Fire in the Night (25 page)

Oh, the nurses loved him alright, and Levi enjoyed every minute of their teasing, always coming back with sharp answers.

By five o’clock, Sarah was still making up excuses for herself for not going to say hello to Lee. She was not combed. Her hair was a mess. Her covering wasn’t neat. What would she say? She didn’t know him. He didn’t know she was there. Or would Anna have told him? Probably.

She was ravenous, having skipped lunch. Levi would be alright until she returned, so she told him she was going to get a sandwich and that she’d bring it back as soon as possible. He barely heard her, engrossed in another animal show.

Sarah hurried down the hall with her purse slung over her shoulder. She looked neither left nor right on her mission the cafeteria.

Again she saw Ashley Walters, who was evidently now intent on avoiding Sarah, and ducked into an elevator with an open door. Sarah wondered why Ashley suddenly seemed so afraid. She wasn’t at first, when she sat down at Sarah’s table at breakfast. Perhaps she had become ill at ease with Sarah being Amish and all.

Still. Sarah pondered Ashley’s hasty retreat after she had confirmed that their barn was one of those that burned down last spring. Did Ashley have some connection, some knowledge of the barn fires? Surely not this sweet, hesitant girl.

Levi came home from the hospital with his ego greatly inflated. His knowledge of wild animals had grown to the point that he took it upon himself to educate every member of the family about lions, giraffes, and just about every other creature that roamed the African grasslands. Suzie was intrigued at first, and Priscilla pretended to be bored, but she actually listened in her own sly way.

So life resumed its normalcy again. Mam finished the housecleaning, and Sarah sewed new dresses for the upcoming wedding season.

When Sunday arrived, Dat’s face became drawn, worry clouding his keen eyes. He sat reading his German Bible, his mouth moving as he memorized and prepared for the sermon he would be expected to preach.

The truth was that his ministry had never weighed heavier on his shoulders. It seemed to drain his life’s blood. He was tired from the lack of support from the members of his congregation.

Davey Beiler’s
ihr
(own) Priscilla had done wrong, and it was not easily forgotten. Now their Levi had been in the hospital again, Mervin was dead, and the barn had been burned at the hand of an arsonist. It seemed God was concerned about the family. Well, no wonder. Look at his sons, the way they carried on with that roofing and siding business, showing no interest in taking over the family farm.

Although that was the thinking of only a handful of people, to David Beiler it was a handful too many. The intricate pattern of love and fellowship was unraveling, destroying the age-old heritage of one for all and all for one, a beautiful design only God could have woven.

David felt the loose threads when he stood up to preach, and his throat constricted with fear, with failure looming on the horizon like a midsummer hailstorm. The black cloud to the west was predictable, but the strength and fury of the storm was not.

So he wavered, the crumbling of his spiritual post a genuine threat. His knees shook, his hands clenched and unclenched, and he stood wordless.

Mam, seated in front of him on a folding chair, bowed her head even farther, her lips moving in prayer. Nervous members of the congregation shuffled their feet as the ticking of the plastic clock on the shop wall became deafening.

Someone cleared his throat, which seemed to jolt David back to life. He began speaking, choked, and stopped.

Anna Mae, sitting in the women’s row, watched her father’s face, and quick tears of sympathy formed. Her Dat had had too much. Sarah was horrified. Please, please. She silently begged for help without forming the actual words of a prayer. Priscilla sat like stone, her face blanched of color.

Then it seemed as if God supplied his needs, and he spoke, softly, lovingly but with power. He left nothing back. He told them of the heaviness of his heart, the silent, cunning way the devil was weaving a pattern of his own, destroying the perfect will of God. There was evil among them, but that evil could not enter into the fold unless they allowed it.

Two barns had burned by the hands of someone who meant harm. A young child had died. Let it not once be named among them to berate, to gossip. Instead, they needed to hold themselves accountable, one to the other.

Small human minds cannot think as God does. Where there is suspicion, hate, backbiting, and bickering—the devil’s own handiwork—the church community needed to replace it with love and forbearance, brother to brother, supporting, upholding, forgiving. God is not mocked.

The conviction that fell was terrible, weighing down guilty members as David Beiler bared his soul. They had never heard anything like it. Old Sylvia Riehl said it was time the poor man spoke from the heart, as she cut a piece of snitz pie at the table later in the day.

For now, God had triumphed.

Chapter 18

M
AM STOOD AT HER IRONING
board as the late November sun slanted through the kitchen window. Her right arm moved rhythmically, pressing the new black cape and apron she’d finished that afternoon.

The maple leaves were gone, and the trees looked unclothed, exposed to the chilly winds that warned of snow but were unable to produce it. The brown, dried up remnants of leaves that clung bravely to the cold branches of the oak trees rustled in the steady breeze, as if their perseverance allowed the Beiler family a tenacious hold on autumn. It was wedding season.

Mam suppressed a sigh of weariness. Every Tuesday and every Thursday, starting the last week in October, after communion services were over, the weddings moved along in full swing. Fifteen of them this year. That meant invitations to fifteen weddings for David Beiler, who was invited along with Malinda for any number of reasons—as a minister, an uncle, a friend.

Monday mornings for Mam meant laundry. During wedding season that task included cleaning the black
mutza
(suit or coat) and woolen hats, ironing extra coverings and white shirts, polishing black Sunday shoes, and making sure there were plenty of snowy white handkerchiefs pressed and in the top bureau drawer for her husband. Priscilla’s job was to wash and polish the buggy.

Sarah had been called to go with Hannah’s sister, Emma, and her husband, Amos, to work at their large, bustling bakery at the farmer’s market in New Jersey, about a hundred miles away. Every Friday and Saturday morning, the market van picked up Sarah at three thirty and returned her at eight o’clock in the evening. She seemed to float on pure adrenaline now, dashing down the stairs, banging the front door so the picture on the wall rattled, eager to be a part of the new world she had discovered.

Secretly, Sarah felt pretty in her white bib apron. When she learned to ring up orders on the electric cash register, she felt very worldly indeed. A real career girl. She loved the atmosphere of the huge farmer’s market. There was a constant rush to mix, bake, wrap, and display the pies and cakes, the bread and cookies, the cupcakes and cinnamon rolls—the list was endless. Sarah rose eagerly to the challenge.

She was a farm girl, her arms rounded, strong, and muscular. So the fifty-pound bags of flour and sugar were no problem, the endless rolling of pie crusts no big deal. She smiled easily and was always friendly and helpful to the other workers. Emma watched and noticed. She wondered why she hadn’t asked Sarah to be a bakery girl before.

The only downside was the lack of sleep, which often caused her to doze off during the three-hour church service on Sundays. She also had trouble staying awake late on Saturday nights with her girlfriends.

But she had money in her wallet now and a savings account at the Susquehanna Bank without her parents’ names on it. If she wanted to purchase a framed piece of art from the craft shop, she could. Or if she wanted to surprise Levi with a new trinket or game, she could do that too. It was absolutely liberating, this new job.

Now the weddings had arrived, and Sarah found she could exist on very little sleep, returning home late every Thursday evening for just a bit of sleep before the alarm rang in the middle of the night—or so it seemed at three o’clock.

The family was wearing black at every wedding this year, since they were still in mourning for Mervin. Sarah had sewn not one, but two new dresses, capes, and aprons, so she still felt as if she was dressed in wedding finery despite their somber color.

She went to Mam at her ironing board to ask if the coverings were ready for tomorrow’s wedding. Mam shook her head.

“That’s next.”

“What should I do?”

“Well, you can make Levi’s bed. Just use the clean blue sheets in the bathroom closet. I doubt if the wash is dry yet.”

“I’d rather put on the fresh ones, from off the line.”

“Alright with me.”

Sarah sat on Dat’s chair, leaned back, and watched Mam lift and inspect the new apron. She nodded with satisfaction, folded it in half, then again, and hung it carefully on a plastic hanger.

Sarah opened her mouth then closed it as she gazed through the kitchen window at the brown oak leaves. Finally she said, “Mam.”

Absentmindedly, Mam said “Hmm?” as she resumed her ironing.

“Rose and Matthew broke up.”

“Did they?”

Mam had not really heard Sarah, her own thoughts preoccupying her. Suddenly she stopped the rhythmic movement of the sadiron and asked, “What did you say?”

“Rose and Matthew broke up.”

“Oh, my goodness! Who did it?”

“Rose.”

Mam’s face went pale, her thoughts whirling, stirred to hurricane force by the ensuing tragedy that was sure to follow. She was scared of the torrential rain, the spiritual and emotional blast that could sweep away her daughter in its terrifying grip. Her lips pale, compressed, she asked flatly, “Why?”

“We talked almost all night, Rose and I. Mam, I feel so sorry for her. She has no real reason. He’s everything she always imagined her boyfriend to be. Yet she feels empty and drained, she said. She wants to stay away from him at least a month to see if her feelings change.”

Mam pursed her lips, folded the black cape, and hung it neatly on the same hanger. “Oh, they all say that.”

Sarah was astounded and looked sharply at her mother’s pale face, the too-bright eyes. There was a sharp edge in her soft voice. “She wants someone else. You know that,” Mam added.

The words were flung at Sarah with a strange intensity before Mam turned, walked swiftly into her bedroom, and closed the door with a firm “thwack” behind her.

“
Die Mam iss base!
(Mam is angry!)” Levi shouted gleefully from the sofa, where he lay with a stack of catalogs, looking for horses.

Sarah felt a warm flush rise on her face. She knew. She knew with a sickening certainty what had upset her mother. It was the idea of Matthew being free. Free to ask her. Free to be hers!

Unable to stay seated, Sarah jumped up, ran up the stairs, and flung herself on her bed, her chin in her cupped hands, her feet in the air, the old house slippers dangling as she dreamed.

God had answered her prayers! He had put her through the fire, brought her patience, and now he was delivering her into a brand new day, one of hope, one rosy with the glow of a new future. Her whole room was infused with the light of her love for Matthew, a golden yellow halo that transformed the very color of the walls. Her world had come crashing about her, righted itself, and turned to its original color.

Then the dark form of her mother appeared in the doorway. “Sarah, I’m asking you to listen to me, this one time. I know it may not make a difference to you, but I don’t feel right saying nothing at all.”

Sarah rolled over, sat up, and pushed her feet into her slippers. The sun disappeared behind a gray November cloud, bringing a sense of unrest and dread into Sarah’s bedroom. She looked at the ratty old slippers and wondered why she’d kept them so long. Dropping to the recliner in the corner, Mam squared her shoulders, folded her hands, and began to speak.

“I know how it is for you. You fancy yourself in love with Matthew. You always have. My soft mother’s heart wants to tell you that you can have him. God has answered your prayers, and this may be so. I hope it is. But you must face reality. It was Rose that broke up, not Matthew, which means nine chances out of ten, he’s heartbroken, and he wants her back.”

“You don’t know!” Sarah’s voice was raw with fierce denial.

Mam remained silent, holding Sarah’s intense gaze with the kindness in her own. Sudden confusion caused Sarah to lower her eyes.

“No, I don’t.” Mam said softly.

The wisdom Mam had gleaned through her years of experience helped her accept the truth: Sarah had built an impenetrable wall of fantasy around herself. She stood up, brushed imaginary dust from her apron, and said, “I wish you God’s blessing, my daughter.” She walked softly to Sarah’s bed and held Sarah in her arms. The moment was warm with love put firmly in place, because it never failed.

Patting the shapely shoulders, Mam stepped back and quipped, “So, if the waters get rough, I guess I’ll sit beside you in your little rowboat and row for dear life!”