I didn’t see Priscilla at breakfast.
Truthfully, I was okay with that. I couldn’t mentally get past the sad notion that perhaps she had heard her mother calling her that day, hadn’t realized the gravity of the situation, decided to ignore the summons, and learned too late at what cost. Her motivation would not have been malicious. Probably, she’d just wanted to be alone.
My prayer was that she would release any lingering guilt about what had happened that day, that she would come to accept that her mother’s death had not been her fault, and that she would finally move past her grief, guilt, and pain, perhaps even to find happiness in the arms of a nice guy like Matthew—or maybe even the widower who was waiting for her back home. If Priscilla was anything like the horses I worked with and was harboring anxiety within the physical tissues of her being, then she needed to know it was okay to let go of what happened back then and move on. Perhaps at some point I might find a way to convince her of that.
Owen and I typically had a full day on Mondays, especially after all the spring plantings were in and people were back in maintenance mode, and today was no exception. Normally, from the moment he and I saw our first client at seven until we stopped for lunch at a little after noon, we were shoeing nonstop. Then, after the midday meal, we would be back at it until four or so. We had developed a routine on our busiest days. One of us would remove the old shoes, clean out the hooves, file them smooth, and essentially get them ready for either new shoes or the same ones, depending on their condition. A good set of shoes for driving horses, with normal wear and tear, could last up to a year. The other of us would heat the shoes in the propane-powered furnace, pound out imperfections, and then nail the hot shoe in place. The nails were driven into the hoof at an angle so that the pointed ends would emerge through the hoof and then were tamped down so as not to snag on anything. The process typically took about forty-five minutes per horse, and we usually had three horses in the shop at a time; two being shod and one ready for his or her turn. Sometimes the owner would tie up his or her horse outside at our hitching post and come back for it later. Sometimes they waited and watched while seated in wooden chairs by our appointment desk. Most didn’t particularly care for the aroma of burned hoof and the accompanying smoke from the hot shoeing process, and we’d see them duck out. No one complained, though, because hot shoes meant the hoof wall was the exact image of the shoe.
Owen and I also made sure that every horseshoe we nailed was properly clipped—meaning we hammered an upward turn at certain places on the shoe while the metal was red-hot, so that the shoe could clip on the hoof. A well-positioned clip helped to hold the shoe in place and allowed for greater stability on multiple kinds of surfaces.
Shoes were attached on the palmar area of the horse’s hooves, which were very much like the human toenail, anatomically speaking, though obviously larger and thicker. Getting shod didn’t hurt a horse any more than trimming toenails hurt a person.
It could be stressful for them the first time or two, though. That’s why we always told our customers to prepare for their young horse’s initial set of shoes by gently tapping on the hooves with a hammer to get the animal used to the feel and sound of the shoeing process. Some horse owners didn’t shoe their animals at all, which was called letting a horse “go barefoot.” But even barefoot hooves still needed to be trimmed, just the way human toenails needed to be trimmed, especially if the horse wasn’t active enough for normal wear to take place.
Among the Amish I knew, there were few horses left to lead a barefoot life. It didn’t make sense not to shoe them, considering the role they played for a typical Amish family. Shoes for a horse meant protection, just as with humans. Considering how much time our horses spent on blacktop, to not shoe them would have been an act of cruelty.
I learned in farrier school that no one is completely sure as to who invented the horseshoe—a very important device considering that a horse’s massive body rests on hooves collectively weighing less than eight pounds. A thousand years after the birth of Jesus, bronze horseshoes had become fairly common in Europe, followed by the manufacturing of iron horseshoes by the thirteenth century. It was an old trade, which was perhaps one of the reasons I was drawn to it. It was a changeless art, done by hand, and unaffected—as near as I could tell—by the technology age.
When I was in the shop, even awkwardly bent over with the bottom half of a horse leg sandwiched between my knees, I felt that I was participating in something that never lent itself to the unknown or the frustration of thorny matters. It was simple. Constant. Blissfully uncomplicated for the most part. It fit my life.
I never wanted to be one to lie awake at night wondering how to undo the knotted threads of a problematic existence. It seemed such a sad expense of time. If someone like Priscilla took that as a sign that I lacked the ability to feel… well, at least I was happy, which was more than I could say for her.
Our last horse for the day was shod by three thirty. I was grateful for a few spare minutes before Natasha arrived with January. While Owen settled with the owner, I headed back to my cottage to wash up and change into a clean shirt. As I walked back, I was at once mindful of the space in between Owen and Treva’s house and my cottage, where there was now a wide vegetable garden, potato patch, and raspberry bushes. I mentally took in the proximity of their house to the garden’s edges. The barn Amos had told me about had to have been a small one, with just enough room for one driving horse and smaller stalls for the petting animals. Perhaps Sharon had moved their driving buggy and cart to the main barns to give Priscilla room to have her petting zoo here.
I heard baby Josef crying from upstairs as I moved past, and that sudden sound drove home the fact that if the windows had been open the afternoon Sharon died, as they were now, and if she really had called out for help, anyone in the barn would have heard her. There wasn’t that much space between the house and the far edge of the garden. So either the windows hadn’t been open or Sharon had been too badly injured from the fall to cry out for help. Or Priscilla had heard her mother but pretended she hadn’t.
I feared the third option was the real truth of the matter.
As I was making my way across the gravel, I saw Priscilla walking up the driveway from the road. She’d been out. She saw me about the same time. Our paths would intersect; there was no way they wouldn’t unless she decided to turn back. Her speed faltered just for a second as she also realized this. But then she continued toward me with even more directness, as though she was composing her thoughts. This would be the first time we’d seen each other since this morning’s incident on the front lawn in her nightgown, so even though I was fine, she was probably embarrassed.
“Guder Nummidaag, Priscilla,” I said, when I reached her. She stopped and so did I.
“Ya. Good afternoon.” Her brow was slightly furrowed, as though she had a buffet of choices of what she wanted to say to me and wasn’t sure which sentences to pick.
“Been out?” I said, trying to act as though I didn’t know this was uncomfortable for her.
“Uh, ya. I… Treva told me about a family in Paradise looking for a nanny three days a week. I went to meet with them.”
“Oh. That’s what Amanda does. For a family in Strasburg. She likes it very much.”
“Ya… I know.” She bit her lip.
“Did it go well?”
My question seemed to startle her. “What?”
“Your interview. Did it go well?”
“I guess. It’s hard to tell. They said they have other people they still need to talk to.”
“Ah. Well, if the Lord wants you to have the job, you will.”
Priscilla nodded absently. “Ya.”
“In the meantime, I need your help with something, if you don’t mind. Any chance you might be free tomorrow afternoon around three or four? I have to get Patch back to Trudy, and I need someone to follow me over to the Fishers’ in my wagon so I’ll have a way to get home once I’m finished there. I was thinking if you do it, then maybe on the return trip we could stop by the cemetery. If you still want to, that is.”
I expected her to look grateful, but instead she just nodded and said, “Okay. Listen, about this morning. I…” Her voice trailed off. She looked pained. I felt bad for her.
“You don’t have to explain anything.”
At this her creased brow arched slowly upward. “Excuse me? You think I owe you an explanation? About…about what you saw this morning?”
“No, I said you don’t have to explain.”
“I know. But by freeing me from having to give an explanation, you’re implying I owe you one in the first place.”
I frowned, trying to follow her crazy logic. Why did every conversation with Priscilla have to be so difficult?
“Is there something you want to explain to me?” I asked.
“No. I’m saying the opposite, that I don’t owe you an explanation.”
Was she nuts? “That’s what I just said. You don’t have to explain.”
“Which means, essentially, that I should but that I don’t have to. There’s a difference, Jake.”
I simply stared at her. I’d never met a person who could complicate a matter as quickly as she could. Being around her was mentally exhausting.
“You know what? Never mind.” I started to walk away.
She was quiet for a moment but then called after me. When I heard my name, I stopped but kept my back to her, the sound of footsteps crunching in gravel as she ran forward.
“I’m sorry,” she said, coming to a stop behind me and lowering her voice as she continued. “I do owe you something. My thanks. I just…I want to thank you for helping me out this morning. For…for taking Voyager back to his stall. I’m grateful. Really, I am.”
I could hear a tenderness just under the surface of her resolve to be stoic—a desire to be understood and to have my friendship without conditions. Turning toward her, I could almost see this softer side shimmering there. It suddenly occurred to me that few people had done for Priscilla what I had this morning. I had helped her—truly helped her—without a word, because I had known instinctively what she needed. And now she felt I was retreating back to the place most people took when they were around her because she was so hard to get close to—the place of not trying hard enough to understand her, the place of wanting information from her.
Explain yourself, Priscilla, is what she heard from everyone, even though none said it exactly that way. We don’t get you at all.
“I want to be your friend,” I said, as gently as I could. “But I’m not perfect. I honestly didn’t mean to suggest I was owed an explanation for what I saw this morning. But as a friend I will say that it’s time to decide whether you want to live like this the rest of your life.”
I sighed heavily, realizing there was just no getting around my suspicions, that she had heard her mother that day but had simply chosen not to respond. Though I didn’t put it in those words, I blurted out more than I’d intended to say. “You don’t trust anybody with the truth. You don’t even trust yourself with it.”
Her mouth dropped open, but she said nothing.
“Here’s the truth as I see it,” I went on, knowing I had no choice but to continue. “You don’t want to face what really happened six years ago, and you don’t think you deserve to be happy. You hang on to the events of the past—which I’m sure are just a little bit different than what everyone else believes them to be—and you’ve guilted yourself into thinking you’re not worthy of a life with any kind of happiness in it.”
She stared at me.
“Tell me I’m wrong,” I challenged, softly, and with as kind a tone as I could muster.
She was still staring at me, wide eyed, when a truck and horse trailer pulled off the road onto the gravel driveway.
January was here.
Priscilla brushed past me and started for the house, the question between us unanswered.