Rebecca's Choice Read Online Free PDF Page B

her eyes. That had happened when her father passed away, and if it happened again, the pain would be even greater.
    For one thing, she was older, and the vigor of youth was no longer a ready source to draw strength from and recover by. The other reason was the child she carried. That she was to bear a child at her age, Rachel had made a measure of peace with. What she could not make peace with was losing the inheritance another time.
    Reuben let her off at the sidewalk, and she went inside, straight to the bedroom. Emma looked like Rachel expected. Because no one else was in the room, Rachel moved out to the living room quickly and found a place to sit among the other women.
    Surely her brothers would be fair. The thought had never occurred to her before. There were, after all, only three farms and four children. Rachel glanced toward the men’s section.
    Ezra was a local, close with Bishop Mose, and well enough off in his own right. Abe and Jonas were from an Amish settlement in Missouri. They had moved there years ago, soon after the founding of the young community, and decided to stay. These two had Rachel worried.
    Granted they were her own flesh and blood, but that seemed distant and unimportant at the moment. Both were about as poor as she was. Rachel knew this from family conversations, and from a general idea of how things stood. Reuben and Rachel had traveled to Missouri for a visit some four years ago, and it had not taken long for Rachel to form her opinion. Neither the Amish community in Missouri nor her brothers’ lives flowed with money.
    How was this going to work? Rachel shifted on the bench and then turned to shake the hand of Esther Yoder, who had come in earlier.
    “She was a good woman,” Esther whispered, bending close to Rachel.
    Rachel nodded and thought Emma would have been a better woman if she’d done what was right before she passed away.
    “Our daughter so loved Emma. Never had a better teacher—not in all her school years. You know how hard good teachers are to come by.”
    Rachel nodded again. “Yes, she was.”
    “The Lord takes when it’s His time. Young and old. Emma had a full life in years and in children.” Esther leaned even closer. “You think he’s coming?”
    “Coming?” Rachel knew her eyes were full of questions because she didn’t have the slightest idea what Esther was referring to.
    “Him,” Esther whispered, the tone of her voice speaking for itself.
    Rachel was beginning to think the woman was a little off but quickly dismissed the thought as nonsense—Esther was one of the most sane women in the community.
    “You don’t know about him?” Esther asked surprised. “I figured the family all knew.”
    Rachel shook her head.
    “Oh.”
    Rachel moved closer, slowly so as not to attract attention.
    “Your parents never told you?”
    Rachel shook her head.
    “The old people must have kept it to themselves, then. My mother knew, though. Maybe not too many did. Those kinds of things are sometime kept under wraps. Emma was once serious about someone. Around seventeen or so. Fell hard too, from what my mom said.”
    Rachel waited.
    “He was Mennonite. Always was. His parents too. Why she got thinking in that direction—who knows? Maybe it was just one of those things. Apparently it got stopped in time.”
    “Why would he come?” Rachel asked.
    “I don’t know,” Esther said. “Just wondered.”
    “Really.” Rachel fast lost interest. A crush in one’s youth was normal. What Emma had done with her love life really didn’t matter to her. Then again, perhaps it did.
    If Emma had married … The thought sent shivers down Rachel’s spine. There could be a dozen children waiting in line—all with their hands out for money from her father’s inheritance. Rachel almost smiled, filled with a sense of gratefulness.
    “It’s sad really,” Esther continued, “that Emma never married. Seems a waste in a way. She could have had children…grandchildren perhaps.