“Full of attitude,” Aaron replied.
“Yah,” Ezekiel said with a laugh. “But in Violet’s defense, I don’t think she’s ever worked a job before.”
“So you like her well enough?” Delia asked. “You’ll be okay working with her for a couple of weeks?”
“Hey, someone to help get the work done is fine by me,” Thomas said. “I’m not sure I like that she’s getting paid and we aren’t, though.”
“She’s getting paid?” Moses protested. “That’s not fair!”
“It’s not that much,” Ezekiel said, and he reached for the bread and the butter to start his sandwich. “Besides, I just got my own buggy, and Thomas and Aaron are getting their own calves to raise for market, and you’re getting a scooter to replace your old one. So it’s all going to balance out. We might not get paid in dollars, but we do have things coming.”
“A full-grown steer for market can make a good amount,” Aaron agreed. “I’m going to make a decent profit off that calf when it’s grown.”
Thomas remained silent, and Ezekiel dished up a bowl of soup and passed it to Delia. She accepted it with a smile. Ezekiel was thoughtful that way—always making sure she had food in front of her. Then he started dishing up his brothers’ bowls, too.
“This is your farm, boys,” Delia said. “This is your roof over your head. One day the four of you will inherit this farm, too. And sometimes we hire help.”
“This is the first time I know of,” Thomas said.
“When you were all very small, your daet hired help,” she replied. “You don’t remember it because you were a toddler, but there are times when a farmer needs some extra man power around the place. And Violet needed something to occupy her time, and I finally got to clean up this kitchen properly. I think we’re ahead.”
The boys grudgingly agreed and dug into the sandwich fixings. When they’d all gotten their soup, Delia had them bow their heads for prayer. After a moment of silence, their heads popped back up and they dove into the food.
“So what do you think of Elias?” Delia asked and sipped a spoonful of soup. The beef and barley soup had turned out rather well, if she did say so herself. This was what happened when she actually had time at the stove instead of rushing around all the time.
“Are you hiring Elias, too?” Ezekiel asked past a mouthful of sandwich.
“Hiring him?” That hadn’t occurred to her at all. “No, he’s only in Redemption because he’s helping his parents move to his sister’s place. He’s well and truly busy enough. I was asking because—”
How was she supposed to say this? Carefully. That was how.
“Who is he, exactly?” Thomas asked with a frown. “I don’t think we’ve ever met him before.”
“No, you haven’t met him. He’s from long before any of you were born. He’s an old friend from grade school. He moved to another community and got married there and had Violet. His wife passed away about a year and a half ago, and we have that in common.” Delia reached for the bread, meat and mayonnaise.
“So, he’s interested in courting you,” Aaron concluded.
“He is?” Moses interjected. “Violet’s daet wants to court our mamm?”
“We’ll be spending some time together,” Delia said.
“He’s courting her,” Thomas said, his jaw tightening.
There it was—the fight they always put up at the thought of any man showing her romantic interest.
“And what if he were?” Delia asked. “What if Elias were courting me? What if he cared about me and wanted to think about a future together? Would that be so terrible?”
Her sons looked at her, varying degrees of disapproval on all their faces. It wouldn’t matter who the man was, she’d get this response from the boys.
“What would be so wrong with a man getting to know me?” she went on. “Am I not a nice woman? Don’t I cook moderately well? Am I so old-looking now?”
“No, Mamm, you’re wonderful,” Aaron said earnestly.
“Yah, you’re beautiful!” Moses said. “And you’re a great cook!”
“It isn’t you that’s the problem,” Thomas said, then took a big bite of sandwich and had to talk past the food in his mouth. “It’s him.”
“I don’t like him,” Ezekiel said.
“Me, neither,” Aaron said.
“You don’t know him!” Delia interjected.
“We’ve seen his type, Mamm,” Aaron said. “The men who see a widow with a big, profitable farm, and they figure they’d like to take that off your hands and let you spend the rest of your days in the kitchen.”
As if getting to spend time in her own home, cleaning it up and keeping it that way, cooking for her family, and getting to sit down and relax with some needlework was such a punishment! How many nights had she lain in bed remembering the days when she could do just that, when Zeke would come inside and give her a kiss and tell her that her cooking was the best in Pennsylvania?
“I wouldn’t mind that so much,” Delia said. “My kitchen is normally a disaster.”
“It’s our farm,” Ezekiel said. “You and Daet built it up together. And we’ve been working it as long as we can remember. We don’t need some man to trot in here thinking he knows flower farming better than we do.”
This was an old argument. They’d brought up these very worries with the last man to show her interest. Mind, they’d had a right to worry that last time, since he’d had an inheritance coming that required he be married.
“No one is taking the farm from us!” Delia said. “But if a man did want to get to know me—”
“Then we’d have to decide what we think of him, right?” Moses interrupted. “That’s the deal, isn’t it? You won’t marry some man and make him our new daet if we don’t like him, right?”
“We already don’t like him,” Thomas said.
