Nine

The smell of wood smoke and coffee boiling brought Rebekah sitting up, scrambling for her clothes. She’d hoped to be the first one up, but that was very hard to accomplish around Aden Robards. She dressed quickly, pleased at her progress in learning how to pull out of a nightgown and into a day dress in the small, trembly wagon. When she brushed her hair, she had to be careful not to hit the side of the wagon; it was so small.

“Smells good,” she said as she hopped down. She was determined she’d be cheerful today but keep a comfortable distance, too. “Do we start work in Cornelia today?”

“I’m going to go in and check it out. You can stay here or maybe visit the Mayfields.”

“What if you get customers right to begin with? You won’t have anyone to assist you.”

“No. But I’ll manage. What about camping here? Would you like to stay here? Or be closer to town?”

She eyed him over her coffee cup. He really did want to know her choice! She lowered her cup without even drinking. “I like it here,” she said, looking about her at the young sturdy trees growing close to stout parents, the stream laced on either side by moss and ferns and giving off a delicate gray vapor. “Let’s stay here,” she said and smiled at the flush of pleasure that filled his face. “If you wanted to stay here, why bother to ask me?”

“Because it matters what you think—very much,” he said.

Her heart did a weird flip, and to be sure he didn’t notice anything different about her, she took a big swallow of coffee. The coffee was scalding hot, so she burned her tongue unmercifully. He looked at her and raised one eyebrow, then shook his head—whether in commiseration or condescension, she wasn’t sure.

After breakfast Rebekah washed the dishes in the stream while Aden packed his saddlebags with all he thought he’d need of instruments and supplies so the wagon could stay put. After he left, she surveyed the oak thicket, the appled hillside toward the house, sunshine twinkling on dewy grass, a cow mooing on the other side of the fence. She bit the corner of her mouth in indecision. What would she do today? She was first tempted to go for a long walk, maybe for miles, by herself. But she did want to see the Mayfields, and there might not be many days like this. Perhaps Betsy would even let her make bread. She couldn’t wait to feel pliable, elastic dough responding to her hands, the smell of warm yeast as the bread rose and baked.

She struck out walking toward the house the way they’d come the night before, following the fence. At the first stout corner post, Rebekah climbed over, managing quite nicely without hanging her skirt up the first time.

The minute she crested the hill, she heard a shrill, happy voice. “Mama says would you like to come help churn.” There came Cerise, her brown-red hair today done up neatly in pigtails glistening brightly to go with her snaggle-toothed smile.

Rebekah couldn’t restrain a giggle. “How many does it take to churn? Do we all get a turn?”

Cerise grabbed her by the hand and tugged her toward the house. “Everybody who wants to has a turn, and we all try to figure out when the butter’s coming so we get to yell ‘Butter’s here!’ first before anyone else.”

“And then what happens?” Rebekah smiled down at the little bouncy girl now swinging hands with her.

“Well, you go around feeling smug and pretty all day ’cause you’re the Butter Girl,” answered Cerise, removing her hand to pose, shoulders back, chin up, one hand on her hip, the other extended, perhaps to appear like a ballet dancer, but appearing more like the spout on a coffee pot, and all the time a silly smile pasted across her face.

Rebekah laughed until they reached the orchard, but the minute she walked under those loaded trees row on row, she felt a hush come over her.

“Why’d you get so quiet all of a sudden? You missing your nice husband?” asked Cerise. “He went to work without you, didn’t he?”

“No, no. I mean, yes, he did. But that’s not why I got quiet just now. It’s these trees. Hear the wind in the leaves? It’s—almost as if they’re talking.”

“Yeah. Sort of, I guess.” Cerise kicked at a dry cow pile. “I think it’s God talking. That whispery sound, you know? Do you think that’s silly?”

“No. Tell me what you mean.”

“Just that. God’s talking. People are always saying God told them this and God told them that. But He don’t ever talk to me like that. But out here”—she waved her hand—”out here I can hear Him talking.”

“Well, then. What’s He saying?”

“Oh, I don’t know that. Not yet. But I don’t understand preachers or much of the Bible yet either. I will when I’m older. I guess right now I just know He loves me. More than even my ma and pa do. I can hear that part. Listen real good, and you can hear it, too.”

They stood still between the trees with the wind blowing Rebekah’s skirt and lifting loose strands of her hair even as it played in the apple leaves.

“Do you hear Him?” asked Cerise in a whisper.

“No, not—not exactly,” answered Rebekah. “But I like it. I like it a lot. I’ve always liked trees—and wind in the leaves.”

“Come on—we’d better hurry, or we’re gonna hear ’em yellin’ ‘Butter’s here,’ an’ we won’t even get a turn! Can you run? Come on!”

Rebekah took the paddle just in time to become the Butter Girl. As all the girls, including Betsy, clamored around her, faces bright, voices strong, she knew she’d never had more fun.

Betsy Mayfield washed the butter, working it around and around with a wide spatula in a big wooden bowl until she’d washed all the white buttermilk away, and only occasional cold water beads remained. Then each one tasted buttered bread and passed judgment on its quality. Finally she sent everyone to help Pa and the boys in the south orchard.

“But what about Rebekah?” asked Cerise, clinging to her new friend.

Betsy laughed as she pushed Cerise toward the door. “Rebekah helps me this time!”

“Ma, you know I need to sew on my new dress,” pleaded the oldest girl, Rosemary, a half pout on her lips.

“Oh, all right. Scoot and get to sewing! Now, the rest of you, go help Pa. There’s more outdoor jobs than inside this time of year,” she explained to Rebekah as the door slapped behind giggles and complaints of five girls. Cerise stuck her head back in with a hopeful plea that maybe she was needed to sweep the floor, but even that Betsy turned down.

At last she and Rebekah were alone, and Rebekah realized the teakettle’s contents were simmering and that a brisk fire crackled in the stove, sounds she’d not heard with the girls’ voices ringing.

“I could go help in the orchard myself,” she offered then. “I don’t know much about orchards, but I could learn.”

“Maybe next time. I was hoping for now that you’d stay with me. I—just get hungry sometimes to know what’s going on in other places. Thought maybe you’d tell me something about travels with a dentist. Mind you, I wouldn’t like leaving my kitchen behind, but—it does seem pretty exciting, too, waking up in so many different places. I wonder—do you hear mourning doves calling and blue jays fussing everywhere you go? Or maybe some strange birds I’ve never heard of?”

All this time the short, wide woman was stretching up to snag a huge pan from its nail, scooping flour into a rusty sifter, busily preparing to make bread.

“Could I—please do that?” asked Rebekah when finally an opening came in Betsy’s chatter. “I would love to make a batch of bread more than—almost anything.”

“Well, of course. Sure you can. You should have told me. Here I was, blathering on like a windmill on a March day. Sure, Honey, you make bread, an’ I’ll wash some apples and start getting them cut for pies. But can you talk whilst you work? Maybe you could tell me what it was like in Macon? I’ve never been south of Commerce. Now Commerce is a good town if you want to buy or sell farm goods, which most everyone in these parts does. But if you want to sit properly and listen to a concert—oh, my goodness, here I go again. Talk, Rebekah, please—I want to hear.”

Rebekah sifted mountains of flour, then scooped up a handful of lard and mixed it in with a small crock of yeasty water. The feel of the sticky dough developing soothed an unsettled place in her inner self. She began to fulfill Betsy’s request by telling her about the Sharps and then Mrs. Leavenworth and even a little about Banner. Rebekah mixed, and Betsy cut apples; one was happy talking, and the other, for once, happy listening. And the sunshine cast shadows of oak leaves on the plank floor at their feet, and a cat full of spilled cream from the churning slept with her eyes half open underneath the stove.

When she covered the dough for rising, Rebekah washed in a pan in front of a window, dried on a flour sacking cloth conveniently hung on a near nail, then sat down by her new friend, idly pulling the cloth back and forth through her hands.

“Everywhere we go we meet new friends and then leave them,” she said, watching Betsy dig in her pan for any apples she’d failed to cut. “That’s the hard part.”

“Do you go to church, you and Dr. Robards?” asked Betsy, cutting the last apple crisply in half.

“Oh, yes. He would have it no other way.”

“And you?”

“Well, I’ve always gone to church, too.”

“But not because you wanted to?”

“I didn’t say that.” Rebekah suddenly felt she was being interrogated.

“I’m sorry. It just sounded that way. I know Jesus joy when I hear it, and I didn’t think I heard it in your response. Now it wouldn’t have to be only in church, of course. My, my, we have more Jesus joy right here in this house than would fit in the grandest cathedral. Tell me about your parents and where you grew up—that is, if you don’t mind. I–I know I’m too curious, but—please tell me.”

Betsy was so guileless, so eager, and her eyes sparkled with anticipation like dark brook pebbles. Rebekah forgot her own momentary irritation and plunged into telling about life at Thornapple. She was stumbling some in trying to explain what happened to Thornapple, about Josh and even about Aden, when the girls’ voices could be heard approaching. Maybe she’d tell her about Mother some other time.

“Sounds like a flock of geese, don’t it?” said Betsy with a smile and a wink. “Families”—she set the lid back on a large pot of beans and slid a bacon grease can to the back of the stove—”families can get closer or more scattered when troubles come. Will you tell me more, Honey, when you feel like it—and when we have a chance to put sentences together in some kind of peace?”

“Yes. And thank you,” answered Rebekah.

“Thank you for what?” demanded Cerise, looking up at Rebekah with her hands on her hips, eyes wide, hair sweaty and matted at the edges of her face.

“Never mind what,” said Betsy. “Wash up, girls, and start buzzing. Cerise, go call Rosemary. I declare I forgot about her in there sewing all this time. She must ’a been making basting stitches by hand. Carol, you set the table. Set a plate for Rebekah, too. Eliza, pour buttermilk. Lucy, you make a pan of gravy—can’t anyone do it like you. Fanny, you mash the taters.”

“And what about me?” asked Rebekah, finding herself trying to be little to stay out of the traffic. “If I’m eating, then surely I can help.”

“Oh. Your bread’s ready to make into loaves. Then you can split those leftover biscuits and heat ’em for now. We’ll have your good, fresh bread tonight.”

After dinner Cerise begged to help Rebekah back to camp since she was loaded with a plate of pie, a patty of butter, and a bowl of beans.

“You will utterly and completely spoil us,” Rebekah fussed.

“Everyone needs some spoiling now and then” was Betsy’s answer, and David Mayfield rumbled a hearty “Amen” as he held the door for her.

After Cerise had left her and Rebekah was puttering about the camp, reliving the lively day, she realized she hadn’t asked Betsy about religion even though she’d had that good opportunity when they were talking about church. Why hadn’t she asked? Something about it made her uncomfortable. Yet she really wanted to know. There had to be something to this “Jesus joy,” as Betsy Mayfield called it.

Aden had found a good reception for practicing dentistry at Moffatt’s Drug Store. Mr. Moffatt, as David Mayfield had told them, was his brother-in-law and had accommodated a dentist two years before. He knew what it would take to make a comfortable corner for waiting clients, as well as a curtained area for the “painful procedures,” as he called them.

“What did you find to occupy yourself with?” asked Aden as they sat around the fire after a supper of Betsy’s delicious offerings. Huddling around the fire helped keep the mosquitoes away.

“I helped churn at the Mayfields’,” she said, smiling as she remembered what fun it was. “I even got to be the Butter Girl for today.”

“Oh, my. What’s that?”

“It just means I was the one churning when the butter came in. The Mayfields celebrate everything. They have—” She was about to say they had “Jesus joy” but thought better of starting such a conversation with Aden. He was thinking about other things and didn’t even notice she’d stopped midsentence.

“I can tell you had a good time at the Mayfields’,” he said after a bit, “so I hate to spoil your fun.”

“But what?” What had he discovered now?

“But you’d best go with me tomorrow. I’m expecting several clients. One lady is bringing her three children, all with bad teeth.”

“Well, you know I really don’t—”

“You won’t have to go every day,” said Aden abruptly, standing suddenly and walking off into the dark.

Rebekah bit her lip. She’d meant to say she didn’t mind going, and instead he thought she meant she didn’t want to go. Well, the nerve of him to interrupt her and jump to conclusions. She made sure she was in the wagon tucked in for the night when he returned.

❧

Breakfast done, Rebekah took her time washing dishes in the edge of the stream, turning them upside down to dry on a flat rock she’d leveled like a table. Then Aden called so impatiently, she almost jerked a knot in her neck.

“What did you say?” she called back.

“Why are you taking so long cleaning up?”

“Well, you haven’t even hitched up the wagon,” she answered, her exasperation clear in her voice.

“We’re riding in on horseback as I did yesterday,” he explained in a voice of forced calm. “I told you last night the things I took yesterday are all I need for now since Mr. Moffatt has a chair that will do quite nicely and a dry sink we can use.”

“I suppose I was asleep when you told me,” said Rebekah, walking up from the creek as she dried her hands. “How can I ever make it up to you?”

He chuckled. “Pretty good, Rebekah. We almost had an argument. Time was when I couldn’t get you to talk one bit.”

She felt her face flame in indignation. “I’m glad we’re riding horseback so I won’t have to sit beside you!” she retorted.

❧

It was nice having the wagon in camp whenever Aden decided Rebekah could stay “home” and do laundry. She could also then count her money and consider how she would get home to Thornapple and what she would do once she got there.

It was also nice to have the camp set up so the Mayfield girls could visit her, particularly Cerise. If the wagon hadn’t been there, little else would’ve been, only a pot of grease suspended from a high limb and maybe a couple of bowls and cups drying on Rebekah’s flat rock by the stream. And of course smoldering remains of a breakfast fire. Cerise loved to climb inside the wagon and pretend she was going west to Oklahoma. Or she’d climb on a large, gray tree stump on the other side of the stream and use it as her stage for delivering resounding speeches that ended in spastic giggles. Rebekah wondered if there ever in this world had been a more interesting child. Once or twice as she watched Cerise’s bare brown feet twinkling with speed as she disappeared over the hill toward home, she allowed herself to wish she could someday be a mother. But it was only once or twice and only for the flash of a second.

Rebekah visited Butterfly Meadows whenever she could. Betsy Mayfield made her feel wanted, even needed, always asking her to tell her about things in the “outside world.” Betsy would often arrange it so that for at least a few minutes, she and Rebekah would have the kitchen to themselves, or the porch where they shelled peas, or the garden while picking cucumbers. Rebekah became so comfortable with Betsy that one day she launched into an explanation of how she came to marry Aden, all about the Isaac and Rebekah thing, even how she didn’t love him, married him because she didn’t know what else to do.

Betsy stopped in the middle of a pod of peas and just listened.

“I don’t think I would have been that brave,” she said quietly when Rebekah seemed through. “And are you—in love with him now?”

“Oh, no.” Rebekah shelled even faster and didn’t look up. “I told him I’d ride with him and help him, but I wouldn’t really be married to him. I’m going back to Thornapple before Christmas.”

“You are?” For the first time Betsy sounded shocked.

Rebekah looked up. “You think I’m terrible, don’t you? But, remember, he only married me because of my name. And what kind of a reason is that?”

“My dear, anybody can look at you two and see that Isaac, Aden, whatever his name is, did not marry you only for your name.”

“But how? Of course he did! That’s what he told me! Only—I’ve always thought there must be something devious about it, because of course it didn’t make any sense.”

“Love doesn’t make any sense,” said Betsy, resting her hands on the side of her bowl and smiling at Rebekah.

“Love? He doesn’t love me!” Rebekah’s eyes widened in alarm.

Betsy laughed in delight. “Honey, you’re in for some marvelous surprises. You aren’t always going to be so unhappy.”

“I didn’t say I wasn’t happy.”

“But you aren’t. And I wish happiness for you. No, better than that, I wish for you to have Jesus joy.”

Rebekah smiled at Betsy’s oft-used phrase. “I’ll be fine once I get back to Thornapple. And I am going back. But I sure will miss all of you. You are a wonderful family. Especially you—and Cerise. But I haven’t left yet. And—uhm—Betsy, if you don’t mind, don’t mention my leaving to Aden. I’d rather—tell him myself when the time comes.”

“Oh dear,” said Betsy sighing. “I don’t like secrets very much. But I’ll try to be quiet. But, Honey, don’t you think—”

“Don’t try to change my mind, Betsy. There’s no use,” said Rebekah firmly. “And now tell me when David and the boys are going to be through adding onto the barn?”

“Oh. They are making a terrific racket down there, aren’t they? David says they’ll be through by Saturday. He says the Yates apples will be ready to pick on Monday, so he’s quitting even if he’s not quite done. It will be nice having the added storage room.”

They were interrupted then by high shrill voices as Lucy and Rosemary hashed out a problem with Lucy’s dress fitting. Rosemary could not get Lucy to stand still long enough for her to get the hem straight, and Lucy was furious because Rosemary wouldn’t get through so she could go on about her business. Betsy smiled as they ran onto the porch pointing fingers at each other. “Tsk, tsk,” she scolded. “Almost grown and still fussing like babies. Both of you, hush. Go take water to your brothers, Lucy, and Rosemary, work on sewing those new curtains until Lucy gets back. If she won’t stand still then, I’ll come in there and hold her in place.”

Rosemary grinned sheepishly and retreated. Lucy scowled and stepped over to the well to draw water.

❧

“I do believe the Mayfields are pretty fond of you,” remarked Aden to Rebekah one day as they walked home after one of Betsy’s suppers.

“And of you, too,” she answered, looking up at him with one of her rare, sweet smiles that gave Aden a thrill of hope. At moments like those, he could believe all animosity was being soaked out of her by the love and kindness of the Mayfield family.

The Moffatts at the drugstore were also very fond of Aden and Rebekah. They insisted on sharing dinner with them at noon whenever they were in the store. Mrs. Moffatt said she didn’t know how to cook in small amounts, and she, being a good deal older than her brother, David Mayfield, had no children left at home. She said they’d be depriving her if they didn’t help her eat beans, late squash, stewed potatoes, cornbread, and whatever else she’d “thrown together.”

They were all eating together on September 20, the four of them, as well as Sheriff Bozeman and his chess-playing buddy Raeford Banks. The sheriff had himself removed the chess game from a mottled table when ordered to by Mrs. Moffatt, who said she wouldn’t dare touch it. The sheriff had tenderly placed the chess set beside a golden hoop of cheese on Moffatt’s scarred counter and was making some joke about whether cheese and chess made compatible companions, when Mr. Baggett from down at the depot came rushing in, his few hairs all awry, his glasses about to fall off. He was waving a telegram and so breathless it was hard to understand him.

Not realizing the seriousness of Mr. Baggett’s message, Mrs. Moffatt continued her stream of dinner preparation remarks as she, with Rebekah’s help, set food on the table.

“Mother, will you hush and listen to this man?” demanded Mr. Moffatt sternly.

“Well, of course I will,” said Mrs. Moffatt, blushing right up to her ears and setting down a pot of beans with a plunk.

“Now. What did you say, Baggett?” asked Mr. Moffatt.

The man gasped for air, and Rebekah wondered if he were about to have some kind of attack. Then the news came out.

“President’s—dead. Died—yesterday. Says it right here. From the bullet he took July 2 in Washington.”

“Oh dear!” whispered Mrs. Moffatt, edging up beside her husband as if suddenly seeking safety or maybe to offer sympathy.

“I thought he was getting better,” said Mr. Moffatt dully.

The sheriff walked back over to his chess game and very methodically began putting the pieces into a grimy wooden box, pawns first, then rooks, knights, bishops, and finally the king and queen. Rebekah wanted to cry, as Mrs. Moffatt was starting to do, but instead she felt wooden herself like one of the sheriff’s pawns. She looked at Aden and wasn’t surprised to see he had bowed his head.

They stayed on at the drugstore for a couple of hours, but no one even thought about teeth at a time like this. Aden and Rebekah were part of the growing crowd simply sitting and standing about saying the same things over and over, about poor Mrs. Garfield and all those children; about what could make a person, no matter how disgruntled, do such a horrible thing; about how Abraham Lincoln was a Republican, too. Rebekah was very glad when Aden said they might as well go home.

Of course they went directly to the Mayfields in case they hadn’t heard. They found David Mayfield in the orchard, and he immediately began hobbling toward the house, calling everyone to come with him. They all gathered, not in the kitchen, but for this solemn occasion in the room that served as dining room and bedroom and, as now, parlor.

“I can’t believe it,” said Betsy.

“I know. We all thought that of course he’d get well. He just had to,” said Rebekah.

David sat hunched forward, elbows on knees, dirty field hat still in his hands. His mouth worked with emotion. “We lost a president already in ’65. Didn’t hold with all his views, but he was my president. Just like Mr. Garfield. What’s our country comin’ to? You children, you listen to me. There won’t never be a time you won’t remember this day, where you was, what you was doin’ when you heard the news. And whenever you remember this day, you remember your ol’ daddy tellin’ you—tellin’ you firm—that God is greater than all this. He’s greater, you hear me? That assassin thinks he’s won, but he ain’t won.” His voice shook, and he reached to a back pocket to drag out a handkerchief. Betsy Mayfield laid a rough hand on his shoulder and gently massaged it.

Rebekah wondered if her own father knew about this. Surely he would by now. He kept up with everything so carefully. She imagined that he would be pretty angry with the assassin and very solemn, even stunned. But she certainly couldn’t picture him stopping to pray about it as Aden had or preaching a sermon like David. Everyone was so different.

But no matter how stunning the news or how it might seem that life would never be normal again, it actually didn’t take long for everyone to pick up their tools and get back to work. The cows didn’t know a president had died. The horses still needed feeding. Apples were steadily ripening, many Yateses were ready to pick, and sweet crisp Terries would be ripe in a week or two. Shockleys wouldn’t be ready till later. One last field of corn begged to be harvested. Aden didn’t do any more dental work that week except for those who came pleading for relief from a toothache. He and Rebekah helped pick apples for a few days, and each day one could feel a little more relief from the awesomeness of what had happened. The Cotton Expo would still happen. Life would go on. The new president, Mr. Chester Arthur, must know what he was doing. The United States was too great to be halted by one assassin, no matter how devastating his work.

One morning after Aden and Rebekah had resumed their usual schedule, he assured her he wouldn’t need her that day, told her she could visit and help out at Butterfly Meadows. She didn’t argue with him and almost forgot there was sadness anywhere, so caught up she became in the merriment of the big working family. As it came time to go build a fire at camp and get ready for Aden’s return, she determined that this time she would graciously turn down all Betsy’s offerings of bacon, fresh bread, butter, and buttermilk. But she wasn’t prepared for refusing the offer Betsy came up with that day.

“I know you must have your own Bible, Honey,” said Betsy, wiping her hands on her apron pockets before sliding a book carefully from a little shelf near the big breakfast table. “I guess you don’t need another Bible. But—because I’ve come to love you so, I really want you to have this particular Bible. It was my uncle Longstreet’s. He didn’t mind making notes in the margins, underlining, and even, in some places, circling certain words that excited him.” She pushed the Bible gently into Rebekah’s hands as she watched her face.

“I–I don’t know—”

“You don’t have to know all about the Author to understand His words,” said Betsy. “Read at least Genesis and Exodus. You’ll find the stories about Isaac and Rebekah there, you know. And—oh, let me see it again for a minute—” She took the book and, lifting one knee to make a temporary table, licked a finger and flipped pages. “Here—be sure and read all the Gospel of John. Don’t miss that. And, of course, one of my favorite books is right here in the middle—Psalms. But here I go, telling you too much. You will take it, won’t you?”

Betsy laid the book back in her hands as if it were a genuine pearl laid out on dark velvet. There was no way to refuse what this lady with the sparkling brown eyes was asking her to do.

“Sure. I’ll read—”

“When business is slow?”

“Yes. Thank you, Betsy. You are so good to me.”

“I feel as if we’re kin—somehow,” said Betsy with a laugh, turning to the stove to check on a kettle of apples.

She knew she wouldn’t read in front of Aden and bring on his questions. That limited when she would fill this Betsy assignment, but she’d do it somehow.

And it wasn’t hard, once she got started. She couldn’t believe she’d ever thought Genesis was dull reading. It was chock full of stories, colorful stories. She read and reread the tales of Abraham, his precious son Isaac whom he was willing to sacrifice but didn’t have to after all, and then Isaac and his Rebekah, the girl from “back home.” She read all about Moses and the rescuing of God’s enslaved people. She read John and memorized some verses that Uncle Longstreet had marked so she had to see them every time she opened the Bible. She puzzled and pondered those words about being condemned just for not accepting God, yet being saved eternally by trusting in Jesus, His Son. Then one day as light was failing and Aden was busy collecting fresh firewood, she sat by a beech tree where roots made a perfect seat near the stream, and she read Psalm 23 until it became part of her. She knew Mother treasured those words, though she hadn’t talked a lot about them. She’d heard her mumbling, “The Lord is my shepherd,” when she didn’t know Rebekah was listening. And now as she read the words over and over, the word shepherd began to take on a new meaning. What if all this about God’s caring for one’s daily needs were true? What if one could “dwell in the house of the Lord forever”? She wanted to talk to Aden about it, but somehow the moment was never quite right. He seemed so detached and worried these days. He still read to her from his Bible after breakfast each morning, but he no longer expected any response from her.

She began to pray every day in her own awkward way that she would somehow understand what God expected of her, that she would know what she must do in order to have the “Jesus joy” Betsy Mayfield talked about and the peace she’d recognized in Isaac Aden Robards. She didn’t know what to expect, but perhaps a sudden burst of power, an electrical sensation, or something very extraordinary would come. So when the Lord quietly changed her life, she hardly realized it for awhile.

“Lord, I know You’re God,” she said one day as she washed and sterilized instruments in a back room of Moffatt’s Drug Store. “Whatever it takes, Lord, make me Your child because that’s what I want to be.”

A few days later, she walked through the orchard with Cerise, carrying a jug of milk and tin of cookies to busy apple-pickers.

“This is the best time of year,” said Cerise, her long brown hair flipping from side to side as she skipped along.

“Why is this the best? What about Christmas?”

Cerise looked up at her friend and screwed up her face in thought. “Well, Christmas is very, very good. But this is better. We are always so happy when we have a big job to do, and everyone is slaving to get the crop in. It’s such a fruity delicious time. I love the smell of apples and everything so lively! I wonder if there’s an orchard in heaven. I bet there is.”

“But—Cerise, how do you know—how can you be sure you’ll be in heaven?”

The little girl stopped in her tracks, looked up at Rebekah with widened eyes so clear and bright. Rebekah caught her breath at their beauty. “Rebekah, I know, I just know, because—I told God I wanted to be His child forever. And that’s all it takes.”

“That’s all it takes? You’re sure? There must be something more!”

“No. No more. That’s all it takes. Come on! There’s Rosemary coming to meet us. She looks done in, doesn’t she? She’d a lot rather be sewing than picking.” Cerise giggled and ran ahead to meet Rosemary.

Rebekah sighed and took a deep breath. The sky above was bluer than she’d ever seen before at Thornapple or anywhere. Globes of ripe apples glistened among leaves lifting in a feathery breeze. Mayfield voices merrily shouting from tree to tree broke into shouts of glee as they realized milk and cookies had arrived on the scene. Amid the shoving and teasing and squealing, Rebekah started her own celebration.

Lord, I’m really Yours now. I never knew it before, but today, this very day, I know I’m really and truly Yours. Oh, just wait until I tell Betsy!

When Betsy heard the news, she cried and laughed and hugged and cried some more. Then she told the rest, and they all hugged Rebekah, and Cerise squealed happily and said they should every one have an extra serving of pie just for joy.

“Aden will be so excited!” said Betsy, a big smile crinkling her cheeks. “When will you tell him?”

“I—tonight, I guess. Do please let me tell him myself,” said Rebekah, suddenly feeling very shy.

But when she tried that night to tell Aden what had happened, her tongue went numb, and he didn’t even notice she was attempting to talk. Later, as she lay in the darkened wagon, she tried to sort things out. How long had it been since Aden confided anything in her? Why should she blame him for not recognizing her great need to speak? She wondered if it was right to try to pull back the curtain that seemed to have come between their lives. Maybe it was kinder to leave it the way it was until she left. Was she still leaving? Everything seemed so different now.