Stranger's Gift (9 page)

Then almost as soon as they crossed a main thoroughfare and entered the Pinecraft area, it was as if they had left the worst of the storm behind. The east/west street that bisected the community was filled with people and activity, while side streets bustled with bicycle and foot traffic. The scene had all the attributes of a church meeting, but John was well aware that it wasn't celebration that had brought these people out in force. It was the need to help and to care for others.

In the faces of those he passed, he saw worry and anxiety and concern for a neighbor who might have suffered. Through the rolled-down windows of Arlen's car, John heard a man call out to a neighbor inquiring about damage the second man had suffered from the gale force winds. At long tables on the covered walkway of a shopping mall, women in traditional Mennonite garb worked in unison filling heavy cardboard boxes with clothing, canned goods, and bottled water. As soon as a box was filled, a boy would load it onto a three-wheeled bicycle, and when the bike's rear basket was filled, the youth would pedal away toward another area where a fleet of small trucks and vans waited. At the same time another boy would pedal forward and hop off to help. Their industry was impressive. Their cheerfulness to be doing God's work and helping others was merely annoying.

Arlen had pulled his sedan into a parking lot near a building marked P
ALM
B
AY
M
ENNONITE
C
HURCH
, and Samuel escorted John to the first-aid tent set up by the Red Cross at one end of the lot. There he had turned him over to a jovial young medic who had cracked stupid jokes with a nearby nurse while attending to John's wrist. They'd given him some pain medication to get him through the next twenty-four hours plus a regulation sling to replace Hester's temporary fix. “You want to keep it elevated,” the medic had instructed. Then he'd patted John on the shoulder and turned to address the next problem.

“Now what?” John said aloud to himself as he looked around for some idea of how he might get back to his place.

“How are you feeling,
Herr
Steiner?”

John turned to find Hester standing next to him. She shielded herself from the steady drizzle with an umbrella, so it was hard to see her features. Still, he could not help but take note of the fact that she was tall enough to meet him nearly eye-to-eye. Memory told him those eyes were blue, although he had no idea why that detail had registered with him. Certainly with everything else he'd had to deal with, the color of a plain woman's eyes should be the least of his concerns. “I'll be fine,” he muttered and turned his attention back to his surroundings as he tried to figure out his next move.

“I thought you might want to call your aunt in Washington.” Hester lifted the umbrella higher to cover both of them and handed him a cell phone. “Or I could do it for you if you like. I mean, I appreciate that your people …”

“Look, let's get one thing straight. I am no longer Amish, okay?”

“You may have chosen to leave the community, Herr Steiner, but …”

“I did not
choose
anything, starting with being born into an Amish community. That was my mother's choice.”

“And your father's,” she said, clearly unruffled by his attitude. “I'll leave you to make your call, then.” She crossed the street and slipped under the canopy that protected the tables where the other women were working.

“Hold on a minute.” John hated asking anyone for anything, especially a woman, especially
this
woman.

She tilted the umbrella to one side and waited for him to catch up to her. But just before he reached her, he faltered and for one awful moment feared once again that he might pass out. “Let me get you something to drink,” she said, steadying him by placing her arm around his shoulders and shielding him with the umbrella. “When was the last time you ate an actual meal?”

“Yesterday sometime. Maybe the day before,” he admitted, trying to remember the meal. Supper, he thought. He recalled a plate of cheese and fruit. Last night. It seemed like forever ago.

“Come with me,” Hester said and steered him across the shopping center's parking lot. A few yards away she pointed to an empty rocking chair in a row of similar Amish-made bentwood rockers that lined the porch of a restaurant touting H
OMEMADE
P
IE
on the large sign that was now listing to one side. “Sit. I'll be right back.”

She handed him a bottle of water and went inside the restaurant. John guzzled and once it was gone wished he had more. His hand started to shake uncontrollably, and he felt suddenly light-headed.

“Here.”

She was back and handing him a paper plate stacked with bread, slices of sandwich meat, cheese, a banana, and chips. “Start with the banana,” she urged, even as John crammed chips into his mouth. She pulled a bottled sports drink from the ever-present cloth satchel. “Drink this. You need the potassium, and I expect your system needs some electrolytes as well.”

“Arlen mentioned that you're a nurse. What kind?”

“A trained one,” she snapped, then seemed to mentally count to ten, softened her voice, and added, “Although there are some things you just pick up along the way.” She handed him the sports drink, then sank down in the chair next to him. “As soon as you've eaten, if you could make that call…I need to return the phone.”

“To?”

She nodded toward a man in a T-shirt and jeans and a battered Boston Red Sox baseball cap. “That's Grady Forrest. He's with the county and pretty much the main man throughout the entire region when stuff like this happens.”

“Stuff like this being a mere category-four hurricane?”

“Amazingly, it didn't quite hit a four—made a good effort though.” She pushed the rocker into motion with one foot.

“Felt like it when I was clinging to that cypress beam.” He took a swallow of the sports drink. He couldn't help noticing that her canvas shoes were still soaked and caked with mud.

“Which allows me to politely raise the obvious question,” she said softly.

He arched an eyebrow and waited.

“Why were you clinging to a beam that might just as easily have crushed you as saved your life? Why didn't you leave when you were warned—repeatedly, from what Margery told me—to do so?”

John shrugged. “I don't like other people deciding what I should and should not do.” He noticed that she had stopped rocking and was gripping the arms of the chair.

“You know something?” She got to her feet and glared down at him.

“What?”

She bit her lower lip and shook her head as if shaking off whatever it was that she'd been about to say. “I'd appreciate it if you could return the phone to Grady as soon as possible. I have to go.” She looked both ways, checking for traffic on the street, which was congested with people and bicycles, and then headed left.

“Hey,” he called.

She stopped walking but did not come back. He wondered if she had any idea what it was costing him to be dependent on her, a woman.

“When can I go back to my place?”

“Check with Grady,” she called, and then she was gone, lost among the hordes of women similarly dressed in plain cotton dresses, their heads now covered by umbrellas or hoods extinguishing the telltale prayer coverings.

Hester knew the answer to John's question. It would likely be days, if not weeks, before he could return to his property for good. For certain that first look-and-leave visit would be in the company of some trained disaster volunteers who would help him retrieve whatever could be safely taken before bringing him back into town. Although her father had invited John to stay with them, she couldn't help hoping that Grady would find him a place at one of the three shelters that had been set up in the area.

“Surely Dad will understand that we have a lot of work to do and a lot of volunteers depending on us for guidance,” she muttered aloud as she made her way toward the church. “John Steiner will be perfectly fine at the shelter. In fact, a night spent sleeping on an old cot might be just what he needs.”

“Are you talking to yourself or to God, Hester?” Samuel asked as he fell into step beside her and offered her the shared shelter of a rain slicker he'd picked up somewhere. She'd left John her umbrella, surely a sign that she made no distinction between caring for him and caring for anyone else who might need protection from the elements.

“Myself,” she admitted. She was glad of Samuel's company. He was a gifted craftsman and certainly a nice-looking and gentle man. Hester had little doubt that he would make a fine partner to spend the rest of her life with. He was mild-mannered enough that he might not even insist that she abandon her volunteer work in order to devote herself exclusively to keeping house and raising a family. But Hester wanted more from a marriage than a fine partnership. She had always fought against wanting more. It was her greatest failing, that longing for something beyond the norm. She loved her work with MCC, and it was that very idea of being expected to focus on her own household and raising a family to the exclusion of anything else that terrified her. Hester was well aware that her father had been pleased by her agreement to volunteer rather than seek a paid position in a hospital. But he'd made no bones about his preference that after her mother died, Hester should transfer her loyalties to the more conservative Christian Aid Ministries where Emma was the local leader. But neither Hester nor her mother believed that God distinguished between the work she did with MCC and the work that Emma did with CAM. Her mother had not only supported her decision to work with MCC but also encouraged it.

Then Sarah's illness had worsened. The end had not come quickly, and the suffering her mother had bravely endured had inspired Hester as she sat with her day after week after month. Hester's guilt that perhaps her mother's suffering was somehow her punishment for not more closely following the traditions of her faith had been staggering. And even in her pain, Sarah Detlef had seen that. In spite of her loss of physical capacity, Sarah had found a way to communicate to her daughter that she had made the right choice in going for her degree and that she was very proud of her for her decision to come home to Pinecraft to serve others.

After Sarah died, Hester had convinced herself that her volunteer work with MCC was her way of honoring her mother's memory and Sarah's own deep dedication to service. The greater truth was that she enjoyed the diversity and demands of the work involved in the variety of projects for which she could volunteer within the committee. Already she had traveled to Central America to help rebuild communities that had suffered the effects of a rebel uprising that had left thousands huddled in makeshift camps. She looked forward to more opportunities to serve overseas. Yes, this was her calling, and John Steiner was only an obstacle, testing her determination to stay on course and help those truly in need.

“Hester?”

She had been so lost in thought and there were such crowds of people about that she had nearly forgotten Samuel was walking alongside her.

“Yes, Samuel?” She did not miss the way he glanced at her and then immediately looked down at his work boots, soaked now and heavy with mud. There had been many times since his arrival that Samuel had made awkward attempts at engaging her in conversation that she assumed was his way of trying to bring them closer.

“I was thinking about John Steiner's place.”

Oh, the sin of pride, Hester Detlef
. She had expected Samuel's comment to be something more personal. Perhaps an expression of his concern for her working so hard and not eating properly. He was that kind of man, always thinking of others—in this case a complete stranger. “What about it?” she asked.

“Perhaps it's not nearly as bad as it appeared at first glance,” he said, his words coming in a rush. “If we could salvage the first level of the house, then Herr Steiner could move back there in a matter of days.”

“And just how would you accomplish that?”

“Arlen mentioned a volunteer crew that is expected to arrive later today from Georgia, experienced builders and even a plumber and electrician. If Grady agrees, I could go with that crew and an engineer from the county to assess Herr Steiner's property.”

“And you would do this because…?”

Samuel smiled. “Because I overheard you and Grady talking, and, well, if helping him helps you and Grady attend to those who may be in more dire straits, then why not?”

Hester stared at him as if truly seeing him for the first time. “You are a gut man, Samuel.”

“Ja, I am,” he replied without the slightest trace of arrogance.

“I appreciate your thoughtfulness, but as each volunteer crew arrives, they must first go where the need is greatest. It's only fair. Herr Steiner will be fine.”

Samuel's smile widened. “Nein. Herr Steiner would disagree.” He pointed to where the man himself was berating poor Grady.