Wonderful Lonesome (21 page)

Abbie threw down the damp rag, hardly able to believe her eyes. What was Jake Heatwole doing in Widower Samuels’s barnyard? Mr. Samuels was away for the entire day. Abbie would not have Jake poking around looking for him. She strode across the small house and out the front door before Jake could even get off his horse.

“Why, Abbie, I did not expect to see you here.”

“Mr. Samuels is not home.”

“I see. Then perhaps I will come again another day.” He started to turn his horse.

“I cannot imagine what business you have with Mr. Samuels.”

Jake tipped his head up and looked at the sky for a moment. “No, I don’t suppose you could.”

“If you are making the rounds trying to convert our people, I would appreciate it if you would stop.”

“It seems that you are imagining after all.”

“Isn’t it enough that you have Willem?”

“I don’t ‘have’ Willem, Abbie. He is a good friend, and we find we have a great deal in common in the things of the Lord.”

Abbie wiped her damp hands on her apron. “I am sorry if I sound rude, but surely you can see my point. We have no minister, and you are trying to start a new congregation.”

“I do not see quite the conflict that you do,” Jake said. “I only seek to offer ministry to a flock without a shepherd. I am not competing for anyone’s soul.”

Abbie crossed her arms across her chest.

“Willem cares for you very deeply.” Jake stacked his hands on the saddle horn.

She said nothing. What would it matter how deeply he cared for her if Willem joined Jake Heatwole’s new congregation?

For a split second, when Rudy heard the knock on the barn’s doorframe, he let himself believe it would be Abbie. She had cleaned his house the week before, but bread day had come around again. If he had not frightened her off with his doubts and declarations of the previous week, more than likely she would come to visit the animals in the barn under the guise of telling him that she had left bread on the table.

But it was not Abbie.

“Hello, Jake.” Rudy would have offered a handshake if his hands had not been mired in muck at the moment.

The bundle of black and white that followed Rudy around scampered to sniff Jake’s hand.

“What can I do for you?” Rudy asked.

“It is I who would like to ask that question. Can I be of any help?”

Rudy surveyed the black suit Jake wore, made of a simple cut but still more fitted than an Amish suit would be. “Thank you, but I wouldn’t want to ask you to soil your clothes.”

Jake laughed. “Perhaps I am overdressed for the sort of calls I am making today.”

“And what sort is that?”

“We don’t know each other very well,” Jake said. “I just stopped by to let you know that if I can help you with any spiritual concerns, I hope you will feel free to ask me. And for the record, I am always willing to take off my jacket and do whatever needs doing.”

“You proved that with Ruthanna and Eber.” What did Jake mean by spiritual concerns?

“You have probably heard I hope to open a new Mennonite congregation in Limon.”

“Yes. God be with you.” Rudy was not aware of any Mennonite families in Limon.

“I believe He is. I am not trying to pressure anyone, but I am going around to the Amish to let them know we will have our first service soon. I know some of you have been longing for plain worship.”

The Stutzman family had been among the earliest to come from Europe and settle in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, in 1737. Amish worship was in his bones. He did not see himself joining the Mennonites, but Jake was right. Rudy did long for the deep, rich worship of his people.

Willem nailed in the last of the new baseboard Jake hoped would help to keep the mice out of his furnished rooms and pushed a sofa back against the wall. The furniture had seen better days. No wonder Jake had gotten such a good price on the rooms. Even the Amish settlers who sank all their money in their land and left little for their houses had sturdier furniture. Earlier Willem had tipped the sofa over and banged a displaced crosspiece back into position and leveled the legs of the small rustic table that would serve as Jake’s writing and study desk.

The doorknob turned, and Jake entered.

“How did it go?” Willem began to pick up the tools strewn around the room.

Jake shrugged. “It is difficult to tell. I can’t say that anyone was surprised.”

“You’ve made no secret of your hope to start a church, and you’ve always been friendly with the Amish.”

“Not everyone was home, and I called on people I was sure were not interested in the Mennonites. I did not want anyone to feel left out.”

“Let me guess. The Weavers, Martin Samuels, Rudy Stutzman.”

“My goodness, your Abigail was quite disturbed at my presence on Widower Samuels’s farm.” Jake sat on the sofa.

Willem grimaced. “Did she try to throw you off the land?”

Jake chuckled. “I have a feeling she wanted to, but Amish restraint got the best of her. She seems to think I have some sort of hold on you.”

Willem dropped his hammer in his open wooden toolbox. “I try to be honest with Abbie.”

“She will not come to a Mennonite church of her own free will, and we cannot force her.”

“There is always the Holy Ghost,” Willem said. “God’s will may change Abbie’s will.”

“Willem,” Jake said, “have you thought about what it would mean if God’s will does not change Abbie’s will?”

Willem straightened the black hat on his head. “Abbie loves the Amish church.”

“So do you.”

“I do.”

“And you love her.”

“Yes.” Willem folded himself into a small chair upholstered in a floral print, something none of the Amish would have in their homes. “But I can also see that the will of God is bigger than the Amish church. If Abbie cannot believe that with her whole heart, then she deserves a husband who will share her conviction, and I will not stand in her way.”

The sky still hung in the faint ambiguous pink and gray of morning’s decision to break forth again when Willem pulled on his boots and loaded his rifle. His traps were designed to kill a coyote or any other animal that found a gopher carcass attractive bait. Early every morning, before tending to farm chores or digging lignite for his
English
customers or even satisfying his own hunger with the bread that Abbie baked and brought every week, Willem made the rounds to inspect the traps. If he found an animal in one of the traps, whether predator or innocent, he would be prepared either to dispense justice or end suffering. So far, after two weeks, he had seen coyote tracks in a wide circle around a couple of traps, but none had succumbed. Today Willem took heavy gloves with him, a purchase of his last trip into Limon. If he wore them to change the bait, he hoped to minimize his own human scent on the trap.

Willem knew the coyotes were out there. He heard them every night, howling and barking whether the moon was bright or dim. Chickens were not the only targets. A coyote could kill a full-grown deer with a strategic strike to the neck. A cow would not be much different. Baby goats and calves had no defenses. The livestock of all the Amish farmers was at risk. They built their fences to keep cows and horses on their land and in pastures. Constructing a barrier that a coyote could not scale over or dig under was likely impossible, and certainly expensive beyond the means of struggling Amish settlers.

On his way out, Willem looked at his coffeepot and fleetingly longed for the sensation of thick black coffee sliding down his throat. But he did not have time for the indulgence and walked past the stove without lighting it. This might be the day that a trap held evidence of the enemy’s demise.

Given the barren yield of the last two weeks in traps spread around on four farms, it was unlikely this morning would be different, but it was possible. No one purported that catching the swift nocturnal wolf-like animals was an easy venture. Willem was not the only man whose traps came up empty. But one day a hungry coyote with pups in the den to feed would step into a trap. If it was an adult male, the threat of future attack would diminish. Willem had no plans to relent on his vigilance.

Willem saddled his horse. Is that what Abbie thought—that it was possible the Amish could have a thriving congregation despite one defeat after another assaulting their efforts? Her hope kept her vigilant for the glory of God among their people. To her, it was only a matter of time and the settlement would rejoice in the triumph of worship.

He trotted the horse through his own land first, planning a wide arc.

Abbie barely slept in the two nights since Jake made his rounds welcoming any interested Amish to his Mennonite meetings. He had talked about starting a church for so long, and now he was going to do it. And he was going to take Willem away from her. The imminence of this reality dulled her appetite and robbed her sleep.

She swung her feet over the side of her bed and reached for her clothes. In a few minutes she was dressed with her hair pinned up adequately enough for the slim risk that she would see anyone on a walk at dawn. Chores during the heat of the day were inevitable, but a walk while the morning was yet cool would help her clear her mind. Abbie looked out the tiny window of her narrow bedroom and judged that the fullness of dawn was still at least thirty minutes away. But the moon had been full only a few nights before and lingered still.

As she walked, she could pray. For Willem. For Ruthanna. For Eber. For all the families. They might not be able to gather to hear sermons and take communion, but she could still pray. Even for herself, that God would quell the unrest of her spirit at the thought of losing Willem.

Abbie had traversed more than two miles on her morning quest for peace when she saw Willem on his horse silhouetted against the rising sun. Her feet stopped and she drew in a long breath. She was angry, hurt, confused, and in love. It all swirled around this man whose left shoulder sloped more severely than his right, this man who knew her heart like no other. She hated being angry with him. “Be ye angry, and sin not: let not the sun go down upon your wrath,” the Bible said. And only a few verses later, “Be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God for Christ’s sake hath forgiven you.” Ephesians 4:32 was one of the first verses Abbie’s parents made her memorize before she had even learned to read it for herself. She knew it in German and in English. Sermons of her childhood had impressed on her that forgiveness was at the heart of a life obedient to Christ.