A Stranger's Wish (The Amish Farm Trilogy 1) Read online

“No. People tend to view it as a hobby at best, or at worst, a waste of time.”

  “Are you good?”

  I looked at him carefully and saw that he really wanted to know.

  “Yes. I think I am. I may never qualify for the American Watercolor Society, but my work is good and constantly getting better. I have some paintings for sale at the Country Shop, and I’m talking with a couple of local galleries about handling some of my work.”

  Clarke nodded as we rose to leave. “It’s too bad it’s so hard to make a living from things like writing and painting, but there’s no money in either unless you’re famous.”

  Suddenly the nebulous wisp of recognition that had been bothering me took form. I stopped in the middle of the aisle and turned to face him.

  “You!” I managed to say before he walked full into me.

  The jolt caused me to lose my balance, and he grabbed me around the waist to keep me from falling. For a split-second we leaned against each other. Then he let go, casual, smiling. He seemed much less affected by our collision than I was.

  “Have you any pressing plans for this afternoon?” he asked before I could say anything.

  “I suppose not.”

  “Want to go for a train ride?”

  “Strasburg Railroad? I’ve never gone, but our kindergarten class goes there every year…are you really Clarke Griffin?”

  “It’s great fun for adults too.” He grinned at me. “Yes.”

  We got in the car and were quiet as Clarke maneuvered onto the road. Then we both spoke at once.

  “They forgot the J.”

  “Do you know my book?”

  We smiled at each other.

  “You first,” he said.

  “They forgot the J on the cover. It just says Clarke Griffin.”

  “So you do have my book,” he said with satisfaction. He tried to be casual. “Do you like it?”

  “Fortunately, I can be completely honest and say yes. Of course, I’m only on page thirty-two.”

  A little boy’s smile when he gets the new red bicycle he wants for his birthday had nothing on Clarke’s. I leaned back and looked at him speculatively.

  “What?” he said.

  “ It’s Up to You is your first book, and it’s recently been released. Am I right?”

  “How did you know?”

  “I recognize the symptoms. You’re afraid to let your pride show for fear people will misinterpret it. You can’t believe you’ve actually written something that people will pay money to read. You’re afraid people won’t like it. And you’re concerned about being able to handle both the criticism and the praise.”

  He looked at me suspiciously. “Don’t tell me you write too.”

  “No. It’s just that I react that way whenever someone buys one of my paintings.”

  We looked at each other with pleased understanding as we pulled into the parking lot at the Strasburg Railroad.

  The railroad runs through the Lancaster County countryside from Strasburg to Paradise. We found seats, and while we waited for the ride to begin, we watched a young family in the seat ahead of us. The two small boys wore engineers’ hats, undoubtedly from the souvenir shop.

  Suddenly the locomotive’s whistle blew, and the younger boy grabbed his mother in a panic and collapsed against her in tears. She held him gently, smiling at her husband over the boy’s head. Finally the train began to move, and the child’s curiosity overcame his fear. He settled back in his mother’s arms to enjoy the ride.

  “Has your book sold well?” I asked.

  “I don’t know. It’s a recent release. Too soon to tell.”

  “If it’ll help, I’ll run right out and buy another copy.”

  Clarke laughed. “And I’ll buy one of your paintings.”

  “Bit of a financial difference.”

  He shrugged. “It’s only money.”

  “I’ve been working on the railroad,” I sang. I clapped my hand over my mouth. “Oops. Sorry.”

  “Do you often burst into song?”

  “Regularly. It’s one of my worst habits.”

  “As habits go, it’s among the least offensive I’ve run into in a long time—and in my profession I run into some doozies.”

  The train puffed to a halt on a siding behind the lumberyard in Paradise.

  “The first lap of ‘The Road to Paradise,’” Clarke said. “Now they’ll move the engine from the front of the train to the back for the ride home.”

  I leaned out the window and watched with interest as the men worked. The engine was detached from the train and steamed slowly past us on a parallel track.

  “How will they turn the engine around?” I asked. “There’s no turntable or anything.”

  “They don’t turn it around.”

  “It goes all the way home backwards?”

  “You don’t think the engineer knows about reverse?”

  “But backwards the whole way?”

  “It’s not like a car, you know. There’s no traffic to deal with, and you don’t have to worry that he’ll jump the tracks.” There was laughter in Clarke’s voice, but no mockery or sarcasm.

  I looked at him witheringly. “Of course he won’t jump the tracks. Casey Jones would never do that.”

  “Casey Jones, sitting at the lever,” sang Clarke in a loud and sound baritone. The little boys in the seat ahead turned to stare.

  I laughed. “The secret is in not singing too loudly.”

  After Clarke dropped me at church, I drove my buttercup car to the hospital.

  “Mr. Everett Geohagan?” I asked the woman at the desk in case he’d been moved to a regular room.

  “Coronary care, fourth floor, room 410.” She looked up from her computer screen. “No visitors.”

  I went up to the fourth floor anyway, hoping that if I appeared assured enough, they would think I belonged there. The doors to the unit parted just as I arrived, and a weeping woman walked out. I slipped in.

  My stomach was queasy as I searched for Mr. Geohagan’s room. I expected someone to grab me by the shoulder at any minute, a scary proposition for a rule-keeper like me.

  “And just what are you doing here?” this mean person would yell at me. “Don’t you understand what Family Only means? Get lost! And don’t come back!”

  But no one paid any attention to me even when I went into the room where Mr. Geohagan lay with tubes and wires fettering him to several machines. I was comforted by the steady patterns on the screens recording his heartbeat and other functions.

  His eyes were closed, his face was pale, there was a slight purplish discoloration about his lips, and he looked what my grandmother would have called “peak-ed.”

  He must have sensed my presence, because his eyes snapped open.

  I smiled. “Hello.”

  “Kristie Matthews,” he said in his whispery voice.

  “You remembered!” I was pleased.

  “Of course I remember. How could I forget the girl who’s been nice enough to call to see how I’m doing?”

  “They told you?”

  “It’s supposed to make me feel good.”

  “The first time I called, I had an awful time.” I took the chair beside his bed.

  Mr. Geohagan smiled, and his eyes moved to my cheek. “How’s your dog bite?”

  “It’s going to be fine,” I said, automatically reaching up to the bandage. “It’s certainly nothing compared to your problem.”

  He emitted a burst of air, which I took to be a laugh. “My health is the least of my problems.”

  I blinked. It seemed to me that not much could be worse than some sort of coronary difficulty. The old ticker stops ticking, and it doesn’t matter about any of the other important things.

  A nurse came in and started when she saw me. “You can’t be here,” she said.

  “My niece,” Mr. Geohagan managed, and I smiled.

  She shook her head. “Only immediate family. Parents, spouse, children.” She looked at me. “You’ll have
to go. He’s too weak.”

  “I am not.”

  But clearly he was.

  “Don’t worry. I’ll be back,” I said.

  And I did go back three days later, when they moved him to a regular room. He was still weak, but he was appreciative of my visit.

  “I don’t want to talk about me,” he said when I asked how he was doing. “Tell me about you. What do you do?”

  “For a living? I’m an elementary school art teacher.”

  “Those children are lucky to be taught by someone like you,” he said kindly. “I know you’re very good. You certainly took charge of me last Saturday.”

  I thought about my near panic and shook my head. “It was all a front.”

  “Isn’t that what teaching sometimes is? Acting like you’re the authority when you’re not certain you’re even marginally qualified?”

  “I think it’s a lot more than that, but you’re right about needing to be the authority. Kids need the structure that a firm but kind authority gives, though there are some kids who challenge you all the time.” Kids like Nelson Carmody Hurlbert, stepson of the candidate for U.S. Senate. He seemed to think that his high profile stepparent exempted him from following instructions and obeying rules. I finally managed to disabuse him of that idea, but I suspected that next week, when I saw him, I’d have to go through it all over again.

  “Tell me about your students. I imagine you are looking forward to seeing them again.”

  And so I did, starting with dear Nelson himself. What I had feared would be an awkward visit passed quite easily. In too short a time Mr. Geohagan became visibly weary, and I knew it was time to go.

  “I mustn’t wear you out,” I said, rising.

  “No one as delightful as you could do that.”

  I grinned at the gracious compliment. “By the way, here’s your key.” I held it out to him.

  “Keep it,” he wheezed genially. “I’ll be here for a while yet. You just hold on to it until I need it again.”

  “Shouldn’t I give it to your wife or someone in your family? Or someone here at the hospital?”

  “No,” he said quickly. “You are its keeper.”

  I frowned.

  “Trust me. I know what I’m doing.” He shook a finger in my direction. “I’ll tell you when I want it back.”

  “Okay.” But I wasn’t happy and I didn’t understand.

  “By the way, would you be willing to mail a letter for me?” He turned toward his night table.

  I saw a couple of business envelopes resting there and recalled seeing them in his pocket Saturday. I reached quickly for the top one to save him the movement. “This one?”

  I glanced at it and saw the addressee was Adam Hurlbert. “Hey, he’s my favorite candidate too. That Nelson kid I was talking about is his stepson.”

  “I’m afraid it needs a stamp.”

  “No problem,” I assured him. “I just bought a book of stamps the other day. In fact, they’re still in my purse. I’ll mail it on my way home. And if there’s anything else I can do for you, just ask.”

  “Thanks.” He fell back on his pillows exhausted, and I left quickly. I dug out a stamp and mailed the letter at the sideways strip mall in Smoketown on my way home.

  I spent the evening doing my final preparations for the beginning of school next week.

  7

  I set my easel by the great sugar maple in the front yard, its massive canopy providing protection from the strong early September sun. My bag with its brushes, paints, pencils, paper towels, and assorted paraphernalia rested against the leg of my collapsible stool.

  I took a large sheet of composition board and placed it on my easel. Then I taped a piece of heavy textured paper to it, working flat as watercolorists do. I hummed to myself as I took a plastic bottle from my supply bag and went into the farm house to fill it with water.

  Mary was at the sink, looking out the window toward the barn. She moved aside as I filled my bottle.

  “You’re going to paint?” she asked.

  “The barn. And Hawk and the hens.”

  She looked out the window again, and I realized she wasn’t looking at the barn but at my easel. I thought of the color sense I’d been aware of throughout the house.

  “You’re an artist at heart, aren’t you, Mary? I see it in your rugs and quilts. Have you ever done watercolor?”

  She got a faraway look in her eye. “Once, when I was about twelve, I found a little tin of watercolors by the road, the kind kids have. It must have fallen out of a car. I opened it, and there were all the primary colors and a paint brush. They had only been used a bit. I took the tin home and hid it.”

  “Why did you hide it?”

  “I didn’t think my father would let me keep it.”

  “Painting is bad?” I knew photographs were frowned on, especially photos of people.

  “Hochmut.”

  I shook my head. “I’m sorry. I don’t know that word.”

  “Pride. Vanity.”

  “Painting makes you vain?” What an odd thought. Painting brought me joy and satisfaction. Maybe if you became famous and made the big bucks, you could get puffed up with your own importance. Still, if you saw your talent as a gift from the Lord, couldn’t vanity be kept in check?

  It struck me that the only thing hanging on the walls in this house was a calendar with beautiful nature scenes and Bible verses. “You can’t hang pictures?”

  Mary began to wipe the oilcloth table cover, already spanking clean. “As a young teen, I painted when my parents were too busy to notice, always in my room when my older sisters were away or working. I painted little things like flowers. Once I painted a meadow with cows grazing and daisies blowing. I took it to school and showed it to my teacher.”

  “What did she say?” I knew how important a teacher’s comments were to a student.

  “She thought it was so pretty she told my parents, ‘You have an artist here.’” Mary gave a small smile, and I could tell that this compliment was still important to her.

  “But you don’t paint anymore?”

  “Hochmut. My father took the paints and forbade me to paint ever again. He said ‘We are a community, Mary, a church. We are not individuals to compete, to set ourselves apart as special. Not hochmut. Demut. Humility.’” She shrugged. “That’s life, or at least my life.”

  But she yearned to paint. I could see it in her face.

  I went out to my easel thinking about the similarities and differences between Mary’s experience and mine. Both of us faced opposition from our families as far as our desire to paint went. But I had been taught individuality my whole life, sort of my family’s version of the army ad slogan “Be all you can be,” and Mary had been taught community and demut. I was taught to stand up for myself, which enabled me to finally stand up to my father. Mary was taught to sublimate herself and yield to her father and her church as her authority. The fact that she had been thirteen or fourteen and I nineteen certainly came into play, but Mary was now an adult and had been for many years. She still hadn’t stood up for the right to use her God-given talent.

  Because she wasn’t looking for rights. That good old American concept, so dear to us fancy folk, was foreign to her.

  I eyed the barn and checked it against the penciled-in shapes I’d previously drawn, all vague and lacking in detail but setting the composition of the picture. With clear water I wet my paper. Then I applied a wash of cobalt blue, dark to light at what would be the horizon, with a one-inch round brush. Next, I twisted some facial tissues and laid the twist on the paper where I wanted clouds to be. The tissues absorbed the wet paint and the white of the paper showed. I softened the edges of the clouds with more clear water. A touch of gray wash on the undersides of the clouds gave them dimension.

  The cornfields with their green stalks and golden tassels came next as I worked background to foreground. I sprinkled sea salt on the still wet fields to create a mottled effect with areas of strong color wher
e the paint diffused under the salt.

  I studied the barn carefully, noting where the sun hit and where the shadows slept. So much of painting was about the play of light and shadow. Taking a two-inch wash brush, I lay down a light gray wash that I let dry. Then, using the same ultramarine blue with a touch of burnt sienna, I went over the shadowed areas for a deeper hue. I dropped in some sap green for the roof, letting the roofline blur. I mixed Prussian blue and burnt sienna for the gaping doorway.

  Lastly, I took a rigger brush and added details. As always when I painted, I was totally absorbed and completely contented. I lost all track of time.

  Finally, I leaned back to survey my work. I was especially pleased with the way the white of the paper was visible in a fine corona around the red hens, making them stand out against the deep gray of the doorway.

  “Nice,” a voice behind me said.

  I started and spun around. On the walk watching me was Jake in his wheelchair.

  “Do you always sneak up on people?” I asked, and it came out more brusquely than I intended.

  “Sorry,” he said. “I thought you were finished.”

  I looked at my painting again and nodded. “For the time being.” I’d need to brush off the salt when everything was completely dry.

  I rose and walked across the lawn, carrying my stool. I sat down by Jake, hoping I’d think of something intelligent to say. I still hadn’t grown used to the chair, and it made me nervous. I’d never been around someone with such a raw, recent disability before. My own good health made his situation seem even more stark, and though I knew it was foolish, I felt guilty because of my functioning, albeit skinny, legs.

  I glanced at the kitchen window, wondering if Mary was looking out, watching over her son. Or over my painting. What caught my eye was the porch with its four steps.

  “You must have a ramp someplace,” I blurted. He certainly hadn’t come down the stairs.

  He nodded. “My entrance has one. Father and Elam built it for me.”

  I relaxed a little. My spoken-before-I-thought comment hadn’t bothered him. “Then you can get around pretty well by yourself.”

  “Sure. From here to the house and back.” His voice dripped bitterness.