Abby Finds Her Calling (10 page)

Abby released his hands. She shook her head, looking as wretched as he’d ever seen Abigail Lambright, the town optimist, appear.
But is she shaking her head because she believes you couldn’t sully her sister that way? Or because she can’t stand to answer you?

“It’s Zanna you should be talking to, James,” she finally murmured, glancing down the hall toward the bedrooms. “I did my best to get her story straight, keeping her here so she could clean up before she faced the rest of the family, but she started phoning her friends. Sam and Mamm are fit to be tied.”

“Will you tell her I’m here? And stay with us while we talk?”

Abby’s eyes widened as though he’d asked her to chaperone—or referee—their wedding night. “I’m not so sure that’s a gut idea, James. She’s already peeved me with her dishonesty.”

“I trust you to keep us both on the high road, Abby. I’m so upset, I might say or do something I’ll wish I hadn’t.” He fidgeted with his hat, caught between extremes: one moment he wanted to protect his Zanna from all the wagging tongues and take her back, while with his next breath he stood ready to condemn her outrageous lie. Her behavior made a big black mark on both their reputations, even though he’d done nothing wrong.

“Ah. Another one telling me I’m my sister’s keeper—and now your keeper, as well.” Abby smiled sadly as her sister-in-law came down the hallway with her black bag. “Do you want Barbara to stay, too?”

James shook his head, reading the same resignation—the same verdict—on the face of Sam’s wife. “Denki for your help, Barbara. Is—is Zanna all right, then?”

“Better than the rest of us, I’m thinking. I’m sorry this is happening, James. None of us wanted this for you.” The midwife paused
at the door, studying his face. “I’m going home to pray on it, and trust that God will guide us all toward His way and His will.”

The door closed behind her and the front room filled with an awkward silence. James had been here with Emma last spring when Abby had moved into this little place. He liked the way the walls glowed with pale yellow paint in the lamplight, and the simple furnishings made him feel so at home. “Guess I’d best wait here for Zanna. Or has she already slipped out the back way, after hearing my voice?”

Again that sadness hung heavily on Abby’s brow, and he was sorry he’d added to it. “I’ll get her,” she murmured. “We’d best be saying what needs to be said so we can all move forward.”

Nodding, James watched her walk down the hall. Such a kind, solid woman, Abby was. Tidy and talented at so many things, yet always giving other folks the credit. He looked at the old oak rocking chair with an afghan folded over its back and then at the sofa, and chose the seat he recalled Sam, Abby, and Zanna’s dat resting in most evenings. As he settled against the flat slatted back, James hoped some of Leroy Lambright’s patience and wisdom would seep into him. Zanna hadn’t been the same since her father had passed, and maybe he needed to address that tonight.

The chair creaked with his weight as he rocked… What could he possibly say to right such a wrong situation? To nip this crisis before all of Cedar Creek believed the rumor that he’d dishonored his bride-to-be? Abby reappeared then, watching her sister come down the hall.

James stood up, his pulse kicking in his temples.
Father God, please give me the right thoughts, the strength to listen and forgive…

Zanna didn’t look at him. She walked like a wooden doll that needed its joints oiled, then lowered herself stiffly to the edge of the couch. Try as he might, James couldn’t see any signs of a baby, but he didn’t want to stare. “Zanna,” he murmured in a voice that sounded strangely adolescent. “Gut to see you got home all right. We were all worried…”

The love of his life focused on the arm of the couch as though some fascinating riddle were written there for her to decipher. When Abby perched on the sofa beside her, James sat down again. The two sisters looked drained, their faces nearly as pale and stiff as their kapps, except Abby’s darker brows and hair set off her features more distinctly. As he gazed at Zanna, who’d promised to be his wife, James reached deep inside himself, searching for a solution—a way to persuade the young woman who appeared so distant now. A mere week ago, she couldn’t stop smiling at him and talking about the wedding.

James cleared his throat. Best to jump in and hope God put good words in his mouth. “Before you say anything, Zanna, I—I love you,” he began fervently. “If we can put the rumors to rest right now—if you’ll still be my wife—I’ll wipe the slate clean. Then this will blow over, and it will be like it never happened.”

Zanna bowed her head. She picked at her fingernails.

Abby grasped her knees, seeming so ready to speak out—yet apparently aware that this wasn’t her conversation.

James sighed. He swallowed the lump of desperation that clogged his throat. “I know it’s been hard on you since your dat died, and maybe I shouldn’t have courted you so soon after that.”

There was not so much as a flicker of Zanna’s eyelashes in response.

“And maybe… maybe you should’ve had a little more time for rumspringa before you took your church instruction and kneeling vows. I know your dat wanted the best for you when he convinced you to do that so soon after you turned sixteen,” he continued quietly.

Still Zanna seemed lost in her own little world, oblivious to how his soul bled as he searched for the words that would get her talking.

James leaned forward, gazing intently at her. Why would his Zanna not look at him? What else could he say to convince her that he wanted the best for both of them? “I was so happy you wanted to
be with me, I probably didn’t realize you needed more time for having fun with your friends or… for trying things out for yourself.”

Zanna fiddled with a loose thread on the sofa, and when she yanked it off, it might as well have been wrapped around his heart. What did a man say to a woman who acted as though he wasn’t seated ten feet in front of her, pleading for their life together?

“I’ll call the child mine. We’ll get on with our lives, Zanna,” he rasped. He couldn’t miss the way Abby’s brown eyes widened gratefully… just as he couldn’t ignore the tightening of his fiancée’s jaw. “For your wedding present I—I bought you that walnut bedroom set you liked at Yoder’s store, so we wouldn’t be starting out in a room that looks the same as when I was a kid. Mamm and Dat’ll be moving to the dawdi haus—”

Zanna’s face was getting red, but he couldn’t stop pouring out his feelings and frustrations. At this point, it was in for a dime, in for a dollar. “As far as I’m concerned, Zanna, you still hung the moon and stars! If there’s anything at all I can—”

“Stop. Just stop, hear me?”

James felt his body deflate. The voice had been Zanna’s, but he hadn’t seen her lips move. He rose to stand behind the rocking chair, to grip its sturdy back for support.

So she’d heard enough? He was being a first-class fool, was he? It had been his greatest fear that he’d lash out, or cry, or… but he’d never dreamed that this young woman, who threw herself into everything with a bright conviction, would refuse to hear him out. Had she no idea how badly she’d slashed him by running away, and now by
this
?

“All right, then, the stories have to stop, Zanna.” James thought the chair back might snap in his grip, yet he felt so powerless. Thank God for Abby, whose wounded expression must mirror his own. “You and I both know I never—
Whose baby is it, then?
”

Zanna’s eyes filled with tears. “Mine,” she hedged.

“That’s no answer, and you know it! How long have you known—?”

“Since… July.”

A horse might as well have kicked him full force in the chest. When James could catch his breath again, he said, “So we’d been engaged for three months when you—for half the summer you’ve been seeing another man.”

“It—it was just the one time—”

“Zanna, that’s enough.” Abby grabbed her sister’s slender arm, and then released it as though it burned like a blazing log. “Maybe you won’t answer to me or to Mamm, but you’ve got to own up to James about who the father is.”

“You could have had the decency to tell me,” James said bitterly. Clearly, his turn-the-other-cheek spirit was getting him nowhere except in deeper trouble. “I spent all my time planning and setting up the house. I turned away carriage business for this month so we could have time together. And you went along with those plans. Acted happy. Said you
loved
me, Zanna.”

“And what else was I to say? When somebody says they love you, you say it back or they feel bad, ain’t so?” Zanna hunched her shoulders. She looked miserable, true enough, yet James detected a stiffness to her features as she pulled herself together… as she carefully worded her answer. “It was gut to see you so happy, James—to see all my family smiling again after Dat’s passing. You kept telling me how perfect it was going to be, our marriage, and I wanted to believe—”

“Well, you could have changed your mind before now!” he cried. “If you couldn’t tell me you wanted out, why didn’t you let Abby know so
she
could’ve—?” James exhaled forcefully. Abby’s alarmed expression warned him he might well break the chair if he didn’t get a grip on his temper. He so seldom felt anger, he didn’t know how to act when such a wave of it washed over him.

James spun around, spearing his hands through his hair like a crazy man. The sight of the lamp on the table soothed him… at least enough to make him realize that no amount of reasoning—no amount of loving Zanna—would save this situation. If she didn’t
understand how he’d sacrificed his pride to ask her to come back, offering to raise this child as his own, what would be served by putting himself through any more humiliation? Hadn’t he endured enough of that in front of four hundred wedding guests?

“You could have said something back in July, too. And obviously you did—but to some other man,” he muttered, mostly to get it off his chest. Zanna was beyond hearing his heartbreak, so what was the point of parading it in front of her? “Guess I’ll leave it to the bishop, then. There’s nothing more I can say here.”

James grabbed his hat and left before Abby could see him out. He didn’t have the heart to listen to her apologies or explanations, or whatever else she might say to smooth his ruffled feathers or soothe his soul. The autumn evening had a nip to it. Across the moonlit sheep pasture, the gentle roll of the hills—so often a reminder of the Good Shepherd they followed—beckoned him to walk and walk until his legs could carry him no farther. Yet he sensed that even strenuous exercise would bring him no peace.

And what would help you? How can you live with knowing that the sweet Zanna Lambright you lost your heart to not only betrayed you on your wedding day but also gave herself to another man long before that, while you avoided such pleasures out of respect for her?

And Zanna seemed so heedless of the wound she’d inflicted. It had stung him deeply to sense that she felt no remorse, no need to apologize.

From behind the barn, two lithe dog shadows moved toward him, their ears alert as they checked his identity. James crossed his arms tightly. He was too infuriated to scratch behind Panda’s ears or to mimic Pearl’s soft, conversational mutterings.

What was he to do now? How was he to answer Emma’s questions, or his parents’, when he got home? Could he attend the preaching at Ezra Yutzy’s place tomorrow and endure the endless stares and speculation? Or should he stay away and let folks talk even more harshly about how he’d shamed Zanna and her entire family?

James started down the long lane toward the county road that separated the Graber place from the Lambrights’ land; before now the blacktop had never seemed like such a dividing line. Why would Sam’s family welcome him here, even if they believed he was innocent of Zanna’s accusations? They, too, were in turmoil. If he went inside to make his peace with Sam and Treva this evening, his attempt might well backfire. Better, perhaps, to visit the bishop: to state his side of the story before Vernon Gingerich and the other preachers heard the rumors secondhand.

A steady
clip-clop! clip-clop!
announced a buggy, and it turned to come down the graveled lane, right toward him. When the rig came close enough that he recognized the bearded faces in the glow of its lantern, James sighed wryly at the timing: Bishop Gingerich had already heard the news. He’d never been one to let problems go untended, and he’d brought along Paul Bontrager, another preacher, to assist with this difficult mission. As the horse slowed, James took a deep breath.

“Evening, Vernon. Paul,” he said with a nod.

“I guess you know what brings us.” In the moonlight, their gazes were fixed on him.

“Jah. I’ve been here trying to get the full story from Zanna,” he replied with a sigh. He pivoted on his boot heel to hide the sudden crumpling of his face. “I don’t know what to make of it, fellas,” he rasped. “It’s like somebody doused the flame and her lamp went out, as far as how she feels about me.”

Vernon leaned forward, his expression grim. “I’m sorry to hear that, James. It’s not our intention to rub salt in the wound, but you understand why we need to get this story from the horse’s mouth—so to speak—rather than relying on hearsay. And because tomorrow’s a preaching Sunday—”

“We figured it best to err on the side of sooner rather than later,” Paul added solemnly. “Haven’t ever had a wedding go wrong in Cedar Creek, and now with talk of Zanna having a baby, well—it’s best to deal with it head-on.”

“We can’t have our other girls thinking that’s the right path to follow,” Vernon said. Then he cleared his throat, sounding a bit uncomfortable. “We also need to make it clear about your part in all this, James. If there’s to be a confession, and a Members’ Meeting about whether to impose a ban, we need to hear from all the folks involved.”

“Jah, I understand all that.” James closed his eyes to keep his head from spinning. He’d witnessed plenty of confessions and the disciplinary actions that followed, but never had he been directly involved—or been dragged into it on account of someone else’s accusations. “Truth be told, I was heading your way, Vernon, to seek your counsel. Zanna’s whipped her family into a lather.”