The Shunning Read Online Free PDF Page A

and such luxuries were for the English. Amish folk relied on horses and buggies for transportation, propane gas to run their camper-sized refrigerators, and a battery-operated well pump in the cellar for the household water. In fact, the Lapp family held tenaciously to all the Old Order traditions without complaint, just as generations before them.
    “How can ya miss whatcha never had?” Samuel often asked his English friends at Central Market in downtown Lancaster.
    Rebecca watched her husband, expecting him to slip out of the room without further comment. She was a bit surprised when he hesitated at the door, then returned to her bedside.
    “Are you in poor health, then? Shall I be fetchin’ a doctor?” His concern was genuine. “Wouldn’t take but a minute to hitch up ol’ Molasses and run him over to the Millers’ place.”
    Peter and Lydia Miller—Mennonites who indulged in the “English” lifestyle—lived about a mile down Hickory Lane and had offered their telephone in case of emergency. On several occasions, Samuel had taken them up on it. After all, they were kin—second cousins on Rebecca’s side—and modern as the day was long.
    “Won’t be needing any doctor. I’m wore out, that’s all,” she said softly, to put his mind at ease. “And it’d be a shame if Cousin Lydia had to worry over me for nothing.”
    “Jah, right ya be.”
    Shadows flickered on the wall opposite the simple wood-framed bed. Rebecca stared at the elongated silhouettes as she sipped her tea. She sighed, then whispered the thought that tormented her soul night and day. “Our Katie . . . she’s been asking questions.”
    A muscle twitched in Samuel’s jaw. “Jah? What questions?”
    Rebecca pulled a pillow from behind her back and hugged it to her. “I have to get up to the attic. Tonight.”
    “You’re not goin’ up there tonight. Just put it out of your mind. Rest now, you hear?”
    Rebecca shook her head. “You’re forgetting about the little rose-colored dress,” she said, her words barely audible. “A right fine baby dress . . . made of satin. Katie must’ve found it.”
    “Well, it’ll just have to wait. Tomorrow’s another day.”
    “We daresn’t wait,” Rebecca insisted, still speaking in hushed tones, reluctant to argue with her husband. “Our daughter mustn’t know . . . she’s better off never knowing.”
    Samuel leaned down and gave her a peck on her forehead. “Katie is and always will be our daughter. Now just you try ’n rest.”
    “But the dress . . .”
    “The girl can’t tell nothin’ from one little dress,” Samuel insisted. He took the pillow Rebecca had been clutching and placed it beside her, where he would lay his head later. “I best be seein’ to the children.”
    He carried the lamp out into the hallway, then closed the door, leaving Rebecca in the thick darkness . . . to think and dream.
    The children . . .
    There had been a time when Rebecca had longed for more children. Many more. But after Benjamin was born, two miscarriages and a stillbirth had taken a toll on her body. Although her family was complete enough now, she wondered what life would’ve been like with more than three . . . or four children growing up here. All her relatives and nearly every family in the church district had at least eight children. Some had more—as many as fifteen.
    It was a good thing to nurture young lives into the fold. Didn’t the Good Book say, “Children are an heritage of the Lord; and the fruit of the womb is his reward”? Children brought joy and laughter into the home and helped turn work into play.
    And there was plenty of work in an Amish household, she thought with a low chuckle. Cutting hay, planting potatoes, sowing alfalfa or clover. Families in Hickory Hollow always worked together. They had to. Without the convenience of tractors and other modern farm equipment, everything took longer. But it was the accepted way of parents, grandparents, and great-grandparents