Harvest of Blessings Read Online Free Page B

Wilma?” her daughter-in-law asked in a tight voice. “It’s a hot day, and when you’re dehydrated you get confused—”
    “I’m not confused!” the old woman insisted. “Do ya think I don’t know my own child?”
    Miriam’s hand went to her belly, where a new baby grew. Her maternal heart sympathized deeply with Wilma Glick’s predicament. She, too, had lost a daughter—had watched her toddler Rebecca get washed downriver in a flood, more than nineteen years ago—so she knew the gut-wrenching pain of such a loss in a way Preacher Gabe would never understand. Every day she thanked God that Rebecca had miraculously returned to her last fall, after being rescued and raised by English parents.
    Was there a way to save this situation, as well? Gabe, in his Old Order male insistence on having his way, might never change his mind about having sent Nora away in her shame. But didn’t Wilma deserve to know the truth about her long-lost daughter?
    “Maybe it was Millie you saw checking on you,” Lizzie suggested gently. “She left the wedding a little bit ago—”
    “Why does no one believe me?” Wilma said, sounding close to tears. “This woman was older than Millie. It—it was like looking in a mirror, seeing myself at that age, I tell you. Except she was wearing a blue baseball cap.”
    Miriam closed the refrigerator and went to the doorway of the front room. Preacher Gabe sat in a straight-backed chair, his arms crossed tightly as he scowled into space. Lizzie stood beside her mother-in-law, rocking little Ella from side to side to keep her from getting fussy. She looked very worried. Scared, even . Ben sat with his elbows on his knees, trying to sort out the details that hadn’t been mentioned, because the scandal that had rocked Willow Ridge and the Glick family years ago predated his coming here.
    And then there was Wilma. The poor old soul looked a hundred years old, so thin and frail she resembled a skeleton wearing clothes a couple of sizes too big as she sat in an old sewing rocker. But her eyes were alight with a fire Miriam hadn’t seen there for years. She was rocking so fast that the sound of the wooden rockers on the hardwood floor filled the front room with her nervous energy.
    As Miriam joined her husband and the Glicks, the tension in the front room seemed as thick as sausage gravy with too much pepper. It was pointless to talk with Preacher Gabe, whose face remained stony as he glared through his rimless glasses, so Miriam leaned over Wilma to stop her frantic rocking. “This is a matter for you Glicks to figure out—and Ben and I need to return to the wedding,” she said as she rubbed the woman’s bony shoulders. She glanced at Lizzie. “Have you and Atlee ever mentioned Nora to Millie?”
    Lizzie shook her head. “Atlee went along with his dat ’s insistence on silence, tryin’ to minimize the damage and the tongue-waggin’.”
    “ Jah , my husband Jesse was the deacon then. I recall how all the church leaders agreed it was best to put Nora out of our thoughts,” Miriam replied with a sigh. “But the same sort of secret came to light when my Rebecca turned up last summer, after she’d discovered that the English woman who’d raised her wasn’t her birth mamm . I will never forget the pain on that poor child’s face,” she added emphatically.
    “I suggest ya deal with this sooner rather than later,” Ben remarked as he rose from his chair. “If our faith and our families are truly foremost in our lives, we need to fix what’s broken so we can keep rollin’ on, livin’ out God’s will for us.”
    Miriam straightened, nodding her agreement. “Not my place to tell ya what to do, but you three and Atlee need to be prepared. This is a skillet full of hot grease that’ll splatter on all of ya. But meanwhile, Wilma,” she added as she grasped the woman’s skeletal hand, “it’s real gut to see ya up and around again. I hope you’ll enjoy that food we brought ya from