The Amish Nanny

HARVEST HOUSE PUBLISHERS

EUGENE, OREGON

Scripture quotations are taken from The Holy Bible, New International Version
^®
NIV
^®
. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.
^™
Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

Cover by Garborg Design Works, Savage, Minnesota

Cover photos © Chris Garborg; Bigstock/Denis Pepin

The authors are represented by MacGregor Literary.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the authors' imaginations or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or to events or locales, is entirely coincidental.

 

 

 

THE AMISH NANNY

Copyright © 2011 by Mindy Starns Clark and Leslie Gould
Published by Harvest House Publishers
Eugene, Oregon 97402
www.harvesthousepublishers.com

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Clark, Mindy Starns.

The Amish nanny / Mindy Starns Clark and Leslie Gould.

p. cm. — (The women of Lancaster County ; bk. 2)

ISBN 978-0-7369-3861-7 (pbk.)

ISBN 978-0-7369-4160-0 (ebook)

1. Amish—Fiction. 2. Nannies—Fiction. 3. Lancaster County (Pa.)—Fiction. I. Gould, Leslie. II. Title.

PS3603.L366A85 2011

813'.6—dc22

2011007092

All rights reserved.
No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means—electronic, mechanical, digital, photocopy, recording, or any other—except for brief quotations in printed reviews, without the prior permission of the publisher.

Printed in the United States of America

11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 / LB-SK / 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

Contents

Acknowledgments

Prologue

One

Two

Three

Four

Five

Six

Seven

Eight

Nine

Ten

Eleven

Twelve

Thirteen

Fourteen

Fifteen

Sixteen

Seventeen

Eighteen

Nineteen

Twenty

Twenty-One

Twenty-Two

Twenty-Three

Twenty-Four

Twenty-Five

Twenty-Six

Twenty-Seven

Twenty-Eight

Twenty-Nine

Thirty

Thirty-One

Thirty-Two

Thirty-Three

Thirty-Four

Thirty-Five

Thirty-Six

Thirty-Seven

Thirty-Eight

Thirty-Nine

Forty

Epilogue

Discussion Questions

About the Authors

Other Books by Mindy Starns Clark

Other Books by Harvest House

AmishReader.com

If I rise on the wings of the dawn,
if I settle on the far side of the sea,
even there your hand will guide me,
Your right hand will hold me fast.

P
SALM
139:9-10

Mindy thanks

My husband, John, for love, support, advice, brainstorming, editing, creating, sharing, and more. From beginning to end, I could never get through the book-creating process—nor, indeed, through life—without you!

My daughters, Emily and Lauren. Whether here at home or away at college, you are both always there with me every step of the way.

Author Sicily Yoder for clarification and advice on the Amish, and Aaron Jarvis for help with the German language. Any errors are purely mine.

Vanessa Thompson, Stephanie Ciner, Kendell Weland, Brian and Tracey Akamine, Brad and Tracie Hall, and Fanus and Mariette Smith.

Leslie thanks

Peter, Kaleb, Taylor, Hana, and Thao Gould for their love, support, and encouragement; my siblings, Kathy Fink, Kelvin Egger, and Laurie Snyder; and my father, Bruce Egger.

Libby Salter and Taylor Cavestri for input in the early stages of the story.

Tim and Leslie Boettcher for sharing their expertise on traveling in Europe (any inaccuracies are mine), and my cousin Robert Germann for his hospitality in Switzerland years ago. That trip was vividly in my mind through the development of this story, especially the scene in the castle in Thun (although I took some liberties with the timeline of that historical site).

Mindy and Leslie thank

Our agent, Chip MacGregor, for his vision; our editor, Kim Moore, for her dedication; and the exceptional folks at Harvest House Publishers for giving such care and attention to every detail of the publishing process.

Also, thanks to Dave Siegrist for his expertise; the Mennonite Information Center in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, for their invaluable resources; and Erik Wesner, author of amishamerica.com, for his insightful view of the Amish.

T
he mailbox was hot, so I yanked the door open and gingerly fished my hand around inside, pulling out three identical square envelopes. That was all. My heart sank. I'd been hoping for a big packet, one containing the acceptance letter and related information about the teaching job at the new school a district away, in Willowcrest.

Teaching was what I wanted to do, and though my acceptance hadn't yet been made official, the president of the school board had already assured me that the position was mine. I knew I had the rest of the summer to get ready, but I'd been so excited after he told me that I had come straight home and started planning lessons and activities for my future scholars. I'd also subscribed to
Blackboard Bulletin
and had even made arrangements to attend my first teacher training class. All that was left now was to receive the official confirmation from the school board. Instead, the mailbox held just three little envelopes, one addressed to my grandmother, one to my parents, and one to me:
Miss Ada Rupp
.

My disappointment quickly evaporated once I realized these were from my sister, Lexie. Her Oregon address was on the back, printed in fancy lettering near the top. Slipping my index finger under the flap, I carefully opened it and pulled out the contents: cream-colored paper tied with a pink ribbon to a larger, dark-brown card.

An invitation.

Standing there at the mailbox beside the empty highway, my eyes skimmed the elegant printing on the front. It read:

T
HE HONOR OF YOUR PRESENCE
I
S REQUESTED
A
T THE MARRIAGE OF

Alexandra Clarissa Jaegar

T
O

James Patrick Nolan

T
HE FIFTEENTH OF
A
UGUST
A
T THE FAMILY FARM OF THE BRIDE
3214 O
RCHARD
R
OAD
A
URORA,
O
REGON