The Patch of Heaven Collection Read online

  There was something brave about the way she stood in his mother’s socks and the too-short cloak and dress she wore. Her blue eyes were steady and trusting. But she had far more to lose in this situation than he did. Why, she could be forced to give up her teaching position if there was any question about where they had been. And he knew well enough the wagging tongues that some women in the community enjoyed using against others. He needed to just forget this whole thing and go see Granger, alone.

  He looked up to see Lilly on the porch, looking back at him. He hastened to get down from the buggy and to reach her side. Before he could get there, the door was flung open by a young woman—Kate Zook. Jacob stifled a sigh. The newly-turned nineteen-year-old Zook girl was as spiteful as her mother, and he and Seth had spent many a social engagement trying to avoid the overt advances of the wily female. The girl was currently looking Lilly up and down with raised, questioning blond brows.

  “Why, Jacob Wyse . . . and Lilly Lapp.” The girl’s voice carried insinuation. Jacob squared his jaw as those nearest the door stopped still to glance in their direction.

  He took Lilly’s arm. “Kate. Good to see you. The cold is a bit much today. Would you mind letting us in?”

  The girl widened the door, and Jacob kept a hand on Lilly’s arm as they pushed into the crowded room. The space seemed overly full of speculative and all-too-interested eyes. Jacob nodded to the men closest to him, then removed his hat, hanging it on a nail. A stirring in the crowd brought forth a petite older woman with a careworn face and anxious hazel eyes, who reached out small hands to touch his sleeve.

  “Jacob, we’ve been so worried,” the woman said in a low voice.

  He smiled down at her. “It’s all right, Mamm. It’s just been a busy morning.” He glanced at Lilly and Mrs. Wyse extended her hand to greet the schoolteacher.

  “Lilly, it’s gut to see you.” His mother’s smile was warm; then she turned to her son. “Last night, Jacob—Seth and your daed went looking when you didn’t come home.”

  Jacob loved his mother, though at the moment he wished she’d contain her concern; she certainly wasn’t making the situation look any better for Lilly.

  He smiled again with reassurance, ignoring the group who’d now gathered about the door. “I’ll explain later, Mamm. Let’s take some time to celebrate. I, er, we must congratulate the bride and groom.”

  “Jah.” His mother nodded, patting his arm. “You both, take off your outdoor things and come and have something warm to eat.”

  He hesitated to take off his coat, unsure if his arm had started to bleed again and shot a quick glance at Lilly. She appeared confident as she prepared to remove the borrowed cloak, but he knew how odd she’d appear once it was off.

  “Uh, Mamm . . . Lilly, I mean, Miss Lapp, would surely like to keep her cloak on, as I would my coat, at least until we warm up a bit.”

  He almost breathed a sigh of relief as Lilly’s fingers paused.

  Then Kate Zook spoke loudly. “Not home last night, then late to the wedding, with the schoolteacher not wearing her own clothes—they do appear rather short. Were you two in some kind of trouble?”

  Jacob saw his mother’s eyes flash green fire at the girl, and Lilly opened her mouth to speak. He cut her off.

  “Kate, danki for your concern, but we must see the bride and groom before we enjoy any of the delicious food. If you’ll excuse us.”

  He grabbed his mother’s arm and Lilly’s hand, figuring it was best to keep them close by in case anyone raised more questions. He plowed through the crowded front room into the next sitting room. Lavish food tables lined the area, with the eck, or bridal table, in one corner of the room. He squared his shoulders as he approached the bride and groom and their attendants with the two women in tow. He was perfectly aware of the attention he was attracting, not just with his mother and Lilly, but also because of the interest people had in what his reaction to the bridal couple would be.

  His determined eyes took in the beauty of the bride, Sarah King—nee, Sarah Williams now—and her dear, familiar face; a face he’d known and loved since childhood. He couldn’t help it; when he saw her he forgot that she was the bride of the day—another man’s wife. He only thought of the years that he’d harbored a love for her that harrowed his heart and mind and robbed his will of reason. It was beyond him, beyond his ability to solve or escape. Then, unbidden, and against his will, he found himself praying a prayer for another love, a love that would sweep all before it like a driving spring rain. He almost smiled as he finished the thought. He must be addled in the head, from his wound and the wedding, because he knew without a doubt that he wanted absolutely nothing to do with another woman. His whole focus of living for the moment would bear no place for a second-best love.

  He refocused and forced himself to acknowledge that Sarah looked happy, even radiant. He’d rehearsed this moment a million times, wondering how he’d get through it. But never had he imagined approaching the table with a concealed gunshot wound and two women in tow.

  Sarah and Grant beamed at them as they came forward. Lovely diversion, he thought, plastering a smile on his face. He stood about as much chance of getting his arm looked at now as an Englischer did at hiding out at an Amish baptism.

  He was within a foot of the eck when sudden, loud voices from the front door echoed across the rooms and he turned with everyone else to see what the disturbance could be. He heard Lilly’s sharp, indrawn breath as a young police officer, with gun drawn, entered the main bridal party room. The bishop, Ezekiel Loftus, an elderly and outspoken man, followed closely behind.

  “I tell you to stop, young man! You’ve no right to be here at such a time as this. It’s a wedding and our people’s own doings.”

  The police officer stood amidst the crowd of stunned guests. The Amish, as a rule, did not believe in violence against fellow human beings and the handgun was an insult to Sarah and her day. Jacob wanted to rap the young man in the head.

  “It’s my doings if there’s a horse thief here,” the officer returned. “And I say there is. I’ve been watching from the woods for the past hour and I noticed you had a late guest or two. One was a big Amish man, no beard, dark hat and coat.”

  The bishop nodded. “And what Amish man doesn’t have a dark hat and coat?”

  “You know what I mean.” The officer’s gaze swung through the crowd and lighted on Jacob, still dressed in his outerwear. “You! Take off your coat.”

  All eyes turned to Jacob and he let go of his mother and Lilly. “As you like.” He reached for the closures on the heavy wool and would have slipped it from his shoulders when Lilly’s voice rang out, clear and resonant.

  “You’re mistaken, Officer. It’s true that Jacob Wyse was late, but he was with me.” From the corner of his eye, Jacob saw her small jaw tighten as she stepped forward.

  The policeman nodded. “Uh-huh, and so would a hundred others of you say to protect one of your own. But the horse was stolen last night, Miss . . . late.”

  Lilly’s voice dropped and her lashes lowered. “He was with me then as well.”

  A collective gasp followed her words. Jacob couldn’t believe what she was saying. The girl had just thrown away her reputation, her very livelihood—for him—in front of everyone.

  “What are you talking about, Miss Lapp?” The bishop demanded, turning toward her, the police officer forgotten, as the guests began to murmur. The bishop was also the chairman of the school board and in charge of Lilly’s position.

  Jacob moved between Lilly and the old man, and something in his spirit forced his voice to carry with level force. From far away he heard the compelling words he pronounced as if they were spoken by someone else. “Jah, sir. It’s as Miss Lapp says, but not as you all may think.” He let his eyes flash to the encircling crowd and reached out to take her hand in his own. “Lilly and I were together, but we were talking—about our future. Sei so gut congratulate us on our engagement.”

  CHAPTER 5

>   They say you never hear it coming,” Grant Williams remarked as Jacob forced himself to be still while the vet sutured.

  “What? The bullet?”

  Grant laughed. “Or the engagement.”

  Jacob wanted to hit something. He found himself actually liking the man who’d taken Sarah’s heart. They were in a back room at the King house and the sounds of the crowd were subdued by the thick wooden walls.

  Lilly Lapp had gone along with his narrish announcement, then apparently explained the situation of his wound to Grant under cover of a congratulatory embrace. He’d soon found himself hustled off by the groom and no one seemed to notice as they surrounded Lilly. The last he saw of her, she was composed and smiling, fending off more questions than trout nibbles during a storm.

  “I’m putting a small drain in. You can see me in a week to have it out. The stitches need another two weeks after that. Which—” Grant grinned at him. “Should put you somewhere around your wedding date, right?”

  “Yeah. Thanks.”

  Grant cleaned up the small mess from a table and put a few things back in his bag. “Guess it’s lucky that around here folks expect me to be able to treat people sometimes as well as animals. I’ve learned to stock up on a few supplies.”

  Jacob sighed. “Look, Grant, you can turn me in, all right?”

  “What?”

  “You know it’s a gunshot wound and that I stole the horse. I don’t want to intrude on your day any more than I’ve done. You could probably get in trouble for helping me.”

  “You think I’d turn my wife’s best childhood friend in to the police? On our wedding day?” He snapped his bag closed. “Nee, danki.”

  “All right, then—thank you. And congratulations.”

  “Danki. Now make sure you get those antibiotics down every day and no lifting saddles or anything else heavy. I don’t want those stitches torn out. I’d offer you some pain medicine but you wouldn’t take it. Right?”

  Jacob shook his head and Grant grinned. “Stubborn Amish man. All right. See me in a week and I’ll see you—back out there with your lovely betrothed.” Grant smiled and closed the door behind him, leaving Jacob to rest his head against the wall. His mind whirled as he wondered in surreal confusion what he’d been doing with his life—especially over the past twenty-four hours.

  I thought that you weren’t a gentleman.”

  “I thought that you couldn’t really create a diversion.”

  They were in the long queue of buggies heading home from the wedding in the winter twilight. Lilly scrunched her eyes closed for a moment against the headache of recalling the afternoon. She sought for something else to say.

  “Well, at least the police are no longer interested in you.”

  Jacob nodded, and she swallowed, thinking about the moment when the young officer’s apparent superior had entered the room. He’d seemed appalled at his junior officer and had sent the young man out. The older officer then apologized profusely to the bishop and the room at large, assuring them that they would look elsewhere for the horse thief.

  “And how is your arm?”

  He shrugged. “Sore. Thank you for telling Grant.”

  She nodded, then spoke in a brisk tone that didn’t match how she felt. “So, shall we go tomorrow and tell the bishop that the engagement is broken?”

  “What?” He turned to face her in the dim interior of the buggy.

  She stared ahead, resolute. “The engagement. I didn’t expect you to speak back there. You should have just let them believe my excuse.”

  “What kind of a man do you think I am to hide behind a woman’s skirts? And you, throwing away your teaching position—how are you going to support your mother?”

  Lilly clenched her lips tight against his words. She knew why she had spoken in defense of him, no matter how strange a reason it seemed, even to her. She searched her heart and felt the conviction of Derr Herr to tell him the truth.

  She pressed her hands together and found her voice. “I would imagine that you haven’t ever given me more than a passing thought in this life, but I’ve always admired you—since we were in school together and you saved that dog.”

  “What dog?”

  “It’s not just that. I don’t want you to think I was angling for an engagement. I wasn’t.” She took a deep breath. “When you kissed me in the barn, I know you thought of Sarah. I pulled away because I do not wish to be a substitute for her.”

  “Then how could you even consider an engagement, a marriage, when you know that I—”

  “That you still love her, and I’d be second-best?”

  “Jah,” he whispered miserably.

  “At the reception, Derr Herr gave me an idea before I ever stepped forward to speak in your defense. Maybe you’d call it an affirmation. Anyway, I had this vision of quilts.”

  “Quilts?”

  “Yes, quilts are made from scraps and secondhand things—but never from the original whole piece of cloth.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “I like quilting. I don’t have time for it much anymore, but I used to love taking secondhand fabric scraps and making something beautiful from them. If Derr Herr gives us the ability to do that with pieces of cloth, how much more of a gift does He give us to patch scraps of lives together to bring Him glory?”

  “But no girl is willing to settle for scraps or to be thought of as secondhand.”

  Lilly laughed. “I could simply tell you that some leftovers are better than the fresh dish itself.”

  “You’re serious, aren’t you?”

  “I guess I am.”

  He stared at her in the dim light. “You’re strong, Lilly Lapp. Courageous. And I think you know how to meet life with all of its unpredictability. I admire those qualities, but I’m not going to lie to you—I guess I can’t anyway if you knew what I was thinking in the barn. I don’t have much of a heart left to give, in fact, it’s mostly scraps itself—a secondhand heart.” He grimaced. “I think it’s one thing to have an ideal like your quilt notion, and a whole other challenge to actually live it out.”

  “It’s a challenge to live anyway sometimes,” she said low. “At least for me.”

  The sound of horses’ hooves echoed in the stillness as she finished speaking. She stole a glance at him, now in profile, as he eased his hat back on his head, revealing more of his handsome face. “Yeah, me too.” He took a deep breath. “You’re like your father. When he’d treat a horse, he’d kind of mutter to himself for a moment, decide what to do, and then he did it. No doubting, no worry—he just moved ahead.”

  Lilly smiled in the darkness. “He used to quote that Scripture verse, ‘Where there is no vision, the people are unrestrained.’ So, I guess he’d get a vision of the way things are supposed to be and hang on to that.”

  “I haven’t had much vision lately, but I know this much about horses—certain jobs go better with two at the pull rather than one. And you and I are strong, Lilly Lapp.”

  “Is that a real proposal, Jacob Wyse?” she asked, her voice laced with humor.

  “It’s a lean proposal; I’ll admit that. But it’s honest.”

  She thought for a moment, her heart beating with a mixture of excitement and trepidation. “So we go through with the engagement?”

  “With the wedding. Bishop Loftus cornered me at the root beer table and pressed for a date.” He grinned at her, a flash of white in the growing dark. “So I gave him one.”

  “You did?” An Amish engagement was supposed to be a secret thing, with courtship carried out just as secretly until the engagement announcement was made at Meeting, at least two weeks prior to the wedding. But what did she expect, announcing herself to being with Jacob alone?

  “I did.” He chuckled. “No one’s likely to forget our engagement for a long time to come.”

  “True enough,” she said, wondering at the stepped-up beating of her heart. “What date did you give?”

  “December twenty-third. They’ll
announce it at the next Meeting.”

  She looked at his big hands, wishing he’d squeeze her cold fingers with reassurance.

  “Our school Christmas program is on the twenty-first.” Her head swam at the idea of things to be done in the coming short weeks.

  “The bishop wants you to finish the spring term and to go on teaching until—” He broke off.

  “Until what?”

  “Nothing.”

  “What?”

  He sighed. “Until the kinner start to come.”

  “Oh . . .” she whispered.

  Jacob cleared his throat. “Let’s have this out in the open then, Lilly. I have no desire to force you into a marriage, a marriage in truth anyway, until we’ve had a chance to get to know one another—for quite a while.”

  “For quite a while,” she agreed, wishing she could slide down the buggy seat and disappear into a spot on the floor.

  “Gut . . . gut. So, here we are. Let’s go in and tell your mamm.”

  Lilly gave a wild glance out the buggy window and realized they’d turned into her own lane. This was what she’d been dreading the most—facing her mother. And she didn’t expect that he’d accompany her. She hadn’t thought that far.

  “I assumed I’d just go in by myself,” she said.

  “Nee, you don’t have to do it alone.”

  You don’t have to do it alone. His words echoed in her mind with layers of meaning. Ach, if only it were true, and he became someone she could share her everyday fears and burdens with, like she had done with her father. Of course, there was Derr Herr and His Word, but sometimes even He felt distant.

  She realized that Jacob had gotten out of the buggy and stood waiting, hand extended to help her down. She gave his palm a light touch as she jumped down and then squared her shoulders to face the white house. Only a single lamp burned in a downstairs window, its flame little welcome against the night.

  “I don’t know how my mamm will be, and I—”

  “Lilly, I understand about your mother. I mean, well, not everything. Don’t try to apologize for her or anything she says. Sometimes people are just hurt, and they need time to heal.”