‘But embracing the future,’ I reminded him, thinking of Jacob and Sarah. ‘Aren’t the Amish all … related? Surely that causes issues.’
Luther raised an eyebrow. ‘I wondered about that too. But they’ve got that covered, apparently. This particular farming community stretches over a radius, from the town, of around twenty-five miles, and a large number of the people are related. However, to avoid birth defects in their babies they have a managed, proactive system of mutual immigration between Amish Communities throughout North America. Jacob's family immigrated here from an unrelated Amish Community in northern Mexico when Jacob was only ten.’
‘So Jacob and Sarah aren’t even distant cousins. Ingenious.’
‘It really is,’ agreed Luther. ‘Planning well into the future.’
The evidence of all this ingenuity and sheer … community … was clear to see, and for a moment, I envied the simple productivity of it all, of how my own ancestors would have created our home. By evening, all the buildings would be erected, with only a bit of roofing remaining to be done. This, along with finishing the building interiors, doing the outside and inside painting, and completing some finishing touches, would be done on the second day, before turning the farmstead over to Jacob and Sarah. On the following day, as the final touches were being applied to the building, other Amish men and boys would fill the barn with hay, animal feed, animals and equipment, the house with furniture, curtains, drapery, linens, dinnerware, and utensils, and the outbuildings with tools and supplies.
‘By the time everyone leaves tomorrow, Jacob and Sarah will have a home ready for occupancy and a farmstead ready for farming. Can you imagine?’
Luther shook his head, hardly able to take it in himself even though it was all transpiring before his eyes.
But surely he should be able to imagine that. ‘Well, won’t you get that, too, if your family is Amish?’
The young man turned to me with a frown. ‘My family isn’t Amish,’ he said. ‘They’re African-Americans from North Carolina.’
‘But you said—?
Suddenly his head jerked upwards. ‘Oh, my aunt and uncle are coming.’
It was the Golden Pond couple, striding across the field toward us as quickly as the woman’s long dress would allow.
‘So who are they?’ I asked, thoroughly confused by now.
‘Those are my great-aunt and uncle, Molly and Charlie,’ he said with a little twitch of his mouth.
He was enjoying this now, keeping me on the ropes.
I looked at them again, holding hands and laughing as Molly trod on the trailing hem of her skirt.
‘Wait. That old Amish couple, who think a horse-drawn buggy is a Ferrari and have obviously been married forever, are your great-somethings?’
Luther shrugged. ‘It’s complicated,’ he said with a mighty twinkle in his eye.
He knew exactly what he was doing. “It’s complicated” was music to a journalist’s ears. “It’s complicated” meant there was a story here. A big, complex, interlaced story that was just the kind of fish I wanted to land.
‘And they haven’t been married forever,’ added Luther mischievously. ‘They only met when they were nearly forty years old, and both in happy marriages.’
Pulling the face of youth which suggested that forty was ancient, Luther clambered up into the buggy and reached for the reins. ‘You’re even wrong about the buggy,’ he said in an infuriating drawl, like a child harboring an outrageous secret. ‘They know all about fast vehicles. All about them. Do you like to drive fast, Brendon? I sure did.’
He was reeling me in, landing me right at his feet on the floor of an Amish buggy.
‘You’d better tell me this story,’ I told him. ‘Otherwise my boss won’t need to worry about me getting shot, because I’m going to die of plain old curiosity.’
At least he had the humility to laugh at my perplexed expression. I sighed, and handed him my card.
‘Start talking,’ I told him. ‘And soon.’
‘I’ve got all weekend,’ he said, nodding across to the barn-raising, ‘if you have the time to spare.’
And suddenly the blank wooden walls of my lake-side cabin seemed a whole lot more interesting.
Chapter 1
* * *
Charlie Boy
* * *
They used to tell me I was building a dream,
And so I followed the mob.
When there was earth to plow or guns to bear
I was always there, right on the job.
Brother, Can You Spare a Dime, Al Jolson
The Great Depression, they were calling it. What was so great about it, Charlie had no idea.
But then, he knew they weren’t suffering so badly, out in the countryside with all the home-grown produce and stock they had to hand. In the city, he’d heard Mr Edmundson saying in church the previous week, there was all sorts of lawlessness, what with people starving and all, unable to find work or even a crust to eat.