An Amish Family Reunion Read online

  The crowd grew quiet as Eli Riehl stood and walked up the aisle, very dignified. Several people clapped as others patted his arm, offering words of encouragement.

  “Tell a good one, Eli,” said one girl.

  “Make up the parts you don’t remember, Eli. Makes for a better story,” said a boy two rows ahead. Apparently, this mysterious young man was only unknown to Phoebe Miller and anyone else who seldom left the farm except to go to church or the post office. She clapped lightly along with the crowd for want of something better to do.

  Eli leaned one shoulder against a pole to prepare for bumps in the road, tugged down his black vest, and cleared his throat. Phoebe swallowed hard as a case of nerves gripped her stomach, as though she were the one addressing the tour group. Quickly, she pulled out another cracker pack. While she nibbled on Nabs, Eli launched into an intriguing tale of a middle-aged schoolmarm who had lived in the Niagara Falls region. Because she’d never married and had been a poor saver, she faced her pending retirement in a state of abject poverty. Resourceful her entire life, the woman decided to navigate the mighty Niagara River in a wooden barrel. Many had tried before but few had succeeded. Annie Edson Taylor believed her bravery in surviving the fall would bring her fame and fortune for the rest of her life. Hoping to generate an income from interviews and public speaking engagements, she alerted the local newspapers about her daring plan. That day they set up their camera tripods downstream of Horseshoe Falls, where the woman’s friends were to watch for the barrel and drag it ashore. Upriver, trusted helpers drilled small air holes in the lid and then helped the sixty-three-year-old teacher, wearing a long dress and fancy hat, into the barrel. Because the schoolmarm realized this stunt could very well lead to her demise, she clutched her beloved pet—an all-black cat—in her arms for the ride. The helpers nailed down the lid and pushed the barrel off into the strong current. Bobbing and jostling, the barrel tumbled in the treacherous rapids to the brink of the falls.

  Eli paused in his narration, while the silent crowd inhaled a collective breath. Phoebe, among others, thought the reckless spinster would surely be pulled out at the last moment and given a stern talking-to by her pastor or perhaps the police.

  After a moment, he continued. “No one on shore suspected a human being was tucked up inside the bobbing cork. Over she went, falling hundreds of feet into the crush of waves and rocks below.”

  “Did the barrel bust apart into a million pieces?” called out a voice.

  “Did the poor soul drown?” asked another.

  “Did they ever find any remains of her body?” inquired a practical-natured sort.

  Questions from the audience sang out as everyone began to clamor with their own likely scenarios. Then Eli raised his hand as though holding a patriarch’s staff. The busload of normally talkative youths grew silent once again. “She lived!” he announced to thunderous applause and hoots of joy. “Miss Taylor’s helpers lassoed the barrel with ropes from small boats and towed it ashore. When they pried off the lid, out leaped the teacher’s cat in fine shape, only a bit perturbed, as we know cats can get. But,” said Eli, roping in his audience like Miss Taylor’s barrel, “the cat’s fur, formerly pure black, was white as new-fallen snow, every bit of it.”

  “No!” cried several in unison.

  “Jah,” concluded Eli with conviction. “At least that’s what the reporters said in the newspaper.” He gave his vest a satisfied tug.

  “But what happened to Annie?” hollered Rebekah Glick.

  Eli’s expression sobered. “When they helped her from the barrel, she was bruised and battered but not seriously injured.” There was plentiful applause from the girls’ side with a smattering from the boys’. “The sixty-three-year-old teacher had survived the one-hundred-seventy-five-foot drop over Niagara Falls in a wooden barrel—a feat many younger and stronger men could not accomplish.” Applause now rose from both sides of the bus. “However, her scheme to generate a retirement income from speaking engagements never panned out. Alas, her fame soon faded, and she died forgotten and penniless in her old age.”

  Phoebe watched Eli place his hand over his heart upon uttering the word “alas” and felt her own pang of sorrow for a woman dead for many years. She had been enthralled by the story of Annie Taylor… and by Eli Riehl. Needless to say, she’d never met anyone so articulate and verbose. His story came alive in the mind of each who had heard it. That indeed was a rare gift. Phoebe joined with the others in a round of applause. When Eli sat down, he didn’t sit with her again but slipped into a seat on the boys’ side.

  Mrs. Stoltzfus delivered a hands-on-hips warning about the dire fate of most who attempted to “ride the falls” lest anyone on the bus would be stupid enough to get such a notion.

  Phoebe wasn’t stupid enough, but her own creative fires had been stoked. She took out her pad and pencils and began illustrating Eli’s tale: the teacher standing tall with her precocious black cat, the barrel riding the tumultuous currents down the river, then the barrel falling though mist and spray to the sharp rocks below, and one of Miss Taylor emerging with hat askew and badly mussed hair, clutching a pure-white cat. She sketched and shaded with frenetic glee, ignoring her travel companions. She ate lunch at the rest area picnic table without tasting her sandwich and only barely following Rebekah’s chatter about new clothes. For the remainder of the way, Phoebe created pictures of Eli’s narrative about a place she’d never seen. She could always change them later if need be, but his words had roused clear images in her mind.

  Eli didn’t speak to her again for the duration of the bus ride, but he, like his story, loomed large in Phoebe’s mind. When she wasn’t thinking about the adventurous schoolteacher, she was thinking about the gregarious Eli Riehl.

  FOUR

  Willow Brook, New York

  Matthew Miller was one happy man. He leaned his head back in the comfortable cab of his foreman’s late-model Ford truck. He was on his way home after a very successful workweek. Only a month on the new job, and he’d already received his first pay raise. Now he received six hundred dollars a week for easier work than he’d done at the racetrack, in addition to health care for himself, Martha, and their two children. Although, Martha was uncomfortable with the insurance card in her wallet. He had a bed in the bunkhouse and dinner each weeknight included at no charge, although the bunk was hard as nails, the blanket scratchy as a case of hives, and the chow was nothing to write home about. And writing home was something he did—every Monday night so that his wife would receive a letter while he was gone, despite the fact he usually had little news since leaving early that morning. Suppers at Rolling Meadows Stables usually consisted of chili, stew, or rolled-up tortilla concoctions because many of the workers were from south of the U.S. Matthew didn’t care what filled his belly from Monday through Thursday night because he would dine on the world’s best cooking on Friday nights through Monday mornings.

  His Martha—the former Martha Hostetler from across the road in his beloved Winesburg. He still got chills up his spine when he thought about someone as pretty as Martha looking twice at him—tall and skinny, with carrot-colored hair and ridiculous orange freckles, even though he never worked outdoors without his wide-brimmed hat. Other men tanned to a warm brown by midsummer, but not him. Matthew’s forearms would remain a semiconnected mass of freckles or, worse, scaly reddened patches of peeled skin.

  God had not only brought him Martha but had since blessed them with two bopplin in the three years they had been married. Matthew had a son, a daughter, and a wife who could cook any gourmet chef under the table. So he no longer was the skinny man she’d married. His hard work as a horse trainer at the Sarasota racetrack and three square meals each day had added fifty pounds to his frame. Although he didn’t like the separation from his family with his current job, Matthew wouldn’t complain.

  “Wake up, Miller. Stop daydreaming. This is your stop.”

  Matthew opened his eyes and glanced around. The truck was indeed id
ling at the end of his driveway. He scrambled to collect his duffel bag, lunch cooler, and thermos. “Thanks, Mr. Taylor,” he said. “Are you sure I can’t give you some money toward gas?”

  “It’s Pete, not Mr. Taylor. And like I told you before, I go right by your place, so I’m not taking gas money for a trip I make anyway.” He grinned with a mouthful of big teeth.

  “Well, thanks again. I’ll see you right here Monday morning at five thirty.” Matthew opened the door.

  “Have a good weekend, Matty. And get plenty of rest. I’m probably turning another horse over to you. The owners have nothing but nice things to say about your work. One asked me, “What does that boy do? Stare into their eyes and hypnotize them into calming down? Or maybe whisper in their ears to convince them it’s in everyone’s best interest.” Taylor laughed good-naturedly. “Saddlebreds aren’t high-strung by nature. They are much calmer than Thoroughbreds, but every now and then you get a willful one. And then we have an uphill battle to turn that beast into something in the show ring worthy of the six figures the owner paid. So I don’t care if you use Zen meditation or hypnotic trances to get your results.”

  Matthew nodded, but he hadn’t a clue as to what his boss was talking about. It didn’t matter. He had his fat paycheck in his pocket, a job he truly enjoyed, and the whole weekend before him like an unwrapped gift. “Okay, then. See ya Monday, Pete, bright-eyed and bushy-tailed.” Closing the door and slinging his duffel bag over his shoulder, he hurried up his driveway toward the backyard.

  Their rented house sat on a one-acre lot on the fringe of a small town in upstate New York. Many Old Order families had settled in the area, enough to form four separate districts. Their home had three bedrooms, a country kitchen, and space for a large garden. Matthew knew he would find his beautiful bride of three years tending her rows of Bibb lettuce and green beans, or picking slugs by hand from her cabbages and broccoli. She would have their two-year-old son close to her side, while their infant daughter would be slung across her chest papoose-style or dozing in her portable crib at the end of a row. Today was no exception. He spotted Martha in a long column of young tomato plants. She was bent low, setting up wire cages that would support the tomato plants as they grew and bore plump, ripe fruit.

  “Hullo, fraa, I’m home at long last,” he crowed and broke into a trot.

  Martha Miller straightened her spine one vertebra at a time. It was a movement of the elderly instead of a young woman of twenty-four. Once erect, she looked like herself, except for the frown on her pretty face. “I thought you’d be home sooner than this, ehemann. It’s nearly seven o’clock.”

  Mindful of where he stepped among the plants, Matthew swept her into a bear hug of an embrace. “We left five minutes after quitting time. I was packed and ready to go.” He showered her face with kisses.

  “Stop. You’ll wake Mary and she’ll start fussing again.” Martha placed a firm hand against his chest and pushed him back. “My, a two-hour drive to get home from work by car? That is just ridiculous.” She wiped her hands against her apron and walked gingerly down the row.

  “It is far away, but you don’t want to move closer to my new job. I’m sure I could find us a suitable home with room for a garden for the same rent we’re paying here.”

  “There are no Amish families living near Rolling Meadows,” she stated simply.

  “No, but I could come home every night to my cheerful wife.” He heard a small but distinctive chuckle even though her back was turned.

  “I would be much more cheerful if you were around more to disagree with on a timely basis. Now I’m forced to save it up all week long.” She cast half a smile over her shoulder.

  “Should I look for a suitable place to rent next week?” He caught up to her and linked his arm through hers as they stepped over the low fence. The barrier was used to discourage hungry rabbits from feasting on their romaine.

  Martha hesitated and then shook her head. “No, Matthew. We should live with our own kind. Our kinner need to grow up with other Amish children or they will become confused if constantly surrounded by Englischers.”

  “In that case, we must deal with the long commute. With the money I can save working there, someday we’ll buy our own farm near other Plain folk. And with my own horse-training business, I’ll never have to leave the side of my always jolly fraa.”

  She nodded in acquiescence as they entered the house and then began setting out their dinner, keeping her eyes averted from his.

  That night, Matthew got down on his knees to pray instead of saying his prayers nestled down under the covers. Then he crawled in next to Martha, who had already nodded off. He cuddled as close as he could without waking her and fell fast asleep a contented man.

  Within a few days, Julia stopped stewing over her daughter-in-law’s letter. She had spring-cleaning to complete, which wouldn’t get done by worrying over her son’s family. What could she do anyway, even if her intuition was correct? They were far away in New York—well beyond the reach of a mamm’s well-intended advice. Matthew might actually listen to reason, never having been as stubborn or willful as his sister Emma.

  Emma—her rebellious child—the one whose rumschpringe days had turned Julia’s chestnut hair to dull gray by the time she married her young man. Julia decided that she would begin cleaning today in the room her daughters had shared while growing up. Inside the seldom-used guest room, Julia discovered mementos of the two sisters who’d once also shared dreams, secrets, and more than a few tears.

  In the closet hung one of Leah’s faded dresses, left behind because the shade of peach wasn’t suitable for a married woman, and because too much of her own good cooking had rendered this size only a nostalgic memory. Julia held the worn cotton to her face to inhale the faint but distinctive scent of her daughter. She would throw the outgrown frock into her ragbag to be cut up into quilting squares.

  Julia ran her dust cloth over the oak writing desk, where Leah wrote to Jonah and Emma had written to her Englischer, James Davis, while he’d been away at Ohio State Agricultural College. Then she headed to the girls’ nightstand and matching bureaus. On a lark, she opened the bottom drawer of Emma’s dresser. Emma had apparently forgotten quite a few items when she packed her bags for their honeymoon train ride to see the ocean. Emma had chosen to see the Pacific Ocean, not the much closer Atlantic. So like my rebellious child. Afterward she’d moved to Hollyhock Farms, owned by the Davis family of Charm. Her husband’s hometown was only fourteen miles from Winesburg, but it might as well be a hundred considering how often Emma, James, and their sons came to visit.

  Julia pulled out the drawer and set it on the bed to examine its contents without straining her back. The items should, no doubt, be dumped into the trash. In the streaming sunlight she spotted the blue jeans Emma had worn under her Plain dress to go horseback riding with James and his friends. She’d ridden all day long astride a thousand-pound-beast and not fallen off. Julia pressed the frayed denim to her nose to catch the fragrance of her oldest daughter. But instead she inhaled the scent of peaches! Sure enough, in the back of the drawer were containers of peach-scented shampoo, body lotion, and dusting powder, along with Cover Girl blusher and a tube of pink lip gloss. Julia squeezed a tiny bit onto her own finger to examine. It too smelled sweet. Emma had so wanted to compete with English girls, not realizing that James had fallen in love with a peaches-and-cream Amish girl who needed no enhancements to her incredible God-given beauty.

  Julia took out a brochure for the Sugar Creek Swiss Festival where Emma had taken her first train ride. It had been just a short trip to Baltic and back for tourists. Was it on the train that James realized he was head over heels in love with Emma? So much so that the young man was willing to give up his fast 4 x 4 pickup truck, Levi jeans, and plaid flannel shirts forever? Their change to New Order Amish meant he could keep his farm tractor, modern harvesters, cell phone, and electricity in their home as well as in the barns. Yet driving a horse and buggy each time
you wished to go anywhere had been a tough adjustment to make. Emma’s change from Old Order to New had been a far easier transition. However, living initially in her pushy mother-in-law’s home brought its own tribulations. Today, seeing Emma and James together with their two sons, you would think they had been born to their current lifestyle.

  Her former rebel, Emma, was one happy woman.

  Julia put the other mementos back in the drawer and slid it into the bureau. After returning Leah’s dress to its hanger in the closet, Julia ran her dust mop quickly over the wood floors and batted down cobwebs with her broom. She took a final glance around the room and closed the door behind her.

  With her heart aching, this wasn’t a good day to throw junk into the trash.

  Everything was how it should remain in her little girls’ room…at least for now.

  FIVE

  Niagara Falls, New York

  Phoebe Miller had never seen anything so grand—and they hadn’t even reached the falls. Out the left side of the bus she viewed the Niagara River, a broad blue expanse of water dotted with seagulls bobbing on the waves, hoping for an easy lunch. Motorboats puttered to-and-fro as anglers sought the perfect spot to cast their lines. The water looked downright benign. Yet thanks to Eli’s story, she knew what dangers lurked beneath the silvery calm surface.

  What if a boat’s engine conked out? Surely the unseen current would be too strong to paddle against, even if the vessel had oars on board. The terrified fishermen would be swept helplessly downstream. Cries for help to other boaters could go unheard. Certainly those cell phones that every Englischer carried wouldn’t work on a rushing, turbulent river. The poor souls would be carried to the brink of the falls, where they would hover for a few seconds before dropping over the edge to their deaths, not having the protection of a barrel like Annie Taylor’s.