After the gathering broke up, Asher cornered Daniel with more questions, while Emma talked with her father. He was forty-six with a beard that was just starting to gray. “Dat,” she asked, “do you think you will go?”
He shrugged. “I agree with your mother that there isn’t enough land here for Phillip and Isaac to have farms of their own. We need to do something.” Dat smiled down at Emma. “But it’s hard for me to think about leaving my father and brothers and our community.”
Emma nodded. “I feel the same way.”
On the way home, under a clear sky and a nearly full moon, Asher took Emma’s hand, the way he used to when they were courting. “Daniel said they’ll be leaving in the spring.”
“They’ve decided to go?” Emma stopped. “I thought they were going to pray about it first.”
“Well, he said they haven’t decided for sure. . . . But he said he’s nearly positive his family will go. He plans to buy a covered wagon and share a freight wagon. We’ll have to pack carefully, taking only what is essential. Tools. Seeds. Staples. Chickens. A few piglets. Bossie and Red. We’ll need to buy a pair of oxen. The roads in Indiana are mostly widened trails, so the traveling will be slow. . . .”
“Have you decided to go for sure, then?” Emma’s voice caught as she spoke.
Asher nodded. “It’s what’s best for us.”
Emma let go of Asher’s hand. The new baby would be five months old. Hansi would be nearly four but not able to walk far at a time. If her Mamm and Dat went too, and her brothers, she’d have help with the children. Tears threatened. She’d never see her grandfather again.
“What about your parents?” Emma asked. “And your brother?” Asher had a twin named Abel, whom Emma had courted—until she met Asher. “What about your family?”
“What about them?”
“Are they interested in going west?”
Asher frowned. “No. That’s the last thing they would want to do.”
“Won’t you miss them?”
Asher sighed. “I will, but the sooner we go west, the better. The land won’t last at affordable prices. It’s what’s best for our family.”
“But it’s so far away. How would we travel that far with Hansi and the new Boppli?”
“It’s not that far,” Asher answered. “Less than five hundred miles. Think of those heading all the way to the Oregon Territory. That’s over twenty-five hundred miles.”
When she didn’t respond, Asher said, “I will begin looking for a buyer for our land. That’s the first step. We will need money to buy a wagon and supplies, and then to buy land in Indiana.”
Emma didn’t voice it out loud, but she knew he would first need to pay his father, who’d loaned him the money for the farm.
When they reached their house, a lamp burned in the bedroom window. Emma had hoped Hansi was fast asleep, but perhaps Mamm was administering another poultice. Asher went out to the barn to check on the animals, while Emma went into the house.
Without hanging up her cloak, she went directly to the bedroom and stopped in the doorway. Isaac knelt beside the bed, while Mamm held Hansi like a baby, staring into his face. His eyes were closed, a wet cloth was draped over his forehead, and his curls were soaked in sweat.
Mamm raised her head and without greeting Emma, she said, “He’s taken a turn.”
“What do you mean?”
“He’s hotter, and his throat is worse.” She paused. “There’s a gray coating covering the back.”
Emma froze.
“It’s diphtheria,” Mamm said.
Tears instantly sprung to Emma’s eyes.
“Now, now,” Mamm said. “You must trust God. Have courage.”
Two of Emma’s cousins had died from diphtheria years ago. Finally able to move her feet, she shuffled to the bed and took Hansi from her mother, knocking the cloth to the floor as she hoisted him over her belly and to her chest. She began to cry.
“Control yourself,” Mamm whispered. “Or you will scare your child.”
Emma had been reprimanded her entire life about controlling her emotions and her anxiety. And she had tried. Ever since Hansi was born, she was afraid he would die. One time, she confessed her fear to Mamm, who only sighed.
Mamm had lost two babies before they’d turned three, which probably contributed to Emma’s fear. There were no guarantees when it came to a child surviving. Emma knew that. God called His people to faith, to trust Him. Yet, even as others quietly seemed to accept the will of God, Emma still feared.
MAMM DID STAY the night, but then she was called away on a birth, and Emma cared for Hansi by herself, applying more poultices, including one made from turpentine and lard. She coaxed as much water and broth into him as she could. He slept fitfully, tossing and turning and calling out for her.
Asher grew quiet, and Emma feared even her optimistic husband thought their son might die.
Mamm came back from the birth, a difficult one that lasted three days. She was exhausted, and Emma insisted she go home and sleep.
The next day, when she came back, she forced Emma to sleep while she watched over the boy.
By the next Lord’s Day, Hansi was delirious. Dawdi came to check on them and sat at the end of the bed, his head bent in prayer and his long white beard dipping toward the floor. His presence was a comfort to Emma.
Hansi’s fever rose and fell. He lost weight, and his skin grew nearly translucent. Asher seemed to grow more and more distant. At night, when Emma had her Kapp off and her hair down, Hansi would reach up and stroke her tresses, bringing tears to her eyes. He was such a sweet boy, even when deathly ill.
Mamm came and went, as did Dat and Dawdi. On Tuesday morning, early in the morning, Emma sat beside Hansi on his little bed. His breathing slowed more and more. Emma knew what was coming, but when he didn’t take another breath, she gasped, waking Asher.
He stumbled from the big bed.
Emma sobbed. “Go get Mamm.”
He did as she asked, but once he left the house, she regretted not asking him to come sit first. She knew Hansi was gone, but one last memory of the three of them together was what she needed. She bent over and kissed her son’s head, his curls against her lips.
Mamm, Dat, and Dawdi arrived, along with Emma’s brothers. All crowded around the little bed, while Asher stood behind them. Dawdi put his hand on her shoulder, as if trying to share his strength.
Mamm washed and prepared Hansi’s body for burial, while Dat and Phillip made a little coffin and Isaac rode across the county to tell Asher’s parents and Abel. Asher had vanished. Emma wasn’t sure where her husband went, but she guessed he went out to work on the farm. He finally returned for supper.
That night, family and neighbors came to view the body. The next day, Mamm scrubbed Emma’s house and got it ready for the service. Neighbors brought food—venison and mashed potatoes, jars of beans and chow chow, fresh butter and cream.
Emma couldn’t comprehend what the preacher said the next day. Jah, they all knew Jesus said, “These things I have spoken unto you, that in me ye might have peace. In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world.”
But be of good cheer. She despised those words. Hansi was gone. Her boy, gone. She would never feel good cheer again. But she didn’t cry. She was trying so hard to control her emotions. But she couldn’t control her feelings.
They buried him in her family plot, next to Emma’s baby sister and brother. Afterward, everyone went to Mamm and Dat’s house for a meal. When Asher finally said it was time to go home, Emma, no longer able to control herself, began to cry. Mamm whisked her off to her old bedroom and sat her down.
“You have this new baby to think of, and your husband needs you.” Mamm stood above Emma with her hands on her hips. “God took Hansi for a reason. You need to rest in that.”
Emma buried her head in her hands and sobbed, but finally she composed herself and walked home with Asher.
They didn’t talk much the next few days, except when neighbors or family stopped by. Asher busied himself with repairing the fence and then dragging the pasture.
One rainy afternoon a week later, he came into the house early, his face flushed and saying he didn’t feel well. He burned with fever. Emma helped him to bed and then ran down the trail to fetch Mamm.
They both guessed it was diphtheria. Mamm assured Emma that adults didn’t succumb to the disease as often as children, but Emma couldn’t help but fear the worst as she applied poultice after poultice.
Asher turned and thrashed, muttering in his sleep about leaving Somerset County, about Indiana, and about the Elkhart Plain. “I’ll start over,” he muttered. “I’ll have more sons.”
Emma regretted her hesitation about going west and assured him that she would go willingly the very next spring. She’d never have more children, besides the one she carried, if Asher didn’t recover.
He did get better. The fever broke, the thick gray coating on the back of his throat disappeared, and he was able to leave the bed and walk as far as the table. The neighbors, Dawdi, Dat, and the boys had been doing the chores and seeing to the farm. Asher tried to go out and help, but he would come in early, exhausted. Even so, October had turned into November, and Emma grew more hopeful. Asher was alive. Surely he would grow stronger with time.
At the end of November, she went into labor. Thankfully, Isaac was staying with them, because Asher wouldn’t have been strong enough to get Mamm. When Isaac returned with their mother, Emma already had the urge to push. Perhaps the Lord was showing her mercy in her time of need, considering everything she’d gone through in the last month.
She had only pushed three times when a perfect little girl slid from her. The cord was wrapped around her neck, and she had a grayish tint to her skin, but Emma didn’t react. It happened from time to time. Mamm would get her breathing.
But then Emma’s mind began to race. How long had it been since she’d felt the baby move? Hours? A day? Why couldn’t she remember?
No cry came. It felt as if hours passed, but it was probably only a few minutes until Mamm placed the stillborn baby next to Emma and said, “Naked came I out of my mother’s womb, and naked shall I return thither: the Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord.”
Emma closed her eyes and cried.
ASHER STILL TALKED of going west with the group in the spring, but it was obvious to everyone it would not happen. He couldn’t even do the chores by himself; there was no way he’d be able to farm. Emma helped him now, trudging through the snow to feed the livestock and hauling water to the trough. Mending the fence when an animal broke through. Chopping wood for the cooker and fireplace.
Mamm feared his heart had been injured by the illness, but she had no idea what that would mean for the future. “Perhaps he will still grow stronger,” she said.
Emma thought of the family cemetery, of the baby girl buried next to Hansi. They hadn’t named her—Emma couldn’t bear to. She also couldn’t bear the thought of Asher joining his children in the next life, not yet.
Her heart changed toward him. She missed his strength and optimism, and she did all she could to help him. She feared if he didn’t get better then they couldn’t keep the farm. And she had no idea how they could make a living without it. Crops had to be seeded, grown, and harvested to pay Asher’s father back for the loan he’d given them to buy the farm in the first place. Jah, for the first time in her life, Emma had to be the strong one. She’d lost her son and daughter, but if she could keep her husband alive, she still had hope for the future.
A few times, Abel rode across the county to check on Asher and the farm. The two had always resembled each other, but now Asher was much smaller and looked much older. Abel was kind and concerned. He clearly cared for his brother. When Emma had shifted her affection from Abel to Asher, there was some animosity between the brothers—and now it was gone.
In the spring, as the Miller brothers and two of their cousins and all of their families packed their covered wagons to head west, Asher went out to start the chores while Emma finished cleaning the fish they’d caught in the creek that afternoon. The warm weather seemed to be restoring Asher’s health some, and his spirits were better too.
A half hour later, Emma slipped into the barn, calling out to him, but he didn’t answer. She waited a moment for her eyes to adjust to the dim light. Asher sat on a bale of hay, his head resting against the wall. Perhaps the fishing had been too much for him.
She called out his name again, but he didn’t stir.
“Asher.” She took his cold hand and then put her face up to his nose, hoping to feel his breath. She waited and waited. But he was completely still. She sat down beside him, resting her head on his shoulder. She sat there and held his hand and watched the light change through the barn door, as numb as she’d ever felt in her entire life. Why had he come down with diphtheria and not her? Why did he have to die young when he’d had so much vigor and hope for the future?
Finally, she rose and shuffled up the trail to her parents’ house to ask for help to move her husband back up to the house to clean and prepare his body. She was a vidvieb now.
After they buried Asher next to their son and daughter, Emma moved back to her parents’ place, and Abel moved onto Asher’s farm, although Emma took Bossie, Red, and the chickens with her. They were all she had of any value.
When she was a baby, and no one, not even her mother, thought she’d survive, her Dawdi had held her for hours, praying over her. Now he often sat beside her, patting her hand. She knew he was praying but wasn’t sure he should bother. She seemed to be crying more and more, not less. She felt no will to live, and she couldn’t understand why the Lord hadn’t taken her too.
A few times, Abel came to visit. Mamm finally spelled it out to Emma as they both kneaded dough one morning. “He wants to court you.”
Emma didn’t reply.
“You need a husband,” Mamm said.
It had only been ten months since Hansi died, nine since she’d lost the baby, and three since Asher had passed. Jah, Abel was the most practical choice. He wasn’t Asher, though, and didn’t have the zeal and spirit that had drawn Emma to her husband. However, she couldn’t think about courting so soon. “I’m not ready to marry again.”
“Don’t be foolish.” Mamm wiped the back of her floured hand across her forehead. “Widows remarry within a few months all the time.” Mamm sank her hands back into the dough. “It’s either that or go to Indiana with us. We’re leaving next May.”
“Dat decided to go?”
Mamm didn’t answer her directly. Instead, she said, “It’s what’s best for our family.”
“Can’t I stay here with Dawdi? If I decide to court Abel, I’ll let you know. If not, I can travel west with the next group.”
Mamm shook her head. “I don’t want to leave you behind, not without a husband. You’re not well.”
Emma felt hollow inside. “What if I go to Indiana but then decide to come back here?”
“I’m certainly not opposed to you marrying Abel—if you wanted to right now, I’d be fine with that. But if you’re not ready, you should go with us. Surely, you’ll have recovered by this time next year, and then you can return, if that’s what you decide to do.” She flipped the dough over and paused for a moment. “Our ancestors fled Switzerland, then Germany, and finally left Lancaster County. Someday, some of our descendants will leave Indiana and go even farther west. Nothing stays the same, Emma.”