The Amish Seamstress (40 page)

“You worry too much, Izzy,”
Mamm
said as she stepped inside and slipped off her black bonnet. “I just stopped by to say hello and deliver some soup and bread for Frannie—and for you too.”

I closed the door behind her as she gave Marta a quick hello. I led her to the kitchen, asking how things were going with everyone.

“Fine,” she said, placing the basket on the counter. She handed me the soup and directed me to put it in the fridge, as if I didn't know to do that. She took out the bread, put it on the counter, and then looped her hand through the basket again.

“Will you be coming home next weekend as planned?” she asked.

“As far as I know. But we'll have to play it by ear as it gets closer.” I didn't add that it depended on how Frannie was doing by then.

We heard a shaky voice from behind us. “Is that you, Peggy?” The commotion had wakened Frannie.

“
Ya
, how are you?”
Mamm
asked, stepping to the end of the bed.

“
Gut
. So much better there are no words.”

“Well,”
Mamm
said, chuckling. “It sounds as if my Izzy is some caregiver.”

Frannie smiled. “She is, of course, but there's more.”

“Oh?”
Mamm
stepped closer but as she did the sound of footsteps fell again on the porch. I hoped it would be Alexander. It wasn't. Klara shuffled in, holding her back as straight as possible.

“Oh, my,” she said as she stepped inside. Looking at her mother, she added, “You're having quite the gathering. I take it you're having a good day.”

“
Ya
,” Frannie responded. “The best.”

“She was just about to tell me her good news,” my
mamm
said.

“Oh?” Klara looked from Frannie to Marta to me and then finally to my mother, who, in a moment of uncharacteristic uncertainty, said, “Weren't you, Frannie?”

“
Ya
, I was.”

Again there was a pause.

Finally Klara said, “And?”

Marta took a step toward Klara. “Giselle is coming. She already bought her ticket.”

Klara froze.

My
mamm
must have felt the tension because she said, “I'd best go so I'm home before dark.”

Seemingly relieved by the interruption, Marta thanked her and so did Frannie. I walked her to the door. “Leave me a message,” she said.

I nodded and told her goodbye.

Once I'd closed the door, I made a point of heading to the kitchen, out of everyone's way, but the room was silent until finally Klara spoke.

“When is she coming?”

“Tomorrow night,” Marta said.

“And when is Lexie arriving?”

“Tomorrow morning.”

“Well, at least that gives you a chance to talk to Lexie ahead of time and let her know her biological mother will be here too.” She stepped away from the bed. “I guess I'll go leave that same message for Ada now.”

I felt a pang of concern for Klara as I watched her leave. She walked slowly toward the door and left without saying goodbye. She seemed frail and much older.

Marta, still at her mother's side, reached out and took Frannie's hand.

Later, once everyone was gone, Frannie awoke from a nap and I fed her a bowl of soup. Then, as I ate one too, I showed her the embroidered
bookmark. She held it tenderly in her hands. The blue thread had nearly faded, making the words hard to read. She traced them with her fingers as I said, “My help cometh from the Lord.”

“Ah,” she said. “Psalm 121:2. My mother quoted that verse at times, I think as a reminder to me. But it was a favorite of my grandmother's also.” Obviously it had been a favored verse of someone else's too.

I told her I planned to make bookmarks like this for her daughters and granddaughters.

“That's a
wunderbar
idea,” she said. “
Danke
.”

I sat back down with one of her nightgowns to mend. There was a small tear in a shoulder seam. As I stitched the worn fabric, she stared at her hands.

“A penny for your thoughts,” I finally said.

She raised her thin eyebrows and said, “I was just thinking about Klara. We all came to terms with the truth in the family a few years ago. I thought healing had taken place then—and I think it did. But she's still unsettled.”

I didn't respond, hoping my silence would encourage her to say more.

She sighed. “Guess it's just our nature,
ya
?”

“Maybe once she sees Giselle in person she can put it all to rest.”

Frannie didn't answer. Instead, she closed her eyes and soon drifted off to sleep.

I finished the nightgown and then cut out the bookmarks from fabric I'd brought along. I also had some interfacing with me that I would use between the two pieces of linen, but first I would do the embroidery.

At nine o'clock, Frannie stirred and awoke enough for me to get her ready for bed. She assured me she wouldn't have any trouble getting back to sleep. She was right. By ten o'clock she was snoring gently.

I took the lamp with me down the hall to my room and dressed for bed myself. As I climbed in under the sheets, I picked up
Native Americans in Colonial America
from the nightstand. I knew I shouldn't read about something so troubling at bedtime lest I have nightmares, but I needed to push the events of the day out of my mind, and I knew a little research could help with that. I still wanted to learn more details about the massacre itself, so I flipped through the book to where I'd stopped before.

I skimmed several pages, trying to focus on the facts and not the
gory details. The account said that twenty Conestoga were left living at Indian Town at the time of the massacre, but only a handful were there the morning in mid-December when the attack took place. The rest were off working.

Following the massacre, the remaining Conestoga were moved to Lancaster Workhouse for their protection, but the killers came back two weeks later and completed their mission by murdering those Indians as well. Of course, that was the official version. Remembering the article Zed had left for me at Ella's house, I knew the Indians may not have been hiding in the Workhouse but rather praying in a church when it happened. Either way, what had been done to them was unconscionable.

I skimmed to the end of the chapter, where a Christian Shawnee chief was quoted as saying, “The white man prays with words while the Indian prays in his heart.”

Closing the book, I couldn't help but agree with him to an extent. Lying there, I thought about all the suffering the Native Americans had endured at the hands of the settlers, and for some reason it made me want to cry. I knew violence had been on both sides, but tonight my heart was with the Indians.

A branch scraped against the siding, startling me. I twisted down the wick in the lamp until it went out, and then I scooted down so the quilt was up to my nose.

That's when the tears finally began to come.

As they did, I tried to figure out what was making me so sad. It wasn't just the story of the massacre.

It was the thought of Frannie dying, I supposed. It was the thought of Zed showing up and not loving me the same way I loved him. And Lexie coming out from Oregon. And maybe even Giselle arriving. Wiping my eyes, I decided that most of all it was the drama of the Lantz family.

I wasn't sure if I could handle it or not.

The next morning, as Frannie napped and I was finishing up the breakfast dishes, I heard a knock on the front door. When I answered it, I was surprised to find my
daed
standing there, holding a box.

I gasped. “Is that what I think it is?”

He smiled. “I imagine so. I went out to Rod's again. He said he finally had a chance to take a good look around for Verna's papers and was able to track down everything.”

Grinning, I glanced toward the driveway and my father's buggy. “So there's more?”

“
Ya
, but not with me. All that was left besides this box was a big wooden trunk too heavy to move.”
Daed
must have seen the disappointment on my face because he quickly added, “Rod told me to let you know you're welcome to come out and look through it anytime you want. And for now at least you have this.”

He was right. With a grateful smile I took the box from his arms and thanked him for his efforts. He simply nodded and said he had to be on his way. He had a table to deliver.

The moment he was gone, I checked on the still-sleeping Frannie and then carried the box straight back to my room. Placing it on the foot of my bed, I took a deep breath, opened the lid, and began to dig in. The contents didn't seem promising at first, but eventually I struck gold. Within the first fifteen minutes I found three more copies of the chapbook!

Ecstatic, I flipped through the first one only to find that it had been cut at the same place as the one Verna and I had found. I grabbed the second. It had also been cut. So had the third, although not quite as close to the margin. I could make out a few letters, but no words, along the edge. Incredible. Someone really had intentionally removed the rest of the story, just as Verna and I had thought, but not just in that one copy. They had done it in all of them.

For a moment frustration nearly overwhelmed me, but that feeling soon turned to determination. I had to learn the whole truth of this situation, no matter what.

I couldn't fathom what horrible thing could have happened to Abigail and Gorg to turn them into Paxton Boys' sympathizers and almost be excommunicated. Especially not after Abigail had so dearly loved Konenquas. My imagination soared, but nothing I came up with made sense.

A short time after noon, as I sat beside Frannie's bed working on a bookmark for Klara, a knock startled me.

Frannie stirred a little but didn't wake. I put my work on the edge of her bed and hurried to the door, expecting a member of my family again.

Instead, I swung the door open and found Lexie Jaeger Nolan, Frannie's granddaughter. She hadn't changed at all and was still as beautiful as ever. Today her blond hair was pulled back in a ponytail. Her brown eyes smiled. “Izzy,” she said, giving me a hug.

She came inside and stepped to the foot of the bed as I closed the door behind her.

Her eyes immediately fell on the sleeping Frannie. Lexie asked, “How is she?”

“Tired this morning. She has good days and bad. Some when she's super alert. Others where she wants to sleep.”

“Is she eating?”

“
Ya
, but just soup and porridge. A couple of spoonfuls of yogurt. But not much.” I grabbed my embroidery off the bed. “You should wake her. She'll be so happy to see you.”

I moved away from the bed so Lexie could take my place. She took her coat off and set it on the chair and then leaned down closer to Frannie. “
Mammi
,” she said. “It's me. Lexie.”

Frannie stirred a little, opened one eye and then closed it.

“
Mammi
,” Lexie said again.

The older woman turned her head toward us. This time she opened both eyes. “Giselle?”

“No, Lexie.”

“Oh, you're here.” Frannie reached for her granddaughter. “I'm so glad you came.”

Lexie patted her grandmother's hand and asked how she was.

“So happy we're all going to be together.”

“
Ya
,” Lexie said, although her voice sounded hesitant.

Frannie's voice cracked. “You'll get to meet Giselle. At last.”

“
Ya
,” Lexie said again, this time hitting the right inflection. “Aunt Marta just told me.”

I stepped to the end of the bed, pretty sure I had a front row seat to a story better than any
Englisch
movie as I imagined Giselle and Lexie—birth mother and daughter—together at last.

Footsteps fell on the porch again, and this time when the door opened, in came Klara.

“Lexie. I thought it might be you,” she said without even a hello first.

The younger woman rose and stepped toward her aunt, giving her a hug.

Klara spoke quietly. “Are you as apprehensive about all of this as I am?”

“I'm not sure,” Lexie said, her voice barely a whisper. “I only just found out a few minutes ago from Aunt Marta.”

Klara nodded and they were both quiet for a moment.

“How is Ada?” Lexie asked, and I remembered that the two sisters, separated as small children by adoption, had become the best of friends once they were reunited as adults.

Klara smiled. “So excited about seeing you. She's going to come by with the kids after a while.”

“Yay!” Lexie replied, a grin lighting up her pretty face. Then she looked at her watch and added, “At some point I should take a nap. I'm exhausted from the flight. Do you mind if I crash on your couch later?”