Sarah's Garden (8 page)

“There,” she declared, just as the clock struck three. Grant stood near the picture window he’d just had installed and watched the dust stir from the horse and buggy coming up the lane.

He turned to smile at her handiwork. “Thank you. It’s lovely, but I don’t think they expect all this.”

“All the better.” She nodded, heading off to do another round of battle in the kitchen.

Mr. Bustle answered the knock on the front glass door, and Grant came forward to greet his guests.

He was struck anew by the purity of Miss King’s gently curved face and clear eyes and her brother’s skin, though tanned, which also shone with good health.

“Welcome.” He shook hands with Luke and then with Sarah, glad that she seemed willing enough to do so. “Please come in and excuse the carpentry mess . . . Mrs. Bustle ’s put on quite a tea in your honor.” He led the way into the dining room and grinned at Luke ’s boyish whistle of appreciation upon viewing the table. Sarah frowned at her brother and looked as though she ’d like to scold him.

“I’m sorry,” Grant said. “But I just have to understand, Miss King—do you want to lecture Luke on the whistle or just in general?”

Sarah frowned as Luke laughed. “Caught,” he told his sister.

“Yes, I am.” Sarah sighed. “If you must know, it’s that my
bruder
is like all the boys . . . he could eat forever. He just ate less than an hour ago . . .
Ach
, that sounds ungrateful . . . I’m making a mess of things . . .” She spread her hands with a helpless gesture as Luke grinned.

Dr. Williams waved an arm toward the table. “Please, both of you, come and sit . . . and please, eat or don’t eat, as you like.”

He drew out a chair for Sarah, who took it with gracious thanks.

Grant filled Luke ’s plate and let Sarah choose as she liked, then he took a piece of cake himself. He moved the beautiful flower arrangement off the table and onto the floor, the better to see his guests’ faces.

“Sorry,” he explained. “I want to look at you as we talk. Your own table was so pleasant in its simplicity.”

“Thank you,” Sarah murmured, toying with her ornate fork.

“Well, if you’ll excuse my ignorance, I’d like to hear all about your kitchen garden and about what you might grow for healing or natural remedies—for both animals and people.”

“I brought your seeds.” Sarah produced the paper packet from her apron pocket.

“
Ach
, Sarah, not from the desk?” Luke groaned.

“Yes, from the desk.”

Grant raised his brow and she continued. “I sort my seeds in a big old desk, though most are not truly mine. They’re from my
grossmudder
. . . excuse me, please, I mean my grandmother and her mother before her.”

“Aha,” Grant exclaimed, pleased that he could contribute. “Heirloom seeds!”

“Well . . . the
Englisch
call them heirloom seeds, but maybe for a different reason than we do.”

“Not just because they’re old?” Grant ventured.

“There’s that, but also the word
heirloom
. . . it’s an older word, in English,
jah
? So I truly think of each seed as an heirloom, a valuable piece of history that—”

“
Ach
. And we’re off,” Luke muttered, helping himself to more cake.

“Let your sister be,” Dr. Williams adjured good-naturedly.

“You haven’t got her talking tomato varieties yet . . . just wait.”

“Tomato varieties? I thought there were only a few.”

“Oh no.” Sarah’s eyes glowed, and Luke shook his head.

“There’s the ox-heart variety, the striped tomato, and the phantom tomato, or white tomato. And, you see, an heirloom plant usually has time as well as a story behind how each seed came into a garden.”

“I’m intrigued,” Grant exclaimed, pushing aside his plate.

“And I’m happy to go and pace off your garden for you, Doctor, while Sarah explains.” Luke rose. “I brought some shovels and a pick. Do you want it right outside the back kitchen like we have?”

“Yes, and if you don’t mind, tell Mrs. Bustle what you’re doing. She ’ll give you some more direction. Thank you, Luke.”

When he’d gone, Sarah fingered her seed package, then gave him a direct look. He marveled at the way her hazel eyes seemed to change colors depending on what light she was in. Now they were a translucent light brown, like the early coat of a young fawn.

“Please, go on, Miss King. I’d love to hear some of the heirloom stories.”

“Well, there are the husk cherries, we call them
juddekaershe
. . . they’ve been grown for nearly five generations in my family. Sometimes they’re called ground cherries or winter cherries. The seed comes from a distant relative who moved here from Schoeneck, Pennsylvania. In Pennsylvania Dutch,
Schoeneck
means ‘beautiful corner,’ and these pretty fruits are related distantly to the tomato family. They look a little like tomatillos, and we use them in pies, jellies, and jams. When the boys pull them up at harvest, they pull the whole plant and hang them upside down in the attics. The winter cherries have to ripen and slip out from their little husks. They also can be harvested all winter and their vines spread out nearly three to four feet on the ground.” Her eyes danced as she described the plants, and he watched as she became aware of how animated she’d been.

“Please, don’t stop,” he encouraged. “I love to hear you speak, and I do want to learn. You see, I can remember kitchen gardens from my childhood. I’d go with my dad on calls to the Amish farms and get to wander around. I always liked the profusion of the gardens and ate more than one ripe tomato straight off the vine.”

“Your father was a vet too?”

“No, he was a medical doctor, a general practitioner. He had many Amish patients and was deeply devoted to the Amish people. He passed that on to me, I guess.”

There was a brief silence while she seemed to consider his words, then he smiled.

“So tell me about some other seeds before Mrs. Bustle thinks we’re not enjoying tea.”

She slanted a curious glance his way, then went on. “Well, there are also peppers—the sweet yellow stuffing pepper . . . you might fill it with spinach or a chicken salad, and the pimiento pepper, which is truly as sweet as an apple,
ach
. . . and I brought seeds for pretzel beans, which really do look like green pretzels when they mature, and the purple burgundy lima bean. It makes a better stew, I think, than just the lima bean itself.”

Grant listened, fascinated by her lilting voice until it seemed more charming than the aged crystal they drank from.

“And there are a few flowers, but useful ones . . . like the oyster plant, which looks pretty, but we use its roots for a mock oyster soup.” She spilled a single seed out into the palm of her small hand to show him. “Then of course, I brought some herbs. The specific ones you like I can give you as time goes along. I’m not sure of all of the medicinal uses as far as animals go.”

“I’ll find out . . . I’ve also enjoyed finding out how much a steward of the land you are, Miss King. You and your family, of course. And I respect what you say about the seeds. If you’ll show me how to plant them correctly, I’ll cherish them. You have my word.”

“Thank you.” She smiled.

Mrs. Bustle came into the room to clear the table, and Sarah rose as if to help.

“No, thank you, dear. You go on outside with the doctor and see what your brother’s got dug.”

Grant gestured toward the kitchen and Sarah went along, her dark shoes and dress seeming to match the timeless quality of the antique oriental runner Mr. Bustle had just laid that morning.

S
arah noticed that the kitchen was still in haphazard condition while Mrs. Bustle explained that she was still adjusting to the stove and relative lack of space. The back screen door was open, and Luke dug heartily. He’d paced off a fair rectangle of land with three neat paths and overturned the sod.

“So how do I go about planting the seeds?” Grant asked, as he and Sarah walked outside and surveyed the rich soil.

“Well . . .” Sarah knelt near the edge of the dirt and he did the same, making her pulse jump with his closeness. She opened her hand, which still held the oyster seed, and reached out to give it to him. The seed stuck to her hot palm and he clasped her hand until his warm fingers slid it free. She looked at the earth and tried hard to think of what Father had told her. He trusted her, but she was beginning to not trust herself when it came to this charming
Englischer
.

“You just stick the seed in a hole in the dirt and cover it,” Luke interrupted in a laconic tone, leaning a boot on his shovel.

Sarah glared over at him, half-embarrassed. “There ’s more to it than that.”

Luke shrugged and turned his back, going back to his digging. “Whatever.”

“So what else is there?” the doctor asked with a faint smile.

Sarah slid her slender fingers through the rich earth, its coolness restoring her calm, until the doctor placed his hand over hers, following her movements in the ground.

“Like this?”

“
Jah
,” she murmured.

He threaded his fingers through hers, and she could feel the weight of his large hand. “And then the seed?”

“Yes . . . point down, if it has one.”

“All right.” He still held her hand in the cover of the dirt and used his other to push the seed into the small opening.

“And then we . . . you just cover it.” She swallowed as she watched their twined fingers moving through the rich earth. She let her hand relax against the pressure of his own and felt her breath come out in a rush when the hole was filled and he still held her hand against the ground. She looked over at him and felt like she might drown in the intensity of his eyes. She dropped her gaze to his firm mouth and wet her lips.

“Water,” she managed.

“Hmm?” His voice was a deep, timbered rumble.

“You need to wet the ground.” Luke declared, pouring water from a tin watering can over the clasp of their hands. They both jumped, pulling apart.

“
Danki
.” Sarah looked up at her brother, who regarded her with a frown. She rose and the doctor did the same, clearing his throat.

“If you would allow me, Miss King, I’d consider it a privilege to see your own garden sometime.”

She nodded and was about to speak when her brother James came around the back of the house.

“Dr. Williams, if you could come, please—the bishop’s favorite cow is down; he’d appreciate you making a call.”

Grant nodded, then turned to grin at Sarah. “My first house call here,” he murmured. “Pray for me. I’ll get my bag.” He hurried off and she avoided looking at Luke, who’d come to stand beside her.

“You’re playing dangerous games, Sarah,” Luke announced, shouldering his shovel. And when she would have protested, he shook his head. “And no, I’m not telling Father and
Mamm
. I like the doctor too, but you—you’d better stick to a good Amish man.” He started to walk away.

“Where are you going?” Sarah found her voice at last.

“To ride with the
Englischer
to the bishop’s.” He grinned back at her. “He ’ll need directions.”

P
ray for him. Pray for me
, she thought. She could not be trusted, even though her parents had told her that they believed in her. And then Jacob’s mocking words and Luke ’s warning . . . it was all too much. She was just being neighborly, she rationalized. Yet she found the doctor so unlike anyone she ’d ever met in the community. Yes, he was worldly, with his electricity and casual talk, but he was also kind and sincere.

She rubbed her shoe in a patch of the earth and thought of how to pray for him. Then she began to walk around the perimeter of the unplanted garden, moving and praying at the same time. She asked for blessings on the doctor’s home and on his work. And she prayed unbidden words from her soul that he would be healthy and happy, and greater still, accepted by the Amish community around him.

C
HAPTER
6

W
hen the red sports car swung onto the bishop’s lane, Ezekiel Loftus, Grant was amazed to see more than a dozen buggies assembled outside the large farmhouse and barns.

“Church meeting?” he asked Luke.

“New vet.”

“Ah.”

He grabbed his bag and a box of generalized “downed cow” equipment and headed for the largest barn. It was stuffed to capacity with Amish folk, a few onlooker animals from side stalls, and one hapless ill cow, proclaimed as Tweet, lying bloated in despair in the middle of the barn floor.

Milk fever; stage three
, Grant thought with a silent groan, and he had no idea of what steps had already been taken to “help” the cow. He’d discovered early in his studies that finding out what a client had already attempted was not always easy. He’d pried information out of self-prescribing, helpful owners that ranged from dandruff shampoo to garlic bologna and everything in between. He’d learned not to blink an eye. Most of the time, the cures were odd but harmless, and he usually was able to intercede in time, but this was different.

Luke had explained succinctly on the brief ride what the bishop meant to the community. “He’s the head of everything, next to
Der Herr
, the Lord.”

“Great.”

“
Jah
, really great.”

Really great
, Grant thought as he faced the man who seemed half his size and three times his age. Here was a typical Amish farmer who surely must be close to ninety. His wizened countenance was not exactly dour but neither was it hopeful, and Grant extended a hand only to have it grasped by a firm grip and a welcoming smile of relief that threatened to split the wrinkled face in two.

“Dr. Williams, thank you for coming so quickly. Tweet here, well, she ’s my favorite . . . practically the mother of the herd . . .” The little man bobbed his head, and Grant saw tears sparkle in his coal black eyes.

It was not the first time he ’d seen a grown man cry over a cow. He recalled a Mr. Boon from vet training who’d proudly displayed a tattoo of his favorite cow on his rugged forearm and had wept openly when she had to be euthanized due to old age. He thought about sharing the tale but decided tattooing, cow or otherwise, was probably out of the realm of the bishop’s appreciation. In any case, he now had the chance to help a true animal lover, something he enjoyed. It was also an opportunity to make or break his practice in the community, he thought. If the bishop’s cow should meet with an unfortunate end, he could just picture the bleak, empty months of no calls and a failed try at a life ’s dream. But if the cow responded to the classic treatment for the ailment, it might mean a more ready acceptance. He clapped the bishop on the shoulder in an attitude of comfort.