The Road Home (47 page)

J
ENNY AND
J
ONATHAN
sat next to each other in two molded plastic chairs in the waiting room of the Lancaster County courthouse while the receptionist went to talk to her supervisor about Jenny's request. Jonathan had been very quiet the past two days, and Jenny felt a little disconnected from him. Her papa and Uncle Bobby had gone to get some coffee from the break room down the hall, and Jenny and Jonathan were alone.

“What was it you wanted to talk to me about, Jonathan?” Jenny asked.

Jonathan looked at her and then lowered his gaze and began to speak. “I've been thinking a lot about…about…”

“About what?” Jenny asked.

“Well, about us,” Jonathan said softly. “And a lot about me. First of all, I want to tell you that I love you with all my heart. I always will. You're the most amazing girl I've ever met. You helped me to find a part of me that's been missing all my life, and I'll never forget you for that, but…”

Jenny's heart lurched in her chest. She suddenly felt cold. “But what?”

“But I just don't think it is going to work out between us.”

There! It was out in the open, and Jonathan looked relieved.

Jenny clenched her hands. “But why, Jonathan?”

“Jenny, you're Amish. I'm not. You love your mama and papa more than anything. Your dad is a wonderful man. I wish my father had been like your papa. Reuben is strong and brave, and yet he's kind and gentle too. He loves you so much. And then there's your mom. She's your rock whether you realize it or not. I know she prays for you every day. Without her to guide you and love you, I think you would be very lost.

“If I take you away from them, I just don't see how it would work out. You would be shunned, and they couldn't speak to you or associate with you. In the beginning we might be happy, but after a while you'd miss them terribly. And the life away from the Amish community is so different. You would always feel out of place. Instead of a family who loves and cares for you, all I can offer is a father who cheats on his wife and a mother who's an alcoholic. It just wouldn't be right.”

Jenny started to protest, but Jonathan shushed her. “Let me finish. I've thought this all through and I want to say it the right way.” Jonathan turned in his chair and took her hands in his. “Even though it doesn't seem that it will work out for us, one thing I can say is that I've been watching this God of yours at work, and the past few weeks have blown my mind.”

He frowned, and paused. “That's not how I meant to say it. It sounds dumb, so let me start again.” He took a deep breath. “I've been amazed at the things that have happened through all this. Actually a better word would be astonished. I can't just call it coincidence anymore, but I haven't known what to call it. When I was a kid, I never really thought about God, and no one told me about Him anyway. I
heard my grandfather use His name as a cussword, but for sure that didn't help me find out anything about Him. Then when I got older, I read books that filled my head with a lot of philosophical nonsense. I tried to apply it to my life, but I found out it just wasn't true. I went out to San Francisco to put my great wisdom to the test, and all I found was a bunch of people who just stayed stoned all the time and did nothing productive. It was like they refused to grow up and take responsibility for their lives.”

Despite the somber tone of Jonathan's words, Jenny giggled.

Jonathan drew himself up and tried to look solemn. “What's so funny? I'm trying to be serious.”

Jenny squeezed his hands and smiled. “I know, Jonathan, and I don't mean to make light. It's just that as you were talking I was thinking about the day we met. You thought I was in a costume for a play, but the costume you were wearing was much more…well, it was silly. You looked very strange. And that van.” She giggled again.

Jonathan looked at her for a moment, but then his stern expression cracked and he smiled too. “Okay, you're right. I looked very weird and, boy, did you let me know it. But hear me out, please. This may be the most important thing I've ever said in my life. I never had anyone who really loved me. Not my dad or my mom, nobody. And then I met you, and for some reason I'll never understand, you loved me—without question, without reservation, holding nothing back, you loved me. I've been thinking about that a lot.

“How did I get to San Francisco from Long Island, and then to Pacifica with Shub, and then to Wooster, where I met the first person who ever loved me and the first person I ever really loved? How does that happen to two people who are so far apart one day and then totally entwined together the next?

“And then when I thought about the incredible gift that your love is to me, I realized that someone must love me a lot to give me such a
precious thing. Someone big enough and powerful enough and merciful enough to take someone like me, who doesn't deserve anything, and give you to me, just to show me how much He loves me. And then I knew. It has to be God. No one else could do it—not karma or destiny or coincidence, but a real, loving, kind merciful being who cares enough about two little people in all this wide world to bring them real love. Your God must be real. And not only is He real, He loves me, and you are the proof of that. So I have decided that whatever it takes, I want to follow your God. I don't know how, but if you'll show me, I'll do it.”

Jenny looked at Jonathan and was about to reply when someone put a hand on Jonathan's shoulder. Jonathan turned and looked up. It was Reuben. They had been so engrossed in their conversation they hadn't noticed him walk up. Jonathan stood up and faced him.

“I heard what you said, Jonathan, and it pleases me,” Reuben said. “Only a fool says there is no God. Jenny can explain to you what it means to be a Christian. It's very simple. It can be summed up in one sentence: ‘Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind; and thy neighbor as thyself.' ”

“Mr. Springer, I do want to be a Christian. But I also want you to know that as much as it hurts me to say it, I'm willing to give Jenny up to keep her from losing you and her mother and her way of life.”

Reuben put his hands on Jonathan's shoulders. “I hear what you are saying, Jonathan, and I admire you for it. Now let me tell you something. I have watched you since we met, and I've come to respect you and, yes, even love you. You are a brave and decent young man. You have cared for my Jenny selflessly, and you've been respectful to me and to her mother. You're a man that I would be proud to call my son. But the most important thing is this—Jenny loves you with all her heart. There is nothing I can do about that. So I want to ask you this. Will
you wait until we've finished answering Jenny's questions and then sit down with me? I may have a solution to your problem.”

Jonathan stood with a dumbfounded look on his face. “Mr. Springer, you don't know how much it means to me to hear you say that. I'll do anything, if it means that Jenny and I can be together.” He turned to Jenny. “Anything, Jenny, because I love you. I've loved you from the first moment I saw you.”

Jenny reached out and took Jonathan's hand. “And I you, Jonathan.”

Just then Bobby came walking up with the receptionist and another woman.

“This is Mrs. Bronstein,” the receptionist said. “She's my supervisor, and she can help you.”

“I've talked with Sheriff Halverson and see no reason why we can't release the information concerning your birth mother,” she said sweetly, smiling at Jenny. “Since there was no court action removing you from your mother's care, and since you were adopted as an unknown child by the Springers, there are no court orders sealing any of your parents' records. So here they are.” Mrs. Bronstein held up the folder. “If you'll just come with me, we can take care of this in short order.”

They followed her down the hall to a conference room with a large table. Everyone took a seat. Mrs. Bronstein opened the envelopes and took out the papers. “Just give me a minute to look these over,” she said.

Everyone sat silently as Mrs. Bronstein scanned the documents. Finally she spoke. “Your father was Robert St. Clair of New York. I don't have much more information than that because he was born in a different county. However, your mother is another story. Her maiden name was Rachel Mary Borntraeger. It's on the marriage certificate that Sheriff Halverson gave me. She was born in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, May twelfth, nineteen twenty-eight. She was not born in a hospital, but her midwife filed the birth certificate. I have it here. She was eighteen years old when she married your father. Her parents are
Abel and Eliza Borntraeger. They live just outside Lancaster in a village called Paradise.”

Jonathan's jaw dropped, and Reuben laughed.

“Of course they do!” Reuben said.

The car drove slowly into Paradise. They were looking for Leacock Road. Bobby saw it first and turned left off the highway. They drove past snow-covered fields and stately barns. A horse-drawn buggy was coming toward them, and Bobby stopped and rolled down his window. The man driving the buggy pulled up. He looked at Reuben with curiosity,

“Hi, neighbor,” Bobby said. “We're looking for Abel and Eliza Borntraeger's place. Can you help us?”

“Bishop Borntraeger?
Ja
. He's the next turn to the right. His barn is a big bright red one, just there. He lives alone now. His wife died ten years ago.”

“
Ja
, friend. We're thanking you,” Reuben said.

They turned right at the next road. The sign by the mailbox read Borntraeger. They drove slowly up the long dirt road. Finally they pulled up in front of the farmhouse. It was a simple two-story structure painted light blue. A porch with a carved railing ran along one side of the house. Dead flowers stood in the snow in two little gardens on either side of the front steps. Suddenly fear gripped Jenny's heart.

“Oh, Papa,” Jenny said.

“What is it,
dochter
?”

“What if…?”

Reuben smiled and touched his finger to his daughter's lips. “
Du lieber Gott
has brought us this far. Now is not the time to stop trusting Him.”

They all got out of the car and walked up on the porch. The house faced west, and the sun was setting over the snow-covered hills behind
them. Their footsteps made a hollow sound on the porch. Jenny stood close to her papa, slightly behind him, while Bobby knocked on the door. They waited for a long time, and then they heard slow footsteps from inside the house. The door opened, and an old man looked out. He was very tall, with a white beard and a stern face. Wrinkles lined the area around his eyes. He looked at them curiously.

“
Ja
? Can I help you, then?” he asked.

“Bishop Borntraeger?” Bobby asked.

“
Ja
,” the old man said.

“Sir, we are here on an interesting—”

The old man waved his hand at Bobby to silence him and stepped out onto the porch. The setting sun was shining in his eyes. He squinted, and then he looked straight at Jenny. He put his hand above his eyes, shading them from the sun, and looked again.

“Rachel?” he asked slowly. “Rachel, have you come home then, girl?”

Jenny stepped shyly out from behind her papa. “I'm Jenny,” she said.

“Jenny?” The old man said her name slowly. “But…I don't understand.”

“I'm Rachel's daughter…
Grossdaddi
,” Jenny said, twisting her hands nervously.

The old man stepped forward until he stood right in front of Jenny. “You are my Rachel's little girl?” he asked.

“Yes,
Grossdaddi
.” The word had a wonderful feel as it came from her lips.

The old man put his hands on her shoulders. He gazed into her face for a long time. “
Ja
, you are her daughter,” he said finally. He paused and then he spoke slowly. “Will you…forgive me?”

“Forgive you,
Grossdaddi
?” Jenny asked.

“
Ja
,” the old man said as tears formed at the edges of his eyes. “I was wrong to be so hard on my daughter…on your mother. It took me a long time to realize that.”