The Amish Nanny's Sweetheart Page 19

  David was propped up in his bed with the wedge Guy had made. The old man’s eyes were closed, his face tight with pain. As Guy paused in the doorway, David coughed again, a racking, dry cough. When it was over, he fell back against the pillows.

  “You wanted to see me?”

  Guy asked the question softly, but David’s eyes popped open as he tried to turn in his bed to see him. Guy moved to Verna’s chair in its place next to the bed, facing David.

  “Guy.” David reached out his hand and Guy took it. The skin was soft and papery, and the strong grip Guy expected was gone. “Where have you been?”

  “Didn’t Verna tell you? I’ve been keeping the farm going.”

  “Ja, ja, ja, I know you’ve been around the farm, but you haven’t come to see me.”

  “I’m here now.” Guy tried to keep his voice light, but David wasn’t fooled.

  “What has happened, Guy?”

  David’s grip clung, in spite of his weakness. Guy couldn’t turn away, couldn’t run. He glanced at David’s eyes and was trapped by his gaze. This man was his boss. His teacher. His friend. The best...father he had ever had.

  Guy dropped his gaze to the floor. To the toes of the wool socks that Verna had knitted during the winter. They had sat in this very room, the fire in the stove keeping them warm, Verna with her knitting needles and David rocking in his chair while Guy read aloud to them from the Farm Journal magazine or the weekly newspaper from LaGrange. This was his home. His family. How could he leave them?

  His jaw tightened until it ached. The chasm yawned wide, reminding him that he couldn’t stand with a foot on each side. He had to choose one or the other.

  He had to stick by Pa, to prove to him that family was the most important thing, whether Pa thought so or not. If only...

  His nose prickled and he rubbed it with his free hand. There was no use wishing Pa would be any different than he was.

  “Nothing has happened,” he said, giving David’s hand a squeeze before he pulled free and stood up. “Nothing you need to worry about.” He put a smile on his face and leaned over to straighten the blanket around David’s waist. “I’m going to town this afternoon. Is there anything you need?”

  Exhaustion showed in the tight lines at the corners of David’s mouth. “I have a hankering for some licorice, if they have any. Ask Verna for a nickel.”

  “I’ll look for it. If they are out, do you want some of those root beer barrels?”

  The older man nodded, resting his head against the pillow. “Ja, that would be good.”

  Guy resisted the urge to kiss the old man’s bare forehead. Instead, he squeezed his shoulder. “I’ll be back in time for milking.”

  When he walked through the kitchen, Verna handed him the covered pail.

  “I made some ham sandwiches, since you’ll miss out on the potpie. And the piece of bread on top is your favorite.”

  “Buttered, with cinnamon and sugar sprinkled on top?”

  “Ja, for sure.” Verna patted his cheek. “There’s a napkin in there, too, and don’t you go losing it.”

  “I won’t.”

  “You’ll have to drink water instead of milk.” Verna’s brow wrinkled as she thought of that.

  “I can drink water, don’t worry.” Guy stepped into the porch and shoved his feet into his boots. “David said he wanted some licorice. Did you think of anything you need?”

  “Some baking soda.” Verna reached into the cupboard for the pint jar where she kept her coins. “A dime’s worth will be fine. Here’s a quarter.”

  “I’ll bring you the change.” Guy settled his hat on his head.

  Verna waved away the idea. “Buy yourself a soda pop. You deserve a treat after working so hard.”

  Guy let the porch door swing shut behind him as he left before Verna could see his reaction. He didn’t deserve a soda pop, or even the dinner pail he was carrying. He deserved to be shot. Or hung. Or at least put in jail for planning to leave them like this.

  He went into the barn through the buggy shed, then out the back door and toward the little shed by the river, his stomach churning. Every step felt like he was wading through a mud hole.

  The night Judith had gone home with Luke, he had asked God for help. Somehow, he had found Judith and been able to help her. Had that been God’s answer to his prayer? Or had it just been chance?

  Guy glanced at the sky as he walked. High, white clouds floated overhead. He knew what David would say. He had heard it often enough: “A man of faith lives by prayer and the Word of God.”

  David was a man of faith, for sure and for certain. But was Guy? He put his hand on his middle, where the churning seemed to be easing.

  “God, if You’re there, help me feel better about what I’m doing. I don’t want to leave, but I have to, don’t I?”

  The shed came into view as Guy got to the corner of the buckwheat field and descended to the edge of the mint fields. Pa stood next to it, waiting for him.

  The churning came back with a vengeance.

  * * *

  Matthew’s words echoed in Judith’s mind as she cleaned up after the quick dinner she had fixed for the two of them. Matthew had gone back to his work in the barn and the house was empty.

  “Give him a reason to stay?” She dried the plates and bowls while the pan she had used for the soup soaked in the dishwater. “How?”

  She put the clean dishes away, glad that no one was in the house to hear her talking to herself. After she was done, she started up the stairs to fetch her sewing, but stopped halfway. Verna might know how to help her keep Guy at home, and she could see how David was feeling while she was there.

  Verna answered the door as soon as Judith knocked.

  “I saw you coming up the lane.” Verna welcomed her with a hug and helped her hang up her shawl. “David and I are in the front room, and I could use your help.”

  “What can I do?” Judith hung her bonnet from the hook on the wall and followed Verna.

  “I need to put a new mustard plaster on David’s chest, and I also need to change his sheets. Two pairs of hands will make the work go much easier.”

  Judith’s mouth went dry. “But I’ve never made a mustard plaster before.”

  “There’s no better time to learn. I’ll show you what you need to do.” Verna went to the table where she had been mixing a yellowish colored dough in a bowl. “This is flour and dried mustard mixed with warm water. It’s a very simple remedy for chest congestion.” She spread a wide strip of cloth on the table. “I need you to hold the edges of the cloth down while I spread on the paste.”

  Judith wrinkled her nose at the strong mustard smell but held the cloth until Verna had used all of the paste.

  “Now we’ll take it in to David.” Verna folded the cloth so the paste was enclosed in a square envelope large enough to cover a man’s chest. “We have to work quickly so he doesn’t get chilled. I’ll need you to take off David’s shirt and undershirt, and then I’ll put the compress on and we’ll dress him again. I just need you to be an extra pair of hands for me.”

  Judith face grew hot at the thought of what Verna was asking her to do. “I can’t undress your husband. It wouldn’t be right.”

  Verna nodded. “Normally, it wouldn’t be. But part of being a woman in this world is knowing how to care for the ill and infirm in your family.” She lifted the plaster, holding it by the corners. “Someday you’ll be a wife and a mother. I hope you’ll never need these skills, but you probably will.”

  Judith’s future suddenly looked very frightening as she followed Verna into the front room. “You mean I’ll need to know how to do this, even though I may never use it?”

  “You never know. But you’d hate to need this knowledge and not have it, wouldn’t you?”

  David was drowsing as he sat propped up in his bed. Verna caressed hi
s forehead to wake him and he smiled when he saw her.

  By the time the compress was applied and the bedding changed, David was exhausted. Verna tucked the blankets around him, then took his soiled clothes and bedding back to the kitchen.

  “I’m glad you were here to help Verna,” David said, grimacing as he shifted to a more comfortable position.

  “How are you feeling?” Judith helped him straighten his pillows.

  “The hip is healing, and my fever is staying down, so I hope we’ve passed the danger of pneumonia.” David coughed. “But other than that, I’m feeling wonderful. I saw Guy today, and talking with him brightened up my day.”

  He coughed again as Verna came back into the room. She gave him a handkerchief and helped him lean over to cough as the mustard plaster started loosening the congestion in his chest.

  “You must have seen Guy leave,” Verna said. “He was going to town, and left not long before you got here.”

  “I didn’t,” Judith said. “I must have just missed him.”

  Her fingers grew cold. Had he gone to town, like Verna said, or had he already left with his father? When David said he had talked with Guy, a brief hope that Guy had changed his mind had flitted through her mind, but with this news...perhaps Guy had only been saying goodbye.

  “He’s a fine young man,” David said, settling his head back against the pillows. “He thinks a lot of you.”

  Judith fingered her apron absently. Had Guy taken the buggy? Or had he walked? Was his father with him?

  “He certainly does,” said Verna. “He’s going through a hard spell right now, but we keep praying for him.”

  “Praying for him?” Judith had heard folks say that, and she had prayed for others before, but she had never thought about what it meant. “You mean, you’re asking God to make Guy act the way you want?”

  “Ach, ne!” Verna covered her mouth at the idea. “We don’t ask God to do what we want. We ask Him to do what He wants. As the Lord’s Prayer says, ‘Thy will be done.’ And we hope that His will is for Guy to become a member of our church and our community.”

  “What if he doesn’t become part of the church?”

  David took Verna’s hand in his. “Then that is as God wills it to be, and we submit to Him. But we will never stop praying for our boy.” He ended with another fit of coughing.

  Verna nodded, her mouth set in a grim smile. “The mustard plaster is working better today than it has the past few days. I think he’s getting better.”

  David’s coughing continued, but Verna didn’t seem concerned as she supplied a clean handkerchief and rubbed his back.

  Judith’s thoughts went back to Guy. If Guy left with his father, that would tell her exactly how he felt about her. Even though Matthew was sure Guy loved her, and even with David’s encouraging words, the truth would come out in Guy’s actions. Any man who loved her had to love the Lord and His people first. He had to be willing to become part of the community.

  But Guy had already made his choice. And if he was gone, then how could she convince him to stay?

  As David settled back on his bed, he said, “I know I’ll never be able to work again, not the way I’ve always been able to.”

  He held up a hand as Judith started to protest. “It’s the way of the world, Judith. Our lives are just wisps of fog in the moonlight. We get older, then we die and someone else takes our place.”

  David’s face was calm. Relaxed. Secure. It was as if he was talking about planting a field rather than his own death.

  He went on. “I’ve thought Guy would take over the farm when I wasn’t able to work any longer, but I always thought we had a few more years left. With this accident, it seems it’s time for me to retire and for Guy to have the farm. It will be a good place for him to live with his wife and to raise his family.” He let his eyes close. “I just hope I’m here to watch his children grow.”

  His voice drifted off and Verna beckoned for Judith to follow her to the kitchen.

  “Does his talk of dying worry you?” Judith asked as Verna indicated for her to take a seat at the table.

  “Ne.” The older woman’s mouth quivered. “I don’t want to lose him, but I don’t want him to suffer, either. I keep praying that God will heal him, but some days it seems like he’s only getting worse.”

  “He said that today was a good day.”

  “Ja.” Verna’s smile strengthened. “Guy talked to him for quite a while before dinner, and it made David happy to see him. I hope Guy decides to spend more time with him.”

  Judith followed a line of wood grain in the top of the table with her finger. When Guy left, it would break David’s heart. Verna’s, too. Couldn’t he see that?

  “I have been hoping that you would be the one Guy chooses to marry.”

  “We will have to wait and see what happens.”

  Verna covered her hand with her own. “I know he is restless. I’ve seen it even more during the past week. I can’t help but think that something has gone terribly wrong for him, but he won’t talk to me about it.”

  Judith shook her head. “Right now he isn’t talking to me, either.” Not since he had chosen his father over her and his family.

  “Then we must pray for him. Constantly.” Verna touched her Kapp. “We are always ready to pray as we keep our heads covered, so we can pray for our loved ones all through the day as they come to mind.”

  Judith turned her hand over so she could give the older woman’s hand a squeeze. “I will pray for him. Always.”

  Chapter Fifteen

  As Guy drove the blue Studebaker into Goshen, the county seat of neighboring Elkhart County, he pushed in the clutch and tried to shift gears. A grinding sound growled from somewhere underneath the car and he cringed when folks turned to stare. Hunching down as far as he could behind the steering wheel, he drove past the courthouse and the bulletproof police booth on the corner.

  Pa had insisted that he drive the Studebaker. “Take it and ditch it somewhere,” he had said.

  So Guy had taken it, but where in the world would he ditch it? And why? Guy couldn’t believe that Pa would steal a car. It was more likely that he had made up that story, too. Pa was a liar, for sure. And probably a petty thief and con man. But to steal a car was crossing a line. Pa wouldn’t go that far.

  He parked outside the drugstore on Main Street, a block from the courthouse square, and read through Pa’s list again. Cigarettes, chewing gum, sock garters, matches, hair pomade and a cake of bay rum shaving soap.

  After purchasing the things on Pa’s list, Verna’s baking soda and a ten-cent sack of licorice for David, Guy opened the door to leave. Two men inspecting the Studebaker made him pause in the doorway. One walked behind the car, writing on a notepad, while the other man leaned inside the vehicle, his head out of sight. Guy looked up and down the street and caught sight of the police box. At least help was nearby if these men were trying to steal Pa’s car.

  “Can I help you?” He tightened his grip on the box of items from the drugstore as his voice quivered.

  The man with the notebook stepped onto the sidewalk next to him, flipping open the lapel of his jacket to show a shiny badge. “Who are you?”

  “Guy Hoover.” He took a step backward as the second man joined the first.

  “Hoover, eh?”

  The second man put his hands on his hips, drawing back his jacket just enough for Guy to get a glimpse of his badge and the shoulder holster he wore.

  “We’re looking for Frank Hoover.” He moved so that he was on one side of Guy while his partner stood on the other side.

  Guy backed toward the drugstore. “Frank Hoover?” Pa.

  “Same last name as yours.” The first man’s smile didn’t go past his mouth. “I don’t suppose you know him, do you?”

  The pieces fell into place. These were Feds. G-men. Guy h
ad seen a movie a couple years ago with G-men and James Cagney, and these men looked and acted just like the cops in the movie. Was Pa a wanted man? Had he been telling the truth the whole time, after all? A stone sank in Guy’s gut as the thought crossed his mind.

  “I know him. He’s my father. Has he done something wrong?”

  The first man took the box from Guy and sorted through it while the second man stepped forward.

  “I think you need to come with us.”

  “Where?”

  The Fed grasped his elbow and started walking him down the street. “To the police station. We can talk there.”

  Guy tried to stop, but the man propelled him on. “Am I under arrest?”

  “We just want to talk to you.”

  Folks stared as they walked the short distance to the police station, and Guy was glad he wasn’t in Emma or Shipshewana where someone might recognize him. The Feds nodded to the police sergeant as they passed the front desk, then climbed a wide, creaking stairway to the second floor. The first man led the way into a room and motioned to a chair on one side of a table. The second man closed the door behind them, and then sat next to his partner across from Guy.

  “I’m Murphy,” the second man said, and threw a thumb toward his partner. “This is Sanderson.”

  Sanderson picked the items out of the box from the drugstore one by one. “Licorice. Hoover hates licorice.” He glanced at Guy. “This must be for you.”

  Guy shook his head. “It’s for a friend.”

  “Baking soda.” The can rapped against the table. “Cigarettes. Chesterfields. That’s Hoover’s brand.” The package hit the table as he pulled out the can of pomade. “Murray’s. He’s a man of habit, that’s for sure.”

  Murphy leaned toward him. “Where is he? Here in Goshen?”

  Guy shook his head in answer to the question as Pa’s lies and stories swirled through his head. He still didn’t know which were true. Or were any of them true? The stone in his gut turned to ice. Perhaps all of them were true.

  “Can you tell me why you want him? What has he done?”