LITMIR.BIZ

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in my parents’ home rather than coming to live with you, Aunt Cora, you’d be appalled—and you’d find my secret much more unsettling than my decision to remain single.

      During the course of the common meal, if anyone asked about her “friend,” Regina stuck to the sketchy details she’d given about the mysterious artist so she wouldn’t incriminate herself further. The meeting with Bishop Jeremiah only took a few minutes, because when he suggested they hold their first organizational talk at his place on the following Wednesday afternoon, everyone agreed. After she bid her maidel friends goodbye, Regina pedaled her bike to her single-story home on Maple Lane, situated at the edge of town. She’d firmly decided to call her masquerade to a halt—to announce on Wednesday that her artist friend had no interest in renting a stall.

      What was I thinking, exposing myself this way?

      She entered her bedroom, stepped onto her large metal trunk, and then opened the short, narrow door in the wall so she could climb the wooden stairs to the attic.

      What if nobody wants my paintings, or, worse yet, people ridicule them? And what if folks figure out that I’m the artist—and that I’ve been living a lie for years? Best to nip this in the bud before I have to tell any more whoppers and get caught in them.

      And yet, as Regina stood in the center of her secret studio, something deep inside her longed to display the work that so satisfied her soul. Nearly every evening, after a day of staining furniture, she spent a few hours in her hideaway, painting nature scenes. Her more recent paintings hung from strings suspended across the studio, except where her easel sat by the small windows on the front of the house. Her older work was carefully stacked upright in bins—and the bins covered half the attic’s plank floor.

      Regina needed to paint the way most folks needed to eat and breathe. Her schoolteacher had complimented her artwork when she’d been young—and because composing scenes and working with color had come so naturally to her, her parents had allowed her to take a short watercolor class at Koenig’s Krafts when she’d entered rumspringa. Dat’s brother Clarence was a preacher, however, so he’d been adamant about Regina’s joining the church at an early age. She’d secured her salvation at seventeen by being baptized, but she’d forfeited her innermost soul: in the Morning Star district, members were forbidden to create art for art’s sake. Unless her painting decorated something useful like milk cans or housewares, it was considered worldly, something that called attention to the artist.

      Regina had obediently tucked her paints and brushes into her wooden trunk, but she’d felt the loss of her art acutely. After her parents had died when a train collided with the bus they were all riding in on the way home from a wedding, Regina had kept herself sane by taking up her paints again, setting up her easel in the attic—where it would be out of sight when anyone came to visit. At twenty-two, she’d been rather young to live alone on her family’s small acreage, but she’d instinctively known that moving in with strict, stern Preacher Clarence, Aunt Cora, and their young daughters would kill her spirit forever.

      Bishop Jeremiah had taken her side and had dropped in on her often until she’d gotten a little older. Martin Flaud had hired her because her father had been one of his finest craftsmen—and because Regina had proven herself to be more meticulous at staining and finishing than any of his male employees. She’d survived the rough, lonely times by working hard at the factory, and by surrounding herself with the quilts and curtains Mamm had made and the furniture Dat had built for their cozy home.

      And so the last ten years had passed . . .

      Regina had willingly given up any chance for marriage—because she couldn’t reveal her sinful pastime to a husband. Her solitary state bewildered Aunt Cora and Uncle Clarence. Her three nieces, however, were intrigued by her relative freedom and independence, which made family dynamics difficult when she spent time at her aunt and uncle’s house on visiting Sundays.

      Gazing at the nature paintings that surrounded her on that Sunday afternoon, Regina felt torn. Why had God given her a keen eye and the talent to render woodland scenes, flowers, and wild creatures on paper if He wouldn’t allow her to paint pictures of His creation openly and without guilt?

      She flipped through the paintings in the nearest bin . . . a pheasant on the riverbank; a collapsing barn surrounded by the first wildflowers of spring; an enlarged study of a dogwood blossom. Each scene brought back the wonder and awe she’d felt as she’d sketched and painted it. It saddened her greatly that she lived a double life that was unacceptable to God and to her family and friends, but painting was a habit she couldn’t seem to kick.

      Once again she told herself to back away from displaying her work at the new marketplace—to preserve her secret rather than risking exposure that would surely get her shunned. Wasn’t it exciting enough to be helping Jo, Lydianne, and the Helfings by creating new shops in what had been a dilapidated stable?

      Regina sat down at her easel. She brushed water on a section of the painting in progress and added a few more ribbons of pink and peach to a sunrise she’d begun. Watching the colors run together and take on the delicate hues of an early-morning sky caught her up in the magic of creating. If it was a sin for her to paint, picking up her brush on Sunday surely compounded her transgressions in God’s eyes, yet she was in such a quandary she didn’t know any other way to handle her opposing emotions.

      She should tell her friends that her artist friend had declined the offer to display his work. And she should pack up her paints and dispose of the evidence of her wayward nature.

      But then what would she do?

      Chapter Three

      Jo felt downright bubbly as she approached the bishop’s front porch on Wednesday afternoon. “Hey there, Margaret,” she said as Jeremiah’s mother opened the door for her. “Denki for allowing us to invade your kitchen when you’re most likely starting dinner.”

      “Sounds like you businesswomen have a lot to discuss if that old stable’s to become a place for shops,” she said. “I’ve got a chicken casserole in the oven, and if your meeting runs long, I’d appreciate it if you’d take it out.”

      “Will do.” Jo smiled, recognizing the same undertone of disapproval in Margaret’s voice that her mother had expressed several times since Sunday’s Members Meeting. “The final decision on buying the Clementi place rests with the entire congregation—”

      “Puh! Martin and Saul have been here to have their say about it, so I already know how the vote will go,” Margaret remarked as they entered the kitchen. “You’ve got coffee and a few cookies on the counter, so I’ll leave you to your planning.”

      Bishop Jeremiah chuckled as he came in from the front room with a stack of papers. “It’s no secret that God’s will and church business proceed faster when the movers and shakers put their influence behind it,” he remarked. “Gut to see you, Jo. I was hoping to speak with you before the others arrived.”

      “I’m early,” she admitted, intrigued by what she’d just heard. “I’ve sketched some plans for the arrangement of the shops and—well, I’m excited, so I couldn’t wait to get here.”

      “Your enthusiasm and organizational skills will go a long way toward helping this project succeed, too.” Jeremiah laid out his armload of papers on the kitchen table. “I hope you don’t mind that I didn’t give you credit for this marketplace idea on Sunday. Saul had been eyeing the Clementi place as additional pastureland for his cattle, and Clarence had remarked about how crowded the schoolhouse has become. When I suggested that we could build a new school on higher ground if the church acquired that property, Ammon jumped on board. Please don’t think I was downplaying your part in this project—”

      “Our church leaders are much more invested in it now because they think it’s mostly their idea—and yours,” Jo put in.

      The bishop met her eye gratefully. “Denki for understanding that. With you and your friends planning the shopping area, I believe we can create an appealing attraction that will benefit our district and the whole town of Morning Star.

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