Courting Buggy: Nurse Hal Among The Amish (29 page)

“
Very funny. I was sleeping when this
emergency occurred,” Hal said. “There wasn't any time to change
clothes.”

The Operating Room team was waiting. A nurse
put a hospital gown on Mary. She told Hal to remove her hand, and
they rushed Mary to the operating room. Hal scrubbed her hands and
massaged the right one to get rid of the numbness.

She went to the waiting room and sat with
Eli. The cesarean section procedure went fast. A nurse came back
about twenty minutes later to tell them Mary had a baby boy. Both
were doing fine.

Hal took Eli to the window in the surgery
room door so he could see Mary. The doctor held the tiny, blood
streaked baby up for them to see. Eli and Hal breathed a sigh of
relief when they heard the baby's mewing cries.

Hal said, “Mary will have to stay here for a
few days. The baby will probably stay in the nursery for awhile
since he's small. The nurses will have Mary and the baby ready for
you to see soon when Mary is taken to a room.”

“
Denki, Nurse Hal,” he said, patting
her shoulder. “You look as tired as I feel.”

“
I am so while you are with your wife
and baby I'm going to the break room and have me a cup of coffee.
You want one before they call you back. You can always take the cup
with you to Mary's room.”

“
Jah, maybe I better have one to stay
awake,” Eli said.

“
Gute idea. I don't want you so tired
you leave this hospital and forget you're supposed to give me a
ride home.”

Eli chuckled then he turned serious. “You are
one person I would never forget. Bless you, Nurse Hal.”

Hal glanced at the waiting room clock. An
hour and a half had passed. It must have been about fifty minutes,
she held the baby back as Mary contracted against her hand. Her arm
felt achy yet. Her hand was slightly numb from the experience, but
she'd be all right with some rest. Even better, Eli and Mary were
going to be floating on cloud nine now that they had a successful
start to their family.

As Hal brought Eli a cup of coffee to the
table, he said, “I've been thinking Nurse Hal. Life is a mixture of
sorrow and joy. We sorrowed when we lost our baby girl, and now we
are filled with joy because we have a baby son denki to you. God is
gute. He moves in mysterious ways His wonders to perform, ain't
so?”

“
Jah,” Hal said wearily as she sat down
to wait for the nurse to come.

Meanwhile that night at the Lapp farm, the
ambulance siren pierced the quiet. The strobe light flashed red and
yellow across the covers and brought Tootie upright in bed. She
felt a panic attack coming on. She shouted, “Fire, Fire! Get out of
the house, everyone! It's on fire!”

By the time she rushed into the hall, the
rest of the family gathered, looking around.

Nora said, “Mercy, Jim, Tootie's been
sleepwalking again. She just came out of Emma's room.”

“
I'm awake. Emma said I could sleep in
her room,” Tootie retorted. “I saw the flicker of flames flashing
on the walls coming through the open bedroom door.

John and Jim rushed downstairs. Nora, Tootie
and the boys followed.

Jim sniffed the air. “I don't smell smoke
anywhere.”

John said, “I do not see flames.”

Emma was coming from the clinic with an
armload of bedding. “Was ist los? What are you all doing out of
bed?”

Nora said, “Your Aunt Tootie screamed fire.
She woke us all up.”

“
There is not a fire,” Emma said
calmly.

Nora frowned at her sister. “I might have
known this was another one of your nightmares.”

“
I saw flashing lights from the flames
and heard the sound of a siren like a fire truck was already here,”
Tootie said. “I'm sure I did.”

“
Actually, Aendi Tootie did see and
hear something like that,” Emma defended. “Hallie sent for an
ambulance to take Mary Mast to the hospital to have her baby. The
ambulance siren was loud, and the lights strobed as they usually
do.”

John wondered, “Why didn't Hal let Mary have
her baby here?”

“
The baby was coming early. Mary Mast
needed more care than Hallie could give her. Hallie is on the way
to the hospital in the ambulance with Mary. Eli is following. When
it is safe to leave Mary and the new baby, Eli is going to bring
Hallie home.”

“
In that case, all of us are going back
to bed for what is left of this night,” John said as he motioned
for everyone to move up the steps.

Tootie looked uncertain about where to go.
Emma said, “Go back to my bed, Aendi. I will be coming as soon as I
take this bundle of dirty bedding to the mudroom. I'm not cleaning
and making that bed this time of night.”

When Emma slipped into bed, Tootie made a
weak sniffle. “Emma, I've been thinking. Hallie is really needed
around here, isn't she?”

“
Jah, everyone depends on her for help
all the time, including this Lapp family. I do not know what we
would do without her.”

“
That makes me sad.” Tootie sounded
maudlin.

“
Why?” Emma asked.

“
If I was to die tomorrow, no one would
miss me or even remember me down the road,” Tootie said.

“
Do not fret, Aendi. You would be
missed by this family. We have enjoyed your visit here and getting
to know you. We love you. We want you to come visit us again and
will remember you always.”

“
Honest?”

Emma giggled. “Honest! I am very truthful.
You are a gute Christian woman who loves her family and is loyal to
family and friends. Just look at how kind you were to Peter
Rogies.”

“
Thank you, Dear. I'll sleep better
knowing that. Good night,” Tootie said.

In her mind, Emma listed the memories
probably brought up at gatherings later on when Nurse Hal's English
Aunt was mentioned; swatting Stella Strutt on the bottom in a
meeting service, daring to sew the woman's apron to the quilting
frame and taking off in Dawdi Jim's courting buggy to Lover's Lane
with Peter Rogies. Emma smiled. Aunt Tootie wouldn't be forgotten
by anyone. She had created some lively moments to be relived in the
minds of Plain people for years to come.

Chapter 19

As the summer days went by, Tootie spent much
of her time by herself, sitting in the porch swing or at the clinic
table where she could look out the window, contemplating Peter and
her promise. Emma told her she was loyal to her friends. If Peter
were here, he wouldn't think she was very loyal. She hadn't kept
her promise to him.

She'd chickened out about asking Nora if they
could go home right away. It was selfish of her to make Nora and
Jim leave just because she wanted to go home in the worse way.
Anyway, Nora would just stare her up and down, realize something
was wrong and demand to know what her hurry was. So Tootie decided
to stick it out. They would have to go home soon anyway. They had
visited long enough at least to suit her.

When Jim was around, he was on a mission to
get her or Nora to go for a ride in his old buggy. Nora continued
to turn him down which upset him, but Jim didn't stay miffed for
long. He was back soon, asking Nora to go with him. When she said
no, he asked her. She kept refusing, too. Jim had become so
insistent Nora barely spoke to him. When they did talk it was
usually in short huffy sentences.

When Tootie's mood didn't change, Hal was
sure something was troubling her aunt. She didn't know any other
way to get to the bottom of it except to come right out and
ask.

“
I want to go for a walk. Come with me,
Aunt Tootie,” Hal said. “While Mom helps Emma pick the green beans,
we can get some of that exercise we're always talking about.” As
they started down the lane, Hal said, “ It's a perfect summer day,
isn't it?”

“
It's a lovely day. As Peter would have
said, Praise the Lord,” Tootie replied.

“
You miss Peter, don't you? You do
understand that you weren't the Dolly he'd been in love with years
ago?” Hal asked.

“
Yes, I knew the way he saw me was
because he was sick. I wasn't the Dolly he once loved, but I didn't
see any reason to explain that to Peter. You said he wouldn't
believe the truth anyway. So I went along with him, because I liked
him.”

“
No harm in that. Peter had some very
comforting times in his last days because of you,” Hal
said.

“
I enjoyed being his Dolly. I admit
that,” Tootie confided.

“
Is that all there was to it? I mean
after you went on that ride on Bender Creek Road and was lost in
the timber with Peter, you haven't seemed the same
since.”

“
What do you mean?” Tootie stared at
Hal. “Are you thinking there was more between Peter and me then
just a friendship?”

“
I don't know what to think. Something
has been bothering you for some time now. I didn't say anything
before, because I thought you were just grieving for Peter. Time
has passed, and you still seem so down in the dumps. Now I think
there's more. What don't we know?”

Tootie shrugged. “I kept thinking if I could
just get away from here and go home I'd put what happened behind
me. I would feel better and just forget it all.”

“
Sounds like you would be running away
from the problem. I get it, but what is the problem? You need to
tell someone just to get it off your chest. If you don't want what
you say repeated, I promise not to tell a soul.”

“
I wish I'd been able to say that to
Peter. It didn't work that way for me. He made me promise to tell a
secret, and it's simply none of my business,” Tootie declared
vehemently.

“
Oh my! Now you really should tell me
before this burden eats you up,” Hal said.

Tootie walked over to the pasture fence and
stared off toward the picnic grove. Her voice was hollow as she
spilled what was wrong. “Don't worry about anything other than
friendship between Peter and me. That's all there was. All Peter
did was talk about the past most of the time. He told me how much
more he loved Dolly than his wife. He was sneaking around with
Dolly after he married Sara. They met on Bender Creek Road often.
That's why Lover's Lane meant so much to him.”

“
Peter Rogies did that! Cooner Jonah
said something happened between Dolly and Peter that broke them up.
He said Dolly just disappeared, but he thinks it was before Peter
married Sara,” Hal told her.

“
Dolly didn't disappear from Peter
until after he married Sara. She finally grew tired of him always
going back to his wife after he had been with her so she moved to
Fremont. Peter asked Dolly's brother about her every chance he got.
Dolly worked at house cleaning jobs to support herself.”

“
Wonder who her brother
was?”

“
His name was Rudy Briskey.”

“
Oh,” Hal said. “I know him well. I
delivered some lambs for him once.”

“
Months later, the brother told Peter
that Dolly had a baby boy, and the baby was his. Peter told Sara he
was spending the day at the salebarn. Actually, he went to see
Dolly and his baby. She couldn't support herself and take care of
the baby so she wanted to find a good home for him. Peter and Sara
were sure by then that Sara was never going to get pregnant so
Peter asked Sara if it would be all right to adopted a baby. He
said he'd heard at the salebarn about an unwed mother that had
given birth to a boy a few weeks before. Sara agreed. Peter brought
the baby home. He said the mother had named him Jonah so they stuck
with that name.”

“
Uh oh,” Hal said softly.

“
I don't think Peter ever saw Dolly
again, but he didn't stop asking her brother about her until the
brother said she had left the Amish faith and married an English
farmer close to Fremont. She had been on shaky ground with the
Amish, because she was an unwed mother. When she married an English
man, her family and the Amish community shunned her. Peter didn't
dare bring her up to Mr. Briskey again.

He didn't stop loving Dolly, and he felt
guilty. He tried hard to make it up to Sara for the way he felt
about Dolly. No one knew where the little boy came from. It was
just an adoption as far as the Amish neighbors were concerned. I
find it hard to believe that Sara didn't suspect something. When
Jonah grew older, it would be hard to miss how much like Peter he
looked.

You told me that Peter was a very honest man
that couldn't abide dishonesty in others. I suppose that's why he
was so torn up for years over keeping this secret from Jonah and
Sara.”

“
That explains why he wanted to be
close to Dolly again. He loved her so much,” Hal said.

“
Yes, he didn't want to ever hurt Sara
or have it get out in the community what he'd done. He reasoned he
couldn't say anything as long as Sara was alive, but he wished
Jonah knew the truth. After Sara died, Peter lost his nerve. So he
picked me, his Dolly, to tell Jonah the truth for him. He made me
promise several times before he died. I kept saying I'd do it to
ease his troubled mind, but Hallie, I can't. It's none of my
business. I don't want to be the bearer of such news to a man who
has just lost his father.”

Hal let out a big whoosh. “I understand. The
only reason to be truthful, I can think of, is Jonah might want to
look up Peter's first love, Dolly. He might want to see if his
mother is alive and get to know her. On the other hand, if the
Amish shunned her that might stop Jonah from wanting to see her. So
telling him would be unnecessary.