The Lesson (19 page)

As soon as school let out for the day, M.K. went straight to visit Erma. She found her hanging laundry in the backyard. “Erma, why did you become a teacher?”

Erma continued to hang pillowcases on the line, gathering her thoughts. “I suppose it was because I had such a natural curiosity about people and things. I was always sticking my nose into other people’s business. I’ve always thought of teaching as being a little bit of a detective.”

Detective? Had M.K. heard Erma right? Did she say that teaching was like detective work? Her ears perked up.

“A good teacher has to hunt and dig to find the right way to reach each child—to give him a love of learning that will last his entire life.”

M.K.’s heart started to pound. “Erma, help me become a good teacher.”

Erma sat on the picnic bench and patted the place beside her. “What made Gideon Smucker such a good teacher for you?”

M.K. had to think that over. “He gave me extra math problems. He let me work ahead of my class. He brought me books he thought I would like.”

“So he challenged you.”

“Not just me. He made things interesting in the classroom. We didn’t always know what to expect.” She smiled. “Once, he had a handful of us meet at the schoolhouse at five in the morning, to watch the tail of a comet as it raced across the sky.” She sighed. “He was a marvelous teacher—the kind that every child remembers fondly for the rest of her life. That’s the kind of teacher I need to be, Erma. If I have to be stuck teaching, I want to be that kind of teacher.”

Erma nodded. “Teaching has its advantages and disadvantages. But there are golden moments, when you connect with a child.”

“But how do I do that?”

“Mary Kate, it begins when you try to see life through other people’s eyes.”

Erma went back to the business of hanging sheets on the clothesline, so M.K. joined her. She hung one blue-checked dish towel on the line, then another. She thought about each pupil, trying to imagine life through his or her eyes.

Anna Mae, she knew, mostly thought about marrying Danny Riehl. Barbara Jean wanted to be home, helping her mother with the new baby. She played dolls at every recess. What would it be like to see life through Danny Riehl’s eyes? He could do math problems in his head and he was the runner-up in yesterday’s eighth-grade spelling bee, even though he was only a sixth grader. The word that tripped him up was “Hallelujah.” When Danny heard the letter he forgot, he slapped his forehead with the palm of his hand. “Ooh . . . silent
J
! I forgot silent
J
.” She smiled at the memory of it. She reached down for another towel and realized she had emptied the basket.

“Which pupil do you worry about the most?” Erma asked.

That was easy for M.K. to answer. “There’s a boy, an eighth grader, who is smart as a whip, but I think he is having trouble reading. He tries to hide it, but he’s going to be graduating soon. And then what? I feel as if I have just six months to help him.”

“What’s he like?”

“His name is Eugene Miller. He’s a swarthy boy with a wiry build. He wins the sprint races on field day. He has an amazing talent for drawing.”

“So he has some things he’s good at.”

“Yes. He loves drawing and he loves getting attention even more.”

“In his own way, Eugene has found a way to get what he needs. I think he’ll do all right for himself.” Erma was observing a butterfly light on a white sheet, luffing in the wind. “I’ve found that it’s often the people who don’t call attention to themselves who have the most to offer.”

Jenny. That’s who M.K. thought of when Erma said that.

Amos grinned at the sight of watching Uncle Hank try to harness the horse to the buggy with four puppies nipping at his pants legs. He kept hopping around as if he were barefoot on live coals.

A few days ago, Edith had re-reconsidered her spurning of Hank after he came calling with Doozy and four puppies in tow. Now, Edith meant serious business and Hank had been moping around the farm ever since. Yesterday, he tried to find homes for the puppies. No luck, not even from softhearted Sadie, though he tried again last night. She told him that twin babies and four puppies would unhinge her fragile balance. Hank returned home with a forlorn look on
his face and four puppies in a cardboard box. Fern saw him coming up the porch steps and headed him off. She pointed toward his Dawdi Haas over the buggy shop.

Insulted, Hank spun around, muttering about women and their lack of understanding.

And then a happy surprise for Hank came late in the day. Edith Fisher had another change of heart. She still didn’t want Doozy or his offspring hanging around her chicken farm, but she did pardon Hank. She sent her son Jimmy over to Windmill Farm with a note saying that Hank was invited for supper on Sunday. The spring was back in Hank’s step.

It was amazing what a little romance did for a person.

10

M
.K. was surprised to see that Chris and Jenny Yoder were at church. They hadn’t attended before today, so she figured someone—like Bishop Elmo or Deacon Abraham—had put a little gentle pressure on them.

It had been almost a week since that unfortunate misunderstanding with the sheriff. And nobody blabbed. That was the incredible thing. It was touching—to think Chris and Jenny would protect her from embarrassment. So kind! So unexpected.

By now, if they were going to say anything, they would have. Wouldn’t they?

Ruthie’s father was the first minister to preach this morning. M.K. had her own rating system for sermons: “boring,” “boring boring,” and “boring boring boring.” Ruthie’s father consistently earned three borings. One thing about his sermons: if you were unclear about the point he emphasized, another would be along in a moment. Fern was forever telling her it wasn’t the preacher’s problem, it was the listener’s. “Hald die Ohre uff.”
Keep your ears open.

Fern poked her with her elbow in a warning to sit up and pay attention.

Fern! So ever-present.

M.K. glanced across the room at Chris. He sat next to her father, who had greeted him warmly. Amos Lapp had a knack for tending to fatherless young men. Sometimes, M.K. thought it was a pity he hadn’t had more sons. A houseful. Instead, he lived with a covey of women and he often seemed bewildered by them.

Chris’s Sunday clothes made him look blonder and taller and grown up. And handsome. He lifted his eyes from the hymnal and looked directly at her, as if he knew exactly what she was thinking. He smiled, and it hit her in the solar plexus. She bowed her head, breaking away from his gaze.

Chris had to bite on his lower lip to stop smiling when he caught Mary Kate Lapp gazing at him in church. She blushed becomingly, he noticed. He still couldn’t get over this was the teacher Jenny had been complaining about so bitterly. He was pleased to see Mary Kate had a full set of her own choppers. She didn’t wear cloppety shoes. She didn’t jiggle when she walked. And she was awfully far from being old.

Mary Kate was sitting next to a young mother with two red-headed twin babies—a boy and a girl. The young mother had a dreamy smile on her face and a faraway look in her eyes, as if she were listening to a pleasant conversation that only she could hear. She didn’t seem to notice that her little boy was teething and chewing on his shirt collar.

Speaking of teeth, Chris noticed that Jenny was sitting next to a little girl who was missing most of her front teeth. Jenny had talked about a cute little girl named Barbara Jean at school and he wondered if this might be her. He noticed that Barbara Jean kept sticking her tongue out, as if she was
continually surprised to find the teeth had gone missing. He was glad Jenny had someone to sit next to, but he wished she had a friend her own age. The older girls had clumped together before church like clotted cream. Not one included Jenny in the cluster. He had worried it would be a mistake to come this morning. He knew the hearts of these people—they would fuss over the two of them as if they were chicks without a mother hen. They would ask questions about where they came from and want to stop by the house with casseroles and baked goods. As tempting as a good meal sounded—and it really did sound good—it wasn’t enough to make him want to come to church and start joining into the community. Not quite yet. The whole notion of it worried him. If they could only lay low until January, when he turned twenty-one. But how could he have said no to the bishop? You just didn’t do that.

But then, while the church was singing the
LobLeid
, Chris was filled with a wonderful sense of worship. It felt good, so good, to be back in church. He breathed in the familiar smells of starch and soap and shoe blacking. He had missed it more than he realized. The worship. Reminders that God was sovereign over all. It wasn’t good to go too long without church.

The hymn ended and Amos Lapp, seated next to him, took back the hymnal and tucked it under the bench. Someday, in addition to the horse breeding business, Chris would like to have a farm of his own, just like Windmill Farm. Fields, orchards, livestock, bountiful vegetable garden. That was becoming his dream.

Amos had introduced Chris to some of the fellows who were close to his age. He wondered what their dream would be. Jimmy Fisher, he noticed, had an eye for the ponies. By
the barn this morning, he had already spotted Samson and asked Chris how fast he had been clocked. “I don’t know,” Chris said. “I’ve never raced him.”

Jimmy Fisher looked at him as if a cat had spoken. “Never raced him? Never?” He ran a hand down Samson’s foreleg. “I could do it for you.”

“Why?” Chris asked.

“Don’t you want to know how fast he could go?”

Chris shook his head. “No need.”

Jimmy Fisher was amazed.

Right then, Chris knew what Jimmy Fisher’s dream would be: Thrills.

Jimmy Fisher reached down to pat Doozy’s neck. It was warm from the sun. This dog was devoted to Mary Kate and followed her everywhere, even to church. Or maybe he was just trying to get away from those little pups that were constantly pulling his tail and chewing on his ears.

Jimmy had known M.K. just as long as he had known his own brother, essentially his entire life. He treated her like a younger sibling too. He had put a billy goat in the cherry orchard when she was picking cherries. She had let the air out of the tires of his hidden ten-speed bicycle. He had tossed a racer snake into the girls’ outhouse at school, knowing full well that she was inside. She had sprinkled water over his entire firecracker collection—just enough to make the gunpowder soft and ineffective. They raced their favorite buggy horses against each other. They were constantly competing, but it never meant a thing. They had a long history together—mostly as enemies, until one day when they put aside their feud and became friends. Good friends.

And now, suddenly, overnight, it had blossomed into love.

How to explain what happened? It was like a switch had flipped and in an instant the world had changed. His mind was racing.

M.K. had taken him along to a volleyball game and barbecue at the Eshes’ home last night, so that he could meet Emily, his future missus. At least that’s what he had assumed until he was actually introduced to Emily and tried to have a conversation with her. He was at his most charming, warm, and witty, thinking at first that she was just shy. Thirty minutes later, his charm had worn out. She had no sense of humor. None whatsoever. She took everything he said literally and tried to dissect it. “I don’t think that could have really happened” or “That sounds like a gross exaggeration.” It was like trying to talk to an IRS auditor.