“
Jah
, well your aunt and uncle gave me an earful, I can tell you!” Mamm retorted. “Beulah
Mae wasn’t one bit happy that you boys changed her plans, and I can’t say as I blame
her.”
Bram slipped into his usual seat on the couch, sighing inwardly. His parents and his
dat
’s mother, Mammi Essie, were all seated as though they were ready for the day’s reading
of the Christmas story, but the big Bible lay open on the table beside Dat, forgotten.
Had Uncle Abe called to inform them that he’d been sweet-talking Mary in the stable?
Hinting that he’d like to leave the Old Order church? Discussions like this one rubbed
him like a starched collar . . . made him even more ready to jump the fence. But this
wasn’t the time to express such opinions.
“Like I’ve said already, it wasn’t our intention to upset anybody,” Nate murmured.
“We were just having a little fun, and now we’ve come home to spend the rest of Christmas
Day with you. I’m sorry about this whole thing.”
“
Jah
, me, too,” Bram added with a sigh. Better to go along with his brother’s apology
and get their parents out of lecture mode. He saw no sign that Uncle Abe had informed
them of what he’d overheard—they would’ve been quick to bring that up—so it was better
not to stir the pot any more.
Bram listened dutifully as his father read the second chapter of Luke from the German
Bible. He went through the motions of contemplating the wonder of the Savior’s birth,
but truth be told, his thoughts had wandered back to Cedar Creek and the Coblentz
home. The girls would be helping Nell set the table by now, getting ready to celebrate
their eighteenth birthday at dinner. They would be serving up birthday cake and exchanging
Christmas gifts and no doubt the ten-year-old twins would keep things lively.
He sighed glumly. Such festivities sounded much more joyful than the rest of the day
in the Kanagy home would be. While he knew there was nothing to be done about it,
he sometimes wished he and Nate had other brothers and some sisters filling up their
table—and distracting their parents—the way most Plain families did.
Bram made his way through a big dinner of meat loaf, mashed potatoes, noodles with
caraway seeds, green bean casserole, and fresh rolls, and then topped it off with
a slice of his grandmother’s coconut pie and some of his
mamm
’s fudge and cookies. While he ate, he thought about the ham and ducks they’d be serving
in Cedar Creek . . . saw Mary and Martha’s flawless faces and blue-eyed smiles in
his mind. Were they making their birthday wishes by now as they blew out their candles?
Were they missing him and Nate, or had they been insulted by his invitation to come
away and work for him? Maybe they were fed up with Nate’s thin-skinned reason for
leaving, too.
“Guess I’d better tend to Felix,” Bram remarked after they ate. “I came right in,
rather than feeding him or brushing him down.”
As he shrugged into his barn coat and headed outside, he heard the kitchen door closing
behind him. Nate, too, had gotten away from the house, not in the mood to chat with
Dat or help Mamm and Mammi with the dishes.
“So why’d you come home?” his brother quizzed him. “And don’t tell me it was out of
loyalty to
me
.”
“It was nothin’ like that,” Bram assured him, but he didn’t want to admit that the
twins had shooed him off. “Why couldn’t you just play along with Mary and Martha’s
little game? Or find a more private way of sayin’ you were onto them?” he demanded.
“We had a
gut
thing going with those girls until you—”
“It’s no
gut
when somebody plays games with your heart and your best intentions. I’ll stick with
training horses, thanks,” Nate replied stiffly. “Horses at least listen to me and
respect my feelings.”
“You’re just sore because you joined the church sooner than you wanted, for a girl
who didn’t marry you. Get over it!”
“And you’ve got an
attitude
, Bram. You need to work on that.”
He was tired of hearing how many things he needed to work on—as though Nate were Mr.
Perfect with all the answers, when it came to girls. Bram entered the barn and dipped
out oats for Felix before working him over with the currycomb. It promised to be one
of the most disappointing Christmases ever, the way things were shaping up between
him and his brother. Maybe he should hitch Felix to his new buggy and look for better
company. If those two cute Coblentz sisters wanted nothing to do with him, he might
as well scout around . . .
Chapter Nine
“Hold it lower, or we’ll not get it through the doorway,” Mary grunted. She and Martha
were putting Jacob’s room back to rights, taking down the spare bed they’d assembled
for the Kanagy boys. “And don’t be pushing me down the stairs, either—unless
you
want to go first, and go backwards.”
“You’re already there, Mary. You go, girl,” Martha quipped as she gripped her end
of the bulky mattress. “This job was a lot easier with Nate and Bram doing the heavy
lifting.”
“You’ve got that right. Take it slow, now.”
Mary started cautiously down the stairs with her end of the mattress, bearing most
of the weight even though Martha was doing her best to hold it back. It would have
been
nice
if Owen and Noah had offered to do this, but their brothers had given them so much
grief about why their guests had left so suddenly that Mary hadn’t asked them to help.
It was the fitting end to a birthday that had dragged its feet since their guests
had left. At least hefting the pieces of the spare bed gave them something to do besides
sitting around, thinking about what they might have been enjoying had Bram and Nate
stayed.
In the front room, their
dat
looked up from the magazine he was reading. “Want some help with that?”
“No, thanks!” she replied.
“We’ve got it,” Martha joined in.
“I was looking forward to getting better acquainted with the Kanagy boys today,” he
remarked. “Nate’s made a
gut
name for himself—and a steady income—with his horse training. And Bram might be a
little wet behind the ears yet, but he’s got a fine future with his auctioneering.”
“
Jah
, they’ve found work that’ll make them welcome in Plain settlements anywhere,” their
mother remarked as she looked up from her quilt frame. “And they come from a respected
family, too.”
“Bet Bram’s already got himself another girlfriend,” Joanna remarked as she focused
on her embroidery. “You can bet
I
wouldn’t have packed his bag for him!”
Mary rolled her eyes at her sister and kept moving through the front room toward the
door to the basement. They eased down the stairway, with Martha going first this time.
After they leaned the mattress against the storeroom wall, where they’d already placed
the box springs, they paused to catch their breath.
“If I hear one more time about how wonderful-
gut
the Kanagy boys are—”
“
Jah
, you’d think we sent away a couple of long-lost sons.”
“—and if Joanna makes one more smart remark, I might just smack her!”
Martha heaved a sigh. “You have to admit they were fun while they lasted. And pretty
cute, too, each in his own way.”
“But we’d be in hot water up to our eyeballs if we went along with Bram’s big ideas,”
Mary whispered. Then her lips curved. “At least he has a plan, though . . . a dream
for his future. Can’t say that about any of the boys here in Cedar Creek—leastways,
not the ones our age.”
“
Jah
, and it’s too bad about Nate getting the cold shoulder from his fiancée. If we’d
had any idea how upset he’d be by us switching around . . .” Martha sighed as she
took a piece of gum from her apron pocket.
Mary shrugged, feeling more disappointed with each passing moment. “I was really looking
forward to Second Christmas tomorrow . . . spending all day out and around with those
boys. But this wishful thinking’s not getting the rest of that bed down here.”
Together they carried the pieces of the bed frame, and when they’d covered everything
with an old sheet to keep it from getting dusty, they returned to Owen and Noah’s
room. Tearing down the rollaway bed Jacob had bunked in was simpler, because they
stored it in a hall closet for when cousins and other kin came to visit.
“It’s probably time to help Mamma set the table for supper,” Mary remarked as they
finished straightening Jacob’s room.
“
Jah
, but I’ll be thinking about how much food Bram and Nate would’ve tucked away—”
“And having them there at dinner when we blew out our candles would’ve been special,
ain’t so?” Mary asked in a tiny voice. “We’re sounding like the folks, going on and
on about what nice fellows they were.”
“Well, they
are
nice. We all just said and did some things that didn’t go over so
gut
,” Martha replied. “And who wouldn’t get their hopes up, looking forward to some fun
with them? I can’t think they really
wanted
to head home . . .”
“Puh! Would you listen to us having a pity party instead of celebrating our birthday?”
Mary leaned closer to Martha, keeping her voice low as an idea bubbled up inside her.
“What’s to stop us from going to Willow Ridge? Isn’t Second Christmas supposed to
be for having fun and visiting?”
“You mean, just drive on over there? To surprise them?”
“Why not?” Mary grinned, grabbing her sister’s arm. “I’m thinking Nate and Bram’ll
be real glad to see us. And if we apologize first thing—”
“
Jah
, it’ll be the best chance we have to clear the air,” Martha said, her voice rising
with excitement. “Really hate to leave things the way they are.”
“But not a word about this to anybody else.”
“Oh no, I’m not listening to any more remarks about the Kanagy boys leaving—”
“Or about how only loose, wayward girls would go chasing after them,” Mary said with
a decisive nod. She was grinning from ear to ear, just like her sister. “Let’s box
up some cookies to take along.”
“
Jah
, never hurts to sweeten the deal. And if we pack some clothes tonight, we can get
out of here before anybody else is out of bed. It’s the best way.”
“We can write Mamma a note so she won’t worry about us.”
Martha let out a short laugh. “She can always call our cells. But by the time she
thinks to do that, we’ll be having ourselves a
gut
time in Willow Ridge!”
“I like it! We’re going!”
When the mantel clock downstairs chimed four, Martha gave up on trying to sleep. As
she began to wind her hair into a bun, Mary slipped into the dress she’d laid out
last night. They rose so often before the sun that grooming in the dark came as second
nature. Their whispered giggles were the only noise they made as they slid their duffels
out from under their made-up beds. Down the stairs they went in their stocking feet,
missing the squeaky spots from years of practice. Mary laid the note to Mamma on the
kitchen counter, and then the two of them slipped into their leather sneakers, coats,
and bonnets. Out they went, as silent and light as two snowflakes.
As a team they hitched Taffy to the enclosed buggy they shared with Noah. When they’d
loaded the cookie box and their duffels, Martha slid inside and took the reins. “Geddap,
Taffy,” she said, thankful that their mare seemed as excited about this adventure
as they were despite the early hour. After Mary slid the barn door shut she, too,
climbed in.
Once they were on the road, they stopped holding their breath. Mary grabbed Martha
around the shoulders. “Oh, this is so much fun!”
“
Jah
, we’ve never tried the likes of
this
before!” Martha replied gleefully. “Bram made a
gut
point when he said we should get out and see something of the world during our
rumspringa
.”
“And it’s not like the parents don’t approve of him and Nate,” Mary pointed out. “Not
like we’re running wild, without a set destination, either.”
Martha followed the county road between the Cedar Creek Mercantile and Graber’s Custom
Carriages, and on beyond the grain elevator at the edge of town. As they passed through
LaPlata, the first glimmers of pink glowed along the horizon. She steered Taffy east
onto another county blacktop and settled back into the seat. “Now isn’t that a pretty
sight, seeing the sun rise behind these farms and pastures?” she said. “Most mornings
we don’t see past our own fences—”
“Or beyond the kitchen sink,” Mary remarked.
“—and we have no idea what goes on in the rest of the world. It’s all well and
gut
for me to help out around home while you’re baking for Beulah Mae—”
“But who knows what we’ve been missing?” Mary said as she peered eagerly at the farms
they were passing in the early morning light. “Sometimes boys get a lot different
picture of things before they marry and start families. I’m really glad we’re doing
this, Sister. It’s
gut
to find out we can take care of ourselves beyond Cedar Creek.”
Wasn’t it wonderful to chitchat this way, just the two of them? Martha had so rarely
left home on Second Christmas, except to go visiting with her entire family, that
this adventure with only her twin was a real treat. “What do you suppose Nate and
Bram will say when we pull into their lane?” she asked. “I can’t wait to see their
faces when we knock on their door.”
“And what do you suppose they’ll want to do once we sweeten them up with cookies and
convince them we really, truly like them?” Mary gazed through the windshield at the
snowy fields now glistening with the sunrise. “Of course, we’ll have to stop at a
house somewhere when we get to Willow Ridge, to ask where they live. No sense in driving
around half the day, trying to guess.”
“
Jah
, there’s that.” Martha laughed. “But we won’t be like boys that way. We
will
ask for directions!”
On they drove, through LaPlata and a few other settlements that were too small to
be considered towns. Taffy was trotting along, tossing her head and enjoying the brisk
morning. The
clip-clop! clip-clop!
of her hooves punctuated their ideas about what they might enjoy doing with Nate
and Bram today. When they fell quiet for a moment, however, Martha wondered if they
hadn’t already passed the farmstead on the left, with its old gray silos and low-slung
barns . . . or did a lot of places in central Missouri look much the same as those
in Cedar Creek? She didn’t think she’d backtracked . . . yet as she saw an intersection
coming up, she felt a rumbling in her stomach that had nothing to do with hunger.
“Um . . . which way do you suppose we ought to go at this crossroads?” she asked.
Mary blinked. She studied the horses in the nearest pasture as though they might have
the right answer. “I haven’t the foggiest idea, Sister,” she finally admitted. “Guess
we were so excited about this trip, it didn’t occur to me we’d never been to Willow
Ridge.”
“Oh, we’ve gone through there—I recall seeing the café where the boys said they eat
nearly every morning. But I wasn’t driving then, so I wasn’t paying attention to road
signs.” Martha drove on for a bit, searching her mind for a logical solution to this
problem as she studied the passing countryside. “But we know it’s south and west of
Cedar Creek, so if we keep heading away from the sun—”
“Or we keep the sun to our left side,” Mary continued, gesturing toward the glow in
the clear, crystal blue sky.
“—we’ll be on a
gut
road. Then when we see somebody out choring or driving, we can ask them.”
“Works for me.”
They rolled along the snow-packed county highway for another ten minutes . . . or
was it twenty? Or only five? Martha shifted in the seat, becoming more aware that
they didn’t know for sure they were on the best route to Willow Ridge. “How about
you grab me a cookie or two out of your box, Mary?”
“I was just thinking the same thing.”
“Then maybe you ought to call Bram and ask the best way to get there,” Martha said
with a sigh. “It’ll let our cat out of the bag, but there’s no sense wandering lost
on roads that won’t take us where we want to go.”
Mary fumbled in the plastic bin at her feet. She placed a napkin between them on the
seat and then chose a couple of turtle brownies and two frosted sugar cookies. She
jammed an angel cookie into her mouth. “
Gut
thing I thought to get Bram’s—oh, my stars!”
Martha cried out, too, as the front wheel struck something hard. Their cookies flew
to the floor as the buggy lurched toward the ditch. “Whoa, Taffy! Easy now, girl,”
she called to the mare.
Her heart was pounding frantically now. Here they were, out in the middle of nowhere,
with no other vehicles in sight, and when she hopped out of the buggy she saw that
the rim and two spokes of the wooden wheel had broken. “Well, we’ve got to call somebody
now, for sure and for certain,” she said in a high, tight voice. “Can’t go any farther
with a wheel like that—and there’s the chunk of ice we hit wrong,” she said as she
pointed to the offending gray lump in the road.
“Oh, Martha . . . Dat’s going to be so angry at us.”
“Well, we’re not calling
him
! Besides, if nobody’s in the barn at home or checking the phone by the road, we might
sit here forever.” Martha fought for reason, determined not to cry.
“I’m not inclined to call Noah’s cell, either,” Mary remarked as she fished her phone
from her coat pocket. “He’ll be mad at us for taking the buggy, as it is. Sure hope
there’s a
gut
cell signal out this way.”
With a shaky sigh, Martha got back into the buggy, out of the wind. She watched her
twin’s fingers dance around the number pad, noting gratefully that she had three strong
bars of signal.
“Come on now, Bram,” Mary prayed aloud as she listened to his phone ringing. “You
always keep your phone close—
jah
, Bram?” she said in a louder, perkier voice. “Well, you’ll just never guess who this
is, or uh, why I’m calling you.”