Free Abram's Daughters 05 The Revelation by Unknown

Leah said softly, "it would affect you terriUy, and most probably any future children, if you and Jake were to many because of being ignorant of what we know." Leah felt she was stumbling over her words . . . wishing there was a better way
    *kan to speak this horrid truth that was going to shatter Lydiann's
    Hut.
    I Lydiann's shoulders dropped and she appeared to wilt at the
    Hention of Jake's and her marriage or perhaps she was reacting
    H the comment about their being ignorant. "I'm listenin'," she
    id.
    I "And promising, too?"
    I "Whatever it is, I won't share with anyone. You have my word."
    I Tears glistened in Sadie's eyes. "Not Jake, neither."
    I Lydiann grimaced when she caught sight of her eldest sister's
    Bars. "What on earth?"
    "Years ago," Leah began again, "when Sadie gave birth to her Hn, she thought he had died ... his comin' too early into the world id all."
    I Sadie sniffled and^moved away from the door, coming to sit be-
    Hde Lydiann. "My sin resulted in a beautiful dark-haired boy . . .
    Iho did not go to heaven that night as I'd thought." She stopped,
    Hearly unable to finish.
    H Lydiann looked first at Sadie and then at Leah and then back at
    Hdie, as if to ask, What are you saying? She opened her mouth to
    Beak but shook her head instead. Finally she ventured, "Surely, you
    H)n't mean . . ."
    H Sadie's eyes met Lydiann's.
    "But Jake is Mandie's twin . . . Peter and Fannie Mast's son!" Hrdiann insisted.
    Leah, still sitting on the other side of Lydiann, reached for her Hnd, but Lydiann pulled away, her breath coming in short gasps.
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    Leah quickly explained how Dr. Schwartz had switched Fannie's stillborn twin son with Sadie's premature babe. "He was just barely alive."
    "Dr. Schwartz did this?" Lydiann asked in obvious disbelief.
    Leah nodded sadly.
    Lydiann's lower lip began to tremble, and she covered her face with both of her hands. "If this is a lie, it's the crudest scheme in the world to keep us apart."
    "We would never think of saying a word 'bout this to you il things were otherwise," Sadie said. "We love you."
    "Ever so dearly," Leah added. "And we want what's best for you and for Jake."
    "For your future children, too." Sadie handed Lydiann ;i handkerchief.
    "But Jake loves me and I care for him. Tellin' me this doesn't change the way I feel," Lydiann sobbed.
    Leah waited a moment before going on. "We were terribly unfair to you and Jake. We did you wrong by not sayin' something immediately." She told how she'd first stumbled onto Jake with Lydiann in the kitchen last summer. "Once Jake left for Ohio, we thought your affection for him might fade with time."
    "How can I just stop carin' for someone so wonderful?" Lydiann was staring now at Leah. "You . . . you knew this for that long? How could you keep it from me?" She bent her head low. "Honestly I don't believe my first mamma would've let something like this happen!" With that she headed straight for the door and flew out.
    / can't bear to watch her heart breaking so, thought Leah. How I wish I could do everything differently . . . for Lyddie's sake most of all.
    Sadie wrapped an arm around her. "I won't let her treat you this way."
    "No . . . no, just leave her be. There's nothin' more we can do." Leah rested her head on her sister's shoulder and gave in to anguished tears.
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    I jydiann had been only five or six when she first realized that folk looked on her and Abe differently than other children, especially women at Preaching service whose eyes shone with sympathy and puy. Leah had been a wonderful-good mother to them both, no question, but while Abe obviously considered Leah his mamma, Lyili.inn had always thought of Leah as both a mother and a sister. And when she'd fallen for the first boy who made eyes at her, she Wondered, if God was somehow making up for taking her mother to heaven early.
    Jake was everythihg I wanted in a beau . . . in a husband and father for my children, she mourned as she headed