Free Rachel's Garden by Marta Perry Page A

patted the little nanny’s side. “I don’t see how she’s going to know what to do when the babies come, with no other goats around to show her.”
    “I’m sure it’s in her nature.”
    “Maybe.” Joseph didn’t look reassured by the glib answer.
    “I tell you what. I’ll ask my brother Aaron about it, if you want. He raises goats, so he’ll know. Then I can tell you what he says the next time I come.”
    “Would you?” Joseph’s smile blossomed.
    “Ja. Now, what do you say we get some work done?”
    “I’m ready.”
    With a final pat for the goat, Joseph hurried out, fastening the pen door carefully. Then he darted across the yard toward the construction.
    Gideon followed more slowly. He was a fine boy, this son of Ezra’s. Rachel was doing a gut job with him, and it couldn’t be easy for her, bringing up a boy without a man in the house.
    He spotted her then—coming out on the back porch to shake out a rag rug. She paused, glancing from Joseph to him.
    Taking that as an indication she wanted to say something, he detoured by the porch.
    “Don’t let him be a pest, now,” she said.
    “He’s not. He was just showing me his goat, and now we’re going to get down to work.”
    “That goat.” She shook her head. “Ezra wouldn’t approve of Joseph treating her as if she were a pet, but it’s hatt.”
    Hard, ja, it was hard for Joseph. For all of them. “Ezra would have been happy the boy found comfort. You must stop worrying about it, because that I’m certain sure of.”
    There it was, then—that smile that softened her cheeks and warmed her eyes. Just like Joseph’s.
    But Rachel’s smile was having a funny effect on him, and he wasn’t sure he liked that. Or at least, not sure that he should.
     
    “Stretch your hand out, now.”
    Rachel watched as Gideon helped little Mary press her palm into the still-damp cement floor for the new greenhouse. Mary giggled a bit, but her tiny handprint took its place next to those of Joseph and Becky, marking the spot that would be the entrance.
    Joseph leaned over Gideon’s shoulder, looking at them. “My hand is bigger than Mary’s,” he observed.
    “But mine is the biggest,” Becky said quickly.
    “It’s not a contest to see whose is biggest.” Gideon lifted Mary back away from the floor. “We put your handprints there so that years from now, when you’re all grown, you’ll look at them and see how small you were the day we started the greenhouse.”
    Rachel had a lump in her throat already, and that comment just made it worse. Panic gripped her for an instant. Where would they be, years from now? What if Isaac was right? If she couldn’t keep the farm, someone else might be looking at the handprints, wondering at them.
    The moment Gideon released her, Mary made an instinctive move to wipe her sticky hand on her dress. Rachel grabbed her just in time to avert disaster.
    “Ach, no, Mary. Becky, please take Mary and wash her hands at the pump—real gut, now. Joseph, you go, too.”
    She kept her face turned away from Gideon, hoping he wouldn’t see that she was upset. Or at least, that if he did see, he’d respect her privacy and not question it.
    “Rachel?” He rose to his feet, brushing off the knees of his broadfall trousers. “Was ist letz? What’s wrong?”
    “Nothing.” Despite her efforts, her voice didn’t sound quite natural.
    “Something, I think, or you would not have tears in your eyes.” He stood, waiting, as solid and immovable as one of the sturdy maples that had been here since before there was a farm on this spot.
    “I hope...” She had to stop. Start again. “I hope the children are still living here when they are grown.”
    “Why wouldn’t they be?” His tone sharpened.
    “If I have to sell the farm, it won’t be the same.” Even if she sold to family, and she and the children came back often, they wouldn’t really belong here.
    “You’re not going to sell the farm.” He reached out, as if to grasp