The Amish Bride (18 page)

He clasped the leather gloves in his hands, twisting them as he spoke, his eyes watching her. “And you won’t change your mind about Micah?”

Ellen shook her head. “
Nay.
I won’t.”

“Is there someone else?” he asked.

She averted her gaze. Why was he making this so hard for her? “I shouldn’t have come here,” she said. “I just... I didn’t want you to think...” She trailed off. Why
had
she come? “I’m sorry. I guess I just wanted to tell you.”

“But there is someone else?” he pressed. “Another man you’d rather have?”

She nodded dumbly. “But it’s impossible. He doesn’t feel that way about me.”

“He doesn’t?”

“Nay.”

“And you’re certain of that?” He took a step toward her.

Her shivering had become shaking. She wanted to run. “He told me so.” She lifted her gaze to meet his, afraid she would burst into tears at any moment. “You...you told me in the orchard.”

“I told you that I didn’t want to marry you?” He smiled. “
Nay
, Ellen, I didn’t say that. I said that I thought you and Micah would be happier together. It was
your
happiness that I was thinking of. But if you don’t want him, then there’s no reason why I can’t marry you. Is there?”

She stood there for a moment, staring up at him, him staring down at her. “You
do
want to marry me? After the way I’ve behaved? The trouble I’ve caused your family?”

“You can be trouble,” he agreed. “But then, I think most things worth having can be.” He hesitated and then went on. “Don’t you see? I’ve never stopped loving you, Ellen.” His smile widened. “So if you’ve behaved unwisely, you are no worse than me.” He chuckled. “Of course, if we are to consider marriage, I have conditions.”

She didn’t know if she wanted to laugh or cry. Neziah wanted to marry her! He wanted to marry her. “What conditions?” she asked suspiciously.

“I’ve had some time to think this over, and I’ll warn you, it’s take it or leave it.”

She waited, unconsciously holding her breath.

“First, I don’t believe I would be comfortable having you and Micah under the same roof. It would make things too awkward when he starts courting again and later brings home a wife. And my boys are mischief enough without my father adding salt to our butter, so we’ll have to live with your parents.” He grinned at her. “Until I can build you your own house, of course. Or a
grossdaddi
house for them, whichever you’d prefer.”

She nodded. “
Jah
, I would like that. I would like to be close to my mother and father, so I can look after them. And my mother would love to have Asa and Joel at her table.”

“
Goot.
That’s settled.” He reached for her hand. “And two, building a house costs money, so I think it would be best if you kept working at the shop. At least as long as you want to.”

Tears clouded her eyes. “You mean it? You don’t care if I work?”

“So long as I can hire a girl to help with the housework and tend to the boys. You can hardly be in two places at one time, can you?”

She shook her head.

“And one more thing.”

“
Jah
, Neziah?” Her eyes were so clouded with tears that she could hardly make out his sweet, strong face, but she could feel the warmth of his coat around her.

“I think it would be a
goot
idea for you to continue to ride your scooter to work in the morning so you have a few minutes to yourself each day. The boys and I will pick you up in the afternoon. Does that sound right?”

“It sounds exactly right,” she said.

“So you agree to my terms?”

She smiled at him through her tears. “I agree, Neziah. But...I have one requirement of my own.”

“Do you?”

She nodded. “November is the traditional time for weddings, and I’d like ours to be the first in the community this fall. We’ve wasted too much time already.”

“Agreed.” He pulled her into his arms and looked down into her face. He was so close that she could feel his warm breath. Her heart was pounding so hard she was certain that he must feel it through the thickness of the denim jacket and their clothing. “So, will you do me the honor of becoming my wife and the mother of my children?”

“I will, Neziah. With all my heart.”

Smiling, he bent and kissed her, and the kiss was every bit as wonderful as she had always imagined it would be. And in that instant, the tenderness of that caress washed away all her doubts. Her mind and her heart filled with joy. In spite of all her missteps and stumbles and the twists and turns of her journey, this was the path the Lord had laid out for her. And she intended to walk every step of the way with her hand in Neziah’s.

Epilogue

Chincoteague National Wildlife Refuge,
Virginia
September, one year later

“T
here. Just as they told us at the Visitor’s Center. We can see the whole Snow Goose Pool from the observation platform.” Neziah propped his black push scooter against a post at the end of the walkway, and Ellen did the same with her green one.

They climbed the steps to the viewing platform, and Ellen raised her binoculars to scan the large, brackish pond. There were so many geese, ducks and waterbirds swimming and diving over the surface of the blue-green water that she didn’t know where to aim her binoculars. It was early morning, and few visitors were out yet. This was fall migration for a multitude of bird species, but the only other birders they could see were far away. The closest, a man in fatigues wearing a cowboy hat, was sighting in a large telescope near the shore, several hundred yards away.

“Look, black-tipped skimmers.” Neziah pointed out a line of gangly, black-and-white waterbirds with distinctive black-tipped red beaks swooping over the surface of the pond.

Ellen turned in the direction he indicated and watched the skimmers scooping up small fish until they swooped in perfect formation and soared out of sight along the edge of the marsh. “Be sure and write them down,” she reminded him. Neziah was keeping a tally of species and numbers of each kind of bird that they sighted each day.

Their vacation, actually a belated honeymoon, was to be a week long, and this was their third day at the refuge. Neziah had asked her where she wanted to go, and she’d chosen Chincoteague for bird-watching during the fall migration. They’d saved all year so that they could hire a driver to take them to and from Virginia, stay in a motel, eat in restaurants and have enough money for admission to the refuge.

Although they had taken accommodations on Chincoteague, the refuge was actually on Assateague Island, across the channel. There were over fourteen thousand acres of beach, marsh, dunes and maritime forest teeming with birds and other wildlife, including sitka deer, wild ponies and the elusive fox squirrels.

For Ellen, this was a dream come true. Neziah shared her fascination with bird-watching, and the trip was a welcome escape from their everyday life at home. If the sight of two Old Order Amish pushing their scooters along the Wildlife Loop or parking them outside the Tom’s Cover Visitor Center did attract a little attention from the tourists, Ellen didn’t care. She’d seen her first oystercatcher that morning, and the day before they’d sighted a merlin, a flock of piping plovers and six brown pelicans.

Neziah pointed to a broad-winged bird circling high over the pool. “Eagle,” he said. “Must be a young one. Has the white tail but not much white on the head yet.” He studied the bird through the binoculars she’d given him for his birthday, identical to the ones he’d presented her with as a wedding gift the previous November.

Ellen sighed with pleasure. This trip was everything she’d imagined it might be when they’d spent hours going over the maps and brochures describing the refuge and the restaurants and lodging available on Chincoteague. Neziah had wanted to bring her in May for the spring migration, but her mother had fallen and broken her wrist. Ellen hadn’t felt able to leave her at that time. The six of them were still living in her parents’ home, but the
grossdaddi
house would be ready for her mother and father to move into by the end of the month. When her father had opted for downsizing to a smaller space, Neziah had started planning for the cottage addition to the house. It had a separate entrance and another off the parlor so that there would be easy access for any of them to move back and forth between the two homes.

The children had settled into their new home easily. Asa continued to spend much of his day with Simeon while Joel was in school. Sometimes, Ellen took Asa to the shop with her, and other days he accompanied his father to the woods or his uncle Micah to the sawmill. Micah was courting a sweet girl from the next town over and seemed to have completely gotten over Ellen, with no hard feelings. Slowly Joel and Asa had come to think of Ellen as their mother, and she had come to love them both. She was still concerned about Joel’s tendency to fill up on sweets when he was with Simeon, but she was gradually bringing order into both boys’ lives. As she’d expected, her mother had gathered them into her arms and heart. Joel was surprisingly protective of his new
grossmama
and gave little trouble to Maddie, the girl they had hired to keep an eye on both of them. Her father, likewise, adored Asa and Joel, often spending hours making them wooden toys and teaching them how to care for the chickens and how to coax the largest and sweetest tomatoes from the garden.

Neziah stepped back from the railing and slipped an arm around Ellen’s shoulders. She smiled up at him, and her heart leaped as she remembered the sweetness of their time together in the hotel room, with its private balcony and view of the water and marshland. The previous night had been a full moon, and the shadowy outline of the Assateague Lighthouse had loomed over the treetops.

“We should do this every year,” he said. “Get away for a few days, just the two of us. I like having you all to myself.”

She smiled up at him. She was content with life at home in Lancaster County. Her friends, her family, her community, their church and their children were there. Married life suited her, fitting as easily as a worn leather glove that was soft and warm and protective. She’d loved Neziah on the day they’d made their marriage vows, but that feeling had grown with each day that passed. They did not always agree, and some problems required patience and wisdom to solve, but they solved them together, cementing their bonds with love and respect and caring. Like his driving animal, Neziah had substance. There was no doubt in her mind that she had picked exactly the right man. Or perhaps... She smiled. Perhaps he had been chosen for her.

“We should come next May,” Neziah suggested, pulling her back into the moment. “For the spring migration.”

“Maybe,” she answered. “That’s a long way off to make definite plans.” She had her own reason for thinking next May might not be possible, but she wasn’t ready to share that hope with him yet. They had been praying for a child and though it was early yet, she suspected that that prayer had been answered.

“Hungry?” he asked.

She laughed. “Starving.” They’d had coffee and a donut before they’d come out to the refuge, but he’d promised her a full breakfast with eggs and pancakes and sausage. There was a good restaurant with reasonable prices on the main street of town. It was a real treat to eat meals that she didn’t have to cook or wash up after. In fact, she was ravenous. She was hungry enough to eat one of those snow geese if it came close enough. That was another reason she suspected that she might be with child. No morning sickness for her. She slept like a rock and woke wanting to eat everything in sight.

“A good thing you made me buy that scooter,” Neziah said. “Otherwise, we’d have a long walk back across the bridge and into Chincoteague. And we need to have a good breakfast. We have that boat tour at two this afternoon.” Neziah had reserved places for them weeks ago.

“Maybe I’ll have the fisherman’s breakfast,” she told him, her mouth practically watering at the thought. “The one with two eggs, sausage, fried potatoes and bacon.”

“Keep on like this and you’ll get as plump as Maddie.”

“Would you mind?” she teased. “If I did?”

“More to squeeze.” Playfully he encircled her with both arms and backed her against the railing. “Have I told you this morning how beautiful you are?”

“Only once,” she replied. She stood on tiptoe and brushed his lips with hers, as bold as any English girl kissing her husband in full view of the world. “But I liked it very much.”

“And I like you very much,” he answered, looking full into her eyes. “There’s just one thing I’d like to get straight between us. A small pebble in my shoe that keeps rubbing.”

“With me?” She tried to think what she might have done lately that might not have met his approval.

“It’s your scooter,” he said, straight-faced, his eyes serious.

“My scooter? What’s wrong with my scooter?” She folded her arms, ready to make a stand. “You said that you wanted me to keep my scooter. To ride it to work. And now you’ve bought one of your own. And you just said how useful it is.”

Neziah grimaced. “It’s the color.”

“It’s green. It’s always been green.”

He nodded. “It is. As green as a lime popsicle. A very bright green. I was thinking, maybe we could buy a can of spray paint. And paint both scooters a nice shade of forest-green. So as not to scare the birds.”

She could hardly hold back a chuckle. “Not to scare the birds,” she repeated.

“Jah.”
He grinned. “To blend in with the trees so we could sneak up on the warblers.”

“Maybe,” she said. “It would be more Plain. Not so worldly.”

Neziah chuckled, and she laughed with him. He clasped her hand and they walked back together toward their scooters and all the years of peace and happiness that stretched out ahead of them.

* * * * *

Keep reading for an excerpt from
THE AMISH MOTHER
by Rebecca Kertz.

Dear Reader,

I’m delighted to invite you to travel from Seven Poplars, Delaware, to the Old Order Amish community of Honeysuckle in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania for a special Love Inspired series, Lancaster Courtships.

In
The Amish Bride
, Ellen Beachey, unmarried and past thirty with aging parents and a fulfilling life, is startled to receive a shocking proposal from her father’s closest friend and neighbor. Urged to accept the challenge by her family and still hoping to be a wife, Ellen finds herself swept into courtship by not one, but two suitors. She wants to follow God’s plan for her, but how can she choose between two very different brothers? And which man will give her the forever love of her dreams without destroying both families?

And I hope you’ll return to Seven Poplars in Delaware in February 2016 to meet Mari, the next prospective bride in the Amish Matchmaker series. Mari has wandered away from her Amish roots, but comes home to find love and acceptance with the Yoders and their friends.

Come join us for more laughter and friendship. There’s always room at my table for one more; I keep the kettle on and warm scones on the back of the woodstove. Until we meet again, dear friend, be well and God bless.

Sincerely yours,

Emma Miller