The Postcard (20 page)

“Hi again, Annie. It’s a beautiful day, isn’t it?”

The man’s voice sounded altogether kind—not what Rachel had expected from a fancy reporter-writer. And snoop. Still, she felt terribly unsettled being out here, so far from the house, with Annie calling attention to them like this.

“It’s a right nice day, all right,” Annie replied.

Rachel held her breath, hoping the man wouldn’t answer her this time. “Let’s head back to the house,” she whispered to Annie.

“Take my hand, Mamma.”

All the way back, on the dirt path through the orchard, Rachel felt uneasy. She wanted to be left alone with Annie on this, her first visit to Mill Creek and the footbridge.

Left alone . . .

The motto of the past two years.

To get her mind off herself, she thought of the blue and purple creek with its dancing pennies. Annie was cute that way, describing things in such a fresh, interesting manner.

“Denki, Annie,” she said, almost without thinking.

“For what?”

“For going with me on our beautiful walk. I enjoyed the creek pennies, especially.”

“Me too, Mamma. Maybe I’ll go back and dip up some of them. Then you’ll believe they’re for real.”

“Promise me you won’t go back there alone,” Rachel blurted.

“I won’t go by myself. I’ll take Copper with me, if Mammi Susanna says it’s all right.”

Rachel guessed they’d be puttin’ lunch together here before long. That would keep the girl from running back to the footbridge . . . and to Mr. Philip. Why on earth did she have to be so downright gabby with strangers? Rachel bit her lip but didn’t say a word. She figured she’d said enough already.

All the way back through the apple trees, Rachel heard the clear song of the brook. She felt the warm, dry dirt under her feet and was ever so thankful for the day.

He was crouched along the bank of the creek, tossing pieces of sticks into the stream, when he first noticed Annie with the young woman. They were leaning on the footbridge railing, peering into the water below. The girl was talking about the brook, it seemed, pointing and laughing.

The woman, whom he was increasingly sure was Annie’s mother, placed her hand gently on the child’s back, eyes closed as she faced the sky. The sun on the water made tiny round jewels of light, and he noticed it especially because Annie was gesturing toward it.

Yet his eyes were drawn back to the beautiful woman, her face still raised to the heavens. In spite of her gray dress and black apron, he found her breathtaking, and he might’ve continued to stare if it hadn’t been for Annie’s enthusiastic greeting.

Only after he had called back to her did Philip begin to understand why the child seemed to stand so close to the woman, why Annie took the hesitant woman’s hand and guided her safely, step by step, away from the bridge and back to the orchard path.

Annie’s mother was
blind
. The realization struck him hard, and he shrank from it, thinking he must be mistaken, wanting to be wrong for Annie’s sake. For her mother’s.

Long after they’d gone, he sat beside Mill Creek, beholding brown clumps of earth as they curled around the mossy banks. He watched with pleasure the delicate shadows made by lofty maples, their yellow-green leaves trembling in a soft flurry of air, and he gazed at silver sunbeams falling atop a riffle of water on smooth gray rocks—seeing with new eyes.

Susanna picked up the reins and called, “
Hott rum!
” instructing the horse to move out to the right. The path that led home was a straight strip ahead with a yellow do-not-pass line running down the middle. Stretching out flat and narrow, the road skirted the edge of the white fence that ran along Gibbons Road, where a red Amish schoolhouse stood, facing east. She relived bygone memories of having dropped off two or three of their sons at a similar one-room school on raw, wintry days while riding along with Benjamin and the boys in their horse-drawn sleigh. Oh, so many years ago.

Roadside flower beds of orange, yellow, and red blossomed as edging along rows of cabbage or sweet corn, the typical Amish way to fancy up property borders. The bishops had no say in how a farmer’s wife “dressed” her flower gardens— couldn’t keep nature from shouting with color. Susanna smiled to herself, privy to the unspoken reason why many of her Amish neighbors chose such a profuse variety of hues. Some of the crimsons, yellows, and oranges clashed— colors they were forbidden to wear, all of them.

Her thoughts roamed back to her conversation with Leah, then back to Rachel. How could she get her timid daughter to see the light about Blue Johnny? She could smooth the way and talk to Bishop Seth Fisher or one of their preachers about it maybe. But, no, it’d be best coming from Benjamin, though she knew he wouldn’t be one for taking sides. The man was easily persuaded when it came to his blind daughter, though he wouldn’t think of letting his partiality show, ’specially in front of his other adult children. Susanna suspected he’d had a favorite these many years. As for Annie, well, there was no getting ’round it, the child was a favorite of them both, even though Susanna wished she could do something about Rachel’s unwise, forbearing approach with the little girl.

Making the turn onto Olde Mill Road, she waved and called a greeting to Rebekah Zook, both her neighbor and cousin by marriage, on her husband’s side. “Another nice day, ain’t so?”

Rebekah looked up from her yellow spider mums and waved. “We could use some rain one of these days.”

“Jah, rain,” Susanna agreed, craning her neck to peer at the blue sky out of the buggy.

The mare bobbed her head, pulling the carriage toward home. Susanna settled back in the carriage, thinking more about Rachel, ever so glad she’d taken the time to stop by and see Leah.

For better or worse.

Fifteen

T
he Quilt Barn was filled with handmade goods. King and queen-sized bed quilts hung from the rafters, smaller wall-hangings and samplers hung on wooden stands, and table runners of every color and shade were displayed on a number of tables, along with place mats, napkins, and potholders.

One wall hanging especially caught Philip’s eye. It was the King James Version of one of the Scripture verses from Gabe’s postcard:
He which hath begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ
.

Philip didn’t give it a second thought and went in search of something authentically Amish to take back to his sister and niece. He was playing tourist, hoping to ease his way into a chat with the owner. A bright-colored quilted apron seemed to have Janice’s name on it, and he carried it over his arm, heading for the next section of goods. He had to look longer to find something he thought Kari might like, finally settling on a faceless Amish doll, though he couldn’t be sure that Kari, knowing how she liked to embroider, might not end up making cross-stitched eyes, nose, and mouth on the doll dressed in the traditional cape dress and apron.

When he went to pay for the items, he introduced himself to the elderly woman behind the counter. “I’m the man Bertha Denlinger sent over . . . from the hardware store,” he said, offering the woman a hearty smile.

“She called me not long ago.”

He waited for her to say that she was indeed Martha Stoltzfus, but she leaned hard on her cane while adding up the amounts on a small calculator. “That’ll be forty-two dollars and fifty-five cents.”

He pulled out his wallet and paid with a fifty-dollar bill, hoping to buy some time with the woman while she made change. “Bertha Denlinger said you might be able to help me locate someone—” he paused—“if you’re Martha Esh Stoltzfus, that is.”

She didn’t blink an eye, just looked him straight in the face and said, “Bertha should learn to speak for herself.”

“I see,” he said, not sure how to proceed. “Well, if it’s not a good time, I can certainly come back.”

“Come . . . go, do as you please, but I’m tellin’ ya right now, there’s nothing more to be said about my dead brother and that wicked woman of his.”

He chose to ignore her terse remark. “How can I get in touch with Adele Herr? I have something important that belongs to her.”

She snorted. “That woman dropped out of the picture a long time ago. Last I heard, she’s dead.”

“Are you sure about that?” He wished the question hadn’t come out sounding so brash.

“She hasn’t been heard of since her father died of a heart attack.”

“Her father?”

“Jah, a Baptist minister up in Reading.”

“Would you happen to know when Adele passed away?” he asked, softening his approach.

“Couldn’t say.” She clammed up after that, sitting down behind the counter, still leaning on her cane, her long blue dress nearly touching the floor.

“Uh, this may be a strange question, but why wasn’t your brother buried in Lancaster? Why Reading?” It was an assertive question, no getting around it, but he felt it might be his last stab.

“Now, you listen here.” She’d lowered her voice, teetering forward on her chair. “We don’t make a habit of speakin’ much ’bout shunned folk—dead or alive—around here, so it’d be best now for you to be goin’.”

“She doesn’t take too well to non-Amish men. . . .”

“I’m sorry to have upset you, Mrs. Stoltzfus.” His attempt was met with utter silence, and for the old woman’s sake, he was glad the other customers were not within earshot.

Rachel helped Mam clear away the lunch dishes. “I can look after the Gift Nook tonight, if you want,” she offered.

“You sure?”

Rachel heard the surprise in her mother’s voice. “Jah, and Annie can help me with prices and things. We’ll do that for you; give you some rest for a change.”

“That’s right nice of you, Rachel. I think I could use a bit of peace and quiet tonight. S’been quite a morning.”

“We had a busy morning, too,” Annie piped up.

“Well, what’re ya waitin’ for? Let’s hear all about it,” Mam said across the table.

“To start with, Mamma and me stripped down all the beds upstairs. We dusted and mopped and cleaned the bathrooms. Then we went walkin’ . . . clean out to the end of the footpath, to the mill bridge.”

“Is that so?” Mam seemed pleased.

“Jah, and we saw pennies—lotsa them!”

“I think ya best tell Mammi Susanna whatcha
really
saw today, Annie,” Rachel cut in just then.

“It was pennies! Hundreds of tiny pennies a-skippin’ down the creek.”

Rachel waited for her darling child to ’fess up, though she wouldn’t have pushed for an end to this fantasy. Not yet anyways. Annie was having too much fun.

“Let me guess,” Susanna said. “Was it very sunny out?”

“Jah,” Annie replied.

“And was it about noon, when the sun’s straight up in the sky?”

“Jah.”

“Then, I do believe what you saw out there in the creek was the sunlight dancing on the water. Am I right?” Mam’s voice wasn’t the least bit harsh, and for that Rachel was thankful.

She could just imagine her daughter nodding her little head ever so slowly, head tilted down a bit, and big blue eyes looking up as innocently as she ever had back when she was only four years old. Annie was a dilly, she was.