The Amish Nanny

As temporary guardian of two sets of young and energetic twins, widowed minister Isaiah Stoltzfus needs a nanny immediately. Keeping the kids happy and safe while also trying to run his blacksmith shop is becoming impossible. So when Clara Ebersol arrives to help, Isaiah is relieved. Able to soothe, teach and delight the children, Clara feels like family. Love-shy Isaiah knows that recently jilted Clara isn’t looking for marriage, either. But with matchmakers—including four young kinder—on the job, Isaiah and Clara may soon find their hands clasped in matrimony.

“The kinder consider you part of their lives,” Isaiah said.

“But a temporary part.”

“Ja.”

“Isaiah, what would you have me do? Treat the twins as if they’re my job and nothing more?” Clara shook her head with a regretful smile. “I can’t. You can’t, either. You were wunderbaar with Nettie Mae tonight, convincing her the glasses made her special.”

“I think she’s special, so why shouldn’t she?”

“And that is what makes you special, Isaiah Stoltzfus. I’m going to say something that you probably don’t want to hear, but, Isaiah, your friends are right. You need to think of marrying because you’re a very gut daed.”

“That’s not the reason to get married.”

“You’re a gift to these kinder. They know it, too.”

“But I’m not their daed.”

“You are. At least temporarily.”

Coming to his feet, he knew he needed to put an end to this conversation before it wandered from the twins to him and Clara. It would be such a small step, and one his heart was pushing him to take. No, he couldn’t. Not when he knew how temporary this situation was.

JO ANN BROWN has always loved stories with happy-ever-after endings. A former military officer, she is thrilled to have the chance to write stories about people falling in love. She is also a photographer, and she travels with her husband of more than thirty years to places where she can snap pictures. They live in Nevada with three children and a spoiled cat. Drop her a note at joannbrownbooks.com.

A Ready-Made Amish Family

Jo Ann Brown

www.millsandboon.co.uk

Fear thou not; for I am with thee: be not dismayed; for I am thy God: I will strengthen thee; yea, I will help thee; yea, I will uphold thee with the right hand of My righteousness.

—Isaiah 41:10

For Stephanie Giancola

It’s been more years than either of us want to admit since you sat down next to me at the first-timers’ orientation (or did I sit down next to you?), and I’ve been blessed to enjoy your friendship ever since. All hail the Queen!

Contents

Cover

Back Cover Text

Introduction

About the Author

Title Page

Bible Verse

Dedication

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Epilogue

Dear Reader

Extract

Copyright

Chapter One

Paradise Springs

Lancaster County, Pennsylvania

“You look like you could use help.”

When he heard the woman’s calm voice, Isaiah Stoltzfus wanted to shout out his thanks to God for sending someone when he’d lost complete control of the situation. One kind was using the bellows in his blacksmith’s shop to blow cold ashes everywhere, and two others clacked lengths of metal together like ancient knights holding sabers while a fourth kind sat on the stone floor and sobbed. In the past fifteen minutes, he’d learned the true meaning of being at his wits’ end. He’d never guessed four young kinder could make him want to throw his hands into the air and announce he was in over his head. He’d been sure the kinder would be interested in visiting his blacksmith shop, but he’d been wrong. After a single glance around the space, they’d been bored and looked for the mischief they seemed able to find anywhere. He needed to take them somewhere else and find a way to divert their energy.

As if he’d given voice to his thoughts, Nettie Mae, the sobbing three-year-old girl sitting on his left boot, pressed her head against his leg and said, “Wanna go home, Onkel Isaiah. Go home now.”

Before he could answer either Nettie Mae or the woman, a cloud of dust exploded out of his unlit forge. He sneezed and waved it away. The other three-year-old girl was pumping harder and harder until a wheezing warning sound came out of the leather bellows. He opened his mouth to tell Nettie Mae’s twin, Nancy, to stop before she broke something, but one of the five-year-old boys who’d been poking at each other with the metal staffs yelped in pain and began crying.

Isaiah took a lumbering step toward the boys, hobbled by Nettie Mae, who clung like a burr to his trousers. How could he have lost control over four preschoolers so quickly?

The task wasn’t one for a man who’d never had kinder of his own. Maybe if Rose hadn’t died soon after they married and they’d had a boppli, it would be easier to anticipate what the youngsters might do next. The Beachy kinder were active and inquisitive, but every time he thought about scolding them, he recalled how they’d lost their parents two weeks ago. He didn’t want to upset them more, yet somehow every situation escalated into pandemonium.

But the woman who had been a silhouette in the doorway didn’t seem to have the same qualms. Without a single word, she walked into his smithy as if she’d been there dozens of times. A flash of sunlight danced on her lush, red hair, which was pulled back beneath her black bonnet. Her brown eyes glanced in his direction before she focused on the kinder. She plucked the shafts out of the boys’ hands and scooped their sister off the cold forge in a single motion, scattering ashes across her own dark blue dress. Placing the metal bars on a nearby table, she settled Nancy on her hip and knelt in front of the boys.

“Where does it hurt?” she asked one twin—Andrew, Isaiah noted—as she wiped tears from his pudgy cheeks and almost dislodged his straw hat.

“Ouch,” the towhead said, pointing to his right thumb that was already bright red.

Isaiah watched in amazement as the woman cradled the little boy’s hand as she ran a fingertip along his thumb. When the kind flinched, she murmured something too low for Isaiah to hear, but Andrew must have understood because he nodded, his eyes wide and filled with more tears.

“I don’t think it’s broken,” the woman said in the same serene voice, but loud enough so Isaiah could hear. “And I suspect as soon as little minds are focused on other things, the bruise will be forgotten. However, just in case, we should watch it over the next couple of days.”

“We?” Isaiah asked, his voice rising on the single word.

“You are Isaiah Stoltzfus, aren’t you?” She looked at the youngsters, then him. No doubt she was thinking there couldn’t be another overwhelmed man with two sets of twins wrecking his smithy in Paradise Springs.

“Ja. Who are you?”

“Clara Ebersol.”

“You are Clara Ebersol?” He shouldn’t stare, but he couldn’t help himself.

As she set Nancy on the floor and came to her feet, he held out his hand to help her. She must not have seen it, because she didn’t take it. When she was standing, he was startled to realize he didn’t have to look down far to meet her gaze. She was, he noticed for the first time, very tall for an Amish woman, because he wasn’t a short man. None of the Stoltzfus brothers were, but her eyes were less than a handbreadth below his. She was also lovely—something he had already noticed—possessing a redhead’s porcelain complexion. Not a single freckle marred her cheeks or dappled her nose.

He forced his eyes to shift away, glad nobody else was there. If he as much as talked to a woman for more than a minute, someone mentioned she would make him a gut wife. Everyone seemed eager to get their widowed minister married. Finding him staring at Clara Ebersol would have given the district’s matchmakers cause to start sticking their well-meaning noses into his life again.

“Weren’t you expecting me?” Clara stroked Andrew’s hair, and the little boy leaned his head against her skirt. “Your brother Daniel learned I was looking for a job, and he asked me if I’d be willing to help you take care of these kinder. He said I’d find you here.” For the first time, her composure showed a faint crack as she looked at him again. “Didn’t he tell you?”

“Ja, he told me.”

When Daniel had stopped at the Beachys’ house on his way home a couple of nights ago, he’d been pleased to tell Isaiah that he’d found someone to help take care of the twins. Isaiah had been grateful when Daniel had said he’d talked to Clara Ebersol himself, and she seemed perfect for the job. Arrangements had been made for her to meet Isaiah at the smithy today, because he’d hoped to finish a few tasks. But what Daniel had failed to mention—and Isaiah had never thought to ask about—was that Clara Ebersol was not a well-experienced grossmammi who’d already raised a household of kinder. She was a lovely young woman. Was his brother, who’d recently fallen in love and found a family, matchmaking? That was the only reason Isaiah could think of why his brother hadn’t mentioned Clara’s age. If he had to guess, Isaiah would say she must be close to his thirty years.

Or had Daniel told him?

Isaiah wasn’t sure he could recall anything during the past two weeks accurately. Maybe if he got a gut night’s sleep, he’d be able to think. Every thought had to battle against the appalling memories of his friends’ funeral playing over and over through his mind, refusing to be forgotten.

Reaching into the pocket of her black apron, Clara drew out four lollipops. The twins focused on her hand.

“I’ve got a red, an orange, a yellow and a green.” She raised her head and asked, “Do they know their colors?”

Again Isaiah wasn’t quick enough to answer, as Ammon, usually the quietest one, shouted, “Want that one!” He pointed to the red lollipop.

She squatted again and made sure each kind got the lollipop he or she wanted. Taking the cellophane off each piece of candy, she led the two sets of twins out of the smithy. She looked around, unsure where to have them eat their suckers.

The space between the long, low building that housed the Stoltzfus Family Shops and Isaiah’s smithy was more cramped with each passing day. His brother Joshua’s buggy shop was outgrowing its space. Last week, Joshua and his two older sons had spent hours setting up a canopy where buggies could be parked out of the weather until Joshua had time to fix them.

“How about over there?” he asked, pointing to the back step of the grocery store his brother Amos ran.

“Perfect.” Motioning for the kinder to follow, she waited for each of them to select a spot on the concrete step. Once they were settled, the girls on one side and the boys on the other by unspoken consent, their tears and mischief were momentarily forgotten.

“Let’s talk,” he said, motioning for her to come back to him.

She hesitated, then walked to where he stood by the smithy’s door. For a second, he wondered if she preferred the kinder’s company to his. Telling himself not to be foolish, because she didn’t know any of them, he recognized he wasn’t in any condition to make judgments. He was so tired he had trouble stringing more than three words together.

Quietly so her voice wouldn’t reach the kinder, Clara said, “Your brother Daniel told me that they’re orphans. That’s terribly sad.”

He nodded, words sticking in his tight throat. It had been only two weeks ago that he’d been roused out of bed in the middle of the night and learned his best friend Melvin Beachy had been killed along with Melvin’s wife, Esta. They’d been traveling in an Englisch friend’s truck coming home from an auction when something went wrong. The truck had gone through a guardrail and rolled, killing all three and leaving four small kinder without parents.

Nobody had been prepared for their deaths, but the whole community came together to help with the funeral. In the past two weeks, he hadn’t made a single meal for the Beachy twins, because at least one person dropped by each day with casseroles and pies and fresh bread. As they had when his wife had died.

“I heard one of the girls call you ‘onkel,’” Clara went on when he didn’t answer.

Relieved to be jerked out of his grim thoughts, he nodded again. “It’s an honorary title. Their daed was my best friend, so the twins grew up with me around.” He was surprised how gut it felt to talk about Melvin instead of avoiding any mention of either him or Esta as he had since their funeral. His family had been trying to tiptoe around the subject. Their efforts not to upset him were a constant reminder of what he’d lost. “Melvin asked me, after the girls were born, to be the kinder’s guardian in case something happened to him and Esta.”

“They don’t have any other family?”

“There are Melvin’s parents and Esta’s sister. But they are out of the country, working with Mennonite missions. The kinder’s grandparents, Melvin’s parents, are in Ghana, and Esta’s sister is in Chile. It’ll take at least a month before they can return to Paradise Springs. Maybe longer for their aenti because a recent earthquake along the Chilean coast tore up many of the roads in the area where she’s serving.”

She smiled. “So you have become their temporary daed.”

He wished he could smile, but grief weighed too heavily for his lips. “I moved into their house to take care of them until someone from their real family gets here. I figured it’d be easier for them than moving to my house.”

He didn’t add that disaster had followed disaster while he tried to keep up with the young and confused kinder who didn’t understand why their parents had failed to come home as they’d promised. It hadn’t taken more than a couple of days for Isaiah to realize he couldn’t oversee them and run his blacksmithing business and fulfill his duties as a minister in the district. Neighbors and his family had been helping with the chores on the farm and in the house. Now that Clara was going to be at the house, she would tend to those jobs, and he could work in the barn without having the kinder out there with him. Keeping an eye on the little kids while trying to milk the family’s dozen cows had been close to impossible.

“I should get to know them.” She walked to the kinder and knelt in front of them.

Isaiah stayed where he was. The soft murmur of her voice drifted to him, but not her words. She seemed uncomfortable with him. If that was so, why had she taken the job? Again, he chided himself. He was in no condition to judge anyone or anything. If she could calm the kinder with such ease, then why would he care if she’d rather spend time with the twins?

But he did.

You’re not thinking clearly. Be glad you’ve got help. And he was. Hoping he didn’t fall asleep on his feet, he turned to the smithy and the task of cleaning the mess the youngsters had made.

* * *

Clara looked from the kinder who were enjoying their lollipops to Isaiah Stoltzfus as he walked with slow, heavy steps into the blacksmith’s shop. The man was exhausted. He carried a massive burden of fatigue on his shoulders, and, if the half-circles under his eyes got any darker, he would look as if he were part raccoon. She guessed that when he wasn’t so tired he was a gut-looking man. His brother had mentioned Isaiah was a widower. The beard he had started when he married remained thin in spots, or maybe its white-blond hair was so fine it was invisible at some places along his jaw. Above his snowy brows, the hair dropping over his forehead was several shades darker, a color she’d heard someone describe as tawny.

He seemed like a nice guy, but nice guys weren’t always what they seemed. She’d learned that the hardest way. She didn’t intend to make the mistake again.

Not getting too close or too involved was her plan. She would help him with the twins, and when their aenti or grandparents returned, she’d leave with a smile and her last paycheck. By then, maybe she would have figured out what she wanted to do in the future. It wasn’t going to revolve around a man, especially a gut-looking one who could twist her heart around his little finger and break it.

A sharp crunch drew Clara’s attention to the kinder. The two sets of twins looked enough alike to be quads. They had pale blond hair, the girls’ crooked braids barely containing their baby fine tresses that floated like bits of fog. Another crunch came, and she realized one boy was chewing on his lollipop.

“Are those candies gut?” she asked, already seeing differences between the two boys. The boy with the injured finger had a cowlick that lifted a narrow section of his bangs off his forehead, and the other one had darker freckles.

“Ja,” said one of the girls.

“I am Clara.” She smiled as she took the empty sticks held out to her. “What are your names?”

The wrong question because the kinder all spoke at once. It took her a few moments to sort out that Andrew was the boy with the bruised finger and the other boy was Ammon. The toddler who had been climbing on the forge was Nancy, and her twin was named Nettie Mae.

She led them to a rain barrel at the end of the building and washed their hands and faces. Each one must have given the others a taste of his or her lollipop, because their cheeks had become a crazy quilt of red, orange, yellow and green. She cleaned them as best she could, getting off most of the stickiness.

As she did, first one kind, then the next began to yawn. She wondered if they were sleeping any better than Isaiah was. Or maybe they needed a nap.

Clara felt like a mother duck leading her ducklings as she walked to the blacksmith shop. A light breeze rocked the sign by the door that read Blacksmith. Peeking past the door, she saw Isaiah checking the bellows, running his fingers along the ribs. Did he fear Nancy’s enthusiasm had damaged them?

Though she didn’t say anything and the kinder remained silent, he looked up. He attempted a smile, and she realized what a strain it must be when he’d lost two dear friends.

“Is it all right?” she asked. When his forehead threaded with bafflement, she added, “The bellows?”

“They seem to be, but I won’t know until I fire the forge.”

“If it’s okay with you, I’ll take the twins home while you do what you need to here.”

“I should show you where—”

“I think I can find my way around a plain kitchen,” she said. She didn’t want him to think she was eager to go, though she was. The fact she’d noticed how handsome he was had alarms ringing in her head. After all, her former fiancé, Lonnie Wickey, had been nice to look at, too.

“I’m sure you can,” he said after she’d urged the kinder to get in her buggy. “But you should know the pilot light on the stove and the oven isn’t working. Do you know how to light one?”

“Ja. Our old stove was like that.” She lifted Nettie Mae, the littlest one, into the buggy. “Did you have something planned for supper?”

“We’ve been eating whatever is in the fridge. I appreciate you coming to help, Clara.” He glanced at where the kinder were climbing into her buggy and claiming seats. “Can you stay until their grandparents or their aenti get here?”

“I can stay for as long as you need me to help with the kinder.” She didn’t add she was glad to get away from her daed, who found fault with everything she did. As he had for as long as she could remember. Doing a gut job for Isaiah could be the thing to prove to Daed she wasn’t as flighty and irresponsible as he thought. She had been as a kind, but she’d grown up. Her daed didn’t seem to realize that.

“Gut.” His breath came out in a long sigh, and she realized he was more stressed than she’d thought. “If it’s okay with you, I’ll finish some things here and get to the farm in a couple of hours. You don’t have to worry about milking the cows. I’ll do that after supper.”

“Take your time. I know you haven’t had much of it.”

He gave her a genuine smile, and her heart did a peculiar little lilt in her chest. She dampened her reaction.

“Danki,” he said. “It’s late, so getting set up for tomorrow is the best thing I can do. Firing the forge at this time in the afternoon would take too long. With you here to oversee the kinder, I’ll be able to finish the commission work that needs to be shipped by the end of next week.”

Curious what he was making, she nodded and walked to the buggy. She climbed in, pleased he didn’t offer her a hand in so that she didn’t have to pretend—again—she hadn’t seen his fingers almost in her face. She made sure the twins were settled, the girls on the front seat with her and the boys in the back where they could peer out the small rear window. Her two bags sitting on the floor between the seats wouldn’t be a problem for their short legs.

Clara drew in a deep breath as she reached for Bella’s reins. The bay shook her mane, ready to get to their destination after the hour-long drive from the Ebersol farm south of Paradise Springs. Clara was eager to be gone, too. Every turn of the buggy wheels took her toward her future, though she had no idea what that would be. The decisions would be hers, not some man’s who made her a pledge, then broke it a few months later.

She had expected the little ones to fall asleep to the rhythmic song of the horse’s iron shoes on the road, but getting into the buggy seemed to have revived them. When she glanced at the twins, she discovered four pairs of bright blue eyes fixed on her.

“You got kinder?” asked Nancy.

“No,” she said, glad her black bonnet hid her face from them. Try as she might, she hadn’t been able to keep her smile from wavering at the innocent question.

She had thought she would have a husband and be starting a family by now, but the man who had asked her to be his wife had married someone else in Montana without having the courtesy of telling her until after she’d found out from the mutual friend who had introduced them. Lonnie had come from Montana to visit Paradise Springs, and he’d courted her. Fool that she was, she’d believed his professions of love. Worse, he’d waited until he was married to write to her and break off their betrothal.

“I like you,” said Nettie Mae, leaning her head against Clara’s arm.

“I like you, too.” Clara was touched by the kind’s words. They were what she needed.

“I got a boppli.” She chewed on the end of her right braid.

“Will you show her to me when we get to your house?” Clara started to reach to pull the braid out of the kind’s mouth as she asked another question about Nettie Mae’s doll, then stopped herself. There was time enough to help the youngster end a bad habit later. Chiding her wouldn’t be a gut way to start with these fragile kinder.

The little girl nodded.

“Me, too,” Nancy announced as she jumped to her feet.

Clara drew the horse to a walk, then looked at the excited little girl. “It’s important we sit when we’re riding in a buggy.”

“Why?” both boys asked at the same time.

Worried that speaking about the dangers on the road might upset the twins and remind them of how their parents had died in a truck accident, she devised an answer she hoped would satisfy them. “Well, you see my horse? Bella is working very, very hard, and we don’t want to make it more difficult for her by bouncing around too much in the carriage.”

“Oh,” said a quartet of awed voices.

“Like horse,” Nancy said, sitting on the front seat again. “Pretty horse.”

“Ja. Bella is a pretty horse.” She slapped the reins and steered the carriage along the twisting road, making sure she watched for any vehicles coming over a rise at a reckless speed.

When a squirrel bounced across the road in front of them, the kids were as fascinated as if they’d never seen one before. They chattered about where it might live and what it might eat and if they could have one for a pet.

“It’s easy to catch a squirrel,” Clara said. “Do you know how?”

“How?” asked Andrew, folding his arms on the top of the front seat.

“Climb a tree and pretend you’re a nut.” She waited for the kinder to laugh at the silly riddle, but they didn’t.

Instead they became silent. The boys sat on the rear seat, and the girls clasped hands as Nettie Mae again began to chew on the end of her braid.

What had happened? They were old enough to understand the punch line, and she’d expected them to giggle or maybe groan. Not this unsettling silence.

“Where Onkel Isaiah?” Nettie Mae asked.

“Want Onkel Isaiah,” whined her twin.

“We’re going home to make supper for him,” Clara said, keeping her tone upbeat.

“Onkel Isaiah make supper,” Nettie Mae insisted.

“She’s right,” Andrew added. “Onkel Isaiah said he’d make supper until Grossmammi and Grossdawdi get home from ’freeca.”

Glad Isaiah had explained the kinder’s grandparents were in Ghana, Clara was able to understand the boy’s “’freeca” meant Africa. She struggled to hold on to her smile as she said, “But I offered to make supper tonight. It’s nice to share chores sometimes, isn’t it? Your onkel and I will be sharing the work.”

“I’ll help,” crowed Andrew at the top of his lungs.

“Me, too!” shouted his twin.

Before Clara could ask them to lower their voices, Nettie Mae began to pout. “Me too little.”

“Nonsense,” Clara replied. “My grossmammi says God has work for all his kinder, no matter if they’re young or old.” She turned the buggy at a corner, following the directions Daniel Stoltzfus had given her. “Sometimes it means taking care of the beasts in the fields or making a nice home for our families. Other times, it’s letting Him know we love Him. We can sing a song for God. Do you know ‘Jesus Loves the Little Children’?”

“Ja!” they shouted.

She put her finger to her lips, but was relieved that they hadn’t withdrawn as they had when she told the joke. “Do you know sometimes Jesus hears the song best if we sing quietly?”

“Really?” asked Andrew.

Already she could tell he was the one who spoke for his siblings. She suspected he was also their leader when they got into mischief.

“Ja,” she answered. “Jesus listens to what’s in our hearts, so when we sing quietly, it helps Him hear our hearts’ voices.”

Singing along with the youngsters, she watched for the lane leading to the Beachys’ farm. Her hopes were high this job would be the perfect way for her to have time to decide what she wanted to do with the rest of her life. The kinder were easy to be around...as long as she kept them entertained. Their onkel would be busy with work, so she probably wouldn’t see him other than at meals.

Driving up the lane toward the large white house with its well-kept barns set behind it, she imagined the first day her parents found money from her in their mailbox. She planned to send her pay home to her parents. Perhaps even Daed would be pleased with her efforts and acknowledge she wasn’t a silly girl any longer. There was a first time for everything. Wasn’t that what the old adage said?

Chapter Two

Clara kept the twins busy once they arrived at the Beachys’ house and had put Bella in a stall in the stable out back. The boys’ straw hats hung on pegs next to her bonnet by the door. The kitchen was a spacious room with cream walls and white cupboards. A large table was set near a bow window with a wunderbaar view of the dark pink blossoms ready to burst on the pair of crabapple trees. Every inch was covered with toys or stacks of dirty dishes.

When she asked the youngsters to pick up their toys and put them in the box in the front room, they kept her busy showing off their dolls and blocks and wooden animals and more trucks and tractors than she had guessed existed. She tried one more time to tell them a silly story, but again they became as silent as a moonless night.

What was she doing wrong? She must mention this to Isaiah when he returned to the house. Maybe after the kinder were in bed, though she’d be wiser to talk to him in the morning when the youngsters were focused on breakfast and paid no attention to the conversation.

Help me find the truth, Lord, she prayed as she put another stack of dishes in the sudsy water and began washing them. The youngsters wanted to help, but she had visions of water splashed everywhere. Instead, she made up a game, and they arranged boots by size beside the door. The weather might be warm, but a good spring rain would turn the yard into mud. It’d be a few weeks before they’d put winter boots away in the cellar.

As the twins debated which boot went where as if it were a matter of the greatest importance, Clara hid her smile and finished the dishes. She took the youngsters upstairs so she could see their rooms after she had swept and mopped the kitchen floor. Once it dried, her shoes wouldn’t stick to the wood on every step.

All the kinder slept in the same room. It was the breadth of the rear of the house, and she guessed from patches in the wood floor it once had been two rooms. Had their daed planned to put the wall up again once the twins were older? She silenced her sigh so she didn’t upset her charges. Not that they would have noticed. One after another tugged on her hand, urging her to come and see the dresser and the pegs on the wall where their clothes hung or to look out the windows, both with a view of the fields beyond the barns and a pond. By summer, the frogs living there would sing a lullaby each night to soothe them to sleep.

The sound of the mantel clock downstairs tolling the hour interrupted Andrew, who was eager for Clara to see his coloring book.

“Time to make supper,” she said.

“Me help!” Nancy and Nettie Mae cried at the same time.

“Everyone can help.” She led the way down the stairs, looking over her shoulder to make sure she was not going too fast for their short legs.

It wasn’t easy, but Clara found jobs for each kind with setting the table or helping her find the bread, as well as telling her where the pickles were stored in the cellar. The twins were excited when she uncovered a bright red oilcloth in the laundry room and spread it over the table. Using it under the youngsters’ plates would make cleaning up afterward simpler and quicker.

Once the twins were carrying spoons and plastic glasses to the table, she went to the refrigerator. As she’d expected, it was full of food brought by caring neighbors. She lifted out a large casserole pan. Peeling back one corner of the foil covering the dish, she discovered it was a mixture of tomato sauce, hamburger and noodles. She hoped the kinder and Isaiah would enjoy it. She was sure they would savor the chocolate cake she’d found in an upper cupboard. She lit the oven with matches from a nearby drawer, put the casserole in, set the timer and went to help the youngsters finish setting the table. Several glasses and two spoons hit the floor on the way to the table, but she rinsed them off and handed them back to the twin who’d been carrying them.

Soon a fragrant, spicy scent filled the kitchen. The casserole must contain salsa as well as tomato sauce. Her stomach growled, and the kids kept asking when supper would be served. She reminded them each time that they needed to wait for Onkel Isaiah. That satisfied them until they asked the same question thirty seconds later.

Hearing the unmistakable sounds of a horse-drawn buggy coming toward the house, Clara helped the kinder wash their hands. She scrubbed their faces clean before urging them to take their seats at the table. As the timer went off, she opened the oven and lifted out the casserole. She was putting it on top of the stove when the kitchen door opened and Isaiah walked in, the twins instantly surrounding him.

He started to speak, but a peculiar choked sound came out of him as he scanned the room as if he couldn’t believe his eyes. He set his straw hat on an empty peg next to her bonnet and strode past the long maple table where the twins again sat. He paused between the gas stove and the kitchen sink, turned to look in each direction before his gaze settled on her.

“Am I in the right house?” he asked.

She couldn’t help smiling in spite of her determination to keep Isaiah at arm’s length. As long as the only thing between them was business, everything should be fine. “I hope so, because this is where your brother said to go, and we’ve spent the past two hours here.”

He shook his head. “But there were dirty dishes everywhere when we left this afternoon, and my boots tried to cement themselves to the floor where the kinder had spilled food and milk.”

“I know.”

“How did you do all this in such a short time?” he asked as if he expected to see dirty dishes piled in a corner.

“Practice.” She smiled at the kinder. “And plenty of eager hands to help.”

He faced her, surprise in his eyes. “Those same hands make anything I try take two or three times longer than if I’d done the job by myself.”

“I know a few tricks.” She smiled. “I’m glad there are plastic glasses in the cupboard. Otherwise, I would have been sweeping up plenty of glass.”

“Ja. They sometimes confuse glasses with a volleyball.”

Her smile widened. “Wash up, and I’ll get the food on the table. It’ll be ready when you are.”

When he glanced at her in astonishment, heat rushed up her face. She was acting as if she belonged there. It wasn’t an impression she wanted to give him or anyone in Paradise Springs. As soon as he went into the bathroom, she busied herself getting milk from the refrigerator and filling each kind’s glass halfway. She needed to guard her words and remember she was the hired girl whose duties were to cook and clean and look after the kinder.

If Isaiah was bothered by what she’d said, he showed no sign when he walked into the kitchen. As he pulled out a chair, he said, “I’m amazed how fast you cleaned the kitchen. It took two of my sisters-in-law more than a day to set everything to order yesterday.”

“The kitchen was cleaned yesterday?” She halted with the casserole halfway between the stove and the table.

“Ja. They came over to help.”

Clara blurted, “You made such a mess in a single day?”

He arched a pale brow, and she laughed.

Sudden cries of dismay erupted from the twins, and Clara set the casserole on the stove. Had one of them gotten hurt? How? The shrieks threatened to freeze her blood right in her veins.

At the same time Isaiah jumped to his feet and hurried around the table to where the youngsters stood together in a clump as if trying to protect themselves from an unseen monster. Their eyes were huge in their colorless faces.

“What is it?” Isaiah asked, leaning toward them. “What’s wrong?”

All four pointed at Clara. Shock riveted her. Were they insulted by her comment about the house becoming a disaster area in a day? No, they were barely more than toddlers. They didn’t care about the state of their house.

“No laugh,” said Nettie Mae around the end of her braid she’d stuck into her mouth again. She put her finger to her lips and regarded them with big, blue eyes. “Quiet and no laugh.”

“No laugh. Quiet.” Nancy pointed at Clara. “No laugh. Gotta be quiet.”

Clara listened in appalled disbelief. Isaiah’s face revealed he was as shocked as she was.

“Not laughing is hard,” Andrew lamented. “Really, really hard.”

“Squirrel funny, but no laugh,” added his twin, his words coming out in an odd mumble. Was he trying not to cry? “Really, really hard no laughing.”

“Really, really hard.” Nettie Mae’s lower lip wobbled, and a single tear slid down her plump cheek.

Clara gasped when Isaiah sat on the floor. He held out his arms, and the kinder piled onto his lap. But there was nothing joyous about them as they held onto him like leaves fighting not to be blown away by a storm wind.

“Tell me about the squirrel,” Isaiah said. “I like funny stories.”

Andrew shook his head, and his brother and sisters did, too. “No laughing. Be quiet.”

“Who told you to be quiet?”

“She did.” He pointed an accusatory finger at Clara.

When Isaiah frowned, she said, “I asked them—”

“It’s gut,” Andrew said. “What Clara told us. To be quiet when we sing so Jesus can hear what’s in our hearts.”

Again Isaiah’s pale brows rose, but his voice became calmer as he replied, “That is true. Clara was very kind to help you learn that. Has anyone else told you to be quiet?”

“You!” Nancy poked one side of his suspenders.

He tapped her nose and smiled. “I’ve told you that a lot, because you make more noise than a whole field of crows, but you don’t listen to me. You keep chattering away.”

The twins exchanged glances, and Clara couldn’t help wondering if they had some way to know what one another was thinking. She’d heard that twins seemed to be able to communicate without words, but had no idea if it was true.

“Tell me the story about the squirrel,” Isaiah urged. “Did he chatter, too?”

Four small bodies stiffened. Nettie Mae chewed frantically on her braid, and Nancy’s thumb popped into her mouth. The boys grabbed each other’s hand and shook their heads.

“No laughing,” Andrew whispered.

Clara squatted beside them and Isaiah. “Who told you that, Andrew?”

The little boy clamped his lips closed as his eyes grew glassy with tears. Beside him, his siblings’ lips quivered.

When Isaiah started to speak, she put her hand on his shoulder to halt him. She wasn’t sure if she was more astonished at her temerity or at the pulse of sensation rippling up her arm. She didn’t want to be attracted to her employer—or any man—until she had sorted out what to do with her life. She wasn’t going to make the same mistake of believing a man loved her and then being shown how wrong she was.

Pulling her hand back, she forced a smile. Now wasn’t the time to worry about herself. She needed to focus on the kinder. “Let’s have supper,” she urged. “It’ll taste better hot than cold.” She made shooing motions, and the twins clambered onto their chairs.

She started to stand but wobbled. When Isaiah put a steadying hand on her back, she almost jumped out of her skin at the thud of awareness slamming into her so hard that, for a moment, she thought she’d fallen on the hard floor. She jumped to her feet as the kinder had and edged away so he could stand without being too close to her.

He asked quietly, “Do you have any idea what’s going on with them?”

“You’d know better than I would. You’ve been around them their whole lives.”

Gritting his teeth so hard she could hear them grind, he said, “My guess is, sometime during the funeral or the days leading up to it, someone they respect enough to listen to must have told them laughing was wrong.”

“Who?”

“I don’t know. You see how they don’t always listen to me, and they love me. I’ve got no idea who might have told them not to laugh.”

Why hadn’t she seen the truth for herself? But who could imagine four little kinder would believe they shouldn’t laugh again? When they’d become silent in the buggy, she’d known something was amiss.

But not this.

Putting her hand over her mouth before the sob bubbling up in her throat could escape, she turned away, not wanting them to see her reaction. “Kinder take everything at face value, so if someone told them not to laugh, they couldn’t guess it meant only at the...” She gulped back the rest of what she was going to say. She didn’t want to speak of their parents’ funeral and cause further distress. “How much do they know about what’s happened?”

He shrugged. “They attended the...the event.”

“Ja, I assumed that.” She was relieved he didn’t say funeral or the names of the deceased. It was further proof he cared deeply about the twins.

“Who can guess how much a young kind understands?” His mouth grew straight. “I’m an adult, and I find it hard to believe my friends are gone.”

“Are we going to eat?” called Andrew, again the spokesman for his siblings.

“Of course.” Hoping her smile didn’t look hideous, Clara slipped past Isaiah and went to get the casserole. “We don’t want supper to get cold, do we?”

She placed the casserole dish in the middle of the table. She reached to pull out an empty chair next to where the girls sat on red and blue booster seats, but moved to another at the sight of the stricken expressions on the twins’ faces. Nobody needed to explain the first chair was where their mamm used to sit.

Isaiah lifted Andrew out of his chair and moved him over one. Sitting between the two boys, he winked at them before bowing his head. Clara watched as the kinder folded their tiny hands on the table and lowered their eyes, as well. They had been well-taught by their parents. Looking from one to the next and at Isaiah, she closed her eyes and, after thanking God for their meal, prayed for Him to enter the Beachy twins’ hearts and ease their grief.

And Isaiah’s heart, too, she added when he cleared his throat to signal the time for silent grace was over.

The kinder dug into their meal with enthusiasm. Clara was sure it was delicious, because it’d smelled that way while heating. In her mouth, the meat and noodles tasted as dry and flavorless as the ashes on Isaiah’s forge would have. She saw Isaiah toying with his food as well before scraping it onto the boys’ plates when they asked for seconds.

He raised his eyes, and his gaze locked with hers across the table. In that instant, she knew what he was thinking. They needed to help the kinder. She agreed, but couldn’t ignore how uneasy she was that she and Isaiah were of a mind. It suggested a connection she wasn’t ready to make with a man again. She wasn’t sure when she would be.

Maybe never.

* * *

Isaiah smiled, hoping the youngsters wouldn’t guess he was forcing it. Kinder were experts at seeing through a ploy, so he tried to be honest with them. When Clara gave a slight nod, he hoped she shared his belief they had to help the twins laugh again.

He was astonished when she pushed back her chair and rose. She opened a cupboard and took down the chocolate cake Fannie Beiler had brought over yesterday. The Beilers lived next door to his mamm, and Fannie’s daughter Leah was married to his brother Ezra. He’d stashed the cake away so the kinder didn’t tease for it before they ate.

And then he forgot about it.

As Clara carried the cake to the table, the twins began squirming with anticipation of chocolate and peanut butter frosting. “Who wants a piece?”

“Me! Me! Me! Me!” echoed through the kitchen.

She smiled and took six small plates out of a lower cupboard. Setting them on the table, she cut the cake. She sliced four small servings and then put a plate in front of each kind. The piece she put in front of him was much bigger.

“Is that enough, Isaiah?” she asked. “Or do you want more?”

“How about if I say I want less?” he asked.

“I wouldn’t believe you.”

“And you’d be right.” He fought not to chuckle, not wanting to distress the twins again.

“Don’t wait for me,” she said. “Try it.”

The kinder needed no further urging. Within seconds, they were covered with chocolate crumbs and wearing broad smiles.

Though he was as eager as the twins to sample the cake, Isaiah waited for Clara to cut herself a small slice. He watched as she ate and glanced at the kinder, smiling at their silliness.

She was gut with them. He’d seen that from the moment she walked into his blacksmith shop and took control of the chaos. She had an intangible air of calm around her that seemed to draw the kinder’s attention so they listened to what she said.

And with her face not half-hidden beneath her bonnet, her hair rivaled the colors of the sunset. Somehow, her red strands weren’t garish but more a reflection of the glow that transformed her face when she smiled. Really smiled, not a lukewarm one aimed at hiding her true feelings.

“Wasn’t the cake gut?” Isaiah asked and was rewarded with four towheads bobbing together, though Ammon wasn’t as enthusiastic at first. The youngsters must be exhausted. “Next time we see Fannie Beiler, you must tell her how much you enjoyed this cake.”

“Yummy!” Nettie Mae said, patting her stomach. “Yummy in my tummy!”

A laugh, quickly squelched, came from where Clara sat beside the girls. She had her hand over her mouth and a horrified expression on her face.

He put hands on the boys’ shoulders to keep them from running away from the table again. Clara had slipped her arm around the girls and started to apologize to them.

“No, don’t say you’re sorry,” he hurried to say. “There’s nothing wrong with laughing, right?” He looked at the boys.

Andrew nodded. “Clara can laugh, I guess.”

“But not you?” she asked.

When the kinder remained silent, Isaiah pushed his plate away, though he hadn’t finished the delicious cake. He folded his arms on the table.

“God wants us to be happy,” he said as he looked from one young face to the next. “He loves it when we sing and when we pray together. Do you believe that?”

They nodded.

“And when we laugh together, too,” he added.

The boys ran into the front room. When Nancy let out a cry, Clara drew her arm back from the girls who chased after their brothers and huddled with them by the sofa.

He wanted to go and comfort them, but wasn’t sure what to say. He couldn’t tell them they should accept the hurts in their lives because God had a plan for them to be happy in the future. He couldn’t say that because he wasn’t sure he believed it himself any longer. Since he’d learned of Melvin’s and Esta’s deaths, the uneasiness that had begun inside him after Rose’s death had hardened his heart like iron taken from the forge. Every heartbeat hurt.

He struggled with his faith more each day. He believed in God, but it wasn’t easy to accept a loving God would watch such grieving and do nothing. More than once, he’d considered seeking advice from his bishop, because he trusted Reuben Lapp as a man of God. But he knew what Reuben would say. Trust in God and be willing to accept the path God had given him to walk. Once he’d been happy to follow, but that was before Rose died from a severe asthma attack and then his friends’ lives came to an end, leaving behind hurt and bewildered kinder who couldn’t understand why the most important persons in their lives had gone away.

“Don’t push them,” Clara said from the other side of the table. “There’s got to be a way to persuade them it’s okay to laugh again like normal kids. I know there is.”

“I wish I could be as sure.”

When she stared at him, shocked a minister would speak so, he rose and went to the back door. He grasped his straw hat, put it on his head and said, “I’ve got to milk the cows. I’ll be back in an hour or so.”

He didn’t give her time to answer. Striding across the yard to the big barn where the cows were waiting, he knew he needed to have an explanation for her when he returned.

He didn’t know what it would be.

Chapter Three

When Isaiah came in after finishing the barn chores, the kitchen looked as neat as it had before supper. The room was empty, so he glanced toward the front room.

The twins were stretched out on the floor, coloring, while Clara sat on the sofa facing the wood stove and the rocking chair Melvin had bought for his wife when they first learned they were going to have a boppli. At that time, nobody had guessed Esta was carrying two bopplin.

He didn’t move as Andrew got up and went to show Clara the picture he’d been working on. While she listened to the boy’s excitement with the colors he’d chosen, she curved her hand across his narrow back, making a connection to the kind. Andrew was grinning when he dropped beside his sisters and brother. Clara returned to stitching a button on a shirt that must be from the pile of mending Esta kept in the front room.

It was the perfect domestic scene, one he’d believed he and Rose would one day share. The troubles they’d had in the first couple of months of their marriage had been behind them, and he’d been looking forward to building a family with her in the days before she died.

Alone.

Thinking of that single word was like swallowing a lit torch. There must have been a sign he’d missed, a wheezing sound when she breathed or a cough that went on and on or blueness around her lips. Something he should have seen and known not to go to work as if it were any other day. Something to tell him to stay home and comfort her and call 911.

He’d failed in his responsibility to her, and he couldn’t make the same mistake with these youngsters. He owed that to his friends who had trusted him with their precious kinder.

Crossing the kitchen, Isaiah was surprised when the kinder were so focused on their coloring that they didn’t raise their heads until Clara greeted him. She continued sewing, and he was astounded to see it was the shirt he’d lost a button on the other day.

“You don’t have to do my mending.” His voice sounded strained.

“I don’t mind. I like staying busy.” She looked at the kinder. “They’ve been coloring pictures for you.”

“For me?”

She nodded, and he saw Andrew was coloring a bright red cow while his twin was using the same shade for a tractor. Nancy had been working on a blue bird with most of the strokes inside the lines, but Nettie Mae’s page was covered with green with no regard for the picture of a dog in the middle of it. The little girl had her nose an inch from the coloring book.

When Nettie Mae paused to try to stifle a yawn, he had to wonder if she was half-asleep already. It had been a long day for the twins and an upsetting one, as well.

Clara stood and set his shirt on a table beside the sofa. “Time for baths.”

The youngsters groaned, but gathered their crayons and put them in the metal box. She snapped the lid closed and picked up their coloring books while the twins asked what he thought of their pictures.

His answers must have satisfied them, though he couldn’t recall a moment later what he’d said. His gaze remained on Clara as she set the books and crayon box on the lower shelf of a bookcase. The thin organdy of her kapp was warmed by her red hair. Every motion of her slender fingers seemed to be accompanied by unheard music.

When she turned, he didn’t shift his eyes quickly enough. She caught him watching her, and the faint pink in her cheeks vanished. Was that dismay in her eyes? Dismay and another stronger emotion, but he couldn’t discern what. As she had before, she lowered her eyes.

She remained on the other side of the room while she said, “Isaiah, I must get the kinder ready for bed.”

“I’ll give the boys their bath,” he said, trying to lighten the situation. “I’ll check behind all four ears.”

His hope the twins would forget themselves and giggle was dashed, because they had become silent again. Did they sense the tension in the room? They couldn’t know why. He didn’t. He couldn’t have said anything wrong, because he’d said less than a dozen words since he returned to the house.

But how was he going to convince the kinder it was okay to laugh? Though he and Clara had assured the twins a gut giggle would be all right, the twins continued to limit themselves to smiles.

I know I should be grateful they can smile, God, but a kind without a laugh seems wrong. You know what’s in their hearts. Help me find a way into them, too, so their laughter can be freed.

He understood why the youngsters might not trust Clara to release them from their promise not to laugh. They hardly knew her, though they seemed to like her.

And why wouldn’t they like her? She was gentle and showed an interest in what mattered to them, acting as if each toy they showed her was the most amazing thing she’d ever seen. They wolfed down the food she put in front of them as if they hadn’t eaten since birth.

But that didn’t explain why the twins didn’t heed him. He’d loved them before they were born. They called him onkel, and they were as close to his heart as his true nieces and nephews. Why didn’t they trust him when he told them it was okay to laugh?

“I’ll give the girls a bath,” Clara said, “and checking behind ears sounds like a gut idea.” She took a single step toward him, then paused. “Are there two bathrooms in the house?”

“We’ll use the bathroom in the dawdi haus.” He took the boys’ hands. “Don’t worry. My sisters-in-law cleaned it yesterday, and I moved my stuff over there.”

“You’re staying in the dawdi haus?”

“Is that a problem?”

For a moment, he thought she was going to say ja, but she replied, “I assumed you would stay at your house.”

He let go of the boys’ hands and crossed the room so he could lower his voice to keep the kinder from overhearing. “Clara, you’ve got to understand. Melvin and Esta expected me to take care of their family, and I won’t let them down. When Daniel told me you’d agreed to come and help, I decided I’d use the dawdi haus. With the door between us and four very nosy chaperones—” He made a silly face at the twins who’d tiptoed over to listen.

Again they didn’t giggle, though they smiled. It seemed bizarre to have young kinder acting restrained.

“You think,” Clara finished for him, “that will keep tongues from wagging.”

“These are extraordinary circumstances as well as temporary ones. Everyone knows that. However, if you’re uncomfortable, I won’t ask you to stay.”

“Stay, Clara!” shouted Andrew, bouncing from one foot to the other. “You said we can make cookies tomorrow.”

“I can ask Mamm to come while we look for someone else,” Isaiah continued as if the little boy hadn’t spoken. “She planned to help, but she had a bout with pneumonia last month. She’s not completely recovered. That’s why my brothers and I thought it was better to hire someone.”

“You need my help, and I’m here.” She held out her hands to the girls. “Let’s get you fresh and clean.”

As she started to walk past him, Isaiah said, “Danki, Clara.” He pointed toward a door between the refrigerator and the stove. “Just so you know, the dawdi haus is through there. You’re welcome to use the downstairs bedroom by the bathroom.”

“I’m sorry to take it from you.”

“I didn’t use it.”

Her earth-brown eyes grew round. “Because it was where...” She glanced at the girls who were listening to every word. “It was where your friends slept?” She gave him a sad smile. “Aren’t there more bedrooms upstairs?”

“Ja, two, but they’re used for storage.”

“Is there a bed in one?”

“Ja, in both.”

“Then I’ll use the one close to the kinder’s bedroom door. I think it’d be better for me to be on the same floor with them.”

He glanced at the boys, who had gotten bored and were pulling blocks out of the toy box. “That’s a gut idea. I slept on the sofa, and I was up there most nights several times.”

“Nightmares?”

“Either that, or they couldn’t sleep.” He grimaced. “I hate that you’ll be taking care of them while I’m sleeping in the dawdi haus.”

“It’s what you’re paying me for.” She spoke the words without any emotion and walked with the girls toward the bathroom.

He wasn’t sure what he would have said if she hadn’t left him standing in the middle of the front room.

* * *

After he’d finished cleaning the puddles in the dawdi haus bathroom left by two little boys, Isaiah returned to the main house. He went upstairs and waited by the twins’ bedroom door. He said nothing as Clara finished reading a story. The kinder listened, rapt, to the tale of a naughty bunny who learned a lesson through misadventures. He held his breath each time a little one raised a hand to an eye. Each time, the kind was trying to rub away any sleep catching up with him or her before the charming story was over.

He forced his shoulders to relax. He needed to stop overreacting to everything the twins did, assuming their tears had to do with grief instead of a bumped knee and being sleepy. He needed to be more like Clara, who kept them entertained but allowed for quiet moments, as well. He could see he’d been winding them up tight in an effort to prevent them from thinking about their parents. He shouldn’t have been surprised they’d acted badly at his blacksmith’s shop.

Being too busy to think hadn’t worked for him either. No matter how many tasks he tried to concentrate on, he couldn’t forget the gigantic hole in his life. How many times in the past couple of weeks had he thought of something he wanted to tell Melvin? Each time, renewed anguish threatened to suffocate him.

“Do you want to komm in and say a prayer with us?” Clara called as she knelt with the kinder by one of the small beds.

Joining them, Isaiah listened to their young voices saying the prayer they spoke every night. Clara asked if they wanted to ask for God’s blessing on anyone special.

Andrew, always the leader, said, “Onkel Isaiah.”

“Clara,” added Nettie Mae, smiling at her.

But the smiles vanished when her twin said, “Mamm and Daed in heaven with You.”

The pressure of tears filled his eyes, but he blinked them away as he lifted Ammon and set him on his bed before doing the same with Andrew. He tucked them in after they kissed him gut nacht. He turned to check on the girls. They were already beneath their covers, but he leaned over to collect kisses from them. All four insisted on giving Clara a kiss, too.

“Sleep well and have pretty dreams,” she said as she turned down the propane lamp so a faint glow came from it.

He walked out with her, and she left the door open a finger’s breadth. “That was a cute story,” he said. “The twins were enthralled, though they’ve probably heard it a dozen times.”

“No, they haven’t. I brought the book with me.” She glanced at the door, then followed him down the stairs. “I brought several along. Reading them a story that their mamm or daed read could be too painful for them.”

He relaxed his shoulders, letting some of his worry slide away. Maybe this would work out. Clara was tender with the kinder, thinking of their needs and trying to keep them from more pain.

He urged her to contact him if she needed anything, then said, “Gut nacht, Clara.”

“Gut nacht,” she replied before she went into the bathroom. She didn’t close the door, and he guessed she was gathering the wet towels left from the girls’ bath.

Going into the dawdi haus, he shut the door to the kitchen behind him. He faltered, then threw the sliding lock closed. Anyone seeing it would realize he and Clara intended on maintaining propriety.

Isaiah lit a lamp in the small living room that had two other doors opening off it. One was to the bathroom, the other to the cozy bedroom. Picking up his extra boots, he set them by the door he’d be using except when he went to the main house for meals or to spend time with the twins.

A light flickered outside the living-room window, startling him until he recognized the easy stride of Marlin Wagler, the district’s deacon. If Marlin went to the main house, he could disturb the kinder whom Isaiah hoped were asleep. He grabbed a flashlight and hurried outside. He waved the light, catching the deacon’s eye.

He wondered why the deacon was calling tonight. The deacon’s duties revolved around making sure the Leit followed the district’s Ordnung as well as handling money issues, helping any member of the community pay medical bills or appointing people to arrange fund-raisers to provide for those who needed extra assistance. He hoped the problem was a simple one, because he didn’t know how long he’d be able to focus on anything complicated tonight.

“Komm in,” he said with a smile.

“I didn’t expect to see you in the dawdi haus,” Marlin said as he switched off his flashlight and walked in.

The deacon was a squat man, almost as wide as he was tall. Since he’d handed over the day-to-day running of his farm to his youngest son, Marlin had gained more weight. He was about the same age as Isaiah’s late daed would have been. What hair remained on his head clung in a horseshoe shape from one ear to the other. It had turned gray years ago.

“Let’s sit,” Isaiah answered, “and you can tell me why you’re here.”

Marlin sat with a satisfied sigh in the overstuffed chair closer to the door. Once Isaiah had taken the other seat, Marlin began speaking of news from throughout the district and beyond. After he finished farming, he’d taken a job giving tourists buggy rides to his family’s farm. He had amusing tales to share about the outrageous questions visitors asked.

“I’ve got to explain over and over,” the deacon said with a chuckle that shook his broad belly, “we’re not part of a living museum. We’re just living our lives. However, I’ve recently driven people who seem to understand that. It’s a blessing to be able to answer sensible questions.”

“But those tourists don’t make for gut stories.”

“No, but they make for a pleasant day.”

“I’m sure.” Isaiah intended to add more, but a knock on the connecting door brought him to his feet. Sliding the lock aside, he opened it. Belatedly he realized he should have explained the situation to Marlin already.

Dear Lord, give me a gut night’s sleep tonight. I’m no longer thinking straight.

“Excuse me.” Clara clasped her hands in front of her. “I didn’t mean to interrupt. I was wondering what time you wanted breakfast, Isaiah.”

“Komm in.” He motioned toward his other guest. “This is Marlin Wagler, our district’s deacon. Marlin, this is Clara Ebersol.”

“Oh,” Marlin said, “I thought you might be the kinder’s aenti Debra. I’ve been looking forward to meeting her.”

“It’ll be several weeks, maybe as much as a month, before Debra will be able to get here from Chile.” He’d never met Debra Wittmer whose home was in California when she wasn’t away on mission work.

“Meanwhile,” Clara said with a smile, “I’m here as a nanny for the kinder.”

Marlin smiled. “Gut. They need a stable home. What a blessing your family and your young man don’t mind you being away.”

“I don’t have a young man,” Clara said, blushing so brightly her face was almost the color of her hair.

“No?” Marlin glanced at Isaiah and arched a brow.

“Will five be too early for breakfast?” Isaiah asked before the deacon could add anything else. He hadn’t expected Marlin to start quizzing Clara about her personal life. It was, Isaiah was sure, an attempt at matchmaking.

“Five will be fine. I’ll have breakfast ready then. Gut nacht.” She shut the door, not hiding her yearning to escape before she embarrassed herself again.

He heard her fading footsteps. Taking a deep breath, because Marlin was sure to have questions, Isaiah said, “Before you say anything, I’m living in the dawdi haus, as you can see.” He hooked a thumb toward the stacks of clothing he’d brought from the main house. “With four very young kinder, I’m staying nearby in case Clara needs help with something. Though she’s already shown she can take care of the household better than I could.”

“I assume Reuben approves of this plan.”

“Ja,” he replied. As soon as his brother had told him about Clara, Isaiah had gone to the bishop and shared the plan with him. Of course, at that time, he hadn’t known Clara Ebersol was a beautiful young woman.

It doesn’t matter, he told himself. He wasn’t looking for someone to court, and Clara was at the house for one reason: to take care of the kinder.

“Gut,” Marlin said, his smile widening.

Isaiah wanted to groan aloud. He recognized the twinkle in the deacon’s eye. Marlin and Atlee Bender, the other minister in their district, had been getting less and less subtle in their pressuring for Isaiah to choose another wife. They believed an ordained man should be married. It was a requirement for one’s name to be put into the lot when a new minister was chosen, but nobody could have guessed Rose would die so soon after Isaiah was selected. Both men had told him that he’d had enough time to mourn, and finding a wife should be a high priority for him. They seemed to think it was as easy as going to his brother’s grocery store and selecting one off the shelf.

Even if it was that simple, he wasn’t interested in risking his heart and the devastating pain of loss again.

* * *

Clara slipped into the front bedroom across from the twins’ bedroom door. It was crowded with boxes and cast-off furniture as Isaiah had warned. Trying to be quiet, she moved quilts and unused material from the bed. The mattress was clean, and she found sheets and a pillow in a cupboard in the hallway.

She made the bed, covering it with the topmost quilt from the pile. After braiding her hair, she went to the bed. Pulling back the bright red, blue and purple nine-patch quilt and the sheet beneath it, she sat on the edge of the bed and plumped the pillow.

Lying down, she watched the moonlight filtered by the leaves of the tree outside the window. It danced, making new patterns with every shift in the breeze.

The day had not gone badly, other than the shocking revelation by the kinder that they’d been told not to laugh. The twins seemed to accept her as part of their lives...so far. And she hadn’t insulted Isaiah—or she thought she hadn’t—so far. She must keep everything impersonal between them, as she would with anyone who hired her. Though he’d been puzzled when she spoke to him from the other side of the front room, he hadn’t said anything.

Thank You, Lord, for keeping Isaiah from asking questions. She started to add to her prayer, but paused when she heard something. The noise was so soft she wasn’t sure if she’d heard it. Then it came again.

A sob.

One of the kinder was crying.

Kicking aside her covers, Clara leaped out of bed. She grabbed the flashlight she’d left on the windowsill. She bumped into a stack of boxes, but kept them from tumbling to the floor. The big toe on her right foot hit the frame around the door, and she bit her lower lip to keep from making a sound. Limping across the hall, she aimed the flashlight against her palm and switched it on. Its glow gave her enough light to see without being so bright it woke any kinder who were asleep.

Her aching toe was forgotten when she heard another sob. It led her to where Ammon was lying on his left side with his knees drawn up to his chest as if in grave pain. She leaned over and spoke gently. He didn’t respond, just kept sobbing.

Wanting to soothe him, she lifted Ammon off the bed and carried him out of the room before he woke his brother and sisters. She kept the flashlight pointed at the floor as she eased down the unfamiliar stairs and into the living room. Lighting the propane lamp while she held him took twice as long as it normally would, but she didn’t want to release the kind. Not when he was sobbing as if he believed nothing in his life would ever get better.

She went to the rocking chair in front of the unlit wood stove. Sitting, she began to rock as she settled Ammon’s left cheek over her heart. She spoke to him, but when her words seemed to offer him no comfort, she began humming the song she’d sung with the kinder in the buggy. She meant it as a prayer, wanting Jesus to fill Ammon’s heart with His love and reassurance. Slowly the little boy’s body relaxed, molding to her. She kept rocking as he closed his eyes, a longer time coming between each sob.

Hearing a soft click from the kitchen, Clara looked over her shoulder. Isaiah walked toward her, his face lengthening when he saw the kind in her arms.

“I saw the light,” he whispered. “Is everything all right?”

“It will be.” She glanced at the kind cuddling close to her. Ammon had fallen asleep. “I thought he’d had a bad dream. I heard him crying and went to check. He wasn’t asleep. I think he’s missing....” As she had before, she chose her words with care, knowing if she said “mamm” and “daed,” she might rouse the little boy. “He wants those who aren’t here.”

“What about the others?”

“Asleep when we came down.”

“That’s a blessing.” He turned a chair around and sat, facing her. “They went to bed tonight for you better than they have for me.”

“They’re exhausted.” She didn’t pause as she added, “You are, too. You should get some sleep while you can.”

“A few more minutes won’t matter, and that guy is pretty heavy for you to tote upstairs. I don’t want you stumbling and getting hurt.”

“I appreciate that.”

Standing, he held out his arms. “Let me take him.”

As Isaiah leaned toward her, Clara realized her mistake. When he lifted Ammon out of her arms, Isaiah’s face was a finger’s breadth from hers. She held her breath and kept her eyes lowered while they made the transfer. Isaiah’s work-roughened fingers brushed against her skin, sending heat along it.

As soon as he took Ammon upstairs, she pushed out of the rocker. She gripped the top of it, her knuckles turning white, as she fought for equilibrium. She couldn’t react like this every time a casual touch brought her into contact with Isaiah. She gripped the chair and was trying to slow her heart’s frenzied rhythm when he came back down the stairs.

Her hope that Isaiah wouldn’t notice her bleached fingers was dashed when he said, “I’m sorry, Clara, for Marlin asking you if you’re walking out with someone. He can’t seem to help himself sticking his nose into matters he believes are his responsibility.”

“That’s a deacon’s job,” she said, not wanting to speak of how she scurried away like a frightened rabbit in a hedgerow.

“This deacon’s job seems to be focused on finding me another wife.” With the cockeyed grin Isaiah seemed to wear whenever he was trying to be self-deprecating, he sighed. “I’m sorry. I know you didn’t figure on being the subject of matchmaking when you took this job.”

“I don’t like matchmaking.”

“I agree. One hundred percent.”

She appreciated his blunt answer and that he hadn’t asked her to explain her comment. She didn’t want to tell him that she was too well acquainted with matchmaking and the heartbreak it could cause.

“Clara, don’t worry. We’ll ignore everyone’s matchmaking.” He walked toward the door to the dawdi haus before facing her again. “In a way, we should be grateful to Marlin for bringing the subject out in the open, so neither of us has to act like we need to hide something.”

“Ja,” she said, as he urged her to try to have a gut night’s sleep.

He closed the door, and she heard the lock slide into place. She reached for her flashlight. Her fingers trembled as she picked it up and turned off the lamp. She hadn’t been honest with Isaiah. She already was hiding something from him. The way her heart took a lilting leap whenever he touched her.

“You can jump about all you want,” she whispered to her traitorous heart while she climbed the stairs. “There’s nothing you or anyone else can do to change my mind. I won’t be made a fool of by another man. Not ever again.”

Chapter Four

As the sun rose the next morning, Isaiah finished his second cup of kaffi and put the empty cup beside his plate with a regretful sigh. Clara brewed kaffi strong, as he liked it when he had a long day ahead of him. He’d already finished milking the cows and let them out in the meadow as well as feeding the chickens and the horses. He wanted to finish the final upright for a double gate ordered by an Englisch horse breeder in Maryland. He needed to make a few curled pieces and a half dozen twisted lengths to complete the pattern. When the gates were finished, they would be shipped to the man’s farm to be hung on either side of a driveway. A truck was collecting it at the end of next week.

With Clara’s arrival, he should be able to finish the job on time. He couldn’t let her delicious French toast tempt him to have another serving and linger at the table with her and the Beachy twins. The kinder were eating their second servings, dripping maple syrup and melted butter on the oilcloth Clara had spread across the table before serving breakfast. Seeing Nettie Mae dipping her fingers in the syrup and then licking them, he smiled. She caught him looking at her and grinned.

“Yummy, isn’t it?” he asked.

“Yummy, yummy, yummy in my tummy, tummy, tummy.”

“Is that your new saying, Nettie Mae?”

“Ja. Yummy in my tummy.” She turned the phrase into a little song.

“I see happy faces. What did I miss?” Clara asked as she brought a new stack of steaming, eggy toast from the stove. She set the platter next to him.

“Nettie Mae said the toast is yummy in her tummy,” Isaiah replied. “And she’s singing about it.”

“And a fun tune it is, too. More kaffi?”

He pushed back his chair and stood. “Danki, but I need to get to work.”

“Do you come home for dinner at midday?” Clara asked, sitting where she had the night before.

“I’ve been since...” He glanced at the kinder who were too intent on their French toast to pay attention to the conversation.

“I can move the main meal to the evening if it’s easier for you.”

“I appreciate that. Once the forge is at the right temperature, I don’t want to cool it down and have to wait to reheat it again. I appreciate your flexibility, Clara.”

She shrugged off his compliment. “Anything else I should know about your work schedule?”

“Usually I am done around four. That allows me time to milk the cows and get cleaned up before the evening meal.”

“I’ll have dinner ready around six.”

“Gut.” He stamped down the thought that Clara had avoided joining them at the table until he got up to leave. That wasn’t fair to her. She’d been busy preparing breakfast and trying to stay ahead of four enthusiastic youngsters who seemed to have bottomless stomachs. But he couldn’t ignore how, when he looked at her, it was as if he faced a closed door.

“Will you need a lunch packed for today?”

He motioned for her to stay where she was. “I’ll get something at Amos’s store today. You finish your breakfast before it’s cold.”

Going to the door, he took his straw hat off the peg above the low row where smaller hats and bonnets waited for the kinder. He put it on his head and reached for the doorknob.

“Onkel Isaiah!” cried Nancy as she jumped up.

Her booster seat slid forward, pushing her toward the table. Her elbow hit her plate, and everything seemed to move in slow motion. The plate flipped into the air, spraying maple syrup everywhere. Her unfinished slice of toast struck her glass and knocked it into her sister’s. Both glasses bounced and rolled onto Andrew’s plate before coming to a stop in the middle of Ammon’s. More syrup and melted butter flew across the table.

Clara grabbed the boys’ glasses and kept them from falling over and spilling more milk on the table. The kinder tried to help, but ended up with more food on them and across the chairs. A plate fell off the table and clattered on the floor. It landed upside down, one corner of toast peeking out from beneath it.

Silence settled on the kitchen as they stared at the mess. He heard a muffled sound and glanced at Clara. She was biting her lower lip to keep from laughing.

“Now I understand how the kitchen could get messy in a single day,” she said. “Maybe I should have put the oilcloth on the floor instead of on the table.”

Isaiah had to put his hand over his mouth to stifle his laugh. The kinder were smiling, but exchanging the uneasy looks he realized were their way of reminding each other not to laugh. He lost any desire to give into the humor of the situation. There was nothing funny when four little kids refused to let themselves act as kinder should.

Who’d told them not to laugh? Once he found out, he was going to have that person explain to the twins he or she had made a big mistake. It was gut for them to laugh. They needed to express their happy emotions as well as their sad ones.

But they aren’t showing those either. That thought unsettled him more. How could he have failed to notice? Caught up in the day-to-day struggle to balance taking care of them with his work at the forge, he’d been too focused on each passing minute to look at the bigger picture.

Hanging his hat on the peg, he ran to the sink and grabbed the dishrag. He wet it, wrung it out and began pushing the puddles of syrup from the edge of the table. The cloth became a sticky mess within seconds. Tossing it into the sink, he grabbed the roll of paper towels.

“Komm, and let’s get cleaned up.” Clara motioned for the kinder to follow her toward the bathroom.

Placing paper towels over the puddle of milk and syrup, Isaiah started to dab it up.

“Leave it,” Clara said. “We’ll clean it once there are a few less layers of syrup on us.”

“Let me get started so no more hits the floor.”

“Danki.” Her smile warmed him more than another cup of her delicious kaffi. Before he could smile back, she’d turned to the wide-eyed twins. “Pick up your plates and put them in the sink on your way to the bathroom. Don’t touch anything else!”

The abashed kinder obeyed without a peep, astonishing Isaiah anew. They’d done as he asked, though not always as he’d hoped. And the results had often been another disaster on top of the one he was trying to get put to rights.

Isaiah went to work cleaning the table and the floor while he listened to Clara helping the twins wash in the bathroom. Later, when the youngsters were in bed and couldn’t hear, he needed to ask her how she persuaded them to obey her.

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