LITMIR.BIZ

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not by looking at their eyes.”

      Johanna met Hannah’s questioning gaze. It was clear to Hannah that for once, even wise, sensible Johanna was dumbstruck.

      “I’m Hannah,” she repeated. “And these are my daughters Johanna—” she indicated each one in turn “—Susanna and Rebecca. This is Irwin.” She turned back toward the rocker by the window. “And Aunt Jezzy.”

      The stranger nodded. “I’m Grace...and this is my boy, Dakota.”

      “Da-kota?” Susanna wrinkled her nose. “That’s a funny name.”

      The young woman shrugged, holding tightly to the child’s hand. “I thought it was pretty. He was a pretty baby. I wanted him to have a pretty name.”

      She had an unfamiliar accent, not one Hannah was familiar with. She spoke English well enough. Hannah didn’t think the stranger was born in another country, just another part of America, maybe Kansas or farther west.

      “Oh, you must be as cold as the child,” Hannah said. “Rebecca, fetch a blanket for our guest.”

      Grace held out a hand to the warmth of the woodstove. Hannah noticed that her nails were bitten to the quick and none too clean.

      “Are you Plain?” Hannah asked in an attempt to solve the mystery of the unusual clothes.

      The woman blinked in confusion.

      “You’re not Amish,” Hannah said.

      “Maybe she’s Mennonite,” Aunt Jezzy suggested. “She might be one of those Ohio Old Order Mennonites or Shakers. Are you a Shaker?”

      “I’m sorry...about the apron.” Grace brushed at it. “It was the only one I could find. I looked in Goodwill and Salvation Army. You don’t find many aprons and the only other one I saw had something...something not nice written on it.”

      Hannah struggled to hide her amusement. The apron was awful. It had seen better days and was as soaked as the rest of her clothes, but the red roosters and the watermelons printed on it were definitely not like any Mennonite clothing Hannah had ever seen.

      “Would you like some clothes for your little boy?” Johanna offered. “We could dry his trousers and shirt over the stove.”

      Grace pressed her lips together and nodded. “That’s nice of you.”

      “And something hot to drink for you?” Johanna suggested. “Tea or coffee?”

      “Coffee, please, if you don’t mind,” Grace answered. “I like it with sugar and milk, if you have milk.”

      “We have milk.” Susanna smiled broadly.

      “Maybe Dakota would like some hot milk or cocoa,” Hannah said, noticing the way the boy was staring at a plate of oatmeal cookies on the counter. “He’s welcome to have a cookie with it, if you don’t mind.”

      “He’d like that,” Grace stammered, shifting him from one slender hip to the other. “The cocoa and a cookie. We missed dinner...being on the road and all.”

      Hannah thought to herself that Grace had missed more than one dinner. The girl was practically a bag of bones. “Let us find you both some dry things,” Hannah offered. “I’ve got a big pot of chicken vegetable soup on the back of the stove. That might help both of you warm up.” She smiled. “But I’m afraid you’re stuck here until morning. We don’t have a phone, and it’s too nasty a night to hitch the horses to the buggy. In the morning, we’ll help you continue on your way.”

      “You’d do that? For me?” Grace asked. She sniffed and wiped her nose with the back of her hand. Her eyes were welling up with tears. “You don’t know me. That’s so good of you. I didn’t think... People told me the Amish didn’t like outsiders.”

      “Ya,” Hannah agreed. “People say a lot about us. Most of it’s not true.” Then she looked at the stranger more closely. What was there about this skinny girl that looked vaguely familiar? Something... Something... “What did you say your last name was?” she asked.

      Grace shook her head. “I didn’t.”

      Hannah had the oddest feeling that she knew what the stranger was going to say before she said it.

      “It’s Yoder.” The young woman looked up at her with familiar blue eyes. “Same as you. I’m Grace Yoder.”

      Chapter Two

      “I’m Grace Yoder,” Grace repeated, gazing around the room expectantly. “And I’ve come a long way...from Nebraska.” Standing here in this fairytale kitchen, her clothes dripping on the beautiful wood floor, all these strangers staring at her, Grace was so nervous that she could hardly get the words out. “We went to Pennsylvania where he grew up, but people said he moved here. I hope this is the right house. We’re looking for Jonas Yoder.” She paused for a long moment. “Please tell him his daughter and grandson are here to see him.”

      “Was in der welt?” the older woman in the rocking chair, Aunt Jezebel, exclaimed. “Lecherich!”

      “Ne,” the oldest sister said to Grace. Her expression hardened. “You’ve made a mistake. Jonas Yoder isn’t your father. He’s ours.”

      The younger girl, Rebecca, looked at her mother. She was holding a blanket she’d just fetched. “Tell her, Mam! Tell her that she’s wrong! It’s a different Jonas Yoder she’s looking for. She can’t be...” She took the hand of her younger sister, the one who looked as if she had Down syndrome, and squeezed it tightly.

      “Absatz,” Hannah said. “Stop it, all of you.” She moved closer to Grace and touched her chin with two fingertips, tilting her face up to the light. She looked into her eyes, and when she spoke again, her voice was kind. “What is your mother’s name?”

      “Trudie,” Grace answered. “Trudie Schrock. She was Trudie from Belleville, Pennsylvania, and she was born one of you— Amish.”

      “Trudie Schrock?” the older woman said loudly from her chair. “I know that name. Trudie’s aunt was a friend of Lavina. Trudie was the third daughter in the family, tenth or eleventh child. The Schrocks had a lot of children.”

      “And her name was Trudie? You’re sure of it, Aunt Jezzy?” Johanna—the one with the attitude—asked.

      “Ya. For sure, Johanna. That Trudie’s the only one who didn’t join the church. It hurt her family haremlich...terrible bad. Her father was a preacher, which made things worse. But there was never any talk of the girl being in the family way. Trudie left home and they never heard from her again. Must be some other Jonas this girl’s looking for.”

      Grace didn’t know what to say, but she knew she’d come to the right house.

      Hannah shook her head. “Ne, Aunt Jezzy. Jonas told me, before we married that...he and Trudie Schrock...that I wasn’t his first serious girlfriend.”

      “But not...” Johanna twisted her fingers in the hem of her apron looking from her mother to Grace and back to her mother again. “Dat would never... To make a baby with a girl not his wife. He couldn’t have...”

      “Hush,” Hannah said. “Don’t be a child.” She waved toward the table. “Come and sit, Grace. Was your mother certain? That Jonas...” She sighed, was quiet for a moment, and then went on. “I should have seen it the moment you walked into my kitchen. You have my Jonas’s red hair...his blue eyes. And you have the look of your sisters.”

      Grace swallowed, feeling a little dizzy. This was even harder than she thought it would be. She felt as if she was going to cry and she had no idea why. Her gaze moved from person to person. “I have sisters?”

      Hannah nodded. “I’m Jonas’s wife, and that makes my daughters—our daughters—your sisters.” She waved toward the stunned girls. “These three are your sisters, and there are four

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