The Days of Redemption (2 page)

With more patience than her parents would have ever guessed she had, she smiled tightly. “I'm sorry, Mr. Swartz. It's simply that, uh, I thought he would have been talking about something else by now. It is the middle of January, you know.”

“He's far away. All the way in Nicaragua,” he said slowly. Pulling out the country's name like she had trouble understanding things. “The letters take a long time to get here.”

Feeling her cheeks heat all over again, she tucked her chin. “Oh.
Jah.
I mean, yes, of course. Thank you for reading it to me.”

“But don't you want to talk about the note? I'm sure you have questions. . . .”

The only question she ever had was “why?” As in
why
did Ed never ask his father how he was doing? As in
why
didn't he ever come back to visit?
Why
didn't he care enough to stay close to home?

But of course it was best to keep those things to herself. She didn't want to hurt Mr. Swartz's feelings. “The letter was so thoughtful, so detailed . . . I, um, I don't have a single question. And I had better deliver more of this coffee before it all runs cold. You know that Mrs. Ames expects me to visit with several people this morning. Have a good day, now.”

The spark in his blue eyes faded. “You're certain you can't stay for a bit longer? I have some more news to share.”

Oh, he was lonely. It broke her heart. “I'm so sorry, I can't stay today.” She just wasn't up to hearing one more story about his perfect child. “I've got quite a bit to do before I leave this afternoon.”

“Well, all right, then. Have a good day, Viola.”

“You too, Mr. Swartz.”

After topping off his cup, and refilling the other two men's mugs, she rushed out of the room and went to the kitchen, where she put coffee and snacks on a tray for the ladies in the craft room. Balancing too much on the white wooden tray, she hurried out of the kitchen, turned left, and then headed toward the back of the building.

When two cups started to wobble, she abruptly stopped and set them to rights. Then rushed forward, and promptly ran into a man leaving the office.

When their bodies collided, the plastic bowls of snack mix fell to the ground. And the coffee carafe began to wobble.

“Watch out!” she said as she tried to gain control of the tray.

Two capable-looking hands reached out and pulled the tray from her. “Careful,” he murmured, his voice deep and steady. Almost as steady and strong as his hands looked. “You almost ended up wearing that coffee.”

Feeling a true mixture of relief and embarrassment, she looked up into the speaker's eyes.

And noticed that his dark blue eyes were tinged with gold. Much like a certain older gentleman's. “Oh!” she gasped.

“What?”

“You . . . You look much like one of our residents.”

“Atle Swartz?”

“Yes. Are you a relation?”

“You could say that. I'm Edward Swartz.”

If his unusual eyes hadn't given him away, his tan and square jaw would have. The man looked like a carbon copy of his father. Well, a younger, spryer, tanner version of him.

“You finally came back?” she blurted before she could stop herself.

“Finally?”

She bit her lip as her director, Mrs. Ames, came out of her office. “Is everything all right, Viola?”

“Oh,
jah.
”

Mrs. Ames stared at the tray the man was holding. “Any reason Ed here is holding the coffee tray?”

“
Nee.
” With a jerk, she pulled the tray from his hands. “
Danke.
Um. Excuse me, I have work to do.”

“Hey, I'll be happy to help you,” he said after the administrator turned to the right and walked down the hall. Leaving the two of them alone again. “That tray is fairly heavy.”

“I can manage just fine.” Unable to stop herself, she raised a brow. “Besides, don't you think it's time you went to see your father?”

She turned without waiting for an answer.

But still, her cheeks burned with shame for her behavior. And for the fact that as much as she didn't like him . . . she couldn't help but notice he was far more handsome than she'd ever imagined.

Ed Swartz stood in the middle of the black-and-white-tiled hallway, more than a little perturbed. First, that woman almost spilled coffee on him, then acted like he was about to attack her while he helped her with the tray. . . .

Then had reprimanded him. Like he was a wayward child.

What was her problem? Was she just in a bad mood, or had she really gotten upset that he'd knocked into her?

Maybe he was simply used to the kindness of the people he worked with in Nicaragua. The people there had so little, they were thankful for the smallest amount of care or consideration.

“Can I help you, young man?”

An elderly lady wearing tan polyester slacks, white tennis shoes, and a bright blue sweater pointed to the sign-in sheet. “If you're visiting, you've got to sign in. It's the rules.”

“Sorry. I guess I got distracted.” After signing his name, he said, “Can you tell me where I might find Atle Swartz?”

A wave of emotion transformed her face. “Are you his son?”

“Yes, ma'am. Edward.”

“All the way from your mission trip? Praise God!”

She darted around the welcome desk, squeezed his arm, and practically dragged him down the hall. “Your father is going to be so happy to see you!”

He doubted his father's happiness would hold a candle to his own. He'd missed his father terribly during his two-year absence.

But his steps slowed when he caught sight of him, sitting in his wheelchair in front of the gas-lit fireplace. His father looked older, frailer.

“Daed?”

His father's head popped up. Stared at him like he'd risen from the dead. “Edward? Edward!”

As Ed crossed the room and wrapped his father in a hug, he realized nothing else needed to be said. For now, they were together, and nothing else mattered. With effort, he pushed all thoughts of the woman with the pretty brown eyes from his mind.

In the grand scheme of things, she didn't matter to him at all.

Peter Keim pulled another cardboard box off a shelf, looked at his mother, and groaned. “Mamm, every time I turn around, I'm finding another box of yours. Why do you have so much stuff?” And more to the point, how come he hadn't seen any of it before?

It was like his mother had hidden a secret life up in the rafters of their home, and it had all gathered dust and begun to slowly rot. When a spider crept out from under the box's top flap, he grimaced. “We should throw this all out.”

From the other side of the attic, his mother looked at the four boxes, two trunks, and six or seven large wicker baskets that were filled to overflowing. She looked a bit surprised to see everything, but even in the dim light of the attic, Peter noticed a faint gleam of anticipation, too. “Oh, Peter, settle down. It's not so much stuff. Not really so much for a woman's whole life. I am fairly old, you know.”

Peter sighed. His mother had been talking like that for months now, which was exasperating, since she was only sixty-four and enjoying exceptionally good health. As far as the family was concerned, the matriarch of their family had decades to go before she went around proclaiming she was old.

“Well, all this cleaning is making me feel old,” he said. Opening up one of the five green plastic garbage bags he'd brought up to the attic, he crouched down next to one of the trunks. “This women's work is wearing me out.”

As he knew she would, his daughter Elsie found fault with that. “Father, you mustn't talk like that. Cleaning is most definitely not only women's work. Besides, you know Mamm with her asthma can't be up here in all this dust.”

He did love how prim and proper his daughter was. “I'm just teasing, Elsie. I don't mind helping with the attic. Besides, it's a whole lot warmer up here in the attic than outside in the fields.”

She rubbed her arms. “I'm tired of winter and it's only January.”

“Patience, Elsie,” his mother cautioned. “Everything comes in its own time. Even spring.”

Getting back on track, Peter brushed aside yet another traveling insect and pushed the box he'd just taken down a little more toward the center of the attic. ”I can't wait to see what you have in here. This doesn't look like it's been touched since you moved in.”

Before his eyes, his mother stiffened. “I had forgotten that box was in here.”

“Then it's time we found out all your secrets,” Elsie teased from her chair near the window. “Mommi, you know what's going to have to happen, don't you? You're going to have to tell us all the stories that go with the items in the box.”

For some reason, his mother looked even more perturbed. “I doubt you'd be interested, Elsie. There's nothing out of the ordinary inside. Nothing that you haven't heard about at least a dozen times. You know, dear, perhaps you should go downstairs with your father. I'll finish up here on my own.”

“I'm not going to let you be up here by yourself, Mamm,” he said. “Stop worrying so much.”

“And I'm not going to leave you, either, Mommi. There might be something inside that you've forgotten about. . . . A deep, dark secret . . .”

His mother laughed. “I think not. My life isn't filled with secrets. That's not what the Lord intended.”

Peter felt his smile falter as his mother's pious remarks floated over him. For all his life, both of his parents had set themselves up as pillars of the community. And as models for their six children to follow.

But their markers were so high, their children never felt they could meet their parents' high standards. It was one of the reasons his brothers Jacob and Aden had moved to Indiana, and his little sister Sara had moved all the way to New York.

Even though he was the middle child, not the eldest son, he was the one who'd elected to live with his parents and take over the running of the farm. It made the most sense. He was used to keeping the peace—a quality that was definitely needed in his parents' company.

But even he was finding it difficult to hear their criticisms day after day.

Well, at least that was the reason he gave for his own private behavior.

Pushing his dark thoughts away, he opened the flaps of the box and pulled an armful of the contents out. On top was an embroidered sampler.

“What does it say, Daed?” Elsie asked, reminding him that with her eye disease, it was getting harder and harder for her to see most anything.

“It says ‘Start and End the Day with Prayer.' ”

Elsie smiled. “That sounds like Mommi.”

Indeed it did. Lovina Keim was the epitome of a dutiful Amish wife. She'd borne six children, had organized charity events for the community, kept a bountiful garden, quilted well, and could still outcook most women in the area.

She was a handsome woman, with dark brown eyes, which her children and grandchildren had all inherited. She was a hard worker and never asked anyone to do anything she wasn't prepared to do herself.

However, she was also critical and judgmental. It was next to impossible to live up to her expectations.

Elsie moved closer, kneeling next to him. “What else is inside?”

Peter looked at his mother, who seemed frozen, her eyes fastened on the box.

Slowly, he pulled out a heavily embroidered linen tablecloth, and a pair of crystal candlesticks. Peter shook his head. While some Amish women did buy some pretty tableware every now and then, these items were extravagant. Even more, he'd never seen them before. “Mother, where did these come from?” He held up one of the heavy candlesticks.

That seemed to set her back into motion. Busily smoothing out the rough fabric of a quilt, his mother glanced away. “I'm not sure. I've forgotten.”

Peter had never known his mother to forget a thing. “Come on, now. You must have an idea.”

“I do not. If I knew, I would tell you, Peter.” Standing up, her mother shook her head. “I'm getting tired. I no longer care to look in these boxes.” Her voice turning pinched, she continued. “Elsie, please walk with me back to my rooms?”

Obediently, Elsie moved to stand up, but Peter held her back with a hand on her arm. “
Nee,
stay, Elsie. Now that we've started digging in here, I'd like to see what else is inside.” Something was propelling him forward. Maybe it was his mother's unfamiliar hesitancy.

Perhaps it was his own selfish wants—a part of him enjoyed seeing her discomfort. It gave her a taste of what he'd felt much of his life. With purposeful motions, he pulled out another sampler of a Psalm, the stitching uneven and childlike. A cloth doll. An old packet of flower seeds.

And then a framed photograph, wrapped in plastic bubble wrap. The Amish didn't accept photographs, believing that copying their image was a graven sin. “Mamm, what in the world?”

“Peter, don't unwrap that.”

His mother's voice was like steel, but Peter ignored the command. He was forty-two years old, not fourteen. And now he was curious.

“Who is this, Mother?” he asked as he pulled the plastic away, finding himself staring at a photograph of a beautiful young woman. Her hair was dark and smooth, her eyes the same coffee-with-cream brown color that looked back at him in the mirror.

A vague thread of apprehension coursed through him.

“Who is it?” Elsie asked.

“It's a woman, a woman of about your age,” he said patiently, ignoring the tension reverberating from his mother. “She's mighty pretty, with brown wide-set eyes and hair. Why, she could be your twin, Elsie.”

Elsie gazed at the photograph, but the three of them knew it was basically for show. Her eyesight had gotten much worse over the last two years. “She is pretty,” she allowed. “Though we all know I already have a twin. I'm glad this girl isn't one, too. I have no need for one more!”