Free Miriam's Heart by Emma Miller Page A

Miriam to hitch Blackie to the courting buggy and drive Johanna and the baby home. Mam had tucked Jonah into her bed and promised that someone would drop him off in the morning. Miriam had tried to find out what was wrong, but Johanna remained tight-lipped. When they’d gotten down from the carriage at Johanna’s house, everything was dark.
    “Pray for our family,” Johanna had said as she’d carried a sleeping Katie up her back steps.
    “But, are you all right? Are you sick?” Miriam had called after her in a hushed voice. “Is something—?”
    “Just pray for me, sister. God has a plan for us. I know He does.”
    Miriam and Anna had discussed Johanna on the buggy ride to Dover this morning, but Anna didn’t seem to know much more than she did. “It’s a problem with Wilmer,” Anna said. “Not sickness, at least not of the body. He’s strong as a plow horse. But I don’t think it is a happy marriage.”
    None of them had really liked Wilmer Detweiler when he’d started coming around the house. He had a steady job in construction and he was a faithful member of the church, but he was moody. Miriam, especially, couldn’t see why fun-loving Johanna would be attracted to him. Everyone had thought that Johanna and Charley’s older brother Roland had been courting for two years, but they’d apparently argued and then broken up. As usual, no one had been able to pry anything out of Johanna.
    But if Johanna and Wilmer’s marriage was in trouble, that was serious. They had two children together, and among the Plain people, marriage was a sacred bond made before God. The couple became one when they took their vows and there was no breaking that union. Marriage was for life.
    “Miriam!”
    Two jars of strawberry jam toppled out of the basketful that she was carrying from the back of the buggy to the table. Anna caught them both before they hit the ground.
    “Whoa, easy,” Anna said. “Pay attention to what you’re doing, twin. We spent too many hours making that jam to waste it.”
    “Ya,” Miriam agreed. Lucky that Anna, despite her size, was so quick. “I was thinking about Johanna and Wilmer.”
    Anna nodded and her cinnamon-brown eyes watered up. “On my knees, last night, I prayed for them.”
    Across the drive, Aunt Martha and Dorcas had a display of fall flowers for sale along with the wooden toys Uncle Reuben made in his spare time. There was a Noah’s ark and an array of animals, a simple sailboat with a long string so that a child could sail it and a girl’s market basket with wooden eggs, vegetables and cups and saucers, all painted to look real.
    Aunt Martha and Uncle Reuben’s farm wasn’t as productive as many others in the community; they’d always had to struggle, but they worked hard every day. Miriam hoped Uncle Reuben would find customers for his toys. Most English children, it seemed, wanted electronic toys that blinked and squealed and flashed, rather than simple handmade items.
    Miriam was putting a quart of grapes on the table when suddenly someone came up behind her and put their hands over her eyes.
    “Stop it.” Embarrassed, she pulled at the hands. It was a man, not a woman. “Let me go,” she said. She could imagine everyone staring at her.
    “You have to guess first,” Anna said with a giggle from beside her.
    “John.”
    “Wrong.” Charley took his hands down and stepped back.
    Miriam whipped around and looked from him to Anna. She could feel her face growing hot. She wanted to run away and hide.
    “Just me,” Charley said with a frown of obvious disappointment. “Just good old Charley.”
    Miriam could hear Dorcas laughing behind her. “Charley, I didn’t—”
    “If you were looking for John, you didn’t miss by much,” he said. He wasn’t smiling now. Hurt showed in his eyes, and his voice was tight. “Here comes your Mennonite boy now.”

Chapter Six
     
    “H ey, Charley, here comes trouble,” shouted Harvey Borntrager. He and two other Amish