Rachel's Garden (6 page)

The truth was that he and Daadi were too much alike—both too stubborn and too proud to see beyond their own opinions.

 

Rachel
dug her hand spade deep into the moist earth, loosening the roots of the weed that was already taller than the thyme uncurling its leaves delicately in the herb garden. This end of the bed was shady and moist, and the mint loved it here. She was eager to see how the variety of lemon thyme she’d planted last year had survived the winter.

“Weed, Mammi.”

She grabbed Mary’s hand just before her daughter could uproot the tiny plant. “Not that one, Mary. See, look for ones like this.”

She showed her the weed she’d just removed, and Mary nodded solemnly, intent on doing it right. If taking pleasure in digging in the dirt was any sign, little Mary would turn into the gardener of the family.

The air was still chilly, but the sun felt warm on Rachel’s back. Already the rhythmic movements and the scent of fresh-turned earth relaxed her. She might be tired and aching after her first hours in the garden, but it would be a happy tired. She glanced at Mary, smiling at her daughter’s intent face as she worked away with her own little spade.

Rachel’s heart warmed with the sun. This was what she’d longed for throughout the long, lonely winter. This was where healing would come for her.

The bucket of weeds was nearly full when Mary sat back on her heels. “Look, Mammi. Onkel Isaac.”

She followed the direction her daughter pointed, and her peace fled. Sure enough, it was Isaac, walking across the field that separated their farm from his.

It was unkind to feel that his coming tore up her peace as surely as she had torn the weeds from her garden.

Even as she prayed, she couldn’t help hoping that Isaac would conclude his business quickly. Gideon was supposed to stop by with the final plans for the greenhouse, and life with Isaac would go more smoothly if he were not reminded of that.

Besides, she found the whole business stressful enough, without having Isaac there looking on while she tried to arrive at some conclusion with Gideon.

She rose as Isaac approached, brushing the earth from her hands and shaking out her apron. “Wilkom, Isaac.”

“Onkel Isaac.” Mary, seldom shy, threw herself at his knees.

He caught the child, lifting her skyward, and tossed her in the air. His stern face softened into a smile at her giggles.

Warmth flooded Rachel’s heart at the sight. Isaac, having only sons, had always had a soft spot for her two girls. Whenever she became exasperated at his bossiness, she should remind herself of how kind he was to her children.

“There, now, little Mary, that’s enough flying for today.” He set her on her feet and patted her head gently.

“I’m afraid she’ll never think it’s enough.” Rachel steered her daughter back to her spade before she could demand more. “You know she loves it when you play with her.”

“Ja.” Isaac’s face was soft as he watched her daughter. “She’s a gut child.” He turned to her. “And how is Leah Glick? We heard she’s been ailing.”

“Doing much better.” The relief she felt sounded in her voice. “I went over this morning to help a bit with the kinder and make sure she’s resting.”

“Gut, gut,” he said, a bit absently. He gazed past her, toward the barn, as if his mind were elsewhere.

“Did you want to talk with me?” she nudged, mindful that Gideon could show up at any minute.

“Just wanted to check on you and the little ones.”

“That’s kind of you. We’re doing all right, thanks to everyone’s help.”

He nodded. “I didn’t want to bring this up until after you’d had some time to get used to the way things are now, but have you been giving thought to the future?”

The way things are now.
He meant her life without Ezra, but he was making an effort to be considerate.

“I think about it all the time. Making decisions, that’s the difficult part.”

“Ja. Ezra always took gut care of you. It’s hard, a woman on her own.”

Tension crept back along her nerves. Surely Isaac wasn’t suggesting that she remarry, was he?

“I’ve been considering the situation. You know, Caleb’s nearly nineteen now.”

Caleb, Isaac’s oldest, was actually a month older than his Onkel William, a thing that wasn’t so surprising when families were large and spread out in age.

“He hasn’t given you much worry during his rumspringa, has he?” Some youngsters did, especially the boys, taking their freedom to extremes, but Caleb had always seemed too serious and responsible for that.

“No, no, he’s too wise for that. Thing is, he’s ready to take a wife.”

A suggestion that she consider marriage to Caleb, coming after William’s proposal, would drive her to hysteria. “Is he?” Her voice sounded strangled.

“Ja, ja. He and Ellen Stoltzfus have decided between them, and we’re agreeable, though we’re not telling anyone but family yet, of course.”

She could breathe again. Really, she was being ridiculous, having such thoughts. “I’m happy for them.”

“Ja, so are we, but having five boys to get settled isn’t an easy thing, you know. In the normal way of things, Caleb would take over my farm, but I’m nowhere near ready to move to the grossdaadi haus.”

He chuckled, to show that was a joke. Naturally Isaac wouldn’t want to give up the reins yet.

“I’m sure Caleb is willing to wait until you’re ready.” That seemed the proper answer, although she had no idea why Isaac would be talking to her about it.

“Well, and that’s just what we don’t want him to do. A young couple like that, just starting out, it’s a gut thing to have their own place. Helps them to be steady-like, knowing what they’re working toward.”

“I see.” She was beginning to, actually. “Are you talking about my farm?”

He looked a little nettled, as if he didn’t care to be rushed toward the point he wanted to make, but then his face smoothed out into a determined smile.

“Don’t hurry into answering me. I just want you to think about this. Seems it would be the best solution all around. Ezra’s farm would go to his kin, as I’m sure he’d want, and we’d pay you a fair market price. Set it up any way you want, with monthly payments or a lump sum.”

Ezra’s farm, he’d said. Of course that was the way he’d see it, conveniently forgetting that the farm had come to them from her aunt and uncle. Childless themselves, they’d made it easy for their favorite niece and her husband to buy their place.

That didn’t really matter, did it? The point was that if she was going to have to sell, it would be better to sell to family, as Isaac said.

The familiar indecision settled on her. “I’m not sure ...” “What aren’t you sure about?” His voice sharpened. “You can’t run a dairy farm on your own. You must be sure of that much. It was hard enough for Ezra, with the children not old enough to help yet.”

Ezra had worked too hard, tried to do too much, but he’d loved it. No matter how tired he was, he always had a smile and a dream for the future. That was what he’d been working for—to have the right life for their family.

“You have to think about the children’s future,” Isaac said, gesturing toward Mary, who’d begun arranging pebbles around the edge of the bed. “Suppose you try to hang on to the farm and you fail. You could get into trouble with the taxes and end up losing everything Ezra worked so hard for. Better to make the decision now, while it’s yours to make.”

He made it all sound so sensible. It was sensible, she supposed. It just seemed wrong, somehow. This wasn’t the way Ezra’s dream was supposed to end.

“I ... I’ll think about it.” Her voice sounded weak and indecisive, even to herself, and she hated that. Had she really been so dependent on Ezra that she couldn’t make up her own mind?

“Gut, gut.” Isaac rocked back on his heels, smiling. “You think on it. Pray on it. I know you’ll decide right.”

It was easy for Isaac to say. He wasn’t the one who’d have to live with the results.

 

Gideon’s
hands tightened on the lines as his buggy rolled down the lane to the Brand farm. That was Isaac Brand he’d spotted, heading back across the fields to his adjoining farm.

Judging by what he’d seen of Rachel’s relationship with her brother-in-law, he probably wouldn’t find her in a tranquil temper after a visit from Isaac. That didn’t bode well for the success of his mission today.

He’d have to be persistent, that was all. He’d been trying for well over a week to get Rachel’s final approval on the plans for the greenhouse. He’d figured that once she’d committed herself to letting him build it, that would be the end of the discussion, and he could get on with it.

But each time he’d tried to pin her down, Rachel had found yet another reason to avoid giving him the final go-ahead. At first he’d thought she just couldn’t figure out what she wanted. Now he was beginning to wonder if she still thought she’d find a way to get out of it entirely.

He didn’t have all summer to get this job finished, not without having it affect the other projects he’d committed to. After the months of recuperation that he’d begun to think would never end, his shattered leg was finally healing. He might not be ready to climb on any scaffolding yet, but a small job like the greenhouse was the perfect place to start.

His hands tightened in the frustration that was becoming too familiar a companion. Orders for the windmills that were his specialty were stacking up. If he didn’t start filling them soon, he risked losing the business to someone else.

Folks had been willing to wait for him so far, some because they were Amish and so were brethren, others because they wanted the skill he provided.

But they wouldn’t wait forever. The doctors kept saying he had to be patient, that he’d regain much of his mobility in time. Unfortunately, patience was not something he’d ever had in great supply. Maybe that was why God had sent him this particular trial—so that he could practice developing it.

Truth was, he’d almost welcomed the pain of his injuries. The guilt he carried every day demanded some penalty. “Survivor guilt,” the doctor had called it. Having a name didn’t help him cope with it.

He stopped at the hitching rail, making an effort not to favor his left leg as he climbed down. Acting as if he were whole must be a step to getting there, he’d think.

Rachel had obviously seen him coming. She stood waiting for him by the herb garden near the back porch, with little Mary digging in the bed next to her. Motionless, she looked oddly forlorn in the slanting rays of the early spring sunshine.

Maybe she saw that he was watching her, because she squared her shoulders and smiled. He thought it took an effort. Her hands weren’t gathered into fists, so apparently her encounter with Isaac hadn’t made her angry, but it had had some sort of effect on her.

“I hope I’m not coming too late, Rachel. Mary, how are you?” He smiled down at the little girl. So like her mother, she was, her blue eyes fixed on him in an unwavering stare.

“No, it’s fine. We’re finished here.” Rachel glanced at her daughter. “Mary, what are you doing?”

Mary had come over to him. She tugged on his pants leg, and then she linked her fingers together in a rocking motion.

“It’s all right.” He grinned at the child. “She remembers that I made her a cradle from my handkerchief once. That’s been over a year ago. Think of her still remembering that.”

Mary tugged at his pants leg again.

“Persistent, aren’t you?” Chuckling a little, he pulled out his handkerchief. He folded it into a triangle and then did the double roll and twist that transformed a handkerchief into a cradle with a baby in it, if you had the imagination of a child. He rocked it once between his fingers and then handed it to Mary.

She laughed and swung it back and forth. “Schloofe, boppli. Schloofe.”

Rachel was staring at him, and he couldn’t read her expression. “You’re very talented,” she said.

He shrugged. “I have nieces and nephews who sometimes need distracting.”

“When did you do this for Mary?” Her voice seemed to have cooled.

He didn’t care much for the disapproval he sensed in her. She’d never really liked the time Ezra had spent with him, it seemed. Had it been jealousy of their close friendship? Or resentment that he took Ezra away from family sometimes? She certainly couldn’t imagine he was leading Ezra into mischief. During their rumspringa, it had been Ezra who always came up with that.

“When she went with Ezra and me to an auction, I think.” He held up the plans he’d tucked under his arm. “Are you ready to take a look at these?”

She blinked at the abrupt change of subject. He could see her scrambling to come up with an answer.

“I ... I was thinking that maybe it doesn’t make so much sense to start the greenhouse right now. I mean, the frost danger will be over in another month, and I probably wouldn’t get much use from it for a while. If you have other projects to do first—”

He kept a rein on his temper. Rachel had been a pliant girl, and she’d always seemed eager to do as Ezra wanted. Now it seemed she didn’t want to be told what to do, and he wouldn’t fall into the same mistake that Isaac made in dealing with her.

“Now is the perfect time to get on with the greenhouse. My leg’s not up to the high work on windmills yet, but I can certainly handle a greenhouse.”

He wasn’t going to tell her the rest of it—his sense that if only he could start doing something for her and her kinder, he’d ease the weight of responsibility that he felt each time he thought of Ezra.

Her face had tightened with the reminder of his injury, but she gave a jerky nod. “Makes sense, I guess. It’s getting chilly. Komm inside. We can work there.”