The Thorn (3 page)

The sweet scent of hay drew Rose into the humid stable, where she spotted Nick, disheveled as usual, shoveling out the manure pit. The tall young man's long, dark hair blended in with his black shirt. It was hard to believe that Nick had persuaded Barbara Petersheim, the bishop's wife, to sew him so many dismal-colored shirts. The black, gray, and brown shirts were clearly Nick's favorites, which amused Rose, since the men in their church district wore shirts made of blue and green fabric, as well as white for Preaching services.

Not even the bishop could get him to conform to their ways. Not in Nick's preference for long hair, nor his five-o'clock shadow ... and definitely not in the bishop's hope for his foster son's living a peace-loving life. No, Nick could bloody a fellow's nose as quick as he could drop his straw hat. Did he think fist fighting was an acceptable sport here? Was it something he'd learned in the city?

"I learn the hard way," Nick had once told her haughtily. And Rose knew it for truth. He'd insisted on using a makeshift fishing pole from a willow branch, even though he could see how many fish she caught by simply using her brother's conventional fishing pole. But he would stubbornly shrug and cast his line into the water. The same was true when it came to cutting hay with Dat or hanging tobacco to dry for a neighbor. Nick refused to imitate what her older brothers - or his foster brother, Christian - did routinely ... and correctly.

Rose justified his disruptive behavior, considering his difficult childhood - something Nick never talked about. It wasn't surprising to her that he seemed so angry. Angry at everyone, really.

Everyone but me.

At twenty-one, Nick had passed the age many young people joined church, yet he still showed no sign of wanting to do so. Didn't he understand that being selected by the bishop to be raised Amish meant the Lord God himself had chosen him? Out of all the lost, worldly souls.

"But by the grace of God I am what I am." Rose thought of the verse from 1 Corinthians that she and Silas Good had discussed months ago, when she'd last gone riding with him. "Sure seems like Nick would look on being chosen as a mighty gut thing," she'd suggested to her former beau, and he had agreed. Silas had felt as strongly as she did about the privilege it was for Nick to have the bishop as his father. "What most fellas wouldn't give for that," Silas had remarked as she rode beside him in his black courting buggy.

Now, while she distributed the feed, Rose felt a twinge at the memory of blond, blue-eyed Silas. She had no idea where things stood with him, since her expanded caretaking duties had kept her from attending Singings for quite a while. And, too, the few Sunday evenings she could've gone, she'd chosen to ride horses with her friend Nick instead. The thought of sitting still and singing the same songs put her on edge - hoping a nice fellow would smile and catch her eye for a ride home and all - when she could be out on a galloping horse, breathing in the nighttime fragrances.

It was her nighttime romps through the countryside with Nick that made her life most cheerful. They'd kept their outdoor jaunts secret - between just the two of them. Even now no one was aware of their companionship, apart from the work they did together in the barn. It was best, they'd long agreed, to avoid needlessly raised eyebrows.

She turned now to look at Nick. He smiled back and fixed his eyes on her head, where he'd once snipped off a strand of her strawberry hair when he was sure no one was looking. They had been pruning the grapevines near the road, after harvesting a bumper crop. He'd pressed the curl into his pocket, declaring it the "most striking red-blond" he'd ever seen. Rose had worried the clipped spot would show till it grew out again. But not a soul ever noticed.

Nick's scruffiness had amused her from his first day here. And sometimes she caught herself double-checking her own schtruwwlich hair, reaching up to push a loose strand over her ear, hoping she didn't look as unkempt as Nick. Goodness!

There were times the womenfolk shook their heads, though not unkindly, when they saw her at canning bees or quilting frolics. They took one look at her and must've understood that her mother couldn't rein in her youngest daughter like most able-bodied mothers did. Still, they liked her even as they winced at the stray hairs at her neck. Rose was known, after all, as a dutiful and loyal daughter. Unlike her sister Hen.

Plitsch-platsch - slapdash - Hen liked to describe her, but with a loving expression to soften the truth. There was no arguing it - Rose did have a penchant for letting things go. She couldn't deny her aversion to tightly twisting her hair on each side to pull it into a tidy bun. After all, she figured no one really noticed her hair beneath the boyish blue paisley kerchief she preferred to wear around the house - nor under her best Kapp on Preaching Sundays, either.

But Hen's opinion didn't count for much anymore. Not since she had joined ranks with the "high people," as Nick called them. For the life of her, Rose had never understood why the rough-and tumble boy from Philadelphia could just blurt out whatever was on his mind one day and clam up the next.

Today, Rose moved along the horse trough. She walked right up to Nick. "I've been wonderin'," she said. "Are all English bigheaded, do ya think?"

Nick smirked and returned to his shoveling. "I'm English, jah?"

"Ain't what I meant." She shook her head. "Remember what you said about my sister?"

"What about her?"

"That she joined up with the high folk when she married."

"Well, she got herself hitched to an Englischer, didn't she?" His black eyes pierced her own.

"That didn't make her uppity, though."

"Says who?"

"Honestly, I'm tellin' ya, Hen's not stuck on herself like some fancy folk." She stroked Upsy-Daisy's mane. "I'd be more apt to worry over her loss of faith."

"Why's that?"

"She rarely talks of the Lord anymore," Rose said.

"Does she read the Good Book?"

"Not to judge, but I doubt it. And her husband won't let her attend worship services, either, let alone come to our Preaching Sundays."

Nick huffed. "And that bothers her?"

"Can't say for sure. But it wonders me sometimes ... and makes me ever so sad."

Nick ran his hand over his stubbly chin. "So you're worried about her soul, then."

"I pray for her, if that's what ya mean." Rose turned and headed back to the feed bin with her empty bucket. Fact was, Hen had shown her true colors back when she first met Brandon Orringer near the old sawmill on Mt. Pleasant Road. But English as she was now, Hen wasn't a know-it-all, as the high people were thought to be.

Rose sighed, rehearsing those hush-hush things Hen had confided to her years before. Nick would not be hearing any of that from her lips, nor what Rose thought about Hen's impulsive marriage - and her lack of interest in joining church. Surely he could see how Hen's stubbornness had broken her parents' hearts. Rose herself saw the pain clearly in both Dat's and Mamm's eyes each and every day.

Mammi Sylvia was testing the roast for tenderness later that afternoon, with Mamm sitting primly in her wheelchair near the woodstove, when Hen's blue car pulled into the lane. Rose heard the motor before she saw Hen get out of the sedan and open the back door for blond, curly-haired Mattie Sue. Typically, months passed and they wouldn't see hide nor hair of Hen, and even less of Mattie Sue. The elusive Brandon had never once stopped to visit.

Glory be! Rose took off running out the back door, straight to Hen. "Oh, sister, you're here again ... three times in two weeks!"

Hen's pretty hazel eyes blinked rapidly. "We came for supper, if that's all right." She gave Rose a hug and then glanced down at a smiling Mattie Sue.

"Well, you're just in time. Mammi's cookin' a delicious meal." Rose fell into step with Hen while four-year-old Mattie Sue hurried away to the barn to play with the kittens.

Hen paused on the sidewalk, her eyes following Mattie. "How's Mamm doing?"

"About the same ... she does complain of bein' chilly lately. And I'm afraid she's come down with a cold."

"It's getting to be that time of year again."

"Truth be told, I don't think it's just the change of seasons. Mamm's getting weaker."

"That's why I came to check on her."

"Since when are you a nurse?" She bristled at Hen's insinuation, as if Rose weren't up to the daily task.

Hen tweaked her elbow. "You silly goose. Don't take things so seriously."

The tightness in her stomach would not give. "I'm do in' just fine looking after Mamm," Rose said softly, motioning for them to go inside.

Lately I've scarcely done anything else!

After supper, Rose slipped out to the screened-in porch, surprised to hear the bishop's son, Christian, and Nick talking loudly near the side of Dat's barn. Nick's head was down, his posture slouched, as it often was when Christian cornered him.

"Well, you're not listening ... Daed insists you attend the family meetin' tonight," Christian was saying.

Nick looked away, shoving his hands deep into his pockets.

"You'd better be there." Christian leaned forward, his straw hat square on his chestnut-colored hair. He waited for a response, shook his head, and turned to leave. Then he stopped in his tracks. "If you'd just loosen up your tongue, things would go a lot better round here, brother."

Nick raised his head. "I pull my weight, and you know it."

"Anyone can muck out a barn."

Nick's expression soured.

"If ya can't appreciate what Daed's done for ya," Christian barked, "you're downright dumm!"

Nick walked to the barn door and gave it a shove to the side.

Christian hollered after him in Deitsch, his face red, his eyes blazing. "Undankbaar, that's what you are!" Christian stormed off across the pasture to the bishop's house. "Ungrateful!"

The word hung like a broken tree branch after a squall. Rose planted her bare feet on the wooden planks of her father's porch, wondering what had gotten Christian so riled up again.

What she wouldn't give to see Christian offer the hand of acceptance to his English foster brother. Her own brothers, especially Mose and Joshua, were the best of friends. They shared each other's farm tools and whatnot, as did Dat and his brothers. All of them seemed to be unified in working the land and caring for the animals. But never once had she heard Christian speak a kind word to poor Nick.

What she had heard were Dat's worrisome comments to her oldest brother, Joshua, who came frequently to assist with welding hitches for buggies and wagons and other heavier jobs that had to do with the conveyances Dat made. "Something must be done to get Nick's attention, to sway him toward the church . . . and mighty soon," her father had said.

This had surprised her. Wasn't swaying Nick up to the Lord? After all, God loved Nick more than even his own mother did. "More than anyone," Rose whispered.

Recently, after a Preaching service, she'd spotted Nick walking past the chicken coop, dressed in his black trousers and coat like the other fellows. In that moment, it struck her that although he looked the same as the others outwardly, he did not resemble any of them on the inside. Then and there, she'd wondered if he would ever join the ranks of the People.

Rose wandered down the back steps and across the yard to the barn. From the day Nick had come to live next door, he had been at odds with their community. Especially with Christian.

A year younger, Christian had always enjoyed a solid relationship with his bishop father, having been the only son for nine years - until Nick arrived on the scene. With his dimpled chin and sparkling green eyes, Christian was exceptionally goodlooking. Rose had once had a short-lived crush on the tall, muscular boy, till it became obvious that he took much pleasure in picking on Nick.

Hearing Dat come into the barn now, Rose headed straight to the stall to check on the bedding straw for their two new foals. She heard her father's work boots on the cement. "Can ya come early tomorrow to help me lift some boards?" Dat asked Nick. "The old bench wagon's nearly shot after all these years." Her father told him that the bishop thought it was time to replace it. "Your Daed wants it finished up in a few more days."