Huckleberry Harvest (15 page)

Noah felt as if his chest caved in, and the doubt buried him like an avalanche. Did he honor his parents? He hadn’t been able to make peace with the answer to that question for three years. Did he dishonor his mamm by honoring his dat? But if he abandoned his dat to care for his mamm, where was the honor in that?

Mandy glanced at him, and her smile drooped. He never had been very good at hiding his darkest emotions, and any mention of his parents dredged up feelings he usually buried at the bottom of his heart. Mandy knew, and right or not, he hated the fact that she had witnessed his shame.

“I need to go,” he said, scooting his chair back and making a horrible racket as the chair scraped against the floor. “In the morning, I have to go to the bishop’s to take a look at his milking machines, and then I’ll be up to start on the roof. Probably around eleven.”

Felty stood and shook his hand. The warmth in his expression made Noah feel a little better. Felty valued Noah’s work and seemed to genuinely respect his abilities. And surely good-hearted Felty would know that Noah tried hard to honor his parents. If he wasn’t always successful, Felty would never think the less of him for it. “I waited till September to start on the roof,” Felty said. “So it won’t be as hot up there. But it will still be mighty hard work.”

Noah couldn’t smile but he nodded and firmly clasped Felty’s hand. “I’m glad for the job. I’m not afraid of hard work.”

“I know you’re not,” Felty said, glancing at Mandy. “You work harder than anybody I know.”

Noah eyed Mandy before donning his hat and coat. She looked extremely unhappy, as if she’d accidentally stepped on Noah’s dog. He wanted to smile, to wink, to do something to reassure her that he was fine and that Anna’s unintentional words hadn’t stung like a nest of hornets. But it was all he could do to keep the hitch in his throat from choking him. “Good-bye,” he muttered. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“See you tomorrow,” Felty said.

“Good-bye,” Mandy said, almost as if she were asking a question.

He slipped out the door and into the night. It would be better when Mandy went back to Ohio so he wouldn’t feel like he was forever in a state of swirling emotions.

He climbed into the buggy and snapped the reins, knowing that it wouldn’t be better at all. Mandy Helmuth might have been annoying, bossy, and prone to stick her nose where it didn’t belong, but he adored those freckles. Maybe she could overlook the worst of him and agree to be his friend.

Perhaps he could talk her into five weeks instead of four.

Mandy drained the dirty water from the sink and then rinsed and wrung out the mop. The entire house took over two hours to mop. Unlike
Englisch
homes, there was no wall-to-wall carpeting, just yards and yards of wood and linoleum floors that needed to be cleaned. Mammi kept her house tidy. Mandy hated to think that she was doing all that mopping every week. Even though she protested whenever anybody called her old, Mammi was getting up in years. Mopping couldn’t be the easiest task.

Mandy gazed out the window for about the hundredth time. No sign of Noah yet. She glanced at the clock. Only ten.

That morning she had gathered eggs, milked the cow, and picked what was left of the ripe tomatoes. After breakfast, Mammi and Dawdi had been in a very great hurry. Mammi had left the dishes for Mandy and wrapped up in her royal-blue sweater. Mammi had many sweaters of assorted colors, none of them the traditional Amish black. She loved her knitting so much that not even the bishop had the heart to tell her that non-black sweaters were against the rules.

Mammi had told Mandy that she needed to make some urgent calls, but hadn’t said what was so urgent that she needed to leave right after breakfast at six o’clock.

After Mammi and Dawdi had left, Mandy had done up the dishes, strained the milk, oiled the furniture, and mopped the floor, and still the minutes had crawled by. Was Noah having success at Yoder’s dairy? She hoped he wouldn’t be late. Surely Dawdi’s roof was just as important as the bishop’s milking machines.

Mandy shook out the mop and shook her head at the same time. Why did she care when Noah arrived? He wasn’t coming to see her.

Her face grew warm. But she would certainly like to see him.

She scowled to herself and shoved the mop into Mammi’s broom closet. Nope. Nope, she didn’t care about seeing Noah. She was only here for three more weeks and didn’t want to form any attachments, especially not with a brawny, ornery Bonduel boy who growled at her frequently and teased her mercilessly.

Not to mention the fact that her best friend was still in love with him. That put a significant damper on things. Kristina would be loudly indignant if she knew Mandy was entertaining any thoughts about Noah or pining for his arrival on Huckleberry Hill.

Even though she had resolved not to be the least bit excited when Noah finally did show up, her heart skittered about when she heard a firm knock at the door. That could only be Noah.

He stood on the porch, frowning as if he’d just come from a funeral. He held a paper plate covered in tinfoil. She couldn’t figure out if he was frowning because he didn’t want to see her or because he was more than usually grumpy this morning.

Neither.

He handed her the paper plate. “I’m really sorry about last night. I said some very rude things that I didn’t mean.”

“What’s this?” she said.

“It’s a gift. A food gift. To show you how truly sorry I am.”

“Another one? You don’t have to bring me food when you want to apologize. Since you do something to offend me every two or three minutes, you’d have to bring an entire grocery store to make amends.”

He winced, but there was amusement in it. “Don’t remind me.”

She peeled back the plate and tried not to laugh. “You brought me an egg salad sandwich?”

“I haven’t gone to the grocery store this week. All I had was bread, mayonnaise, and eggs. And horseradish. I put horseradish in it. My special recipe. You’ll like it.”

Mandy didn’t waste any time. Her stomach growled as if somebody had suddenly awoken it from a long nap. She snatched one of the halves and took a big bite. The horseradish mixed with mayonnaise and a pinch of mustard made her taste buds dance a jig. “Mmm, this is delicious.”

He quirked his mouth into a sheepish grin. “I’m glad you like it.”

She took a bigger bite, and he waited as she savored then swallowed. “You are a very gute cook, Noah Mischler.”

“Well, it’s not technically cooking.”

She finished the first half and picked up the second. Hesitating, she held the sandwich out for him. “I’m sorry. It’s rude to eat in front of you like this. Do you want some of this?”

He shook his head and stepped back. “I’m thoroughly enjoying watching you eat it.”

She didn’t offer a second time. She took another voracious bite.

He gazed at her with a boyish grin on his face. “Eggs Benedict again this morning?”

“Oatmeal.” Mandy shuddered. “With bacon bits.”

He chuckled. “I’m beginning to fear you might starve before you go back to Ohio.”

“Not if you keep doing things to offend me. You’re good at apologizing.” She finished the sandwich and brushed her hands off. “Now that you can’t possibly take back your gift, I want you to know that you have no reason to feel bad. If anybody should apologize, it’s me.”

“That’s not true,” he said. “I don’t usually talk to girls the way I talked to you last night.”

She wanted to wipe that concerned look off his face. She opted for a diversion. “How does your lip feel this morning? The swelling’s gone down.”

“Fine. My dat . . . It feels fine. I didn’t get hit that hard.” He backed away from her and down the porch steps. “I better start on that roof. I don’t want Felty thinking he’s paying me for doing nothing.”

She nodded, surprised at how disappointed she felt. Noah would be eight feet above her head all day, but she wouldn’t even be able to see him. At the moment, spying sounded like a pretty good idea.

“I brought Chester,” Noah said. “He doesn’t often get a chance to go on an adventure. Do you think it’s okay if I let him out of the wagon?”

“Jah, of course,” Mandy said. “Would he like a playmate?”

Noah nodded.

“Sparky,” Mandy called. “Come and play with Chester.”

Sparky waddled down the hall as if she’d just awakened from a long nap. “Sparky, do you want to play outside with a new playmate?”

Sparky wagged her tail, paused long enough to let Mandy run a hand across her back, and padded outside to meet this new friend. She hopped down the steps and stopped, sniffing the air, looking for the new playmate with her nose.

Noah walked to an old and creaky wagon pulled by a team of Percheron draft horses. How could he afford the workhorses and the two for his buggies? His dog Chester perched faithfully on a box in the back of the wagon, waiting for Noah to give him permission to get down. That was the most obedient dog Mandy had ever seen. Noah gave the word, and Chester seemed to spring to life. He bounded from the wagon and romped around the yard as if he’d just been freed from prison. When he passed Sparky, he nudged her with his nose, and Sparky sprang to life, bounding after Chester in a game of doggie tag.

Noah’s wagon was laden with several bundles of asphalt shingles for Dawdi’s new roof plus a configuration of boards and metal pipes that would be fitted together to make scaffolding. She watched as Noah hefted a bundle of shingles and started a pile of them to the side of the house. They must have been heavy. She could see the muscles of his arms and back tighten under his shirt and the sweat beading on his forehead after only two trips to the wagon.

He glanced at her as he made his third trip to the wagon, and she realized that she couldn’t stand on the porch and stare at him all day.

No matter how much she wanted to.

“Can I help?” she called.

He shook his head, not exerting more energy than he needed to.

Mandy had run out of excuses to stand there. She turned to go into the house when Mammi and Dawdi rolled up the hill in their buggy. Dawdi stopped the buggy in front of the house and Mammi practically jumped from her seat and came racing toward Mandy as fast as her eighty-three-year-old legs would let her.

“Oh, Mandy,” she panted, looking like a child about to open a Christmas present. “We’ve only got three minutes before they’ll be coming. We need to make a pitcher of lemonade and grab a stack of paper cups.” She raced into the house. “And where’s my clipboard? I need my clipboard.”

Mandy inched into the house where Mammi frantically searched for her clipboard among Dawdi’s newspapers and magazines at the side of his recliner.

“Is everything all right?” Mandy asked, not really wanting to know what Mammi was up to. She had a sinking feeling it involved pot holders, teeth, and prospective husbands.

“Mandy,” Mammi asked, reaching into her knitting closet and pulling out four, five,
six
pot holders. Mandy swallowed hard. Mammi was expecting a crowd. “Run out to the buggy and get the lemons. Only fresh-squeezed will do.”

Mandy slumped her shoulders and trudged outside. She couldn’t muster any of Mammi’s enthusiasm. Six fewer pot holders. They’d be knitting until Ascension Day.

Chester, who had been sniffing patches of dirt, ran to her and expected a greeting. She patted him on the head and scratched his neck. “You’ll run the unsuitable ones off for me, won’t you?”

The buggy had already disappeared. Dawdi must have taken it into the barn. She walked into the dim space and found Dawdi unhitching the horse while singing one of his many cheerful ditties, with lyrics that didn’t quite fit the tune. “
I know there is a land of beautiful flowers, where you and I will meet when we’re dead. We’ll sit and while away the long, long hours, In heaven’s bright eternal land.
”

“Pretty Flowers” had never sounded quite like that before.

“I’m here for the lemons,” she said, with as much excitement in her voice as if she’d said, “I’m here for my root canal.”

Dawdi stopped singing, reached into the buggy, and pulled out a grocery bag. “We bought three dozen,” he said, winking at her. “Your mammi is planning on a lot of thirsty boys.”

“I know,” Mandy said. “She brought out six pot holders.”

Dawdi’s eyes twinkled as he stroked his beard. “Those are only for the boys who haven’t already gotten one.”

Mandy grimaced. “How many are coming?”

“A baker’s dozen, at least.”

Mandy went speechless, shocked into silence by the sheer numbers.

Dawdi handed her the bag of lemons, which was really quite heavy, and finished unhitching Pepper, the horse. “Your mammi always puts other people’s needs ahead of herself. I love that about her.”

Mandy took a deep breath and tried to look on the bright side like her dawdi always did. At least this batch of young men would get a nice, cool glass of lemonade for their trouble—whatever trouble it was that Mammi was planning on causing.

Well, maybe not. They’d run out of ice before they ran out of suitors.

Mandy followed Dawdi as he led Pepper out of the barn and released her to graze in the small fenced-in area north of the barn. She really didn’t have a reason to follow him. She was just avoiding the inevitable gathering.

“Be sure to save a glass for Noah,” Dawdi said as he closed the gate. “He’ll be working hard in the sun all afternoon.”

Mandy lugged her bulging bag of lemons back to the house. She encountered Noah along the way, going back to his wagon for another load of shingles.

“Here,” he said, taking the bag of lemons from her before she even had time to protest. “Let me help.”

She followed as he carried the bag into the house and laid it on the kitchen counter. “Trying to get rid of your warts?” he said, one corner of his mouth twitching upward.

She narrowed her eyes at him. “I don’t have warts.”

Mammi stood at the counter measuring cup after cup of sugar into a five-gallon cooler. “Noah,” she said. “Would you like to help us pick a husband? They’ll be here any minute.”

Mandy winced and held her ground, although every nerve in her body wanted to run down the hill and keep going until she got to Milwaukee. Surely in Milwaukee there weren’t any mammis or Amish suitors or boys whose deep-brown eyes pierced through her skull every time they looked at her.

The muscles of Noah’s jaw clenched, as they always did when he was irritated about something. “Nae, I’m afraid I can’t spare the time.”

Mammi didn’t look overly disappointed. “All right then. We’ll tell you how it turns out.”

Noah crossed to the door and disappeared more quickly than Mandy would have thought possible. It was just as well. She’d rather that he not witness her humiliation.

“I thank the good Lord that I have two lemon juicers,” Mammi said, pulling both of them from her bottom drawer. “Felty loves gadgets.”

Even working together and as fast as they could, it took Mammi and Mandy almost twenty minutes to juice all the lemons. Mandy thought her hand might fall off by the time they finished. She glanced out the window as she poured the last of the lemon juice into the jug. “Mammi, I thought they were coming any minute.”

She mixed water with the lemon juice and sugar in the jug. They didn’t have a spoon long enough to reach the bottom of the jug, so she used the paddle from Mammi’s old butter churn to mix the water, sugar, and lemon juice. Hardly anybody churned butter anymore, but Mammi held on to it just in case. Or rather, Dawdi held on to it. He loved gadgets.

Mammi furrowed her brow. “I can’t remember if I told them ten-thirty or eleven. Maybe it was eleven. I’m glad I got the times mixed up. We wouldn’t have been ready at ten-thirty.”

“Just what have you planned for all these boys, Mammi?”

“Last night at three in the morning, I shot up from my sleep with an idea. Felty thought I was having a heart attack. Noah said you like muscles, so we’re going to give these boys a muscle test.”

Mandy wasn’t sure she wanted to ask. “A muscle test?”

“I think it’s the cleverest idea I’ve ever had. That’s what comes from sleeping on a problem.” Mammi dumped all the ice cubes they had—one tray—into the jug and slid the lid onto the top.

Mandy winced. Nice tepid lemonade for the muscle test.

“Oh dear,” Mammi said, taking hold of one of the jug handles. “This is going to be too heavy for me to carry out to the barn. Mandy, get Noah, would you?”