Keys of Heaven (4 page)

“Oh, I want to learn,” he replied. He touched the sleeve of her work dress, pleated, not gathered, into the arm hole, as the
Ordnung
said. “Especially about you.”

“There is nothing to learn.” She took off again. At this rate, she'd be home in ten minutes. She had to get rid of him before anyone saw them. Dat would have a fit if he got wind of it. “I'm not special.”

“I bet you are.”

“I hope not.” She didn't slow her pace, or waste breath trying to think of ways to soften her words. “If I thought I was, that would be prideful, and pride is a sin.”

“There's no such thing as sin.”

She choked on her own breath for a second, before she got it back enough to set him straight. “You're wrong. How do you explain all the bad things in the world?”

But he only shrugged. “People do bad things.”

“And that's called sin.”

“Semantics. So what do you do for fun around here?”

She'd better look up what
semantics
were in the dictionary when she got home. There was nothing more irritating than for a know-it-all to actually know something.

“You could go to the water park. Or the mini-golf. There's a quilt museum in town your mother would probably like. And—”

“I meant you, Priscilla Rose. What do you do for fun? Do you have a boyfriend?”

Well, this was the limit! She had made a mistake even to talk to this boy. They were nearly to the bridge on County Road 26. She had to lose him, and quick.

“That's none of your business.”

“So you don't.”

“I do, too!”

“Where is he? Is he going to take a buggy whip to me for talking to his girl?”

“He would not do that. We do not believe in violence.”

“So he won't mind me talking to you?”

Here they were at the bridge, and she had reached the end of her patience. “
I
mind you talking to me. I'm sure your parents are wondering where you are.”

“I'm sure they're not.”

“Go away and stop bothering me,” she said in rapid
Deitsch
, and scrambled up the bank like a rabbit. When she crossed the bridge, she did not look down, but she had the distinct feeling he was watching her.

S
arah practically floated over to Jacob and Corinne's on Friday night. A letter had come from Simon—only his second since he'd been in Colorado. But what made her happy was not so much the news it contained, which was much like Joe's to Priscilla, but the simple fact that he was safe and well and able to do prosaic things like write letters. A letter meant a measure of normalcy in his life—paper, a pen, a quiet place. She could be grateful for that, even if the rest of his days were taken up with horses and chores and dealing with people he was never likely to meet here on the farm in Willow Creek. For one thing, around here, horses were meant to work—pulling buggies or plows or harrows—not to ride.

“When he gets back, he'll be itching to ride Dulcie,” Caleb said as they climbed the steps to his grandparents' kitchen door. “I wonder if they learn rope tricks out there?”

“The only thing he'll be roping around here will be you.” Sarah grinned at her youngest, who was always in motion and often had to be roped in, and pushed open the door so that he could precede her.

He carried the big deep bowl of fresh-picked garden salad, with cucumbers, lettuce, raw peas, shredded carrot, sliced strawberries, and for a little surprise, even a few Johnny-jump-ups she'd found in the rockery. But what delighted her most was the cheerful, unexpected orange of the nasturtiums and calendula petals.

“You did it.” Amanda hung over the bowl for a moment, as if she could smell the flowers, before she took it from Caleb and set it in the middle of the dining table, which was set for sixteen.

“Ask and ye shall receive,” Sarah said with a smile. She knew all but one of the women in the kitchen from family gatherings, and the busy time before dishing up went quickly with introductions, catching up on family news, and hearing about the trip down, for which they'd hired a big van and a driver.

When Corinne began to mash the potatoes, she glanced around the room until she caught Sarah's eye. “
Liewi
, would you go call the men in? It'll take them longer to wash up than it will to get all this food on the table.”

Belatedly, Sarah realized that Caleb had handed over the salad and vanished in the direction of the barn, so they didn't have him to send. “I'll be right back.”

Her father-in-law was a prosperous and careful steward of the land—so much so that Joshua and Miriam had been able to build a home on the property, and Sarah's late husband, Michael, had been given five acres of his own when he had returned to the district after the death of his first wife and had courted and married Sarah. Since Michael hadn't intended to farm, he was quite happy for his father and older brother to continue doing so for a third and fourth generation, and left his machine shop to pitch in and help during planting and harvest. That is, until the cancer had sent him home to God.

In the dark hours of the night, sometimes Sarah had to light a lamp, open her Bible, and remember that his spirit had been delivered to a better place, where there was no pain and no tears. The garden reminded her daily of God's mercy, but during the first years, the Bible had been the authority she'd turned to, and found comfort there.

Sarah passed her mother-in-law's enormous garden, which was becoming more Miriam and Amanda's as Corinne got older. The barns and sheds were neatly painted white, the trim a decorous black, as were most of the homes and buildings in this district.

Just where the drive widened out so the buggies could turn around, and before the paddock where the horses grazed and the gate opened into the orchard, the men had drawn up chairs in a circle to visit and joke and make plans for their fields. Jacob waved as he saw her coming along the gravel drive.

She waved back, and called, “Dinner is ready—time to wash up.”

Jacob slapped his knees and got up, tossing a joke over his shoulder to the other men as they folded up the old wooden chairs that were too rickety to use in church, and took them into the barn. They straggled up to the house—her father-in-law, his oldest son Joshua and Joshua's two boys, Caleb, Corinne's cousin Ezekiel King, and a man she didn't know. Was this the relative she'd mentioned before? The husband of one of the women in the kitchen?

But no, he had no beard. She looked away as Ezekiel caught up to her. “Sarah, it's good to see you. Caleb tells me Simon is working in Colorado. How is he?”

She shook his hand. Zeke, according to Corinne, was the family jokester, so you never knew what he was up to. Every time Michael had talked about him, it had been with a reminiscent smile. “He's well, Zeke. I just had a letter from him today, in fact—all about a trail ride with some Japanese businessmen.”

For once, she had been the one to surprise Zeke King, and not the other way around. “Caleb said he was working on a dude ranch, but I couldn't believe it was true.”

“It's true. He and his buddy Joe are looking after the horses, from what I understand—and, I hope, keeping themselves as separate from bad influences as they can.”

“It's big country out there,” said the stranger. “More country than people, I think. He'll be all right.” He held out his hand. “My name is Silas Lapp.”

Zeke finally remembered his manners. “And this is Sarah Yoder, my cousin Corinne's daughter-in-law. She was married to Corinne's second boy, Michael, before the Lord took him.”

Sarah shook his hand. “Have you been to Colorado, Silas?”

“I have.”

Anxious to get everyone to the table, Sarah turned and chivvied them toward the house. They'd be the last ones seated at this rate. But at the same time, she was vitally interested in finding out even the smallest things about the state, which might as well be a foreign country, it was so unlikely she'd ever get the chance to visit.

“I hope you'll tell me a little about it. I want to picture my boy somehow, and the only way I've been able to do it so far is to check books out of the library.”

“We'll have to talk it over at dinner, then.”

And he was as good as his word—especially since the only two chairs left at the table when they finally got inside were right next to each other at the opposite end from where Sarah and Caleb usually sat on Friday nights.

After a silent grace, when plates and cups began to clatter, Silas passed the big bowl of potatoes to Sarah and said, “Where is the ranch your boy works on?”

“The postmark is Buena Vista, so that must be the nearest town with a post office, but he mentioned once that the ranch is in a place called Cottonwood Springs.”

Silas smiled, a look in his eyes as though he was appreciating a memory. “The closest Amish settlement would be in Monte Vista, then.”

“Is that close enough that a boy in Cottonwood Springs might have an opportunity to go to church?”

If so, she would write to Simon that very night and suggest it—even if they had to ride one of their trail horses to get there.

“No, I don't think so. It's a hundred miles or more—but there is a bus service.”

So far? Imagine living a hundred miles from church. Her mind could hardly take in a country so vast. “I could write and suggest that for his next weekend off.
Denki.
” And she smiled at him, determined to join him in looking on the bright side. Even if the boys were too far away to ride in one day, just knowing there were some of their own people only a couple of hours away on the bus was a gift. The knot of worry that had been plaguing her despite her confidence that God held Simon in His hand loosened just a little. The evil one took every opportunity he could to sow doubt, and now this good man had allowed himself to be used by God to sweep it away.

“Where have your travels taken you?” Amanda asked shyly, handing him the bowl of salad.

He picked up the tongs and was about to take a scoop of it as he answered her, when he stopped. “Is that a flower?” He laid it on his plate.

“It's a nasturtium. I like them in the salad, so Sarah puts in a few for color.”

Sarah added, “There are tiny pansies and some marigold petals, too.”

“It has color, all right. Are you sure they're safe to eat?”

“Oh,
ja
,” Sarah assured him. “And good for you.”

“Sarah is an herbalist.” Amanda took back the salad bowl to steal the last nasturtium and crown her little pile of greens with it.

“Herbalist-in-training, you mean,” Sarah said. “Jacob's sister Ruth is the real
Dokterfraa
in this area.”

“Ruth Lehman in Whinburg?” Zeke asked. “Fannie, wife, we should go up there and pay them a visit while we're here.”

“I can take you on Tuesday, if you like,” Sarah said. “I go for lessons with her every week.”

“That would save us hiring a driver.” Fannie helped herself to chicken and dumplings. “
Denki
, Sarah. Silas, why don't you come with us? You're always interested in new things. Maybe you could learn a thing or two.”

“I'm glad he takes an interest in what's around him,” Sarah said with a smile. “He's been telling me about Colorado, where my boy is working.”

“Better you should tell these girls about your farm, Si, and your plans for it,” Zeke said. “Did you know, Sarah, that the phone company wants to put up a repeater tower on his land? They'll pay him a fortune and he doesn't have to do one thing to earn it, just let them build it.”

What on earth was a repeater tower? “What do those do?”

“Pay money,” Zeke chortled.

“They pass on a signal to cell phones,” Silas said quietly. “And it's not for sure. They came around many of the farms to ask permission from our men.”

“They wanted the same thing from Deacon Moses Yoder in Whinburg,” Jacob said. “I think he was wise to turn them down. What does it say of a man when he can work and doesn't? Sitting back and watching a metal structure sending its signals doesn't glorify God.”

“And it puts one whole field out of commission,” Silas agreed.

“I'd say you could plant beans or corn for six generations and not get the money for them that a tower could bring in six months,” Joshua put in.

“And there's no sin in being clear of debt. ‘Owe no man anything, but to love one another,'” Zeke quoted.

“Maybe it does contribute to the use of cell phones,” Corinne said, “but at the same time, a fruitful field is a fruitful field, and if the phone company is willing to pay fairly for it, I don't see any sin in it.”

“I have had this discussion with myself many times,” Silas told them. “And come to no better conclusion than we have right here.”

“What does your bishop say?” Sarah asked him. “You would be guided by his thoughts in any case.”

Silas nodded. “He is in favor of it.”

Jacob shook his head. “You're lucky you don't have a bishop like Daniel Lapp in Whinburg, then. He told Moses no, flat out. Of course, Deacon Moses had to be an example.”

“I am not a deacon,” Silas agreed. “But the Lord's will could change at any time.”

Every man in an Amish community had to be prepared for that. When the lot fell upon you, there was no declining it, or putting it off, or asking someone else to take your place. A man simply submitted himself to God's will and entered upon a life of service to church and community that would not end until his death.

The conversation turned to other things, and Sarah urged another helping of dumplings on Silas. “Tell me something else about Colorado. Since we have you here, I find myself thirsty for information like a hart for water brooks, knowing I may not get this chance again.”

“I'll be here for a few days,” he said. “Perhaps we might go for a drive and I can tell you more.”

Sarah swallowed her surprise at his forwardness; he hadn't seemed like that kind of man. But she could not react too strongly or Corinne would see it, and a little idea might grow in her mind that should not be there.

“You can tell me more now,” she said, with a smile to let him know she wasn't offended. “Did you see the Rocky Mountains? What are they like?”

Again, his eyes took on the distant gaze of a good memory. “I did. Picture the earth flinging itself toward heaven and then being frozen there in the sky, thousands of feet high.”

“I can't picture it—or I can, but only because of the photographs in the books I borrowed.”

“I had not been so smart before I left, so I was stunned by the mountains. You can see them for a hundred miles off, and they stay in the distance—until between one moment and the next, there you are in the midst of them, looking up and up until you get a crick in your neck.”

“That I can well believe.”

“But up until that point, you go through what they call the foothills. They aren't like the hills here in Lancaster County.” He nodded in the direction of the window, which faced north toward a view of Battle Ridge. “They're much higher and wider—almost mountains in themselves. I believe the ranch your boy works on must be in the foothills, if he is near the Cottonwood Valley.”

“If there are ranches, there must be water for the animals, too.”

“
Ja
, the rivers are precious, because the land is what they call high desert, covered with golden grass in the summer. But the rivers aren't like the ones here. Instead of running deep and quiet, they fling themselves through granite canyons and off hundred-foot precipices. Even in the shallower grade of the foothills, they still roar among the rocks, as cold as the glaciers they spring from.”

She gazed at him, seeing the picture he painted in her mind's eye as well as she could the sharp angles of his jaw and forehead. “You are a good storyteller. I can almost see the land.”

Beside her, Caleb was transfixed, too, and Sarah noticed out of the corner of her eye that Amanda was listening so intently that her supper was only half eaten, her fork lying limply in her fingers.