Johanna's Bridegroom Read Online Free PDF

it.”
    “What happened before...between you and him...it hurt you,” Anna continued. “I remember how you cried. But Roland was young then and sowing his oats. Can’t you find it in your heart to forgive him?”
    Not forgive, but forget. Could I ever trust him again?
    “Miriam!” Charley shouted from outside. “Come take this horse! I don’t trust these kids with this mare, and I can’t stand here all day holding her. I’ve got work to do.”
    “Go. Have fun,” Ruth said. “But promise me you’ll think about what we said, Johanna.”
    “Please,” Anna said. “We only want what’s best for you and your children.”
    “So do I,” Johanna admitted. “So do I.”
    * * *
    The Mennonite school, where the festival was held, wasn’t more than five miles away. Mam and Grace and the others were there when Johanna and her crew arrived. Jonah and ’Kota were fairly bursting out of their britches when Miriam turned the buggy into the parking lot, and Anna’s girls appeared to be just as excited. A volunteer came to take the children’s modest admittance fees and stamp the back of their hands with a red strawberry. That stamp would admit them to all the games, the rides, the petting zoo featuring baby farm animals, a straw-bale mountain and maze and a book fair where each child could choose a free book.
    “There’s Katy!” Jonah cried, waving to his little sister. Katy and Susanna were riding in a blue cart pulled by a huge, black-and-white Newfoundland dog. Following close behind trudged a smiling David King, his battered paper crown peeking out from under his straw hat. David was holding tight to a string. At the end of it bobbed a red strawberry balloon.
    “I want a balloon!” Mae exclaimed. “Can I have a balloon?”
    “If you like,” Johanna said. “But your Mam gave you each two dollars to spend. Make sure that the balloon is what you really want before you buy it.”
    “I want a balloon, too,” ’Kota declared. “A blue one.”
    “Strawberries aren’t blue,” Jonah said loftily.
    “Uh-huh,” ’Kota replied, pointing out a girl holding a blue strawberry balloon on a string.
    Johanna smiled as she helped the children out of the buggy and sent them scurrying safely across the field that served as a parking lot. Despite his olive skin and piercing dark eyes, Grace’s little boy looked as properly plain as Jonah. The two cousins, inseparable friends, were clad exactly alike in blue home-sewn shirts and trousers with snaps and ties instead of buttons, black suspenders and wide-brimmed straw hats. No one would recognize ’Kota as the thin, shy, undersized child who’d first appeared at Mam’s back door on that rainy night last fall. Another of God’s gifts. Life was full of surprises.
    “Over here,” Mam called. “Why don’t you leave the girls with us? I imagine Lori Ann, Mae and Naomi would like to ride in the dog cart.”
    “There’s J.J.,” Jonah shouted. “Hey, J.J.! He’s climbing the hay bales. Can we—”
    “I promised Naomi we’d go to the book fair first,” Miriam said, joining them. “Grace is working there all morning. Don’t worry about the horse. Irwin’s going to see that the mare gets water and is tied up in the shed. Do you mind if we go on ahead, inside?”
    Quickly, the sisters made a plan to meet at the picnic tables in two hours. Children were divided; money was handed out and Johanna followed ’Kota and Jonah to the entrance to the straw-bale maze. From the top of a straw “mountain,” J.J. waved and called to them. The area was fenced, so she didn’t have to worry about losing track of her energetic charges. Johanna found a spot on a straw bale beside several other waiting mothers and sat down. Since J.J. was here, Johanna was all too aware that Roland couldn’t be far away. She glanced around, but didn’t see him.
    Her sisters’ advice about Roland echoed many of her own thoughts. Years ago, she and Roland... No, she wouldn’t think about that.