An Amish Christmas Quilt (12 page)

C
HAPTER
4

Matthew knew, as all the community did, that the bishop's back door was always unlocked. Bishop Umble didn't hold with not “being open,” as he called it in church, and this view extended to the very wood of his
haus.

“Hiya?” he called, and when no one answered, he slipped off his boots on the rug beside the door and trod quietly across the pristine kitchen to take a seat on one of the comfortable living area chairs. He took off his hat and loosened his coat, glancing around with taut nerves. He hoped the bishop hadn't forgotten, though it didn't line up with the
auld
man's nature.

He listened to the tick of the wind-up clock and the crackle of the woodstove and settled back further, willing himself to relax. Soon, the grueling
nacht
past caught up with him and he closed his eyes against a swimming wave of peaceful drowsiness.
If I fall asleep, I'll surely hear someone
kumme
in. . . .

 

Luke Lapp took his role as deacon to the small mountain
Amisch
community seriously. So, when an old widow stopped to ask for a bit of kindling from his scrap pile at the woodworking shop, he gave her his full attention.

“You'll excuse me,” he muttered to the
Englisch
customer who'd made the trek up the mountain to look at some veneer wood for a daughter's vanity.

“Of course.” The
Englische
r, Mr. Ray, was jovial. “I'll poke about your shop, if you don't mind?”

Luke smiled with a brisk nod.
Of course I mind—it's a workshop, not Kauffmann's store....
But he'd learned that the
Englisch
had different social boundaries from the
Amisch
, and, after all, the customer meant no harm.

He filled the back of Frau Knepp's sled in a few quick motions, then piled the
auld
woman back in under the blankets. “Don't unload it alone,
sei se gut
,” he said politely to the widow. “I'll
kumme
over shortly and do it for you.”

He was rewarded with a toothless smile, then watched her pull away. He waited to make sure she navigated the tight turn at the end of his lane and went back in search of Mr. Ray.

He found the
Englischer
admiring the tall gun cabinet that stood along a weather-tight back wall of the shop.

“Cherry, isn't it?”

“Through and through.”

“Your scroll work is remarkable. What a gift you have!” Mr. Ray smiled.

Luke shifted on his booted feet, uncomfortable with praise. “As Derr Herr—The Lord—gives.”

Mr. Ray toyed with a latch on one of the glass doors. “Nice bunch of guns too—I collect a little. What's the prize in the white sack?”

A small sound, a smothered sigh, escaped Luke's throat as he gazed through the glass at the gun carefully shrouded in white cotton. “It's—nothing. A relic, you might say.”

“I'd be interested in . . .”

“I'm sorry, Mr. Ray. We were discussing those veneers? I've got a cabinet shipment to get down the mountain soon.”

The
Englischer
cleared his throat, obviously understanding that he was being warned off. “Of course.” He smiled. “The veneers . . .”

Luke turned his back on the gun cabinet.
Today need not be a day for ghosts.... I have work to do.

Laurel knocked hesitantly on the back door of the bishop's
haus
, and when no one answered, she finally gritted her teeth and went inside on tiptoe. Frau Umble was at the quilting of course....

She saw Matthew sprawled on one of the bishop's chairs, his big, lean body deep in repose. His dark brown hair was tousled, his head tilted backward against the simple doily on the chair back.

Laurel smiled to herself as she realized they were alone in the
haus
. It was simply too
gut
an opportunity to miss. So many of their embraces had been stolen ones in the cold outdoors—the idea of kissing Matthew awake in the warmth of a home appealed to her impulsive nature and sent her senses racing.

She bit her lip and made her way to the back of the chair where he lay. Leaning over, she smiled into the perfect bone structure of his upside-down handsome face. A lone freckle, an angel
buss,
as Aenti June called the sun marks, sat parallel to the dimple in his chin and she couldn't resist brushing her nose over the spot. He sighed in his sleep and parted his lips. She leaned farther, feeling the chair back in tight accord with the dizzying place in her stomach, and balanced on tiptoe.

She blew softly on his mouth and he shifted a bit, still visibly deep in sleep. Laurel smiled, then captured his bottom lip with her damp mouth, marveling that such a simple change in position could produce such heady sensations.

She kissed him with artful strokes, tilting her head, until she saw his dark, thick eyelashes flutter against the flush of his skin.

 

Matthew was dreaming. He had to be.... He recognized, in his subconscious, that he'd never burned to such an extent. He felt turned upside down and inside out, as if he were coming apart, and could only think about his next thickened heartbeat and the sensation that his mouth nearly watered with want....

A light hand on his shoulder brought him up from the first depths of sleep and he groaned aloud with reluctance, not wanting the moment to end. He felt like begging for another bit of time and taste in his half-dreaming state and pushed back against the surge of waking. The pressure on his mouth increased subtly and he drew a frantic breath, arching upward in an effort to follow the movement.

“Do you like this?” Laurel's soft voice was a throaty shimmer of sound at the back of his mind.

“
Ach, jah
,” he breathed, the words tangled in his consciousness. “Please . . .”

“Please, what, Matthew?”

He smiled, coming half awake when he recognized the light tease in her tone, like a veil wafting through summer air. Then he remembered where he was and reached his hands upward to capture her sweet face, working his mouth hard against her until he heard her own soft sounds of harmonious pleasure.

“Ahem!”

Matthew fell out of the chair at the brisk clearing of the bishop's throat. He staggered to his feet, then bent once more to snatch up his hat, wringing it between his hands. He moved quickly to grasp Laurel's arm from the other side of the chair and then hauled her behind him, shielding her slight body with the bulk of his own.

“Bishop Umble, uh, sir . . .” Matthew resisted the urge to look away from the shorter man's bright blue eyes and craggy raised brows.

“It doesn't appear as though an explanation is necessary as to why you both wanted to see me.” The bishop's voice was even but not condemning, and Matthew felt himself relax to a slight degree.

“
Jah
, we wish to marry.”

“To say the least,” Bishop Umble returned dryly, then indicated the couch with a sweep of his aged hand. “
Sei se gut
, let us sit.”

Matthew guided Laurel to the couch, then perched in a tense posture a more than safe distance from her hip. He was ashamed to have put Laurel in such a compromising position in the bishop's own home.

“So,” Bishop Umble began without preamble. “By any chance, do either of your
faters
know?”

 

Laurel struggled to keep her voice level though she could feel her cheeks still heated from the impromptu kissing, but she felt she should speak up as she sensed Matthew's nervousness.

“Nee
, Bishop Umble. We—we have been courting in secret.” Normally, the mountain Amisch kept an impending marriage secret from all until their intentions to marry were announced at the end of a church service at least two weeks prior to the wedding itself. Courting, too, took place at
nacht
, when no other was around but the couple themselves.

The bishop raised a brow. “In more secret than normal, I would imagine.”

“
Jah
, sir,” Matthew muttered.

Laurel watched the bishop pass a hand over his brow, as if deep in thought. Then he sighed aloud. “I must make it known to you both that I have tried, over the years, to speak to your
faters
in an effort to mend their . . . discord.”

“Do you know why they fought?” Laurel asked, unable to contain her curiosity.

The bishop shook his head and spread his hands before him. “
Nee
, it is a secret lost long ago and known only between the two of them. There was a time, when I was a much younger man, that I can remember them as inseparable friends. But, like all fighting of this sort, the reason often becomes lost to time, but the disagreeableness goes on, fueled by pride.”

Matthew cleared his throat. “We were hoping that you might . . . prepare them both somehow before the announcement is made next week at church service.”

The bishop smiled grimly. “I fear there is no preparation for that moment save an intervention from Derr Herr's own Hand.”

Laurel felt her heart sink. A miracle seemed a far-off thing at the moment.

The Bishop seemed to read her thoughts, then laughed with a wise look. “It is the season for miracles, my
kinner
. We will have to see what Derr Herr has in store.”

C
HAPTER
5

John Beider took a long pull on his coffee and settled back more comfortably in the chair near the woodstove. His legs were crossed at the ankle and his favorite socks showed signs of his wife's
gut
mending around the toes and heels. He glanced at his visibly drowsy companion, old Tab King, and smiled to himself. It was no insult to John when a friend began to drift off after a few of his tales—in fact, he saw it as a compliment to his storytelling prowess.

He was spinning a fair yarn to Tab about the Ice Mine at the base of the mountain, and his guest revived at the mention of silver.

“Now, wait jest a minute here, John.” Tab ran a hand through his gray hair, making it stand on end. “I've heard tell of the Cattaguras Indian and the silver, and the farmer what owned the mine lookin' for silver, but I ain't never heard of no silver coins nor government payload bein' lost on Ice Mountain.”

“I'm not saying Ice Mountain for sure, but somewhere in these parts anyway. You see, with all the logging and mining going on way back around here, the government set up an outpost with a bank included near Coudersport. But one of the clerks who worked at the bank got upset and quit the day before the payload was supposed to arrive.”

“What he get upset over?” Tab asked.

“Hmmm?
Ach
, I don't know for certain, probably no one does, but he quit. He quit and he walked off—with his keys still on him.”

Tab looked suitably intrigued and John went on, painting a picture with his words. “That same afternoon, some
Englisch
ladies came into the bank, wanting to set up a jelly display sale for the poor of the area and the lone clerk agreed. Little did he know how much them jelly jars would come to matter in the next few hours.”

“Ya don't say?” Tab leaned forward a bit.

“
Jah
. . . the clerk who'd quit earlier that day came back that night. He knew when the payload was to be delivered, and he showed up right after the delivery team of horses had been driven off. The clerk who'd quit was drunk and mad as a rattlesnake. He had a gun and a small leather sack and he demanded that his former coworker hand over the payload.”

John deepened his voice to portray the scene. “
I mean it, Sam. Hand over the silver or I shoot.

“
And raise half the town in the process? I don't think so . . .

“The former clerk cocked his gun and Sam decided he'd better not risk it, but when he kicked the wooden box—pay in silver coin for seventy-men—toward the robber, he made an interesting point.”

“What'd he say?” Tab asked, gratifyingly curious.

“Ach
,” Tab murmured in agreement.

“The robber's eyes swept the dim room and lighted on the stacked jelly jars. He gestured with his gun.
Empty me some of those jelly jars. Glass don't rot when it's buried
.

“
You're crazy. What good is buried silver?
Sam wanted to know, but then he hurried to obey when the gun waved in his direction.

“The jelly spilt out on the floor like a pool of blood and made Sam even more nervous. He opened the chest of silver and filled six sticky jelly jars full of the coins. He carefully filled the robber's satchel and handed it over.

“Then, before Sam could even raise an alarm, the ex-clerk disappeared into the night and the forest. Three days men from the town hunted for him—they even called in U.S. Marshals. When they finally caught up with the ex-clerk, he was collapsed in the woods, lying half-dead with the diphtheria. He was delirious with fever. They got him back to town and tried to make sense of his ramblings. It seemed he was trying to do right in the end and tell them where he'd buried the silver, but all they could make out was ‘by a triangular tock where the ground is cold as ice.' To this day,
Englischers
still hunt these mountains for the buried treasure, but none has found it yet because the clerk died without ever truly revealing his secret.”

Tab blew out a whistle of appreciation. “Whoo-ee, you know how to tell a story, John Beider. Jest think of it—what that silver'd be worth today.”

John was about to speak when the sound of a rifle shot from back on the mountain broke the moment.

“Somebody huntin'.” Tab sat up straighter in his chair. “Say, do you remember the story of that
Englisch
hunter who had a camp over on the far side of the graveyard?
Ach
, but you was jest a
buwe
then.... They say he dropped a deer as big as a buffalo and . . .”

“Possum Johnson,” John said, feeling a tightness around his mouth.

“
Jah, jah
, Possum Johnson it was.
Auld
Smucker Kauffmann bought that rifle from the family when the man passed on, had it hangin' in his store for quite a while.... I wonder what happened to that shotgun? Now there'd be a story. . . .”

John rose abruptly. “Tab, I'm sorry, but I've got some shingles to shave. I've been rambling on too long.”

Tab laughed and got to his feet. “You? Ramble? That's fun, John Beider. Pure fun.”

John knew his smile didn't reach his eyes, and he was only too happy to help Tab off the snowy porch and wave him on his way. Back inside, the silence once again seemed to engulf him and he couldn't resist touching the old wound in his mind, like running a cautious tongue over a canker sore.

He'd gone to Meg Lapp's funeral, of course, but he hadn't been able to bring himself to speak to Luke even then. It didn't feel right
. I had no idea what to say in the face of that kind of loss and with Luke sobbing . . . . Gott, why didn't I speak when I had the chance?

John swallowed hard in the cozy warmth of the kitchen and decided he'd do a few shingles, then go and check on his
sohns
. Thinking about Luke's wife was a good reminder that anything could happen in the mountains, all kinds of accidents, and his
buwes
were too precious to think about losing....