The Wings of Morning (20 page)

The driver stopped smiling. He felt the
americain
was almost ready to come to blows with him. They were a rough and ready bunch, always looking for a fight. He changed his tone of voice. “
Pardonnez-moi, monsieur
. You will need to transfer to another transport in Paris. I am not sure where you are heading exactly, but the front is hours away from our great city and many of the
americain
squadrons are south of us.”

Jude was humiliated by his burst of temper.
I am still Amish and a Christian
, he reminded himself,
whether I am heading into a war zone or to a café in Paris
. The two men did not speak for the rest of the trip. The mist from England and the channel was gone and a blue April sky had been spread over them by the sun. Birds swooped in front of their vehicle. Green fields and hedges gleamed in the light. It was beautiful, and except for an occasional military convoy or group of soldiers Jude would have had no idea he was getting closer to the battle lines.

The driver dropped him off at some sort of gathering point for Americans in Paris. He was told by a young man with an accent as thick as creamed honey that he would have to wait. Did he want a book? A coffee? Jude said no to the book and yes to the coffee, taking it outside and settling down on the steps to watch the Paris traffic as well as the men, women, and soldiers cramming the streets. After a while he began to reread Lyyndaya’s letter. He smiled again as he read the part where she said,
And if I did fall in love with you, how would it be any different from the way I feel about you now? Would my heart race a little faster? Would I get goose bumps when I heard you call my name? Would I have trouble keeping myself from taking you and your mop of brown hair into my arms? Well, all those things are happening now anyway, so what will be the difference—can you tell me?

Jude heard his name called, and he quickly folded the letter and tucked it back in his pocket. He was quickly herded into a truck with five other fliers and two American drivers. The truck banged and snorted east, the drivers warning the pilots they would not get to their aerodromes anytime soon. Jude pulled out Lyyndaya’s letter and began to read it again.

“Where are we headed?” asked a youth with flaming red hair sitting beside Jude. “Is it a state secret or something?”

“Nope. A placed called Nancy.” A pilot facing them yawned. “It’s a couple of hundred miles away. Betcha they pull over and snooze for the night once it’s dark.” He glanced at Jude. “Whatcha got there, sport? Letter from your girl?”

“Are you talking to me?” Jude looked up from the pages.

“Don’t see no one else with a letter.”

“She’s—a friend.”

“Sure. A friend. We all like gals that are friends.”

The others laughed.

Jude felt the heat in his face. “Well, I’m telling you the truth. No one is talking about marriage yet. I like the wisdom in her letters.”

The man stared at Jude in mock disbelief, his mouth open in an exaggerated way, his eyes popping. “You like her
wisdom
? Are you kidding me?”

“Look, she is a friend, nothing more than that.”

“Nothing more, huh? Say, you got a funny accent. Where you from? Berlin?”

“Knock it off,” growled an older and muscular man with a thick black mustache. “He’s an American. That’s all that matters. Where’s home, kid?”

“Pennsylvania,” Jude responded, as if he were speaking with one of the Amish elders.

“A good place. The North won the war in Pennsylvania. You ever been down to Gettysburg?”

“Once when I was seven or eight.”

“I got to get to it after this French fracas. Granddaddy fought there. Lost a lung, but he never regretted the wound. Said the United States was made there more than it was made at Lexington or Concord.”

As rough as the ride was, as the day dragged on and night fell, each of them dropped off. Jude thought he never slept, but over and over again he kept jerking awake and snapping his head up, Lyyndaya’s letter still clutched in his fingers as if it were diamonds or gold. Once he sat straight quickly and stared about him in a bewildered way, his mind racing. The older man with the thick mustache grunted.

“That got your attention. See out the back?”

Jude saw only blackness. Then it lit up as if it was on fire. After several moments it went dark. Then flared up again. A loud grumbling reached his ears.

“Looks like a lightning storm is coming this way,” he said.

The older man grunted again. “There’s a storm all right, but it’s not coming to us, we’re going to it. An artillery barrage, kid. Ours, theirs, who knows? But I been watching us get closer and closer. That’s to the west and north of us, that’s why we can see it even though we’re looking out the back of the truck. We must be right on top of the lines by now.”

“What time is it?” someone asked.

“Three,” answered another voice.

The next flash made the backs of Jude’s hands yellow. The pages of Lyyndaya’s letter were sharp and clear.

“You could read by that,” said the man with the mustache. “Why don’t you give us something, kid? Nothing that’s personal, keep that to yourself. Just something to cheer a fellow up that’s a long way from home.”

The flashes were getting stronger and brighter and the roar of the explosions coming to their ears sooner. Jude glanced at the men around him in the glare and all of them were looking at him with faces that were tired, lonely and, meeting his gaze, hopeful. Then it went black.

“All right,” he said.

The next burst of light lasted fifteen or twenty seconds. His eyes fell on the page in his hand, the ink smeared by the Channel spray from the day before.

“
This is what I pray
,” he read out loud, “
that you may be safe, that you may be well, that no harm may come to you or those you call your friends, that the war may end soon, that by this Christmas of 1918 you will be home among those who love you and standing at the table, carving the roast goose, laughing and thanking God for every breath you take
.”

L
yyndaya heard Bishop Zook’s voice calling to his horse—“whoa”—and came down the stairs to open the door with her mother and father. The April sun was setting in purples and reds behind him.

“
Guten Abend
,” the bishop said. “I’m sorry it’s so late. May I come in?”

“
Ja, ja
,” Lyyndaya’s father said. “Come.”

They all took seats around the kitchen table as Mama brought coffee with milk and sugar and placed it by the bishop’s hand.

“
Danke
,” the large man said with a nod. “So is Ruth here as well?”

“I have put her to bed early with a fever,” replied her mother. “She has not been well since breakfast.”

“I’m sorry to hear it. I will pray for her before I leave.” He sipped at his coffee and his eyes fell on Lyyndaya. “But Lyyndy is here. That is good.” He looked at her father. “The Holsteins are fine?”

“
Ja
.”

Then he met her mother’s eyes. “And the other children? The boys? The girl?”

Her nodded. “
Gute, danke
. Luke is in the barn rubbing down the horses. I can fetch him.”

The bishop lifted a hand. “Luke need not be here.” He took more of his coffee then set the cup down and looked around at them, his eyes sad but firm.

Lyyndaya knew what was coming.

“Sometimes we make such an announcement at the church gathering,” he began. “This time I felt it best to speak with each family in turn. I have been to see Mr. Whetstone. Next, after him, I knew I must come here.” He looked down at his coffee cup a moment. “The
English
do not understand these things. Our neighbors think us harsh and cruel when we pronounce the
Meidung
. Yet they quarrel and have lawsuits and will break off friendships, even with family members, for a lifetime. They have their own
Meidungs
, hm? Only they turn a cold shoulder, as they say, for years even, without ever giving the person who has been cut off an opportunity to say they are sorry, to come back. Sometimes, even if these persons say they are sorry, they still are not permitted to a return to a church or a business or even their family.”

He lifted his eyes to Lyyndaya. “It is not that way with us. We ask a person to repent. If they do, if they stop the wrongful behavior, that is enough. So far as the east is from the west, so far is the taint of sin removed from them by the cross of Jesus Christ. For us, and for God, it is as if it has never been. We bring it up no more and do not permit it to be held against them in the church or among the Lapp Amish. This the
English
rarely do.”

He quietly asked for a refill of his cup. Once Lyyndaya’s mother had poured the coffee and returned to her seat, he resumed his talk.

“I promised the leadership we would deal with this after Easter. Well, Easter, as you know, was at the end of March and more than two weeks have gone by.
Who knows?
I thought. Perhaps Jude would send us a letter. Perhaps he would show up at the door. Maybe we would hear he has been arrested by the army for refusing to fly an aeroplane and shoot down other men. But there has been nothing. When I made inquiries as to his whereabouts, military officials told me he had left England and been assigned to an aerodrome in eastern France, right at the front. ‘What sort of squadron,’ I asked. ‘Reconnaissance?’” He shook his head. “They stared at me as if I had grown a horse’s head and said, ‘Of course it is a fighter squadron, sir. A pursuit squadron. Americans are anxious to see their boys perform well in aerial combat like the great French and British and German aces.’” The bishop lifted his cup to his lips and drank. “Even our good Canadian neighbors have many men who fly and kill. So of course we cannot be seen as second-best.”

“Jude is to be shunned,” Lyyndaya blurted, suddenly tired of the long buildup to the inevitable.

The bishop nodded.

“But what if he repents?” she asked, almost desperately. “What if he returns from the war and says he is sorry?”

“I have told you. We welcome him back. He is forgiven as we are all forgiven in Christ.”

“What about Pastor Miller? Or Pastor King? They are very angry with Jude. What if they do not forgive?”

“They must forgive.
Forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors
.”

“But if they do not—”

“Hush, daughter,” soothed her mother, putting a hand over her daughter’s. “They are good Christian men. They know what it means to live the life of following Jesus.”

Bishop Zook nodded. “
Ja
, they know. But there is something I must explain. You came here after the Spanish–American war. It was in 1898. Lyyndaya, you were not even born. Twenty years have gone by. Yet the Kings and Millers cannot forget they lost family in that terrible war. America brags about her great victories. The Millers and Kings lost sons and brothers. They have nothing to brag about.”

Lyyndaya’s father sat up. “I knew nothing of this.”

“It is not spoken about. As I say, it has been twenty years.”

“But were these family members not part of the Amish faith?”

“Some were—but they left us and chose to fight. Others had struck out on their own. A few were living in Philadelphia. A few in Pittsburgh. One of Pastor King’s brothers was in Florida, very close to Cuba. Patriotic fervor was running very high at the time. As it is now.”

“So they—” Lyyndaya began and stopped.

“The pain is always with the Kings and Millers,” the bishop said to her.

Her father cleared his throat. “Do you not think it strange, Bishop Zook, that Jude Whetstone should do this? Enlist? Go to war?”

The bishop’s eyes seemed to droop. “I do.”

“Does it not sometimes occur to you that we do not know the whole story?”

The bishop shrugged. “I have spoken with my son. And not just my son, but all the other young men. It is the same. They believe the harsh treatment altered his thinking. Hardened him. So that suddenly he felt the way to follow God was to fight for America’s freedom. Though what a European war has to do with our country’s liberty has never been satisfactorily explained to me.”

“Don’t you—sometimes wonder—if there is something we do not know?” pressed Lyyndaya’s father hesitantly.

The bishop sat back in his chair and hooked his thumbs in the suspenders under his dark jacket. He glanced up at the ceiling. “
Ja, ja
,” he seemed to say to himself. “But what?”