Sadie smiled at me, looking up for a moment, and said, “Good morning, Dadi,” and went back to her milking.
I said good morning back. I do not know why I felt sadness, but for a moment, I did. But by the time I was walking to hitch the horses to the plow to prepare two more acres for the wheat, I was no longer sorrowful.
And the air was cooler, the first truly cool day for many, many months.
IN THE AFTERNOON, BISHOP and Mrs. Schrock came for an unexpected visit. Mrs. Schrock talked with Hannah, maybe about Sadie. This would be good for Hannah, because Mrs. Schrock is frail, but a gentle, quiet heart, and very good at prayer.
Bishop Schrock talked with me, and it was about Mike. He was concerned for my soul, being around such a one. He was thinking that I should consider ending our partnership, of finding another to seek the orders for my woodshop among the English.
“There are English and there are English,” he said. “He is a divorced man,” he said, “and a drunkard. In the town I heard that the police had to be called because of their fighting. He is not someone you should be associating with. He might steal from you, and might bring shame on all of us.”
Bishop Schrock talked for quite a while. When he preaches, this is also true.
I listened, mostly. We have had this conversation before. Back in August, on the 10th. And, let me look back. Yes, July 14th. And other times. Bishop Schrock is a persistent man, so different from Bishop Beiler.
And I answered that I was very sorry that Mike was having such a hard time, and that such things were common now among the English. And I said, as I have every time we have spoken of this, that though the English cannot be of the Order, and we cannot take their ways into our hearts, we must always be compassionate to them.
If I only pray for him, and do not help him through my listening and our work, then am I doing as Jesus would have me do? I said this, as I always say this. And Bishop Schrock always looks away, and his face looks as if he has hurt a tooth, his jaw working a little bit. That is how his face looks, when I say that.
Last year, when he brought his concerns about Mike to the deacons, and they talked, that is what I said. I said other things, too, but that was the heart of it. And they decided what they decided. That is why I still work with Mike.
“I will pray for you on this matter,” said Bishop Schrock. I thanked him, and told him that I always appreciated a heartfelt prayer.
And then we talked about chickens.
September 20
The day began, and the cool was in the air as the sun rose. Fall is so close now. Sadie is helping more. Jacob was milking this morning, but she was near the house, moving methodically through the last of the everbearing strawberries, filling a small basket with the fruit.
It is so late to be gathering them, but they keep coming. Joseph Fisher told me that last year, they still had everbearing strawberries coming in late October. Of course, the frost and that one huge early snow came, but it was still so very late.
Sadie and Hannah spent the morning working on strawberry preserves, and Jacob and I killed and plucked that hen, and two broilers we’d been fattening up.
It was a slow day, a calm day. I went to sit near the road, and chewed on a bit of straw, and watched the English roar by in their cars. Car after car, whoosh.
Whoosh. Whoosh. Such a hurry.
But for me, it was restful, a sabbath, though not the Sabbath.
SADIE WAS STILL OUTSIDE, though it had been dark for several hours.
I heard Hannah call for her, and Sadie replied, but I did not hear what Sadie said.
I went to the kitchen, and Hannah told me to go talk with her. What did she say? I asked. Just talk with her, Hannah asked. She was trying not to be upset.
And so I went, and I sat, and I asked her what she was doing.
She was not upset. She was not unhappy. She looked at me with her large eyes set kind and sad into that slender face, and she smiled.
“I’m waiting for the angels, Dadi. I want to see them when they come.”
I asked her what that meant. But she just smiled, and shook her head. “You’ll see, Dadi.”
Then she asked, “Dadi, can you stay with me? Can you sit awhile?”
I said that I could. “If it takes three nights, or even seven?” she asked. I told her that I could.
“It is very soon, Dadi,” she said. “Very soon. I’m glad you’ll sit with me.”
And so we sat, for an hour, saying little. My concern faded, as she nestled against me. After a while, she gave me a little hug, and went in to go to bed. She did not seem upset.
Hannah and I talked afterward, and I told her what Sadie had said. She asked what it meant again, and I said what I had said before.
She is not angry or afraid, I added. And she has been doing so well in the kitchen and around the house.
I know, Hannah said. And then she paused, as if to say more, but she did not.
September 21
After breakfast, today was mostly apple picking. The Fishers came to join in, and then the Sorensons, as our acre and a half of trees was ready for picking, and the four of us can only gather in so much. Deacon Sorenson brought his big wagon, and three of his sons, and the eldest’s wife and her new baby.
We moved from tree to tree, in groups that mingled and changed. Jacob was a help, of course. And Sadie was very busy. She laughed, and passed a smile to the middle Fisher boy. Then she went back with Hannah and Mrs. Sorenson and Mrs. Fisher to help prepare the meal for tonight.
The baskets filled quickly, and the two wagons were soon loaded. The yield was not as much as the year before, and many of the apples were small, but it was still an abundance. After a long, slow day, twenty-two bushels, with much still left on the trees. There would be plenty for sale, and for cider, and for preserves.
Then there was talking, and lemonade, and some early cider.
For dinner, ham, and freshly baked bread, and beans in the cool of the late afternoon. Deacon Sorenson said a simple blessing, as is his way. It was a very nice day.
SADIE SAT OUT AGAIN tonight, watching the sky as the stars appeared. I sat with her, of course. We mostly talked about the day, and the picking, and when I mentioned Sam Fisher, she may have blushed a little. But it was dark.
The air was cool, and as the night grew deeper, it took on the scent and crispness of autumn.
Another night like this, and we will need a fire in the stove, I said to Sadie. “I love to just watch the fire in the fireplace,” she said. “So pretty, as it dances.”
I agreed.
We sat for maybe an hour, until the sky was fully dark. And then she said, “Not tonight,” and gave me a little hug, and went to prepare for bed.
September 22
And on the third night, the angels came and filled the heavens.
It began in early evening, as I watched, sitting with Sadie again, just as she had asked.