Seasons of Sugarcreek 02. Spring's Renewal Read Online Free PDF

much.”
    “I noticed that she does seem to have a lot of patience with him.”
    “She would need it,” Elsa joked. “My Anson could talk the ear off a person, he could. But somehow Clara gets him to channel all his energy, such as when she had him introduce everyone at the play today. That was a good thing, that was. If he’d had to sit quietly with the others, he would have been causing trouble in no time.”
    “The program was nice. She seems nice, too.” He frowned. Saying she was “nice” sounded so…inadequate.
    “She is that. She’s done a good job teaching them how to write English. She’s taught them many other things, too. Caleb can list all the presidents in order.”
    “My teacher only had us sit quietly and do our lessons. We did very few programs.”
    “The previous teacher had events like this, but not as many as Clara. She has the students present several times a year. The Christmas one is especially nice. For that program, us moms came up and made everyone a hot lunch.”
    Though he’d thought he had seen a glimmer of match-making earlier, his aunt now seemed intent to focus only on Clara’s teaching accomplishments. He wondered why.
    Rather bluntly he said, “Aunt Elsa, how did Clara get her scars?”
    “Ah, those scars are a shame, aren’t they?”
    “What happened?”
    She sighed. “Clara was involved in a kitchen accident when she was five or six.” She shook her head sadly. “It was a terrible thing. Somehow hot oil from a fry pan splattered on her. It burned her something awful. She was in the hospital for weeks, she was.”
    Tim was shocked. “That’s terrible.”
    “Oh, it was! Actually, it was much worse than that.” Keeping an eye on Maggie and Toby, who were holding hands and trying to skip in the field, Elsa lowered her voice. “Clara got an infection at the hospital and developed a terrible high fever. We weren’t sure if she was going to survive. Her mother was in a terrible way.”
    Looking at him sideways, she said quietly, “I heard it was right painful. She’s had several operations. Skin grafts and such. For a few years the poor little thing seemed to always be covered in bandages.”
    Tim imagined such things had to be very costly. “The community paid for all that?”
    “They did, but actually, her father worked for a fencing company and their insurance helped a bit, too. It was a lucky thing, that.”
    “I feel sorry for her.”
    “She looked worse, Tim. Now we’re all used to it. Besides, that saying about what is inside a person counts is still true. Clara is a beautiful woman on the inside.”
    To his eyes, she was pretty on the outside, too. Her brown eyes were expressive and pretty. And the rest of her skin was a pale, creamy pink. “Is she courting anyone?”
    “She’s not.” Elsa shook her skirts as they walked to the top of a hill, then started down into the valley that surrounded her home. “I’m afraid most of the men here can’t see past her looks. And, well, her mother is dependent on her. Whoever married Clara would have to take on her mother as well.”
    “That’s too bad, don’tcha think? It’s like she’s destined to be alone for always.”
    Elsa blinked in surprise. “She’s lucky to be alive. I’m sorry to say I’ve never thought too much about her courting or not. She was always in and out of the doctor’s and hospitals, and then her father passed away and her mother’s health started failing. Then the teaching job came up and she took to it like a duck in water.”
    But Tim had seen something in Clara’s eyes. Something that said she was more than just a teacher. “Is she an only child like me?”
    “No, she has two older sisters. They married but don’t live nearby.” Looking out in the distance, her voice became reflective. “I guess I’ve simply been used to her lot in life. She has problems, it is true. But we all have our crosses to bear.”
    “Hers seem greater than most.”
    “Perhaps.”
    Tim