A Groom for Greta (Amish Brides of Celery Fields) Read online

  He realized now that he’d gotten lost in thought while Roger had continued to speculate on what might have gone on between Greta and Josef. “...wouldn’t be human if they didn’t have words now and again. Whole town knows that this is hardly the first time. I mean you take a fiery little thing like Greta and put her with a man as fence-straddling as Josef and there are bound to be some times when they don’t see eye to eye.” He chuckled and stood up. “Wait ’til those two are married and spending all day and night together. Oh, there are gonna be some fireworks then, I’ll guarantee it.”

  Roger was still chuckling to himself after he’d tipped his hat and sauntered back to the hardware store—no doubt to report to his wife that Luke had not had any further information to offer. Luke started inside his shop, but a flash of color caught his eye and he paused to look down the lane toward the house where the Goodloe sisters lived.

  In the gathering dusk, Greta was taking down laundry from the clothesline that ran from the house to a palm tree and back again. She yanked free the clothespins and dropped them into a basket at her feet, then snapped the sheet, towel or clothing item hard against the hot westerly breeze and folded it into a precise rectangle before adding it to the pile already in another larger basket.

  Luke told himself that he remained where he was watching her until the line was empty because he wanted to be sure that she had recovered from her earlier distress. But the truth was that he could not seem to stop watching her. It was as if Josef’s harsh words had pried open a door. Suddenly the beautiful Greta Goodloe might be free to consider other suitors. And there had been a time when a much younger and more foolish Luke would have taken a good deal of pleasure in that news. But he had been different then.

  “This is not the sister for you,” he told himself sternly as he forced his gaze away from her and headed inside.

  * * *

  Greta saw Luke Starns watching her. She’d also seen Roger Hadwell make his way over to the blacksmith’s, observed the two men talking and wondered if Luke had decided that since she had already broken their bargain by refusing his offer of a ride to services, he was free to tell Roger everything. In that case she had made a complete fool of herself confiding in the blacksmith and, no doubt by morning, everyone in town was going to know about it. She would be the subject of whispers and conversations that stopped the moment she entered the room when she and Lydia arrived at services.

  Oh, who do you think you’re fooling? Sooner or later everyone has to know the whole story.

  Well, let people talk. It certainly hadn’t been her idea to end her relationship with Josef. And the way he had done it—in the middle of town, with no explanation at all? Of course, she really hadn’t waited for him to explain. On the other hand, he could have followed her. But, oh no, he was too...

  What?

  Shy?

  Proud?

  Cowardly. Yes, that explained it. For as long as she’d known him, Josef had allowed her to have her way and deep down she had known that even the hint that she might be attracted to some other boy could have Josef falling all over himself to win favor with her. On the other hand, he had made it clear on more than one occasion that once they married, he would determine where she went and who she saw and when. Greta had accepted that, once she married, the man was in charge. But she had always assumed that after marriage she would be able to find her way around Josef’s jealousies and strict ways the same way she had during their courtship.

  She paused for a moment—a clothespin clinched between her lips—as she looked at Luke Starns. As usual she had acted in haste—confiding in him without thinking through the possible consequences. She barely knew the man beyond seeing him at services and the occasional nod when she passed his shop.

  Honest. Trustworthy. These were words she’d heard applied to the blacksmith. But could she trust him? It had been evident that he failed to understand the seriousness of what had transpired between Josef and her—of just how precarious things were. And yet he had listened and shown concern.

  She had to trust someone. Perhaps he and Roger Hadwell had been discussing business or just passing the time of day. She would know tomorrow as soon as she and Lydia arrived at services. If Luke drove Lydia and her to services, as soon as they pulled into the yard of Pleasant’s house, there would be one of two reactions. Either the women would be whispering about her and giving her those pitying looks that she could not abide. Or they would be talking about the surprise of seeing Lydia and Luke arrive together, delighted that at long last the romance they had all anticipated had taken its first baby step.

  An idea began to take shape in her mind and she smiled softly to herself. She placed the last folded pillowcase on the pile of laundry. Arriving with Luke was definitely the way to go. If he had gossiped, she would know it at once and would then inform him that he was not worthy of Lydia and could certainly not depend on Greta to help him court her. If, on the other hand, he had held his tongue under the pressure of Roger’s probing, then she could turn the attention of others to the prospect of a romance between Lydia and the blacksmith and all speculation about what had happened to her would be short-lived.

  She hoisted the heavy basket onto one hip and headed back to the house. Somehow she had to get Lydia to agree to let Luke Starns drive them to services and see her home after the singing. While it would be nigh on to scandalous for Luke and Lydia to arrive for services without Greta’s company, Sunday evening singings were occasions where single people in the community could openly socialize, even flirt a bit. Of course, in most Amish communities such gatherings were intended as events for young people in the sixteen to twenty age group. And in most Amish communities they attracted additional young people from surrounding Amish towns.

  But Celery Fields was the sole Amish community for miles around in Florida and so these social evenings included anyone who was single—regardless of their age. Greta had never seen Luke at a singing in all the time he’d been in Celery Fields but clearly his intention was to be there the following evening. Now if indeed she found that she could trust Luke then all Greta had to do was make sure that he and Lydia were seated across from each other at the long table set up in the barn with the males on one side and the females on the other. And then she could make some excuse as to why she could not ride back to town with them.

  * * *

  Early on Sunday morning Greta heard Lydia stirring. Usually her sister would already have seen to the horse and cow they kept, gathered the eggs, prepared their breakfast and dressed in the lavender dress she reserved for their biweekly services, all before Greta was even out of bed. But not today.

  Still smarting from the events of the day before, Greta had not slept well at all and she felt restless and out of sorts as she dressed. Using the blackened pins lined up on her bureau, she anchored her skirt into place. Then she twisted up her hair into a bun and pulled hairpins from between her lips to stab it into submission. Finally she lifted the prayer kapp from its resting place on her bedside table and prepared to set it atop the tight bun.

  Unfortunately Lydia’s answer to Greta’s distress the evening before had been to counsel prayer, Scripture and early to bed. There had been no opportunity at all to bring up the subject of Luke Starns. Furthermore, in the middle of the night Greta had realized that because she had rejected Luke’s offer to drive them after all, she needed to reverse that decision and hope that he would agree. Thus the urgency of her early morning errand—one that her sister must not observe.

  Checking to be sure that Lydia was otherwise occupied, Greta picked up the note she’d prepared the night before and ran down the lane to the blacksmith shop. All was quiet through the little village and she thanked God for that. She crept up the staircase on the side of Luke’s shop that led to his living quarters and slipped the envelope under the door. When she heard the distinctive sound of a man clearing his throat from somewhere beyond that door, she ran down the stairs and all the way back to her house.

 
* * *

  Luke had found the small white envelope when he’d headed out to hitch up his wagon.

  Luke Starns,

  Your kind offer to drive my sister and me to

  services today is most appreciated. We will be

  ready at eight.

  Greta Goodloe

  Luke couldn’t help but smile. So Greta Goodloe had decided to keep her end of their bargain after all. He wondered why. Greta did not strike him as a woman who did anything without a good reason—something that would be of benefit to her. Not that she wasn’t devoted to her sister. Their closeness was well-known through Celery Fields and it was seldom that one was seen without the other—even when Josef Bontrager was around.

  He reread the note. The implication was that Lydia had agreed to this idea—and that surprised Luke. More than surprised him, it made him suspicious. Had Greta actually gotten Lydia to agree to the plan? He doubted it. But now that he’d been given the opening he’d sought to call upon Lydia, he hardly cared what Greta’s motives might be. Of far greater concern was that he return to his room above the shop and make sure that he had done everything he could to make the best possible impression on the schoolteacher.

  He changed his shirt for one that he’d been saving for just such an occasion. He ran his thumbs down his suspenders making sure they were straight and without any twists. He brushed his navy wool pants to remove any possible traces of crumbs from his breakfast. Finally he picked up his wide-brimmed straw hat and set it precisely on his head, wishing for the first time in his life that he owned a mirror.

  Pure vanity, he thought, chastising himself for such a lapse on the Sabbath of all days. He set his hat more firmly on his thick hair and headed downstairs to hitch up the wagon, thinking that it would be more proper if he had the courting buggy he’d been given when he had turned sixteen and left behind when he moved to Florida.

  “Courting buggies are for kids,” he muttered to the horses as he fixed them with their bits and harness. “Lydia Goodloe and I are no longer young. And she is a practical woman. She will not mind the wagon.”

  Outside he took special care hitching the team to the wagon and ran the flat of his hand over the seat to be sure there were no splinters that might catch on the sisters’ skirts. He paused as he thought about the splinter he’d removed from Greta’s thumb the day before. How vulnerable she had seemed standing there in the reflected light of the fire, licking at her wound like a kitten whose paw had been injured. How very smooth her skin had been especially in contrast to his rough and callused palms. For a moment he was carried back to Ontario—and another young woman whose hands had been as soft as that.

  Luke shook off such thoughts. Those days were behind him. He lived here now. His life was here in Celery Fields and if God granted him his prayer, his future was with Lydia Goodloe—not her sister, no matter how pretty and lively she was.

  * * *

  Greta closed the door to her bedroom and sat on her bed, trying to catch her breath before going to share breakfast with Lydia. She was relieved that Lydia had long ago insisted that she would take care of the usual chores and preparing their breakfast on Sunday mornings. She took a minute to steady her breathing as she felt the flush of exertion from having run all the way back after leaving the note for Luke. She hoped she could trust the man.

  Trust.

  Perhaps Josef had looked to the future and seen a lifetime of uncertainty when it came to trusting her. For it was true—as often as he had declared his love for her, she had never once been able to bring herself to say the words to him. She had simply accepted that she and Josef were meant for one another and she had believed with all her heart that in time she would come to love him as much as she liked him.

  Her head reeled with the need to find some logical explanation for his sudden decision to quit her, and then to find an equally agreeable solution to this sudden upheaval. On a morning when she had expected to arrive at services and hear her name linked with Josef’s in the announcement of coming nuptials, she must instead wonder how she could possibly endure the day. For endure it she must. Even if Luke found her note and showed up to drive them to services, chatter about a romance between Lydia and Luke would take time to develop. And there was always the possibility that Lydia would refuse to accept the ride.

  And what of the added humiliation if Josef had failed to tell Bishop Troyer not to include them when he made the announcement?

  “Liddy,” she called out, her voice shaking with panic as she flung open the door of her bedroom. “Liddy!”

  Chapter Three

  Lydia came running down the hall from the kitchen. “What is it? Are you all right?” Greta looked up at her sister with tear-filled eyes and an expression of pure panic. Lydia rushed to her side. “Come, sit. Take a deep breath.”

  Greta did as her sister instructed. Since their mother’s death when Greta was only a toddler, she had relied on Lydia to show her the way through the travails of daily life. “What if...” She drew in a long breath and gasped, “What if Josef has not spoken with Bishop Troyer? What if...”

  Lydia frowned, a sure sign that she had not considered this possibility and was even now working through the logistics of how best to handle this latest crisis in Greta’s life. “Well, we shall simply have to make certain that the bishop knows what has happened. Therefore, it would be best if we arrived at services as soon as possible.”

  Greta nodded. “You’ll speak with him?”

  “Bishop Troyer? Of course, but Greta, he is likely to want to speak with you—and Josef.”

  Greta groaned.

  “Now, sister, it’s not necessarily as dire as you may think. As I told you last night,” Lydia continued, “I suspect that Josef has simply had a bout of nerves. Marriage is a big step. There is every possibility that after a night’s lost sleep he regrets his impulsive action and has not yet figured out how to set things right again.”

  When Greta had told Lydia the news over supper the evening before, she had taken great comfort and hope from her sister’s reassurances. But Lydia might know many things—might even be the smartest person in all of Celery Fields—still when it came to matters of the heart, Lydia had almost no experience and besides, didn’t Greta know Josef better than anyone did? Although he had a reputation for being wishy-washy, once he did settle on a plan of action, he could be as stubborn as any other man when it came to changing his mind.

  And yet when she heard the snort of a horse and the soft plodding of hooves on the sandy road that ran past their house and on out to the countryside, Greta flew to the window. She could not help but hope that it would be Josef bringing his buggy to collect the two sisters for services as he had done ever since their father had died a year earlier. In that instant she played out the entire scene of how he would come to the door, hat in hand, eyes on the ground. And she would greet him as if nothing had passed between them the day before. The three of them would climb into his buggy and arrive at services as they had every other Sunday.

  But when she looked outside there was no buggy. Instead there was a wagon with a matched team of black Percheron horses and climbing down from the driver’s seat was none other than the blacksmith, Luke Starns.

  “What on earth?” Lydia had followed Greta to the window and was also watching Luke approach the house.

  “He’s come to drive us to services,” Greta said. “He offered,” she added with a shrug as Lydia’s eyebrows lifted in surprise.

  “And you accepted this offer of a ride with a man we barely know?” Lydia asked, her voice the one she used when questioning a student.

  “Not right away,” Greta stammered. “I mean I thought about it and well, Josef is certainly not going to call for us.”

  There was a knock at the door. It was five minutes before eight o’clock. “I told him to come at eight,” Greta added.

  “Come drink your tea and eat something,” Lydia said with a resigned sigh. “I’ll get the door.”

  Theirs was
a small house and Greta did not really have to eavesdrop to overhear the exchange between Lydia and the blacksmith. She nibbled at a slice of rye bread as her sister greeted Luke.

  “You are early, Luke Starns. My sister is just having her breakfast.”

  Greta frowned. “Oh, Liddy,” she whispered to herself. “Show the man a little kindness.”

  She heard Luke mumble an apology.

  “Well, come in out of the heat,” Lydia instructed.

  While Lydia marched down the hallway to the kitchen, Greta saw that Luke had remained uncertainly by the front door.

  “Liddy,” Greta hissed, “offer the man some juice.”

  “We do not have time for juice, Greta.” She took a cloth napkin and wiped a crumb from the corner of Greta’s mouth. “Now, come along or we’ll be late.”

  Outside, Lydia stood aside, making it clear that she expected Greta to climb up to the wagon’s only seat first. “It’s going to be another hot day,” Greta said, trying to ease the tension that hung over the trio as heavily as the humidity. “Even for August,” she added when they were all three seated.

  But it was apparent that she could not expect comments from either Lydia or Luke. Both of them were sitting as if someone had placed a board against their backs and they were each staring straight ahead, their mouths tightly set into thin lines. Clearly any attempt Greta might make to start a conversation was useless so she bowed her head and folded her hands in her lap. She might as well put the time to good use—praying that somehow she might get through this day.

  At Pleasant’s house, where services were to be held, Pleasant’s husband, Jeremiah, came forward to welcome them. If he thought it odd that they should arrive with Luke Starns, he gave no sign.