Rebecca's Choice (The Adams County Trilogy 3) Read online

He had dedicated his life to the service of his fellow man. There had been other chances, but he hadn’t taken them. He could have married, but he chose not to, not out of bitterness but because he didn’t want to.

  The envelopes were already open, so he sat down and pulled the first letter out.

  “My dearest Emma,” he said aloud, reading his own words.

  You know of my love for you, yet I feel like saying it again and again. I am left with the memory of your face, but already it is being crowded out by the memory of how our last visit ended—you were climbing the hill to the house, your brother at your side.

  I hope and pray with all that is within me that our love will not be lost. You need not tell me of the wide gulf that exists between us, erected by religion. There is but one religion, our love for God and our love for our fellow man. Can you not see that, Emma? My heart aches that you might.

  Surely your brother cannot believe me so evil that we must be parted. I cannot even know if this letter will reach you, and yet I could never rest if I did not try. You know how much I care for you. Have I not told you a hundred times? Were the moments we spent together not precious though few?

  Can you really think, Emma, that being apart and never seeing each other again is the will of God? Surely that is not something that even crosses your mind. Yet when I have driven out to our place, at dusk as always, you have never been there.

  The sun set as it always did, but I felt only the emptiness that was left beside me and in my heart. On some of the evenings that I wait, I believe the sunset puts on a grand display for my sake. I take courage in this thought and search for the hope that it’s true.

  Yours truly, with all my love,

  Manny Troyer

  He set the letter down, lost in thought. So she had received this—his heart’s cry, his agony—yet he had heard nothing back. Why would she keep the letter? It puzzled him. Perhaps the answer was yet to be discovered, as there seemed to be more letters. On the verge of digging deeper, he felt drawn to the two remaining letters—his letters.

  He felt strangely stirred, as he heard his own voice from across the years. The passion moved him. How long had it been since he had felt such emotion? He knew the answer. A very long time. Not even in his service—in his best service—he felt such passion. He hadn’t planned it this way. He had just left the emotion behind as a thing that did not belong to him, a subject that had passed him by.

  Yet here it was again. He unfolded the second letter.

  My dearest, dearest Emma,

  My heart is full tonight—full of sorrow—like the ocean is full of water and salt at the same time. I went out to our place under the tree again. The sun made no effort to say anything. It set like a stone without ripples, the clouds the color of clay.

  Have you received my other letter? Surely your brother would not block such a thing. I can’t imagine him as such a mean creature, even though he is Amish. You are Amish, and yet I hardly think God ever made a lovelier creature than you, Emma.

  The light of your eyes makes me weak inside. The touch of your hand always felt like the dawning of a brand new day. When I met you on those evenings, Emma, it was as if I came alive again for the first time. I thought the feeling would go away, but it never did. Perhaps that is why God is taking you from me. Is it because I have loved too much?

  I have never loved like this before, Emma. I really haven’t. There were other girls, as I suppose there were boys for you. I was a little interested, but when I first saw you, a flame leaped up in my heart.

  I told myself it was impossible, that I should never have come, but how is one to turn off the stars or keep the moon from shining, Emma? I could no more stay away from you than I could keep from breathing.

  This must be why God has taken you from me. I am angry with Him. Perhaps I shouldn’t tell you this, but I figure you won’t read this anyway, not after I failed to get a response from the first letter. Yet I must tell someone and why not you, even if you never read it.

  There is no use saying that I love you, Emma. The whole world is saying it for me, and surely you can hear.

  Manny Troyer

  “Well…” Manny said, “what a rascal I was.” The trace of a smile crossed his face. He opened the third letter.

  My dear Emma,

  This will be my last letter to you. Today I went to the house. I knew someone was home because there were buggies in the yard—two of them. I don’t know Amish people that well, but in my world, two cars in the yard indicates someone is at home.

  The ache in my heart has gotten no better. I suppose it never will, but then I expect many before me have thought the same. My calamity is not that strange, I have decided. I have loved, and loved with all my heart, but then so have others before me.

  I will join them, bitterly and unwillingly, but I will do it. Of this I am determined. I made peace with God last night at our church. It was there I imagined you would stand one day. The pulpit was removed as they do when the special day has arrived. The people had gathered. There you would be, my Emma, my beloved one, to claim, to love, and to promise sacred vows with.

  I now know it will never be. I am sure you didn’t come to the door. The courage it took to come there was great. Perhaps you will never understand that. I tried to bridge the gap between us with the only tool I had, myself, but the door didn’t open.

  Goodbye, Emma. I sold the Corvette today. The sale brought quite a good price but no joy to my heart. That was lost the last time I saw your eyes light up with love for me. You will forgive me for giving up. Surely you will understand.

  I wish to thank you, Emma. Perhaps that will surprise you too, if you do read this. As I said in the last letter, I was bitter against God. Yet I am thankful to you and to Him, that He made love like this, and that you allowed me to feel it. For this I am in your debt. I now know what it is to love.

  In this I may have sinned—I did not love God the same way, but I now know how, and I will try.

  Goodbye, Emma. I never got to kiss you. Wish I would have.

  Manny Troyer

  “Well…” he said again. “So…who would have thought it.”

  He glanced at the clock. The time was well past his suppertime, but he dug deeper into the box.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  Sunday morning couldn’t have dawned more cheerful. The sun rose without a color in the sky, its light bright and piercing. Already the trees were green, buds bursting from their long winter-imposed sleep. Rebecca went out to help Matthew hitch up for the drive to church. He insisted on driving the single buggy lately, even though he wasn’t with the young people yet.

  “It’s too tight in the surrey!” he declared vehemently earlier that morning at the breakfast table.

  “He’s growing up,” Lester replied, speaking over his head.

  “A little too fast!” Mattie said.

  “Please,” Matthew had begged, trying that angle. “Rebecca shouldn’t be driving in the surrey anyway. She’s almost married.”

  Lester grinned at the logic but allowed the request with a nod of his head.

  “He’s not getting too big for his head?” Mattie asked.

  “Just growing up,” Lester replied.

  Rebecca paused outside the living room door to watch the pair of robins build their nest. They were busy in the tree near her upstairs bedroom window. One of them landed next to the half-built nest and wrestled with the piece of twig in its mouth, while the other flew off, apparently in search of fresh material.

  “Would you hurry?” Matthew hollered from beside the buggy. Rebecca knew he could easily get the horse under the shafts himself, so she lingered. So rhythmic were the lives of birds, dictated by forces outside themselves, sprung by the change of seasons—summer, fall, winter, then spring. Love for them seemed nothing more than a biological timing, over which they had no control.

  Humans, she thought, they mess it up because they have control. The day in front of her made the case. Before this, choice had a
lways seemed attractive, but it now lay down a path strewn with obstacles and implications all tangled up in a frightful mess.

  Last night, after the younger children were in bed, Lester had called her back down to the living room. Mattie sat on the couch, her hands in knots in front of her. As Rebecca could tell, her mother had been deep in thought.

  “We need to go over this,” Lester said, motioning to Rebecca to sit on the couch beside Mattie.

  Rebecca had no objections to the talk they were about to have. In a way she felt relief. Perhaps her father knew of a way around the problem or could find a way.

  “You are about to make a big decision,” Lester said. “Seems to me, we should be certain.”

  “He means to ask whether or not there really is a problem,” Mattie added.

  “Are you sure this is true?” Lester asked.

  “You mean Emma’s will?” Rebecca asked.

  “Yes.” Lester nodded.

  Rebecca threw her hands in the air. “I only know what I’ve been told and read from The Budget and all.”

  “So we’re basing this whole thing on The Budget,” Lester said sounding exasperated. “Shouldn’t we have asked someone and verified this thing? Maybe Leona knows something.”

  “How would she?” Mattie asked. “They only tell family.”

  “I suppose so,” Lester allowed. “I don’t like it. I just don’t. Seems like a lot is being made of something when all this time no one has talked with a lawyer or someone who really knows.”

  “You wouldn’t get a lawyer, would you?” Mattie asked. “Surely not.”

  Lester shook his head. “No, not like that. We could talk to the one Emma used.”

  “I wouldn’t know how to do that,” Rebecca told him.

  “She can’t,” Mattie added. “I won’t have her asking questions or running out to Milroy as if she’s after the money. You know how that would look.”

  “I suppose so,” Lester agreed. “I still don’t like it.”

  “The bishop has made up his mind,” Mattie said, as if that proved everything. “He doesn’t want Rebecca going along with communion. Do you think he would decide such a thing on a rumor?”

  Rebecca could see that her father had doubts, and she grabbed eagerly at the slender thread. “Do you suppose it’s all a rumor?” she had asked.

  “It’s not,” Mattie said. “Such things just aren’t.”

  “It still seems a little wild, this accusation. Why would Emma leave her money to Rebecca—and for such a reason?” Lester glanced at Rebecca. “Did you ever give her reason to think you were leaving the Amish? Dropped a hint? Is that why? Did she try to persuade you?”

  “No,” Rebecca said shaking her head. “I talked with her about Atlee but said nothing about leaving.”

  “You sure?” Mattie asked.

  “Sure,” Rebecca said. “She asked me whether or not I was thinking of leaving. I said no.”

  “Still strange,” Lester said. “This whole thing is strange. It makes no sense at all—not a bit of sense. Leaving money for such a reason is so out of the blue.”

  “Maybe the girl said more than she knows,” Mattie suggested. “Sometimes people think they hear things and believe they are true when they are not.”

  “Still makes no sense,” Lester said. “Anyway, we have pre-communion church tomorrow. Do you really plan on going through with this?”

  “It’s not me,” Rebecca said, raising her hands in the air. “I have nothing to do with it. Isaac said I can’t. The ministers decided it. They want to wait it out and see if something else might show up to clear the matter.”

  “I guess that’s reasonable,” Lester allowed. “I hope something shows up. Maybe this is all based on a rumor.”

  “You’re grasping at straws,” Mattie informed him.

  “Might be,” Lester agreed. “Is John really not going along with communion?”

  “He said he wouldn’t,” Rebecca told him.

  “Did you try to persuade him?” Mattie asked.

  “No.” Rebecca shook her head.

  “Then I’ll talk to him,” Lester concluded. “He shouldn’t stay back. It’ll just make things worse.”

  Rebecca knew it would, and perhaps her father would have a chance this morning to talk with John and persuade him otherwise. Inside, though, she hoped John would stay back. It was a selfish thought, she figured, but it felt good. It would be lonely to go through this by herself.

  “I’m leaving by myself,” Matthew hollered, this time from inside the buggy. His hands gripped the lines, ready to release them.

  Rebecca knew he wouldn’t dare leave without her. If he did it would be the end of his privileges with the single buggy. She smiled at him as she climbed in, and he made a face. As Matthew let the lines out and the horse shot forward, their father came out of the house to get his own horse.

  “You’d better take it easy,” Rebecca warned him. “Maybe I should drive.”

  That Matthew wouldn’t let her was a forgone conclusion. The very idea was a joke in itself. To drive into church with his sister at the lines might well destroy his masculinity beyond repair.

  Matthew confirmed her conclusions with a snort through his nose.

  “I’m your sweet sister,” she told him.

  “All the more reason for me to drive,” he said.

  “You are making no sense.”

  “Perfect sense,” he said. “I drive.”

  After Matthew dropped her off at the end of the walk, Rebecca went in to wait in the wash room, a line of women ahead of her. She left her bonnet and shawl on the corner of the table. Slowly she moved with the line, time seeming to hang still in the air.

  She figured most of them knew about her and Emma by now, the news received when they read The Budget. What they didn’t know, they were to find out before this day was over. She, Rebecca Keim, had to stay back from communion. It would be the beginning of many uncomfortable days.

  Rebecca saw Wilma with several other younger girls. She was certain Wilma would not turn away from her. Drawn by the hope, she walked over and stood beside Wilma, though there were still other women she had not shaken hands with. This morning the matter would have to slide.

  “We heard from Milroy,” Wilma whispered.

  Rebecca leaned toward her, their shoulders together.

  “It’s true. Mom heard from her sister. She talked with Ezra’s wife, Elizabeth, and Emma did leave you almost everything if you marry John.” Wilma’s eyes were big.

  “I’m not marrying for money,” Rebecca whispered back.

  “I know,” Wilma said, and the line moved toward the living room.

  So it is true, Rebecca thought, as she followed Wilma. Her father’s hope that some new information would surface lay on the hardwood floor, stepped on, squashed flat. Her head hurt already, and the day was young.

  They were early Rebecca noticed when the line of girls walked in front of the seated women. Usually the boys were already at their benches. She sat beside Wilma and waited. The house was still and silent, broken only by the soft shuffle of feet on the hardwood floor and the squeak of hard benches as bodies settled down on them.

  Rebecca searched for John’s face in the line of boys. They came in, one after the other, almost shoulder to shoulder. They took rapid steps forward, their faces turned to the ground. Rebecca found John’s face and wondered, Did Father speak with him? Will he stand with me today—in this hour of trouble?

  She felt shame in her hope yet yearned for his support. Is he not to be my husband? Am I within my rights to expect this much of him? She imagined this might soften the blow. Perhaps it would make it harder for the ministers to leave her dangling in the wind. With John, a minister’s son, by her side and abstaining too, the ministers might have more of a chance of changing their minds.

  They would change their decision, she was certain. She had done no wrong. She didn’t regret the past. She felt as if she would do the same thing again, and yet she knew things
might not look so to others. Others might misunderstand. Surely, she thought, the tide will soon turn and the matter will clear up.

  She found and held John’s gaze, the warmth of his look filling her and almost causing her to gasp. Wilma glanced sideways at her in astonishment. John dropped his eyes, but in the moment of their contact, she knew. She was certain John would stand with her. He would risk all to show them her innocence. He would demonstrate his belief in her. Today they would be together in heart and mind.

  With the song announced, the songs began, and they heard the familiar sounds of the ministers’ feet moving upstairs. What they said this morning, Rebecca really didn’t care. The delight of the prior moments still filled her. John would stand with her. With that love she felt impenetrable, like a fortress that couldn’t be breached.

  She wondered if it would always be so. Was this what it felt like to be wrapped up in John’s arms and held? Was this how God created love to feel like—so safe and secure, so like Himself? The voices rose all around her in song, and she joined in, her heart full. This surprised her because she knew what would come afterward.

  As the ministers returned, the singing stopped. Isaac got up first, and then Bishop Martin completed the last sermon, his voice rose and fell with a rhythmic sound. He closed the service and asked the members to stay seated. The younger children stood up and filed out.

  In the silence that followed, Martin got to his feet again and began. The list of items he had to go over was long, which wasn’t unusual. A few old rules needed refreshment, and some new rules needed consideration. Rebecca listened, but her heart wasn’t in it. It didn’t matter anyway. Women would get to express their views when the deacon or one of the ministers came around, but few did. On rule changes, the word of the men carried.