It was odd for Hannah to be so still, and odd for her to be sitting in her mother’s lap during family devotions after breakfast on Wednesday. Rhoda had moved Hannah from the davenport in the front room to her own bed and barely allowed Clara to go near the room. For two days Rhoda pampered Hannah, who had returned to the family table for breakfast that morning. The fever had lasted only a day, and with hot tea and freshly churned ice cream the sore throat was managed through the second day.

But here Hannah was at breakfast and morning devotions. Though she was in her mother’s lap, she sat up straight with bright eyes. In Clara’s consideration, Hannah seemed well, though Rhoda would want to be certain three times over before releasing the girl to resume her play and chores.

Standing beside them, Mari’s lower lip protruded in a jealous unacknowledged pout as she leaned against her mother’s arm. She wanted to be the girl in her mamm’s lap. Across the table, Josiah’s feet gently and intermittently thumped the legs of his chair, as if in response to a thought that flitted through his mind.

Hiram Kuhn sat reading aloud from the big German Bible as he did every morning and evening. On many days, like this one, the sound droned. The older Hiram got—almost fifty now—the more he droned. The children were well trained to sit still and appear respectful, but Clara wondered whether they heard anything more than an undulating buzz.

Rhoda’s countenance was as blandly perfect as it always was. Her eyes fixed on her husband as he read, her head nodding slightly at intervals. Outwardly, nothing about Rhoda had changed. If she suspected that Clara had overheard her say it was time for her to marry, she did not reveal it in her composure. Neither were her words unkind. An onlooker would suspect nothing.

Yet Clara twisted in confusion and frustration, her spirit wringing more tightly each day.

While her father’s Amen still draped the room, the family scattered, Hiram and Josiah to outside chores and Rhoda and the girls to wash Hannah’s hair. Clara sat alone for an instant.

Fannie. She would go see Fannie and Sadie. At least there she could do some good.

At the turn from the Kuhns’ lane onto the road that led toward the border, a wagon clattered in the street. Clara stepped well to the side. The wagon slowed, and a milkman looked down from the bench.

“Looking for a ride?” he said. “I’m going over the border.”

“Thanks, Reuben,” Clara said, “but it’s a lovely morning. I think I’ll walk. Maybe on the way back this afternoon.”

Reuben shook his head. “I’ll be sorry to miss you. Yonnie has that run. Shall I tell him to look for you?”

Clara smiled and remained uncommitted. If she was at the Maple Glen Meetinghouse when Yonnie came by, she could face the question then whether she was in the mood to ride with him. The walk was only five miles in each direction. Clara had little else to do to pass the hours.

“I know where to catch him,” she said to Reuben. “I pray God brings favor to your day.”

Reuben clicked his tongue, and the horse moved ahead.

Clara doubted Rhoda would scowl even if Clara missed supper, although her siblings were sure to wonder where she was. Illness or essential overnight travel were the only reasons for missing the evening meal and devotions. In this expectation, the Kuhns were no different than any other Amish household—on either side of the border.

What did Andrew eat for supper? Clara occasionally wondered about this question. Did he cook or eat a cold plate? Did he accept invitations from families who pitied him after his parents moved to Lancaster—or who had a daughter of a marriageable age? Did the young women who eyed him at Singings turn up on his farm with casseroles or pies? Clara never asked Andrew these questions. If she would not say she would marry him, why should he not accept invitations?

Still, the thought that he might stung.

Yonnie Yoder had a younger sister who had trailed after the boys when they were children as much as she was allowed. In his telling of the stories, Andrew never seemed to mind that she was there digging worms with them or climbing the lower branches of a tree while the boys scrambled higher. She was old enough to wed now, and though Andrew’s great-grandmother had been a Yoder, the relationship was distant enough to allow for a marriage.

Clara pushed the thought out of her mind. Andrew was waiting for her.

Andrew with his Model T.

Alone on the road, Clara smiled at the memory of riding in the automobile while Andrew drove. He was not afraid of the form that joy might take in his life.

Old Bishop Yoder might have other ideas.

“I can do it!” Sadie raised a shoulder to interfere with Fannie’s movement. The girl knelt on a chair to stir the apples, brown sugar, and raisins for the apfelstrudel. Her tongue poked out one side of her mouth in concentration as her fist gripped the wooden spoon handle and she pushed through the mixture in swift, thorough circles.

Fannie returned to kneading the dough. In a few minutes Sadie would insist on helping to stretch the dough thin, and Fannie would let her. Sadie was only five, but she had a knack for baking already. She knew just what the dough should feel like as she pulled it into a rectangle to fill with the apple mixture.

As troublesome as it was to think that Sadie might be her only child, Fannie delighted in ordinary moments like this one. Sadie would forget them. She would grow up with the automatic motions of making strudel, and dozens of other dishes, flowing from her fingers. One day she would prepare food in her own kitchen, perhaps with her own little girl.

But Fannie would store up these moments in her heart, the way she was sure Mary had stored up the moments of Jesus’ childhood.

“Knock, knock.” The voice came from the back door, which stood open to disperse the oven’s heat.

“Clara!” Sadie dropped her wooden spoon and scrambled down from the chair to throw herself at the visitor.

“I didn’t know you were coming.” Fannie brushed flour between her palms and wiped her hands on her apron before embracing her cousin.

“Neither did I,” Clara said. “I only decided after breakfast.”

“We’re having strudel for lunch,” Sadie declared.

“Or,” Fannie said gently, “dessert after supper.”

“Or both!” Sadie’s eyes glistened with optimism.

They stretched the dough, filled it, rolled it, and slid it into the hot oven.

“We have something to show you,” Sadie said once her hands were clean and dry. “A surprise.”

“Oh?” Clara’s glance moved from Sadie to Fannie.

“Can I go get it, Mamm?” Sadie was nearly jumping in excitement.

“Yes. Remember to take care.” Fannie watched the marvel that was her daughter scamper down the hall. She gestured for Clara to move into the front room.

“Close your eyes!” Sadie called from down the hall, and Clara complied.

Fannie nodded encouragement for Sadie to lay the gift in Clara’s lap.

Clara’s eyes popped open. “What’s this?”

“It’s a Bible storybook!” Sadie’s enthusiasm gushed out of her. “It’s all the stories you’ve sent me in a scrapbook, and when you write more, we’ll put those in, too. Hurry up and write more!”

Clara giggled, the same girlish giggle Fannie had heard through the secret moments of their childhood. Neither of them had a sister. They were sisters to each other.

“I can’t read all the words yet,” Sadie said. “Actually, I can only read a few. But I know them all by heart because Mamm reads me your stories every night before bed.”

“They’re not my stories,” Clara said, “they’re God’s stories.”

“I know that, silly. Mamm says you’re helping me hide God’s Word in my heart.”

Fannie sat on the arm of a stuffed chair watching the pair of blond heads meeting temple to temple as Clara and Sadie turned the pages in the scrapbook with a plain green woven cover.

“It was Sadie’s idea,” Fannie said. “She saw the book in the mercantile in Grantsville and told me what she wanted to do.”

“It’s lovely.” Clara closed the book and ran two fingers across the thick weave.

“Are you going to tell me a story today?” Sadie turned her face up, her eyes wide in hope.

Clara smiled. “As a matter of fact, I was going to mail you a story, but I decided to bring it myself.” She reached under the bib of her apron and pulled out two sheets of paper.

Sadie jumped up. “I’ll get the paste. Let’s put it in the book right now and then you can read it to me.”

“Perfect,” Clara said.

“You have to visit to my Sunday school class.” Sadie’s voice trailed out of the room.

Clara glanced at Fannie. “Why would she suddenly ask me to visit?”

“You haven’t been to church with us since we were very small,” Fannie said. “You really should come.”

Clara watched the door slam behind Sadie as the child skipped out the kitchen door to play in the sunshine.

“You’re very patient with her,” Fannie said. “You didn’t have to read so many stories. I’m trying to teach her to be grateful for small blessings and not demand the universe!”

Clara chuckled. “I get to go home. You’re the one who will have to read more at bedtime.”

Fannie cut a slice of apfelstrudel, still warm, and slid it onto a plate to hand to Clara. “Do you remember being five?”

“Not very well.” Clara poured two cups of coffee and settled in a kitchen chair. “I remember more about visiting your family than being at home with my daed.”

Fannie sipped coffee. “Remember when we found the litter of seven kittens in the barn and didn’t tell anyone for five days?”

“I was eight. We were afraid your daed would drown most of them. Nobody needs that many barn cats. By the time he caught us, we’d named them all.”

“As soon as they were old enough to wean, he made us drag them around in a cart until we found homes for all but two.”

“I’d do it again,” Clara said. “Poor kitties.”

Fannie nibbled strudel.

“What about when we were older?” Clara said.

“What do you mean?”

“When we were twelve or thirteen. You must remember something.”

Fannie raised an eyebrow. “About what?”

Clara chose her words carefully. “There was new information in 1905 about the vote of the Pennsylvania congregation ten years before to shun the Maryland churches. Something about a misunderstanding.”

They both looked out at Sadie, who was tossing a stick for the dog Elam had brought to the Esh marriage. The dog was aged and reluctant, though.

“Obviously my parents weren’t at either meeting,” Fannie said. “We heard rumors. Some boys who came down to an auction were rude to my brothers.”

Clara vaguely remembered. For a while Rhoda had not wanted Clara to visit the Hostetlers, at least until things settled down again.

“What did your parents do?” she said.

Fannie shrugged. “What they always did. After family devotions one night, they told us what they thought we needed to know.”

“Did we ever talk about this?” Clara asked, wondering why she couldn’t remember.

Fannie shook her head. “Mamm took me aside and said there was no need to talk about it with you. It wouldn’t change anything. You were always welcome to come, and she hoped you would still want to.”

“But what did they say about the vote? About the shunning?”

“People voted against their conscience to please the bishop.” Fannie took an indulgent sip of coffee. “They used to talk to us often about conscience. A sense of what’s right doesn’t come from pleasing a man, even a bishop. They wanted us to please God.”

“But the bishop must have thought he was pleasing God.”

“My parents also said some things we must leave to God.” Fannie brushed crumbs off the table into her hand. “So much trouble over whether or not to have Sunday school for children—it seems ridiculous after nearly forty years.”

Clara lost interest in her coffee. Forty years or not, the matter was not settled. Andrew might think change was coming, but Clara dreaded the impending rancor.