Miriam's Heart (2 page)

Miriam looked at him, her eyes wide with hope. “It will be all right, won’t it, Charley?”

“God willing,” he said.

“It’s John,” Anna exclaimed. “He’s getting out of the truck with his bag.”

Great,
Charley thought. It would have to be John and not his uncle Albert. He sighed. He supposed that John knew his trade. He’d saved the Beachys’ Jersey cow when everyone had given it up for dead. But once the Mennonite man got here, Miriam would have eyes only for John with his fancy education and his English clothes. Whenever John was around, he and Miriam put their heads together and talked like they were best friends.

“John must have been close by. Maybe it’s a good sign.” Miriam looked at him earnestly.

“Ya,”
he agreed, without much enthusiasm. He knew that it was uncharitable to put his own jealousy before the lives of her beloved horses.
“Ya,”
he repeated. “It’s lucky he came so quick.”
Lucky for Molly and Blackie,
he thought ruefully,
but maybe not for me.

H
e’d witnessed a true blessing today, Charley thought as he watched John bandaging Blackie’s hind leg. Both animals had needed stitches and Molly had several deep cuts, but neither horse had suffered a broken bone. Between the sedative the young vet had administered and the help of neighbors, they’d been able to get the team back to the barn where they now stood in fresh straw in their stalls.

Charley had to admit that John knew what he was doing. He was ashamed of his earlier reluctance to have him come to the Yoder farm. With God’s help, both animals would recover. Even the sight of Miriam standing so close to John, listening intently to his every word, didn’t trouble Charley much. It was natural that Miriam would be worried about her horses and John was a very good vet. Reading anything more into it was his own insecurity. After all, John wasn’t Amish; he didn’t have a chance with Miriam. She would never choose a husband outside her faith.

Since she was a child, Miriam had had a gift for healing animals. When his Holstein calf had gotten tangled in a barbed wire fence, it had been ten-year-old Miriam who’d come every afternoon to rub salve on the calf’s neck while he held it still. Later that year, she’d helped his mother deliver twin lambs in a snowstorm, and the following summer Miriam had set a broken leg on his brother’s goat. More than one neighbor called on Miriam instead of the vet for trouble with their animals. Some men in the community seemed to forget she was a girl and asked her advice before they bought a cow or a driving horse.

If Miriam had been born English, Charley supposed that she might have gone to college to study veterinary medicine herself, but their people didn’t believe in that much schooling. For the Old Order Amish, eighth grade was the end of formal education. He’d been glad to leave school at fourteen, but for Miriam, it had been a sacrifice. She had a hunger to know more about animal doctoring, so it was natural that she and John would find a lot to talk about.

“I think we can fix the hay wagon, but a good third of the hay is wet through.”

“What?” Startled, Charley turned to see Eli standing beside him. He’d been so busy thinking about Miriam that he hadn’t even heard Eli enter the barn.

“The hay wagon,” Eli repeated. He glanced at John and Miriam and then cut his eyes at Charley, but he kept talking. “Front and back wheel on the one side need replacing, as well as some broken boards, but the axles are sound. We should be able to make it right in a few hours.”

Eli was sharp and not just with crafting wood. Charley could tell that he hadn’t missed the ease between Miriam and the Mennonite boy, or Charley’s unease at their friendship.

“Right.” Charley nodded. Eli was his friend and Ruth’s intended. Charley had been working on the foundation for their new house today. Otherwise, he wouldn’t have been at the Yoder place and close enough to reach Miriam when the accident happened.
God’s mysterious ways,
he thought, and then said to Eli, “Maybe we can get together some night after chores.”

“Ya,”
Eli agreed with a twinkle in his eye. “No problem.”

“I don’t know what we would have done without you,” Miriam said to John as he opened the stall door for her. “When the hay wagon overturned, I was so afraid…”

Charley could hear the emotion in her voice. It made him want to walk over to her and put his arms around her. It made him want to protect her from anything bad that could ever happen to her. Instead, he stood there, feeling like a bumpkin, listening in on her and John’s conversation.

“You didn’t panic. That’s the most important thing with horses,” John said, speaking way too gently to suit Charley. “It’s a good thing you didn’t try to get them up without help. It could have been a lot worse if I hadn’t been able to sedate them.”

I’m the one who told Miriam to wait,
Charley wanted to remind them.
That was my decision.
But again, he didn’t say what he was thinking. He knew he was being petty and that pettiness could eat a man up inside. How did the English refer to jealousy? A green-eyed monster?

Miriam looked over toward Charley, noticed him watching them and smiled, making his heart do a little flip. Why hadn’t he ever noticed how sweet her smile was?

“You were there when I needed you, too,” she said. “I was so scared. One of them could have been killed.”

I was terrified, but for you more than the horses. It seemed like it took an hour for me to run across the field to see if you were hurt.
The words caught in his throat. He couldn’t spit them out, not in front of John and Eli. Usually, he had no trouble giving his opinion, flirting with girls, cracking jokes, being good-natured Charley, everybody’s friend. But not today…today he was as tongue-tied as Irwin.

He couldn’t tear his eyes away from Miriam. She was wearing a modest blue dress now, a properly starched
kapp
and a clean white apron. As soon as they’d gotten the horses out of the creek and headed back toward the barn, her sisters had rushed her to the house to put on dry clothes. The blue suited her. It was almost the color of a robin’s egg, without the speckles. Her red hair was freshly-combed and braided, pinned up and mostly hidden under her
kapp,
but he couldn’t help remembering how it had looked in the sunlight.

This morning, he’d been a bachelor, with no more thoughts of tying himself down in marriage any time soon than trying to fly off the barn roof. He’d certainly known that he’d have to get serious in a few years, and start a family, but not yet. He had years of running around to do yet—lots of girls to tease and frolics to enjoy. Now, in the time it took that wagon to overturn, his life had changed direction. After seeing Miriam this way today, he realized that what mattered most to him was winning her hand and having the right to watch her take her
kapp
off and brush out that red-gold hair every night.

Unconsciously, he tugged his wide-brimmed straw hat lower on his forehead, hoping no one would notice his embarrassment, but Miriam didn’t miss a trick. She reached up and pressed her hand to his cheek. The touch of her palm sent a jolt through him, and he jumped back, heat flashing under his skin. He was certain it made him look even more the fool.

“Charley Byler, what’s wrong with you?” she demanded. “You’re red as a
banty
rooster. And your clothes are still soaked. Are you taking a chill? You’d best come up to the house, and drink some hot coffee.”

“Can’t.” He backed off as if she were contagious. He couldn’t take the chance she’d touch him again. Not here. Not in front of the Mennonite. “Got to pick up Mary,” he said in a rush. “Thursdays. In Dover.” Every Thursday, his sister cleaned house for an English woman and his mother depended on him to bring her home. “She’ll be expecting me.”

“I forgot,” Miriam said. “That’s too bad. Mam and Anna are cooking an early supper, since we all missed our noon meal. I think they’ve been cooking since Mam got home from school. She wanted me to invite you and John to join us for fried chicken and dumplings. You’re welcome to bring Mary, too.”

“Ne.”
He pushed his hat back. “Guess we’ll get home to evening chores.”

Shadows were lengthening in the big barn, but Miriam could read the disappointment on his face. She could tell he wanted to have dinner with them, so why didn’t he just come back after he picked up his sister? She didn’t know what was going on with Charley, but she could tell something was bothering him. She’d known him long enough to know that look on his face.

“Another time for certain,” Charley said, and fled the barn.

“Ya,”
she called after him. “Another time.”

“Well, since Charley can’t come, maybe there’s room for me at the table,” Eli said.

She folded her arms, turning to him. “I didn’t think I had to invite you. You’re family. I bet Ruth’s already set a plate for you.” She smiled and he smiled back. Miriam was so happy for Ruth. Eli really did love her, and despite his rocky start in the community, he was going to make a good husband to her.

“Good,” Eli said, “because I’ve worked up such an appetite pulling those horses out of the creek, that I can eat my share and Charley’s, too.”

Eli lived with his uncle Roman and aunt Fannie near the chair shop where he worked as a cabinetmaker, but since he and Ruth had declared their intentions, he ate in the Yoder kitchen more evenings than not.

Miriam looked back at John expectantly. “Supper?”

“I don’t want to impose on your mother.” John knelt beside a bale of straw and closed up his medical case. “Uncle Albert is picking up something at the deli for—”

“You may as well give in,” Miriam interrupted. She rested one hand on her hip. “Mam won’t let you off the farm until she’s stuffed you like a Christmas turkey. We’re all grateful you came so quickly.”

John picked up the chest. “Then, I suppose I should stay. I wouldn’t want to upset Hannah.”

She chuckled, surprised he actually accepted her invitation, but pleased. She knew that he rarely got a home-cooked meal since he’d come to work with his grandfather and uncle in their veterinary practice. None of the three bachelors could cook. When he stopped by her stand at Spence’s, the auction and bazaar where they sold produce and baked goods twice a week, he always looked longingly at the lunch she brought from home. Sometimes, she took pity on him and shared her potato salad, peach pie, or roast beef sandwiches.

Blackie thrust his head over the stall door and nudged her, hay falling from his mouth. Miriam stroked his neck. “You’ve had a rough day, haven’t you, boy?” She took a sugar cube out of her apron pocket and fed it to him, savoring the warmth of his velvety lips against her hand. Then she walked back to check on Molly. The dapple-gray was standing, head down dejectedly, hind foot in the air, unwilling to put any weight on it. That was the hoof that she’d been treating for a stone bruise for the last week, and the thing that concerned John the most. He was afraid that the accident would now make the problem worse.

“Do you think I should stay with her tonight?” Miriam asked, fingering one of her
kapp
ribbons.

“Nothing more you can do now.” John moved to her side and looked at Molly. “She needs time for that sedative to wear off and then I can get a better idea of how much pain she’s in. I’ll come back and check on her again before I leave and I’ll stop by tomorrow. I need to see that the two of them are healing and I want to keep an eye on that hoof.”

“Supper’s ready!” Ruth pushed open the top of the Dutch door. “And bring your appetites. Mam and Anna have cooked enough food to feed half the church.”

“Charley had to pick up his sister in Dover so he left,” Miriam said, “but John and Eli have promised to eat double to make up for it.”

“Charley can’t eat with us?” Ruth pushed wide the bottom half of the barn door and stepped into the shadowy passageway. “That’s a shame.”

“Ya,”
Miriam agreed. “A shame.” Ruth liked Charley. So did Anna, Rebecca, Leah, Johanna, Susanna and especially Mam. The trouble was, ever since the school picnic last spring, when Charley had bought her pie and they’d shared a box lunch, her sisters and Mam acted like they expected the two of them to be a couple. All the girls at church thought the two of them were secretly courting.

“Lucky for you that Charley was nearby when the wagon turned over,” Eli said. He and Ruth exchanged looks. “He’s a good man, Charley.”

Miriam glared at Ruth, who assumed an innocent expression. “It’s John you should thank,” Miriam said. “Without him, we might have lost both Molly and Blackie.”

“But Charley pulled you out of the creek.” Ruth followed Eli out into the barnyard. “He might have saved your life.”

Miriam could barely keep from laughing. “Charley’s the one who nearly drowned me. And the water isn’t deep enough to drown a goose.” She glanced back at John. “Pay no attention to either of them. Since they decided to get married, they’ve become matchmakers.”

“So, you and Charley?” John asked. “Are you—?”

“Ne!”
she declared. “He’s like a brother to me. We’re friends, nothing more.” It was true. They
were
friends, nothing more and no amount of nudging by her family could make her feel differently. When the right man came along, she’d know it…
if
the right man came along. Otherwise, she was content staying here on the farm, doing the work she loved best and helping her mother and younger sisters.

Ruth led the way up onto the back porch where Miriam and the two men stopped at the outdoor sink to wash their hands. John looked at the large pump bottle of antibacterial soap and raised one eyebrow quizzically.

Miriam chuckled. “What did you expect? Lye soap?”

“No.” He grinned at her. “People just think that…”

“Amish live like George Washington,” she finished. Ruth and Eli were having a tug of war with the towel, but she ignored their silly game and met John’s gaze straight on. “We don’t,” she said. “We use all sorts of modern conveniences—indoor bathrooms, motor-driven washing machines, telephones.” She smiled mischievously. “We even have young, know-it-all Mennonite veterinarians.”

“Ouch.” He grabbed his middle and pretended to be in pain. Then, he shrugged. “Lots of people have strange ideas about my faith, too. My sister gets mistaken for being Amish all the time.”

“Because of her
kapp,
” Miriam agreed. “Tell her that I had an English woman at Spence’s last week ask me if I was Mennonite.”

“I’ll admit, I didn’t know much about you until I came here. I was surprised that the practice had so many Amish clients.” Eli tossed the towel to him and he offered it to her.

“Of course. We have a lot of animals.” She dried her hands and took a fresh towel off the shelf for him.

She liked John. He had a nice smile. He was a nice-looking young man. Nice, dark brown hair, cropped short in a no-nonsense cut, a straight nose and a good strong chin. Maybe not as pretty in the face as Eli, who was the most handsome man she’d ever seen, but almost as tall.