A Hope for Hannah (Hannah's Heart 2)

  A Hope

  FOR HANNAH

  JERRY S. EICHER

  HARVEST HOUSE PUBLISHERS

  EUGENE, OREGON

  All Scripture quotations are taken from the King James Version of the Bible.

  Cover by Garborg Design Works, Savage, Minnesota

  Cover photo © Garborg Design Works

  A HOPE FOR HANNAH

  Copyright © 2010 by Jerry S. Eicher

  Published by Harvest House Publishers

  Eugene, Oregon 97402

  www.harvesthousepublishers.com

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Eicher, Jerry S.

  A hope for Hannah / Jerry Eicher.

  p. cm.

  ISBN 978-0-7369-3044-4 (pbk.)

  1. Married people—Fiction. 2. Amish—Montana—Fiction. I. Title.

  PS3605.I34H365 2010

  813’.6—dc22

  2009047456

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means—electronic, mechanical, digital, photocopy, recording, or any other—except for brief quotations in printed reviews, without the prior permission of the publisher.

  Printed in the United States of America

  10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 / BP-SK / 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  Contents

  One

  Two

  Three

  Four

  Five

  Six

  Seven

  Eight

  Nine

  Ten

  Eleven

  Twelve

  Thirteen

  Fourteen

  Fifteen

  Sixteen

  Seventeen

  Eighteen

  Nineteen

  Twenty

  Twenty-one

  Twenty-two

  Twenty-three

  Twenty-four

  Twenty-five

  Twenty-six

  Twenty-seven

  Twenty-eight

  Twenty-nine

  Thirty

  Thirty-one

  Thirty-two

  Thirty-three

  Thirty-four

  Thirty-five

  Thirty-six

  Thirty-seven

  Thirty-eight

  Thirty-nine

  Forty

  Discussion Questions

  About Jerry Eicher…

  Other fine Harvest House Amish fiction from Jerry Eicher…

  More fine Amish fiction from Harvest House Publishers…

  Amish-fiction lovers may also enjoy cooking the Amish way….

  AmishReader.com

  One

  Hannah Byler awoke with a start. She sat up in bed and listened. The wind outside the small cabin stirred in the pine trees. The moon, already high in the sky when she and Jake went to bed, shone brightly through the log cabin window.

  Beside her she heard Jake’s deep, even breathing. She had grown accustomed to the comforting sound in the few short months since they’d been married. She laid back down on the pillow. Perhaps it was just her imagination. There was no sound—nothing to indicate something might be wrong.

  But her heart beat faster—and fearfully. Something was wrong—but what?

  “Jake,” she whispered, her hand gently shaking his shoulder. “Jake, vagh uff.”

  “What is it?” he asked groggily. He spoke louder than she wished he would at the moment.

  “I don’t know,” she whispered again and hoped he would get the hint. “I think there’s something outside.”

  Jake listened and sat up in bed with his arms braced on the mattress.

  “I don’t hear anything,” he said, a little quieter this time. “There are all kinds of noises in the mountains at night.”

  “I think something is outside,” she insisted.

  They both were silent a moment, waiting and listening. Hannah half expected Jake to lower his head back to his pillow, tell her the fears were a bad dream, and go back to sleep. Instead he pushed back the covers and set his feet on the floor.

  Just then a loud snuff outside the log wall stopped him. They both froze. Hannah didn’t recognize the sound. No animal she knew ever made such a noise.

  “It sounds like a pig,” Jake said, his voice low. “What are pigs doing out here at nighttime?”

  “It’s not a pig,” Hannah whispered back. No stray pig, even in the nighttime, could create such tension. “It’s something else.”

  “But what?” Jake asked, the sound coming again, seemingly right against the log wall.

  Hannah lay rigid, filled with an overpowering sense that something large and fierce stood outside.

  “I’m going to go see what’s out there.” Jake had made up his mind, and Hannah made no objection.

  Jake felt under the bed for his flashlight and then moved toward the door. Somehow Hannah found the courage to follow but stayed close to Jake.

  Their steps made the wooden floor creak, the only sound to be heard.

  Jake slowly pulled open the wooden front door, his flashlight piercing the darkness as he moved it slowly left and then right.

  “Nothing here,” he said quietly and then stepped outside.

  Hannah looked around Jake toward the edge of the porch. “It was around the corner,” she whispered.

  Jake walked slowly toward the corner of the house, but Hannah stayed on the porch near the front door.

  Jake stopped momentarily and then stepped around the corner of the house. Hannah could only see a low glow from the flashlight. In the distance by the light of the moon, the misty line of the Cabinet Mountains accented the utter ruggedness of this country. During the day, the sight still thrilled her, but now that same view loomed dangerously.

  For the first time since they’d moved into the cabin after their wedding, Hannah wondered whether this place was a little too much for the two of them. Was a remote cabin, a mile off the main road and up this dirt path into the foothills of the Cabinet Mountains, really what she wanted?

  “It’s a bear!” Jake’s voice came from around the corner. “Come take a look—quick—before it’s gone.”

  “Gone,” she whispered.

  “Come see!” Jake’s urgent voice came again.

  Again Hannah found courage from somewhere. She stepped around the corner of the house and let her gaze follow the beam of Jake’s flashlight, which now pierced the edge of the clearing around their cabin. At the end of the beam, a furry long-haired bear—as large as the one she’d seen once at the zoo—stood looking back at them, its head raised and sniffing the air.

  “It’s a grizzly,” Jake said, excitement in his voice. “See its hump?”

  “Then why are we out here?” Hannah asked, nearly overcome with the urge to run and desperate for solid walls between her and this huge creature.

  “The men at the lumberyard said there aren’t many around,” Jake said in her ear. “Mostly black bears down in this area.”

  “Shouldn’t we be inside?” she asked the question another way, pulling on his arm. “It’s not going away.”

  “It will leave sooner if we stay in sight rather than go inside,” he told her, his light playing on the creature whose head was still in the air and turned in their direction.

  “Well, I’m going inside,” she said, her courage now wholly depleted.

  “It’s going,” Jake announced, and so she paused. They watched, fascinated, as the great creature bobbed its head and disappeared into the woods.

  “It’s gone,” Jake said, a bit disappointed. “That was a grizzly.”

  They turned back to the cabin, Hannah following Jake�
�s lead. As they stepped onto the porch, Hannah considered their front door. Suddenly the solid slat door—so bulky before—now looked thin, an unlikely protection against the hulk that had just disappeared into the dark tree line.

  “What if it comes back?” she asked.

  “It won’t. It’s just passing through,” he assured her. “They don’t like humans. They’re wanderers anyway. It’ll probably not come this way again—ever.”

  Not reassured, Hannah shut the door tightly behind them and pushed the latch firmly into place.

  “Bears hang around,” she told him. “This one could come back.”

  “Then we’ll deal with it. Maybe the game warden can help. I doubt it will return, though.” Jake was fast losing interest and ready for his bed again.

  Jake snuggled under the covers, pulling them tight up to his chin. “These are cold nights,” he commented. “Winter’s just around the corner. I have to get some sleep.”

  Hannah agreed and pulled her own covers up tight. Jake’s job on the logging crew involved hard manual labor that required a good night’s sleep. She didn’t begrudge him his desire for sleep.

  “I sure hope it doesn’t come back,” she said finally.

  “I doubt it will,” he muttered, but Hannah could tell he was already nearly asleep.

  To the sounds of Jake’s breathing, she lay awake and unable to stop her thoughts. Home, where she had grown up in Indiana, now seemed far away, a hazy blur against the fast pace of the past few months.

  What is Mom doing? she wondered. No doubt she’s comfortably asleep in their white two-story home, secure another night just like the night before and ready to face another day just like the day before.

  Thoughts of her earlier summers in Montana—tending to Aunt Betty’s riding stable—pushed into her mind. This country had seemed so glorious then, and she had dreamed of her return.

  The wedding had come first. She smiled in the darkness while she remembered the special day. After a flurry of letters and Jake’s visits as often as he could, Betty got her wish for a wedding in Montana. Hannah’s mother realized it was for the best. Because the plans for Hannah’s wedding to Sam Knepp ended in a disaster back home in Indiana, Roy and Kathy decided they couldn’t have the wedding there and possibly face that embarrassment again. Even Jake was in favor of the wedding in Montana—here where they had met.

  Their hearts were in Montana now—close to the land and the small Amish community in the shadow of the Cabinet Mountains. But lately Hannah asked herself if living out here in the middle of nowhere was really for their best. Then she was thankful that at least she was with Jake—better here with Jake than anywhere else without him.

  But as she lay in the darkness unable to sleep, she found herself wishing for close neighbors. She wished she could get up now and walk to the front door, knowing that someone else lived within calling distance—or at least within running distance if it came to that. Now, with a bear around, a night wanderer with mischief on his mind, there was nowhere to go. She shuddered.

  She wondered if she could outrun a bear and reach a neighbor’s house. She pictured herself lifting her skirt for greater speed. How fast can bears run? Can they see well at night to scout out their prey?

  Hannah shivered in the darkness and listened to Jake’s even breathing, wondering how he could sleep after what they had just seen. A grizzly! Jake had been sure it was a grizzly they’d heard sniffing around their cabin just outside their bedroom wall. Why was Jake not more alarmed? He had even seemed fascinated, as if it didn’t bother him at all.

  She had always thought she was the courageous one, the one who wanted adventure. After all, she had come out to Montana on her own that first summer. The mountains had fascinated her, drawn her in, and given her strength. But tonight those same mountains had turned on her and given her a bear for a gift—a grizzly. Even the stately pine trees, with their whispers that soothed her before, now seemed to talk of dark things she knew nothing about, things too awful to say out loud.

  She turned in the bed, hoping she wouldn’t disturb Jake. She thought of his job on the logging crew, really a job of last resort. Yes, at first it was a blessing because they needed the income, but now it had become more and more of a burden. Jake didn’t complain, but the burden was apparent in the stoop of his shoulders when he came home at night. It revealed itself in his descriptions of how he operated the cutter, navigated the steep slopes, and worked with logs that rolled down the sides of the mountains. She also heard it in his descriptions of Mr. Wesley, his boss. She had met Mr. Wesley once when he had stopped by the house to interview Jake for the job. He operated the largest timber company in Libby, and his huge, burly form matched his position, nearly filling their cabin door that day. She had been too glad Jake had gotten the job to worry much about Mr. Wesley, but after he left she was glad she wouldn’t see him every day.

  Hannah shivered again, feeling the sharp chill that seeped into the log house—the same one that seemed so wonderful in summer. Winter would come soon to this strange land, and neither she nor Jake had ever been through one here.

  Hannah willed herself to stop thinking. Now she knew for certain. There had been something she wanted to tell Jake but had wanted to wait until she was sure. Now on this night—the night the bear came—she was certain. The strangeness puzzled her. How could a bear’s unexpected visit and this wonderful news have anything to do with each other?

  Two

  Hannah woke only a few hours later, just before dawn. She expected to be groggy after the night’s events and was surprised at how clearheaded she was.

  Quietly she slid out of bed to avoid waking Jake. He could have his last few minutes of sleep uninterrupted. Hannah walked out to the large front window of the cabin, its metal frame outlined by the last of the moon. She stood in front of the window and looked toward the east where the sun would soon come up.

  Jake had said windows were a problem in log cabins. He was surprised one this size hadn’t broken as the logs settled over the years. It was a blessing of the Lord—a sign perhaps—she had thought. It was one of the things that had persuaded her to accept Jake’s decision to buy this remote cabin.

  The loneliness of the area had excited her at the time. But this morning it felt empty, a void needing to be filled. She looked for signs of the first sun ray above the Cabinet Mountains but found only stars, their brightness still undimmed.

  As beautiful as it was here, for some reason a wave of homesickness for Indiana swept over her. Indiana. Home. There her mother would be up at this time, perhaps even earlier. She would be making soft noises in the kitchen as she prepared breakfast. There, Hannah too would be awakened, not do the waking as she soon would for Jake.

  The responsibilities of the day pressed in on her. Jake’s breakfast needed to be made and later the last of the garden needed tending. Was this how life was or would be? A simple life with its demands, settled down to spurts of joy with Jake and the danger of bears lurking in the night?

  One other bright thought hung on the horizon, not unlike that vigorous twinkling star above the highest peak of the mountain range. Her mother and father were coming to visit before communion Sunday. They would see aunt Betty, her mother’s sister, but Hannah knew the real reason they would be coming all those miles. They were coming to see her. Perhaps that was the cause of her sudden homesickness.

  Maybe so, she decided, and if that was the case, her homesickness would soon go away. As for the grizzly’s visit last night, no doubt it was as Jake said—an experience that wouldn’t be repeated.

  Hannah returned to the bedroom and gently shook Jake’s shoulder. “Time to get up,” she whispered.

  He slowly opened his eyes. “You’re up already? A little early, isn’t it?”

  “I just woke up. I couldn’t sleep any longer. Probably the bear last night,” she suggested as an explanation.

  “Yeah, maybe,” he agreed, sitting up. “There was a bear last night, wasn’t there?”

/>   “Yes, there certainly was.”

  “It was just passing through. Bears don’t hang around for very long in this area,” he said, apparently feeling the need to repeat his prediction from last night. “Is it looking like rain?”

  “Not that I could tell,” Hannah said.

  “Mr. Wesley thought we might be in for a storm. Hopefully not. I really can’t lose the wages.”

  “Are we short on money?” Hannah asked, a little surprised by the comment. The last time she had checked their bank account, it seemed fine.

  “It’s fine now,” Jake said, “but winter’s coming soon enough. There won’t be as much work for me then, and the mortgage payment is a burden.”

  “Then you better get to work,” Hannah said. “I’ll get breakfast started.” She impulsively reached out and ran her hand through Jake’s hair. He was cute in the morning even when he talked about bothersome things like bears and his concerns about the money.

  Jake smiled sheepishly, and Hannah kissed his forehead and turned to the kitchen. With a glance around, Hannah saw she needed to make a quick trip outside to the little springhouse, which stood about fifty feet from the cabin and served as their refrigerator. Jake had repaired the ramshackle little building soon after they moved in after the wedding.

  With quick steps in the cool air, Hannah unlatched the door and took a handful of eggs from the wooden pine shelves. On her return she felt the chill of the morning air sink in deeper and wondered why she hadn’t noticed the cold earlier. It was never this cold quite so soon back in Indiana.

  Hannah thought about Jake’s fear over the growing scarcity of work. Her dad had always taken care of money problems when she was growing up. Her mom had rarely spoken of money. Now she realized part of being married was dealing with money. She would have to do her part and help Jake out when she could. As hard as he worked for what seemed like meager wages, he deserved that much out of her.

  Yet, wouldn’t God take care of them no matter what happened? Jake would find work somehow, and if there wasn’t work, they could skimp on the money they had. She had canned vegetables from the garden last summer, and there were still some potatoes and carrots in the ground, ready to be harvested. That would all help. And they could always save more, couldn’t they? Most important of all, they loved each other. Surely that would see them through anything.