Johanna's Bridegroom (4 page)

“Don’t go to sleep,” a familiar male voice said.

Johanna’s eyes flew open and she jumped so hard that she nearly fell off the bale of straw. Roland stood directly in front of her, holding two red snow cones. “Roland.”

He laughed and handed her one of the treats. “It’s strawberry. If I remember, you like snow cones. Any flavor but blue.” He took a bite of his own.

She searched for something to say. In desperation, she grabbed the snow cone and took a bite. Instantly, the cold went straight to her brain and she felt a sharp pain. “Ow!”

He laughed at her, sat down beside her and reached over and wiped a granule of ice off her chin. “You always did do that,” he reminded her.

“Let me pay you for this,” she stammered.

“
Ne.
Enjoy. I bought it for J.J.”

Johanna gasped. “I’m eating J.J.’s snow cone?”

Roland shrugged. “I’ll buy him another one. Now that ’Kota and Jonah are up there...” Roland indicated the top of the straw slide. “With him, it would just go to waste. It would be a puddle of strawberry syrup by the time he got to eat it.” He grinned. “So you’re doing me a favor. Keeping me from wasting a dollar.”

“Oh.” She still felt flustered.

“That was smart—what you did with the bees. They went into the box you put out for them.”

Bees were a safe subject. Tentatively, she took another nibble of the snow cone. It was delicious. She couldn’t remember when she’d had one last. Whoever had made it had ground real strawberries into the juice. She fixed her gaze on the ground. Roland was wearing new leather high-top shoes. Black. His trousers were clean, but wrinkled.
Very
wrinkled. They needed a good pressing.

“I’ve always been afraid of bees,” he said.

She licked at the flavored ice. “I know.”

“J.J. seems fascinated by them. He asks me all kinds of questions—questions I can’t answer.”

She took another bite, chewed slowly and swallowed. “I think he’s a bee charmer. They won’t hurt him. You don’t have to worry.”

“I found the biscuits you left for us on the kitchen table Thursday. And the potato soup. They were good, really good.”

“I’m glad you liked them.” A dribble of strawberry water ran down her hand onto her wrist. She passed the paper cone into her other hand and licked up the stray drop. “Messy,” she murmured.

“Good stuff is.”

Silence stretched between them. Shivers ran down her arms. Should she say something to him about what she’d been thinking? About the two of them? Normally, if a girl and a boy wanted to court, there was talk back and forth, between their friends at first, then between the girl and boy themselves. But she and Roland weren’t teens anymore. They didn’t need intermediaries, did they? She looked around. No one was within earshot. If she was going to say something, she had to do it now, before she lost her nerve.

“Roland?”

“Ya?”

“I want to talk to you about—”

“Johanna! Johanna! Did you see? King David and me! We rode in the blue cart.” Johanna’s sister Susanna appeared in front of them, laughing merrily. “No horse. A dog. A dog pulled the cart! Did you see us ride?”

David, glued to Susanna’s side, smiled and pointed at Johanna’s snow cone. “Ice cream? I like ice cream.”

David, like Susanna, had Down’s syndrome but was harder to understand. Johanna could usually follow what he was saying. He was a good-hearted boy, always smiling, and Johanna liked him.

“Ne,”
Susanna said. “Not a ice cream cone. A snow cone.” She stared longingly at Johanna’s. “Can we have one?”

“I don’t like snow. To eat it,” David said.

“You’ll like it,” Susanna assured him.

“I’ll buy you snow cones.” Roland reached into his pocket.

“You have money, Susanna,” Johanna reminded her. “
Mam
gave you five dollars. Did you spend it all?”

Susanna shook her head.

“It’s nice of Roland to offer, but you need to buy your own. And buy David one, too.”

Rebecca joined them, with Katy in tow. Katy looked longingly at Johanna’s snow cone.

“Here,” Johanna said. “Have the rest of mine, Katy. Or get Susanna to buy you one. She and David were just headed to the snow cone booth.”

Rebecca glanced from Johanna to Roland and back. Johanna could almost see the wheels turning in her sister’s head.

“Ah,” Rebecca said. “I think we need to find snow cones for Susanna and David. Can you help me, Katy?”

Johanna’s fingertips tingled and her chest felt tight. Maybe this wasn’t the time. Maybe Susanna and David’s interruption had kept her from doing something she’d regret. “I’ll come with you,” she said.

Rebecca chuckled. “No need. You two
old
people sit here in the sun. I think I saw the snow cone stand by the school.”

Roland pointed. “It’s by the gym doors, but if you don’t have enough—”

Susanna waved her five-dollar bill. “I have money,” she said. “Come on, King David.” She started off and, again, David followed.

Rebecca looked back at Johanna. “Have fun, you two,” she teased. “Come on, Katy. Would you like to see the baby lambs?”

Roland watched the four of them walk away. “Smart, your sisters,” he said. “All of them.”

Johanna smiled at him. “
Ya.
All of them,” she agreed. “Susanna, too.”

He nodded. “I always thought so. A credit to your parents, that girl.”

Johanna took a deep breath and clasped her hands so that Roland wouldn’t see how they were shaking. “Roland?” she began.

In his gray eyes, color swirled and deepened. “Yes, Johanna?”

She took another breath and looked right at him. “Will you marry me?”

Chapter Four

O
nce, when he was eighteen and learning his trade as a farrier, Roland had been kicked by a stallion his uncle was shoeing. The blow had been so quick and hard that Roland was picking himself up off the ground almost before he’d realized that he’d been struck by a flying hoof. He hadn’t lost consciousness, but for what seemed like an eternity, he hadn’t been able to think straight.

Johanna’s matter-of-fact question had much the same effect. He was stunned. “What did you say?” he stammered. Around him, the laughter and happy shrieks of the children, the red balloon that had come loose from its mooring and was floating skyward, and the sweet smell of ripe strawberries faded. For a long second, Roland’s whole world narrowed to the woman sitting beside him.

Johanna rolled her eyes. “Are you listening to me? I asked if you would marry me.”

He swallowed, opened his mouth to speak and then took a big gulp of air. “Did you just ask me to marry you?” he managed.

She folded her hands gracefully over her starched black apron. “It’s the logical thing for us to do,” she answered.

He heard what she said, but his attention was fixed on the red-gold curls that had come loose from her severe bun and framed her heart-shaped face, a face so fresh and youthful that it might have belonged to a teenage girl instead of a widow and mother in her late twenties. Johanna’s skin was fair and pink, dusted with a faint trail of golden freckles over the bridge of her nose and across her cheeks. Her eyes were the exact shade of bluebells, and her mouth was... Roland swallowed again. He’d always thought that Johanna Yoder had the prettiest mouth—even when she’d been admonishing him for something he’d done wrong.

They had a long history, he and Johanna...a history that he’d hoped and prayed would become a future. In the deepest part of his heart, he’d wanted to ask her the very question that she’d just asked him. But now that she’d spoken it first, he was poleaxed.

“Do I take that as a
no?
” she asked, as a flush started at her slender throat and spread up over her face. “You don’t want to marry me?”

He could hear the hurt in her voice, and his stomach clenched. Johanna’s voice wasn’t high, like most young women’s. It was low, husky and rich. She had a beautiful singing voice. And when she raised that voice in hymns during Sunday worship service, the sound was so sweet it almost brought tears to his eyes.

Abruptly, she stood.

“
Ne,
Johanna. Don’t!” He caught her hand. “Sit. Please.”

Clearly flustered, she jerked her hand away, but not before he felt the warmth of her flesh and an invisible rush of energy that leaped between them. The shock of that touch jolted him in the same way that his skin prickled when a bolt of lightning struck nearby in a thunderstorm. He’d never understood that, and he still didn’t, but he felt it now.

“You know I want to marry you,” he said, all in a rush, before he lost his nerve. “I’ve been waiting for the right time...when I thought you were—”

“Through mourning Wilmer?” Johanna’s blue eyes clouded with deep violet. She lowered her voice and glanced around to see if anyone was staring at them.

Roland found himself doing the same. But the children were busy climbing the mountain of straw, and no one else seemed to have noticed that the ground under his feet was no longer solid and his brain had turned to mush. He returned his gaze to her. “To show decent respect for my Pauline and your—”

“Deceased husband?” She made a tiny shrug and her lips firmed into a thin line. “Wilmer was my husband and the father of my children. We took marriage vows together, and if...” She took a deep breath. “If he hadn’t passed, I would have remained his wife.” She shook her head. “I’d be speaking an untruth if I told you that there was love or respect left in my heart for him when he died—if there wasn’t the smallest part of relief when I knew he’d gone into the Lord’s care. I know it’s a sin to feel that way, but I—”

“Johanna, you don’t have to—” he began, but she cut him off with a raised palm.

“
Ne,
Roland. Let me finish, please. I’ll say this, and then we’ll speak of it no more. Wilmer was not a well man. His mind was troubled. But the fault in our marriage was not his alone. I’ve spent hours on my knees asking for God’s forgiveness. I should have tried harder to help him...to find help for him.”

One of Johanna’s small hands rested on the straw bale between them, and he covered it with his own and squeezed it, out of sympathy for her pain. This time, she didn’t pull away. He waited, and she went on.

“You know I was no longer living under Wilmer’s roof when he died. His sickness and his drinking of spirits made it impossible for me to remain there with my children.” Johanna raised her eyes to meet his gaze, and Roland saw the tears that her pride would not allow to fall.

A tightness gathered in Roland’s chest. “Did he... Was Wilmer...” A rising anger against the dead man threatened to make him say things he might later regret. As Johanna had said...as Bishop Atlee had said, Wilmer’s illness had robbed him of reason. He was not responsible for what he did, and it was not for any of them to judge him. But Roland had to ask. “Did he ever hit you?”

Johanna turned her face away.

It was all the answer he needed. Roland wasn’t a violent man, but he did have a temper that needed careful tending. If Wilmer had appeared in front of them now, alive and well, Roland wasn’t certain he could have refrained from giving him a sound thumping.

Johanna’s voice was a thin whisper. “It was Jonah’s safety that worried me most. When Wilmer...” A shudder passed through her tensed frame. “When he began to take out his anger on our son, I couldn’t take it any longer. I know that it’s the right of a father to discipline his children, but this was more than discipline.” She looked back, meeting Roland’s level gaze. “Wilmer got it into his head that Jonah wasn’t his son, but yours.”

“Mine?” Roland’s mouth gaped. “But we never...you never...”

Johanna sighed. “Exactly. I’ve been accused of being outspoken, too stubborn for a woman and willful—all true, to my shame. But, you, above all men, should know that I—”

“Would never break your marriage vows,” he said. “Could never do anything to compromise your honor or that of your husband.” He fought to control the anger churning in his gut. “In all the time we courted, we never did anything more than hold hands and—”

“We kissed once,” she reminded him. “At the bishop’s husking bee. When you found the red ear of corn?”

“We were what? Fifteen?”

“I was fifteen,” Johanna said. Her expression softened, and some of the regret faded from her clear blue eyes. “You were sixteen.”

“And as I remember, you nearly knocked me on my—”

“I didn’t strike you.” The corners of her mouth curled into a smile. “I just gave you a gentle nudge, to make you stop kissing me.”

“You shoved me so hard that I fell backward and landed in a pile of corncobs. Charley told on me, and I was the butt of everyone’s jokes for months.” He squeezed her hand again. “It wasn’t much of a kiss for all that fuss, but I still remember how sweet your lips tasted.”

“Don’t be fresh, Roland Byler,” she admonished, once again becoming the no-nonsense Johanna he knew and loved. “Remember you are a grown man, a father and a baptized member of the church. Talk of foolishness between teenagers isn’t seemly.”

“I suppose not,” he said grudgingly. “But I never forgot that kiss.”

She pulled her hand free and tucked it behind her back. “Enough of that. We have a decision to make, you and I. I’ve thought about it and prayed about it. I’ve listened to my sisters chatter on the subject until I’m sick of it. You are a widower with a young son, and I’m a widow with two small, fatherless children, and it’s time we both remarried. We belong to the same church, we have the same values, and you have a farm and a good job. That we should marry and join our families is the logical solution.”

Logical?
He waited for her to speak of love...or at least to say how she’d always cared for him...to say that she’d never gotten over their teenage romance.

“What?” she demanded. “Haven’t I put it plainly? We both have to marry someone. And you live close by. We’re already almost family, with your brother Charley and my sister Miriam already husband and wife. You have plenty of room for my sheep and bees. I think that empty shed would be perfect for my turkey poults.”

“Turkeys? Bees?” He stood, backed away, and planted his feet solidly. “I’d hoped there’d be a better reason for us to exchange vows. What of affection, Johanna? Aren’t a husband and wife supposed to—”

Her eyes narrowed, and a thin crease marred her smooth forehead. “If you’re looking for me to speak of romance, I’m afraid you’ll be disappointed. We’re past that, Roland. We’re too old, and we’ve seen too much of life. Don’t you remember what the visiting preacher said at Barbara and Tobias’s wedding? Marriage is to establish a family and strengthen the bonds of community and church.”

Pain knifed through him. All this time, he’d been certain that Johanna felt the same way about him that he felt about her. Not that he’d ever betrayed his late wife—not in deed and not in thought. He’d kept Johanna in a quiet corner of his heart. But now he’d thought that they’d have a second chance. “It was my fault, what happened between us. What went wrong...I’ve never denied it. I know how badly I hurt you, and I’m sorry. I’ve been sorry ever since—”

“Roland. What are you talking about? We were kids when we walked out together. Neither of us had joined the church. That’s the past. I’m not clinging to it, and you can’t, either. It’s time to look to our future. What we have to do is decide if we would be good for each other. We’re both hard workers and we’re both dedicated to our children. It seems silly for me to look elsewhere for a husband when you live so close to my mother’s farm.”

“So we’re to decide on the rest of our lives because my land lies near your mother’s?” He hesitated, realizing his words were going to get him into trouble. But he couldn’t help how he felt and he wouldn’t be able to sleep tonight if he didn’t express those feelings. “I take it that you’d want to have the banns read at the next worship service. Since you’ve already made up your mind, why wait? Widows and widowers may marry when they choose. Why waste time with courting when you could be cleaning my house and your sheep could be grazing in my meadow?”

“Are you being sarcastic?”

“Answer me one question, Johanna. Do you love me?”

She averted her eyes. “I’m too old and too sensible for that. I respect you, and I think you respect me. Isn’t that enough?”

“No.” He shook his head. “No, it isn’t.” Where had this gone so wrong? He had pictured the two of them riding out together in his two-seater behind his new trotter, imagined them taking the children to the beach, going to the State Fair together this summer. He badly wanted to court Johanna properly, and she’d shattered all his hopes and dreams by her emotionless proposal. “It’s not enough for me. And it shouldn’t be enough for you.”

She pursed her lips. “Well, that’s clear enough. I’m sorry to have troubled you, Roland. It’s plain that we can’t—”

“Can’t what? Can’t find what we had and lost? Pauline was a sensible match that suited both our families. In time, when J.J. came, love came and filled our house. When I lost her, part of my heart went with her. But I won’t marry for convenience, not again. If the feelings you have for me aren’t deep and strong, you’d be better to find some other candidate, some prosperous farmer or tradesmen who would be satisfied with a sensible
wife. Because...because I’m looking for more.”

Red spots flared on Johanna’s cheeks. “It’s good we had this talk. Otherwise, who knows how much time we would have wasted when we should be looking for—”

“I hope you find what you’re searching for,” Roland said. “And when you find a man willing to settle for a partnership, I hope you’re happy.”

She folded her arms over her chest. “You don’t find happiness in others. You find it in yourself and in service to family and community.”

“So you’re saying I’m selfish?”

“I didn’t mean it that way.”

“It sounds as if that’s exactly what you meant.” With a nod, he turned to search for his son and walked away. There was nothing more to say, nothing more he wanted to hear. He wanted to make Johanna his wife. He could think of no one who would be a more loving mother to J.J., but not under these circumstances...never under these circumstances.

“I’m glad we got this straightened out,” she called after him. “Because it’s clear to me that the two of us would never work out.”

Johanna’s temper was out of the box now. She was mad, but he didn’t care. Better to have her angry at him than to feel nothing at all.

* * *

Later that evening, at the forge beside his barn, Roland shaped a horseshoe on his anvil, with powerful swings of his hammer. Sparks flew, and his brother Charley chuckled.

“Just make it fit, Roland,” Charley teased. “Don’t beat it to death.”

It was after supper, but Roland hadn’t taken time to eat. He’d been hard at work since he’d left the festival. Not wanting to spoil J.J.’s day, he’d given permission for Grace to keep him with her boy, ’Kota, and bring him home in the morning. Since tomorrow wasn’t a church Sunday, it would be a leisurely day for visiting. Hannah Yoder, Johanna’s
mam,
had invited him to join them for supper tonight, but after the heated words he and Johanna had exchanged, her table was the last place he wanted to be.

Besides, Roland was in no mood to be a patient father this evening.

Charley had apologized for bringing his mare to be shod so late in the day. “I wouldn’t have bothered you, but I promised Miriam we’d drive over to attend services in her friend Polly’s district. You know Polly and Evan, don’t you? They moved here from Virginia last summer.”

Roland did know Evan Beachy. The newcomer had brought a roan gelding to be shod just after Christmas. Evan was a tall, quiet man with a gentle hand for his horses. Roland liked him, but he didn’t want to make small talk about the Beachys from Virginia. He wanted to get Charley’s opinion on what had gone wrong between Johanna and him.