Courting Ruth (16 page)

“No matter what people say?”

She turned and hurried toward the house.

The days after the near-tragedy in the barn passed swiftly. Late spring was always busy on the farm. In a few days, school would be out, and Mam and Irwin would be at home every day. To her surprise, Ruth had discovered that Irwin, who lacked common sense in dealing with the cows and chickens, had a real feel for gardening. He loved pulling weeds, hoeing and planting vegetables. Not only was he as careful with seeds as Mam, the boy had a knack for laying out perfectly straight rows.

That suited Ruth. Her favorite outside chore was tending the flower beds and cutting fresh bouquets for the house. There were always extra flowers to give away and to sell at the auction. She tried to spend as much time in the yard as she could, mowing and making the annual and perennial beds beautiful, but this year, she didn’t feel quite the satisfaction she usually did.

Sweet corn wouldn’t be planted for another week or two, but Miriam needed help in preparing the field. Samuel had come with his team of Percherons to do the plowing and disking, and when the moon was right, Miriam would hitch Molly to the planter to sow the seed. This spring Irwin would be another pair of hands, and they needed him badly with Leah and Rebecca still at
Grossmama’s
.

Keeping busy from dawn until dusk should have assured Ruth a good night’s sleep, but it hadn’t turned out that way. She couldn’t get Eli out of her head, and every night, when she climbed into bed, thoughts of him kept her awake. She went over and over what they’d said to each other the day of the fire and wished she’d said something different, though what, she didn’t know. They couldn’t be together for too many reasons, but she wished she could have said something to keep him from walking away, looking so sad. Ruth was surprised how much she missed Eli, missed talking to him, seeing him, seeing his handsome smirk. She missed him, and as one week turned into two, she began to wonder if he would ever return to Seven Poplars or if he really was gone for good. Not that she could blame him. Why would he come back?

When Eli had been in Seven Poplars, he’d caused her trouble, but having him away felt even worse. What was wrong with her? Why was she pining over this boy? She’d made her decision, and she had to learn to live with it.

So Ruth tried to keep busy and tried to work hard, thinking hard work would sweep all the feelings tumbling inside her out the door. Or at least under the rug. Today, there would be no time for moping. She, Mam and her sisters were going to Johanna’s house to help her clean for an upcoming church service. With three-year-old Jonah and baby Katie, Johanna could use the help. Her husband, Wilmer, had gone with a vanload of mourners to Indiana to the funeral of a great-uncle and would be away for four days. No one said anything out loud, but Ruth and all her sisters, including Johanna, seemed to be relieved he was gone for a few days.

For an Amish man, Wilmer didn’t like farming much, and he was not much help with the small property he and Johanna rented from an English man. Johanna took care of the sheep, the beehives and the hundred baby turkeys. She milked two dairy goats and raised game birds for sale to restaurants in the city. And cared for her two children, and put her husband’s meals on the table, and washed her family’s clothes and did all the work in the house. Wilmer worked in construction, and when he came home after a day’s work, he retreated to his workshop or the parlor where he spent evenings reading and writing letters to his relatives.

Wilmer, Johanna said, put in long hours and was a good provider, but he didn’t like to hear crying babies or trip over toys. He’d been a serious man when Johanna married him, and in the four years since their wedding, he’d become almost morose.

But Johanna was Johanna, always full of hope and energy. Nothing daunted her, and she looked forward to readying her house for church services with all the excitement of a once-a-year trip to Rehoboth Beach. Johanna loved company, and she loved the company of her mother and sisters most of all. Today would be a wonderful day. They were taking three huge picnic baskets of food, and the housework, shared between them, would go as easy as whipped cream on one of Anna’s pumpkin pies.

The morning flew by in a flurry of soapsuds, buckets of ammonia and warm water for scrubbing windows, and the flutter of fresh-washed laundry and rugs hanging on the line. It was a beautiful day, sunny with a cool breeze, and no one minded the heavy work, least of all Ruth. Johanna had a new letter from Leah and Rebecca and kept them in stitches of laughter as she related the newest adventures their sisters had suffered in caring for
Grossmama
and Aunt Ida. The best news of the letter was that Leah was coming home for a visit next month. She’d found another family who had engaged a driver to come to Dover for a wedding, and they’d promised to bring her along.

After a shared midday meal accompanied by warm chatter and laughter, Mam and her sisters all found quiet spots to rest for an hour before tackling the yard work. Ruth took little Katie up to her bedroom to rock her to sleep. She untied the baby’s
Kapp
ribbons and was just about to lay her down for her nap when Mam came into the room.

“She’s asleep then.” Mam smiled down at the baby. She was chubby and healthy, her mop of dark curls the image of her father’s. Jonah, in contrast, had hair as red as Dat’s, a feature that Wilmer didn’t approve of.

“Johanna’s blessed,” Ruth whispered. She placed Katie on her back and covered her with a red-and-blue quilt Johanna had designed and stitched before the baby was born. For a moment she stood looking down at the old-fashioned cradle their father had brought from his family home in Pennsylvania. A sweet longing made her sigh with regret…her sisters’ babes were the only ones her arms would ever hold.

“She is blessed, as we all are,” Mam said, still looking down at her grandbaby.

Together they tiptoed out of the room, and Ruth pulled the bedroom door closed behind them. She was about to descend the stairs to the first floor when Mam touched her arm and motioned her to sit on the top step beside her.

“I need to talk to you.”

Ruth sat down, suddenly apprehensive.

“I’m worried about you,” her mother said. “You seem so sad lately. Does it have to do with Eli going away?”

Ruth shot her a startled look.

“You think I haven’t noticed? Or Anna or Miriam? They were talking to Johanna about it after you brought the baby up.” She tucked a stray curl under Ruth’s
Kapp
as she had so often when Ruth was a child. “Maybe it is time you start spending less time at home and more time with other young people. If Eli isn’t the one for you, there are other men who would make fine husbands.”

Ruth stared at her mother in disbelief. “I don’t understand. You agreed that I should stay single, stay on the farm to help you with Susanna. Now you’re saying I should be finding a husband?”

Hannah looked equally surprised. “Ruth Yoder! When did I ever say you should stay at home?”

Ruth’s stomach tightened. She felt as if she was falling. A mistake…a terrible mistake. “In…the buggy. After you caught Eli and me together in the grape arbor.” She went on more quickly than before, as if, if she said it, it would be true. “You said I had to set a good example for my sisters and the younger girls in our community. That I had to do what was right.”

For a moment Hannah stared at Ruth. “My darling daughter, how did this happen? How did I not make it clear to you what I was saying?” Hannah cupped Ruth’s face in between her soft hands. “I wasn’t telling you I wanted you to stay home with me. That was my way of telling you it was okay to go, to be with Eli if you wanted. My point was, though, that you had to do it the right way. In marriage, in the church. Not playing games or behaving foolishly.”

“But you told me about the letter.” Ruth caught her mother’s hand and squeezed it. “I value your wisdom, Mam. You were right about Irwin and I was wrong. If you think Eli is an unsuitable match…”

“I was trying to help you think independently and not to listen to what other people said or thought. I told you about the letter so you would have all the facts. I expected you to go to Eli and ask him about the letter.”

“Dat wouldn’t approve of him, would he?”

Mam sighed. “Probably not, but you aren’t like your father. You’re like me. When I left my family to marry your father, when I changed my faith for him, it was because he was the one man in the world that my heart told me would bring me true happiness. He brought me my beautiful children and he brought me to God. I want nothing less for you, Ruth.”

“Not all marriages can be like that.”

“
Ne
. Look at Johanna’s. Or Lydia’s. They are couples who make marriage work, who take joy in their children and in following God’s path. But you need more, my precious one. What if God sent you this Eli Lapp from Belleville? You talk of following God’s will. Have you considered that maybe our Lord sent him to you so that you could lead Eli back to His grace?”

Ruth couldn’t hold back the tears. Soon she was sobbing, and her mother was holding her as she wept. “It’s too late,” she managed between bouts of crying. “Too late. I think…I think he wanted to…to ask me if he could court me, but I…I wouldn’t even talk to him. He even tried to tell me why he was going to Belleville. But I turned him away, and now he’s gone back to that girl…and…I’ve lost him forever.”

Mam pushed back Ruth’s cap and kissed the crown of her head. “That might very well be Eli’s choice. And if it is, then this isn’t the path you are meant to follow. God will never abandon you, my child. He was with me when I lost your father and He is with me every moment of every day.”

“But…if I’ve thrown away my only chance at love…”

Mam rocked her in her arms, her tears falling on Ruth’s cheek. “Whatever happens, you will be stronger and wiser for it. But nothing will convince me that your true path is to remain unwed. If not this wild boy, Eli Lapp, then another. I don’t know. But what I do know is that you, Ruth, are a woman meant to love and be loved.”

T
he sixteenth of June dawned hot and hazy, and Ruth awakened with a stirring of hope in her heart. It was her birthday. The sadness she’d felt at losing Eli remained with her, but she pushed it to the far corner of her mind, determined not to spoil the day for her family by pining for what could not be.

Tonight there would be a birthday celebration dinner. They’d invited Samuel and his children and, of course, Irwin, and Johanna and her family would be there. Leah had been able to remain with them longer than she’d expected before she had to return to Ohio, so having her there for dinner would be a special treat. Ruth’s one wish was that Rebecca could have been with them, too, but it would still be a fun evening.

The family had never exchanged expensive gifts on birthdays, as the English did, but Ruth was sure that Anna would bake a coconut cake, and Mam would surprise her with some special treat. More important, when they gathered together to share the meal, Ruth would feel the love and joy of being part of something precious.

Deciding to pick flowers for the breakfast table, Ruth walked down to the orchard with the puppy, Jeremiah, following her. She laughed at the little dog’s antics as he sniffed at the scent of a rabbit, leaped to chase a toad and barked furiously at an angry wren that objected to them near her nest in an apple tree. Ruth took her time in the warm sunshine, picking fat black-eyed Susans and delicate Queen Anne’s lace. Just as she started back to the house, she heard the sound of a horse and buggy coming up the lane.

Scooping up the puppy, Ruth hurried to see who it was. She couldn’t imagine who would be there before breakfast. As she came around the corncrib, she suddenly felt as though she’d tumbled off the top rung of the windmill ladder. Climbing out of a neat new black buggy was Eli. He saw her and smiled, and her knees went weak.

“Ruth.”

She opened her mouth to say his name, but she was too breathless to speak. She swallowed, trying to say something, anything, but she could only stare at him, clutching the puppy and the flowers to her chest.

How handsome he was in his black leather boots, blue trousers, powder-blue shirt, navy suspenders and straw hat. He looked so…
Plain
.

“You’re back.” It was a silly thing to say.

“I’m back.” He grinned, then the smile faded, and he looked so serious. “I’ve missed you.”

His eyes were bluer than she remembered. “Gone some time, you were,” she managed.

“Ya.”
He seemed suddenly shy, unsure of himself.

“Busy up there in Belleville, I suppose.” She was aware of just how silly those words sounded as soon as they tumbled out of her mouth. She must look a sight, barefooted and
Kapp
askew. She put Jeremiah down, and the puppy barked and spun and ran to bark some more at Eli.

“Hey, puppy.” He bent and petted the squirming animal. “He’s putting on weight. He looks better.”

“If Irwin keeps feeding him, he’ll be as fat as a pig.” She watched the puppy wiggle with pleasure as Eli rubbed his belly. Silence stretched between them.

“It’s early, you’re about,” she said finally.

“Ya.”
He stood up, slipping his hands into his pockets, looking at her, then the puppy, then her again. “I thought so, but I…I thought you were an early riser.”

She felt her cheeks grow warm. Why was he looking at her so intently? Did she have dirt on her nose? She shifted the flowers from one hand to the other. “I am,” she admitted.

Again, they were quiet.

“Those for me?” he asked after a moment.

“Ne.”
She looked up and then laughed, and he laughed.

It felt good.

There were so many things Ruth wanted to say to Eli. Needed to say. Only she didn’t know where to start. Finally she just plunged in. “Roman didn’t know if you were coming back or if he should look for someone else to help in the chair shop.”

Eli nodded. “I guess he should. I wanted to…” He took a deep breath. “I came early, Ruth, because I wanted to see you without anybody else around.”

She felt a sinking feeling in her stomach. He must have decided to stay in Belleville for good, and he’d come to tell her. She nibbled at her lower lip. She didn’t want to hear him say it. “Your family is well?” she said, stalling. “Your mother?”

“Good. She’s good. And my stepfather and little brother are good.”

“Good,” she echoed, not sure what to say next. If he was going back to Belleville, was there any point in saying anything? All she would do was embarrass herself, maybe him.

He took a step toward her. “I know you don’t want to talk to me, but I didn’t want to go away for good without saying goodbye.”

Hot tears stung the back of her eyelids. When she’d seen him in her yard, she’d thought for just a second that maybe there was a chance that she hadn’t ruined everything, but now…

“I have something for you. Fannie said today was your birthday, so I hope you’ll accept it. I made it for you.” He walked to the back of the buggy.

She followed him.

He raised the canvas on the back and lifted out the beautiful cherry box with the round top and the carved wrens that he’d shown her so proudly once before. “It’s a bride’s chest,” he explained. “Remember it?”

“Of course I remember it. It’s the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen.” She set the flowers down on the back of the buggy, unable to take her eyes off the piece of furniture. “But…but I’m not getting married.”

She wasn’t getting married, not ever. But she wanted the chest. The finish gleamed in the sunlight, and she couldn’t keep her hands off it. She stooped to stroke the smooth wood. “It’s not meant for me. You should save it for your intended.”

His gaze met hers across the bride’s chest with such force that she felt light-headed.

“You will marry,” he said. “When the right man comes along, the man who’s good enough to deserve you.”

“It’s a treasure,” she said. “And the little birds…” She tried to find the right words. “It’s a gift the Lord has given you, to make something so beautiful.”

“Not as beautiful as you are to me this moment.”

Her breath caught in her throat, and a single tear spilled down her cheek. She looked down. Stood up. “You shouldn’t say things like that.”

“Why not? It’s true. I’ve never met anyone like you before, Ruth, and I never will again. I’d never give this to another woman.” He caught her hand and squeezed it and let go. “It was meant for you. It always was, even before I knew you.” He took a breath. “I love you, Ruth. That’s why it has to be yours.”

She lifted her gaze. “Then why are you going away?” she demanded, suddenly angry. “Are you marrying that Belleville girl? That Hazel?”

He stared at her in astonishment. “
Ne!
Why would you think that?”

“Because you went back to Belleville. Because…I thought…” Confused, she broke off. Behind her, she heard the kitchen screen door bang. Someone had come out on the porch, but she didn’t care. “You
aren’t
marrying her?”

“I’m not marrying anyone. It was you I wanted, only you. And if I can’t have you, then…then, I have to leave Seven Poplars.”

More tears followed the first, and she dashed them away with the back of her hand. She had to say it, she
had
to. Even if nothing would ever come of it. Even if it was too late. Only she didn’t know how to tell him she loved him. “But what if I…what if I care for you, too?”

She reached for his hand and clung to it as if she were drowning and he was the only hope she had of living. “Oh, Eli, I’ve been such a fool. I thought I shouldn’t marry anyone.” Once she started, the words gushed from her mouth. “I thought it was God’s will that I stay with Mam and Susanna and then you came along and I felt differently, but then there was the gossip and then…but then…”

“Wait, go back,” he said. “You…you care for me? The way I care for you?”

She looked into his eyes, his face a blur through her tears. “So much it hurts. Only I made such a mess of things.”

“Are you saying your mother might give her permission?” Eli asked incredulously. “That she’d let you marry me? If…you wanted to?”

She held his gaze. “She only wants what’s best for me. She’d give her blessing if you joined the church. I know she would if you could put the world behind you and your past and be happy being Plain.”

“And you would marry me? In spite of all the gossip—”

“I realized I don’t care about that. I only care about you. But I’m Amish. I can’t live in the English world, and I can’t marry a man who didn’t share my faith.”

He glanced around. “Is there someplace we can sit down?”

“This way.” She led him around the house to a bench near the garden gate. Wild roses grew up the trellis behind them, and the newly mown grass was as soft as a carpet under her bare feet. Shyly, she sat on the edge of the seat and tugged him down to sit beside her. “No grape arbor here,” she teased. “We’re in plain view. We’re respectable.”

“But I’m holding your hand,” he reminded her.

She smiled at him. “Nearly respectable.” Excitement bubbled up inside her, and she trembled with joy. Were they really sitting here talking about marriage? Could her world really have tumbled upside down like this so quickly? So beautifully? “Would you consider it? Would you come to church with me? Become a part of it again?”

He raised her hand and kissed her knuckles. “Too late for that. I already joined the church. I went back to Belleville to mend the trouble with my mother, with my family, and while I was there, I talked with our bishop. I met with him many evenings, and he answered a lot of questions that troubled me. He made me look at things differently.
You
made me look at things differently.” He grinned. “So last Sunday, I joined the Amish Church.”

She touched one navy-blue suspender. “So that’s why no red ones?”

“Ne.”
He laughed. “I sold the red ones with my motor scooter and bought the horse.”

She laughed with him. “Not with the money you got from that old motorbike, you didn’t. Or did you buy a blind horse?”

“He’s a fine horse, strong and smart. Wait until you see how fast he can trot. And this buggy was a gift from my stepfather Joseph. He said that I never had my proper portion from my dat. He’s a good man, and he is the right husband for my mother. I’ve never seen her so content.”

“I’m glad. And I’m glad you have such a wonderful bishop, that he could lead you to God.”

“He is a good shepherd,” Eli said, “but it was your mother that opened my eyes more than anyone.”

“Mam?”

“Ya.
Your mother and Roman and Samuel and you and your sisters.” His eyes glowed with emotion. “For many years, I wasn’t sure that I belonged in God’s grace, or that He wanted me there. But I watched your family and community bring Irwin into your home and love him, despite his faults. It wasn’t until I got back to Belleville and had time to think that I realized what I had witnessed here. If there was a place for Irwin in the Plain world, I realized maybe there was one for me.”

“There will always be a place for you here, Eli. In our community. In our home.”

“So does that mean you’ll let me court you?”

“If you’ll forgive me for being so stupid and stubborn, for thinking that I knew best what God wanted. You warned me not to be a martyr, to listen to God, and you were right.”

“Will you accept my bride’s chest?”

“Only if you’ll ask me to marry you. Officially.” Her heart was so full of joy that she didn’t care how forward she was being—that she’d practically proposed to him, instead of the other way round.

“You’d have me, even when you don’t know the truth about Hazel and me?”

“I know you, Eli, and I know you’d never do anything dishonorable. You might make a mistake. We all do because we’re human. But you’d never desert the mother of your child.”

“You’re right, I wouldn’t.” He started to reach into his pocket. “I have a letter from her, a letter that will explain everything.”

“I don’t need to see your letter,” she protested, stilling his hand with hers. “I believe in you.”

“But I should have told you the truth as soon as I knew I had feelings for you, and I should have told my mother before I ever left Belleville the first time.” He looked away, then back at her. “Will you listen now?”

“If you want to tell me, of course I’ll listen.”

He took her hand again. “Hazel was my friend, and we went to some parties together, but she was like a sister to me. I was never her boyfriend. Not ever. I knew she liked an English fellow, and I knew she was secretly seeing him.”

“You don’t have to tell me these things,” Ruth said, her heart already going out to Hazel, the girl she had secretly disliked because of the hold she had on Eli. The hold Ruth thought she had on Eli.

“I do need to tell you. It’s important that there be no secrets between us.”

Ruth nodded and Eli continued. “I took Hazel to a bonfire one night, at Edgar Peachy’s farm. There were English there, and she left the party with someone. I tried to stop her but, Ruth, I didn’t try hard enough. She was having trouble at home, you know, following the rules…being who her parents wanted her to be. Hazel was always different. She loved school and she wanted to be part of the bigger world. But that night, she’d argued with her father. She wasn’t thinking clearly.”

Eli sighed, but he didn’t look away from her. “I blame myself for what happened. If I had stopped her, if I’d taken her home when I should have, instead of letting her go with that Englisher, maybe it would never have happened.”

“Maybe it would have anyway,” Ruth suggested softly. “If not that night, another.”

“Maybe,” he conceded. “But she was so scared when she found out she was going to have a baby. She tried to talk to her boyfriend, but he wouldn’t have anything to do with her after that night. So she asked me to marry her so that no one would know what she had done. I liked her a lot, but I didn’t love her. I told her I would help her. I would give her child my name, but only if we told the truth first. I couldn’t lie about that to her family or mine.”