My Amish Childhood Page 10

Dad pondered the situation for a while until a local man, who must have heard about the problem, arrived with his proposed solution. He would dig the basement himself, he said. His brother, Pedro, and he would take care of it. His name was Fausto. He was a jolly man, always ready with a laugh. A man of medium height, he proclaimed the basement digging no problema and showed off the large biceps in his arm as evidence. The man clearly was used to hard work.

  Still Dad was skeptical. They went down to the site, and Fausto took a few test whacks at the shale. The ground broke off easily under the point of the pick, which was smaller than Uncle Mark’s wide shovel. It was still no problema.

  Dad laughed and moved on to the next point. How much would this digging by hand cost? No doubt seeing Canadian manual labor prices dancing in his head, Fausto quoted a ridiculously low amount, like 200 or 300 lempiras for the whole project. No doubt an astronomic sum in his mind, but Dad was truly stunned.

  “We’ll be done in no time,” Fausto proclaimed. “Me and my brother, Pedro.”

  “I don’t know about that,” Dad told him, not wanting to take unfair advantage of the situation. “How about we set up a weekly rate? I’ll pay you at the end of each week until you’re finished.”

  The two sized each other up for a few moments.

  Fausto stood there, the young man who had only recently taken on a young wife and whose first child, a daughter, had been born the prior year, being about the same age as my sister Sarah Mae. While on this job search, he had left both his wife and daughter behind at his parents’ place, or rather his parents’ hut, more than two hours away by bus.

  Dad was the Amish man with seven children. He ran a prosperous machine shop, living in tight quarters across the road by our standards. But the place had more rooms than any three local huts, and now he was building a yet larger house across the road.

  I cannot fathom such contrasts, even in looking back. But it illustrates the problems faced by the Amish in a third-world culture. Their norms were completely upended, and they hardly knew where to begin setting them upright again. Stateside, few people from the Englisha wanted to be Amish. They admired them, perhaps, but from afar. There the Amish were the poor living among the rich. In Honduras, the Amish were rich beyond all local comprehension. What Fausto was thinking while he made his deal with Dad, I don’t know. But I got to know him well afterward. He would stay on as our worker all the years we remained in Honduras. I can guess his thoughts.

  An honest man he was, open-faced and trustworthy to a fault. The man couldn’t read or write, and he had no desire to learn. It wasn’t necessary for the life he wanted to live. So I think Fausto saw more than just a basement needing to be dug that morning. Here in front of him was the life he wanted to live: working for a rich man from the States. A person whose business wouldn’t fail next year. Someone who wouldn’t disappear on him next week. A person who wouldn’t be out of money when payday arrived. Fausto saw all of this, or at least a glimpse of it, I’m sure.

  “Twenty lempiras a week,” Fausto said, his face breaking into a broad grin. “For me and my brother Pedro.”

  Why not? Dad thought. Ten dollars in American money. There was nothing to lose. And he wouldn’t be cheating the man with a pitiful contract price.

  “Okay,” Dad said. “Twenty lempiras a week. When can you start?”

  “Right now,” Fausto said. “Where is the wheelbarrow?”

  The needed tools were produced, and the digging began. Digging that would go on for long weeks, and all done cheerfully. The two men worked hard all day, from seven in the morning until four in the afternoon. And each Friday Fausto collected his twenty lempiras, gave eight of them to Pedro, and disappeared for a weekend visit with his wife. On Monday, the two were back again, digging away. They dug all week, the one man for six dollars American and the other for four.

  That scene is a permanent fixture in my mind. The great dig, going on and on. Never a week missed that I can remember. Not for sickness, or heat, or storms. It took them over four months, if I remember correctly. The shovels were worn into half-moon circles by the time they were done.

  Dad kept the tools as mementos for years, dragging them with him when we moved stateside, and bringing them out to show visitors. He would tell the story of the two locals who dug his basement by hand through shale rock.

  When the hole was completed, Dad hired Fausto on full-time for eighteen lempiras a week. That would be nine US dollars. And Dad built a small one-room shack for Fausto set up a few hundred yards north of our house. There Fausto brought his wife, Elsa, and daughter, Maria, to live.

  It was while the great dig was going on that I had my one-and-only true fist fight. I showed up bloody and bruised at the dig one afternoon to display my battle wounds. Neither Fausto nor Pedro seemed that impressed, which greatly deflated my high.

  The altercation had begun in Grandfather’s mango orchard after lunch. The local boys had nicknamed me pata sopae months earlier. Local slang for “buzzard feet,” I think. Not that I objected; it was true after all. I was tall, skinny, gangly, and consisted mostly of feet. I resembled, I suspected, the ugly black carrion-eating birds who are a constant presence in any Honduras landscape.

  But such designations do bear down on the soul, however bravely born. So when the fistfight was proposed between me and one of the local boys, I was honored by the attention more than anything else. I was glad to be considered a worthy opponent. Winning wasn’t exactly something I expected. What I thought would happen, I’m not sure. Things were kind of hazy in my mind. I was clearly doing something forbidden and well knew it. Amish boys didn’t fight. But this wasn’t really the kind of fighting the adults talked about, I reasoned. We weren’t angry with each other.

  So I agreed, and much excitement ensued. A few of the locals bowed out at once, much to my surprise. But a boy was finally found as the designated fighter to stand against me. We lined up, facing each other. We were just on the other side of the little wooden footbridge that spanned the canal in the mango orchard. We moved closer to each other, and he got a few licks in on my chest and face that cut and stung for awhile. I really didn’t know what to do; I didn’t have a clue. Finally seeing an opening, I took a swing and then another one. I put everything I had into them.

  The result was pure amazement on my part and on the part of the boys standing around me. The fellow was lifted literally off his feet and thrown onto his back. He lay there stunned for long moments while I stared down at him.

  Cheers and wild exclamations broke out, whereupon the boy on the ground leaped to his feet. He took one look around before racing off through the mango orchard. I felt pure joy rush through my veins. From the power of the blow. From the cheers around me. From the raw admiration. I had never felt such a thing in my life.

  “Let’s put someone else up against him,” the other boys proclaimed at once. But no one could be found. I was the victor of the day. And they chattered in great detail about every move of the fight, which really hadn’t lasted that long. For my part, I made my way back to the digging of the basement and presented myself for more accolades. I shut up about the matter after being deflated by Fausto and Pedro’s bored reaction.

  The following day I learn that fame carries a high price. A person becomes the target that must be dethroned. A local boy—a really large local boy—and much older than I, worked on Grandfather’s place. He hadn’t been there on the day of the fight. He was now ready for the proposed rematch. The others encouraged him, and he grinned with glee at their urgings. He was clearly taking upon himself the challenge of lowering me down a notch or two.

  I knew and he knew that he could whop me—and do it easily. So I said no, I wasn’t going to fight him. That wasn’t an acceptable answer. He hounded me for days. He dogged my steps, insisting on setting up a time for the great challenge. But I always said no. Finally we passed him on the trail out in the open fields on the way to Grandfather’s place. Brother John was with me that day. The boy challenged me
again. I again refused; whereupon he came up and slapped me in the face. Hard. That produced the result he wanted. I flew into him, fists flying. The fight lasted less time than the other one had. He was on top of me, pounding my face.

  “I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” I muttered repeatedly.

  Sorry for what, I didn’t know. For winning, I guess. It seemed the appropriate thing to say groveling in the face of a bully. And it produced the result I wanted. The beating stopped.

  He got up, brushed himself off, and strutted on down the trail.

  “You should have beat him on his back with the wooden end of your slingshot,” I told John, trying to salvage a little of my bruised pride.

  “I should have,” John agreed.

  We both knew it would have been useless. The outcome had been preordained. And John would have been beaten up for his efforts.

  I gathered myself together and stayed out of fistfights from then on. Even Mom never found out. Or if she did, she kindly didn’t broach the subject with me.

  Chapter 18

  Two events would conspire to stop the great dig while it was ongoing, but neither succeeded. One was when word swept through the community that the new road from Tegucigalpa would pass through the lower part of Sanson, cutting the farm in half and greatly reducing its value to anyone. A low-flying plane was even seen passing over, allegedly marking off the new road.

  Should the community consider moving before such devaluation took place? And if moving was in the works, Dad sure didn’t want another house on his property to dispose of.

  Fausto and his brother, Pedro, scoffed at such a thing. “It will never come,” they said. “Who has that much money to spend on a road?”

  But the Amish had a vested interest in the subject, so Dad went in to talk with the officials in Guaimaca. They counseled remaining calm, not wanting to lose such valuable contributors to the local economy. Surely land prices would actually increase with a paved road, or perhaps this paved road would never happen.

  Not that any of us wouldn’t have welcomed a paved road running from the capital to the community and then on out east to Olancho. The problem was believing the road would happen in the first place, and second, when, in this land of mañana. After more consideration, Dad ignored the talk and the basement digging never halted.

  The road did end up coming through, exactly where the people had said it would. Only it was years after we’d left. I never heard of anyone losing property value in the process.

  The other event wasn’t so easily shaken off. Fausto and Pedro didn’t scoff this time. They shook their heads and said little. We sat out on the wooden fence beside the old cottage for hours that morning, feeling the shock in the air. Three of the David Peachey children came down to talk to us children about it—Rhoda, Daniel, and Joseph.

  I don’t know what they thought they could do. Comfort us perhaps. Share in our shock since the robbers had also been at their place last night. On top of that, their mother was dying of cancer, a fact well-known in the community by then. But that’s how that family was, always kindhearted and thinking of others.

  I’d slept through the whole thing, but my two oldest sisters, Susanna and Miriam, had awakened and peeked out of their bedroom, only to flee back at Mom’s orders to hide. They hid shivering under the covers until the robbers left.

  The evening before, up at Grandfather’s place, Uncle Abner was loading the truck around nine o’clock for his usual produce run into Tegucigalpa. Uncle Mark and Cousin Ira were helping, along with the driver of the truck. They were just finishing up, working by the light of the vehicle and gas lanterns, which they’d hung around. It wasn’t a small task, packing in all the vegetables, butter, sour cream, and other goods. They had to be packed well enough to survive the rough, bouncing, four-hour ride the next morning.

  Things were far enough along that Cousin Ira decided to leave. He walked up the dark path between Grandfather’s place and where he and his newlywed wife lived along the creek. Near the irrigation canal he was jumped by four men with guns. They ordered him to lead the way back to the produce truck.

  He did, of course, what with guns stuck in his ribs and all. When they arrived at the produce truck, a mad rush was made into the light and guns were flourished. Uncle Abner, Uncle Mark, and the driver were quickly secured, and the four men searched the premises, taking whatever they wanted. The loot was gathered outside on the ground.

  Grandmother was alone with them upstairs while they searched that part of the house, but she suffered no physical harm at their hands, other than being frightened out of her wits.

  Quickly it became apparent that the four robbers were operating under the command of a fifth man. This man lurked in the shadows during the whole night’s episode. Never visible but always consulted when the time came for important decisions. Now there was such a decision. The men could find only one gun in their search of the house, and there were supposed to be two. The fifth man said so.

  Uncle Abner admitted that, yes, Grandfather had kept two guns in the house while he was alive. But that one had been borrowed by his nephew Paul, Uncle Joe’s oldest boy, that very afternoon for bird hunting. Much grumbling ensued, but what could be done about it? The gun wasn’t present.

  “Then we must go to Joe Stoll’s place and find the gun,” the order came from the lurking fifth man. So the march began with two hostages—Uncle Abner and Cousin Ira—in tow. Uncle Mark and the driver were left behind with instructions to stay put for the night.

  The impression at the beginning was that decisions were being made by the robbers on the fly. But now I question that. The event fell together too neatly to not have been planned in some detail. First, it wasn’t necessary to go past our place to arrive at Uncle Joe’s. They could have gone on the other side of the ravine on the trail that lay between us and Uncle Stephen’s. Going over the gully would eventually lead them past the children’s home at the turn, which would have put the robbers in sight of another likely target if the thing had been unplanned. And there would have had to be lights on at the children’s home because the Northern Indiana Amish never retired until late.

  Either way, the trek with the hostages leading the way went past our place. The robbers decided to stop in. The four men proceeded to beat on the front door, which didn’t induce Dad to open it. He believed in nonresistance, but he wasn’t going to willingly open a door in the night to strange men who beat on it. This problem was quickly overcome by orders from the four robbers to the hostages. “Speak to them in your language.” With gun barrels at their backs, Uncle Abner and Cousin Ira obeyed.

  “It’s us, Abner and Ira,” they hollered in German. “Open the door.”

  Dad finally did, turning the lock on the door. He was nearly knocked to the floor by the force of the gun barrels thrust into his ribs. The marks were there for days afterward. Mom was in her nightgown, and in no condition to receive visitors, but there was no choice in the matter. That was also about the time my two sisters stuck their heads out of the bedroom. Mom shooed them back in with quick orders to hide.

  Mom never did learn to speak Spanish for reasons of her own, but that night she understood when the men asked, “Muchachas?” [girls] after seeing the retreating forms of my sisters.

  “No,” Mom lied, fearing the worst. “Muchachos” [boys].

  I doubt if they were fooled. They simply had other things on their minds: guns and money. Dad had been planning to leave for a trip to the capital in the morning to restock supplies, so he had plenty of money around. The robbers made off with a big haul, around 3000 lempiras. And they took the last of our guns. This fact pained me the most as I was consigned for the rest of my time in Honduras to a pellet gun. (Which may not have been that bad an idea, come to think of it.)

  Leaving our house, the little party proceeded into the darkness, taking Dad with them as a third hostage. Hands tied behind their backs, the men went with orders not to make a noise unless told to. Somewhere between Uncle Joe’s place and o
urs, among the gently rolling slopes, the hostages were ordered to kneel on the ground. Consultations were taken with the shadowy commander. The three thought they were going to be shot because their usefulness was over. I had only to look at Dad’s face the next morning to know he’d been fully convinced of that. He carried about him the shadow of death.

  For reasons unknown, they were ordered back on their feet and on to Uncle Joe’s place. Twice more that night that ritual would be played out. Whether for terror purposes or because their captors really did plan to shoot them and were persuaded otherwise, no one would ever know.

  Arriving at Uncle Joe’s, the procedure was repeated. Only this time, Aunt Laura opened the door because Uncle Joe was tending to a sick baby. The robbers rushed in and caught the poor man in the bedroom without his pants. I’ve had many bad dreams of having to cross a crowded room and being unable to find my pants. Of running and running and never arriving. But I have never had pistols prodding my ribs while I was trying to put my pants on. I doubt that Uncle Joe found the situation amusing in the least.

  When it became clear the house had been thoroughly searched for guns and money, the men made ready to leave. They left Uncle Joe behind with strict orders not to leave the house, saying they were leaving someone outside to guard the place, which turned out to be untrue.

  From there the party backtracked past our place, ending up at David Peachey’s house, and using the same routine there. They seemed to become less violent with the gun punching as the night proceeded. Perhaps they realized we really were peace-loving people.

  Forcing the hostages to carry the bags of loot, the robbers continued on over to La Granja, crossed Turk Road, and hit Emil Helmuth and Minister Vernon’s places before calling it a night. The robbers made their last threats to the hostages, warning them to never report this to anyone, let alone the police, or they would be shot. With those words hanging in the air, they vanished toward the mountains and into the early morning mist.