not tell whether he was considering disagreeing with his father or simply wanted Gideon to be safe.

“We’ll talk more at home,” Gideon said. “Why don’t you drive the buggy home? I’ll see you there. I feel like a walk.”

Tobias looked from Gideon to Ella before shuffling toward the horse and finding the reins. Ella watched him put the buggy into motion and drive past them before reaching for Gideon’s hand.

He squeezed her fingers. “It’s all right.”

“You keep saying that,” Ella said.

“It’s true.”

“But it’s risky.” Slowly they began to walk toward the Hilty farm. “You’re breaking the law.”

“So is your father.”

“I know.” Her voice caught. “I’m worried about both of you.”

“We are in God’s hands.”

“What if there are consequences?”

“The authorities are blustering,” Gideon said.

“How can you be certain?”

He lifted one shoulder and let it drop. “Perhaps I’m not. But why will they concern themselves with Amish young people? We pay our taxes, and they leave us alone. That’s the way it has always been. They are blustering for the sake of their own people, not for us.”

Ella pressed her lips together. Gideon made a good point. The Amish population in Geauga County was fairly significant, but no one had ever disturbed their way of life. They lived on their own farms, took care of each other, and asked little of the
English.
Why should the
English
care now?

But the deputy had been to see Gideon with the superintendent. Official correspondence reminding everyone of the laws had arrived in the mailboxes of all the Amish families.

“What if they press the issue?” Ella said. “What if you’re wrong and they do care?”

“Then I will be wrong about that,” Gideon said, “but I will not be wrong about our right to express our religious beliefs. Even the
English
laws protect that.”

“I’m nervous, Gideon.”

“I know.”

“I wish I could be as calm as you are.” Ella sighed. “I should get home. Rachel and
Daed
and David—I don’t know what to think.”

“Seth will be all right.”

“It’s David I’m worried about.”

At the sound of the bell, students who had attended Seabury Consolidated Grade School the previous year responded by jostling out of their social groups and into grade-level lines. Margaret’s job in this annual first-day ritual was to assist and redirect any students who seemed uncertain what to do. She ambled through the recess play area while students scrambled into formation and spoke quietly to children who looked confused about the procedure, pointing toward the lines they should join. These children were in three categories: first graders starting school, older students who were new to the district, and Amish, with their expansive, startled eyes sponging up the motion around them and the details of the building before them.

“Look at them.” A seventh grader jeered at two Amish boys in his line. “I’ll bet they don’t even know how to read.”

“That’s enough,” Margaret snapped. “In this school, we show respect for all our students. Is that understood?”

“Yes, ma’am.” The boy looked at his feet.

Margaret turned to the Amish students. “Welcome to our school. I would love to know your names.”

“Seth Kaufman,” one said.

“Jacob King,” the other said.

“You’re both in Mr. Taylor’s class. You’ll enjoy him and learn a great deal.”

“Danki,”
Seth said.

Jacob elbowed him and whispered, “Speak English.”

“Thank you,” Seth said.

The last straggler found a place in the fourth-grade line, and Margaret marched alongside the first graders to greet her own students. The daily entrance into the school always began with the youngest classes. Margaret led the wobbly line of six-year-olds through the main hall on the first floor, up the stairs at the rear of the building, and into her classroom. There, she stood at the door greeting children and pointing to where they should sit. She’d already memorized the seating chart. Now she simply needed to connect faces with the names.