“Danke.” Arden sucked in a shaky breath. “I appreciate that more than you know.”
“Now, if you wanted to stop in for a cup of coffee, my wife has been baking,” Job said.
And how could Arden say no to the man who’d just forgiven him so much? But also...this was Sarai’s father, and he was getting a rare opportunity to sit down with the man and get to know him on a different level. An idea had started to grow inside of him... Now that he was free of his debt, things might be a little different between him and Sarai.
He smiled gratefully. “I’d be happy to.”
Maybe, just maybe, Job would one day be willing to welcome Arden into his family. But one step at a time...
An Englisher woman accepted the last carton of eggs from her order and placed it into a box in the back seat of her car.
“Thank you so much,” she said. “I’ll see you again next week.”
“Yah. See you.” Sarai smiled, but her chest still felt tight.
She hadn’t slept well the night before, and she hadn’t even told Mammi what had happened. She didn’t want to ruin her grandmother’s happiness right after her engagement. She looked like a girl in love—blushing and smiling and humming to herself while she worked.
The Englisher drove away, and Sarai walked back over to the porch where Verna waited, sitting on the step.
“Sarai, you look so sad,” Verna said.
“I’ll be all right.” But she wasn’t sure that was true, and she couldn’t just lie to her friend, so she added, “Eventually.”
“You fell for Arden, didn’t you?”
A tear slipped down Sarai’s cheek, and she dashed it away. “I did. But it was foolish of me. I’m no better than any of the others, am I?”
“Was he just playing games?” Verna asked with a frown.
“I wish he were,” Sarai said. “I know how to be angry at him. But this was earnest and real and honest.”
“Then what’s wrong?” Verna asked.
“First of all, he can’t come back because he needs to pay someone back for something, and...it’s not my story to tell, and I promised him I wouldn’t tell anyone. But he needs to pay someone back and he doesn’t feel like he can come here until he does.”
“Oh...” Verna frowned.
“And even if he’d paid them back, his family still needs him in Ohio, and if it weren’t for his family needing him, maybe he’d stay here. And me going to Ohio is quite scary...” Sarai winced. “I suppose for me, it all boils down to the fact that I don’t know if I can really trust his love.”
“Because of his history,” Verna said with a nod.
“Yah.” Sarai sank down onto the step next to her friend, and Verna reached over and took her hand.
“I hope I wasn’t part of you worrying about him going back to old ways,” Verna said. “I know I reacted really quickly when I saw him talking to my niece, but she talked to me later, and she felt terrible. She’d been throwing herself at him, and he kept kindly telling her she needed to come back to us women. He wasn’t taking the bait, Sarai. He was being decent.”
“That’s what he said, too,” she said.
“So it’s confirmed,” Verna said.
“Maybe.”
Verna was silent for a moment. “I shouldn’t say anything, but I went to Bishop Glick this morning, and I told him about my worries about my niece. Arden came up, and in confidence, the bishop told me that they’d been hearing very good things about Arden in Ohio. He works very hard. He’s reliable. He’s honest and fair. Sarai, he’s not the same as he was.”
Sarai looked over at her friend, her mind spinning. “He really has changed?”
“It happens,” Verna said. “Gott doesn’t leave us the way He finds us. He improves upon us, and it seems that He has been working on Arden. He’s more compassionate now, and he’s careful in his affections and actions. You even said he needed to make something right with someone here in Redemption. That’s not the boy I remember!”
“Me, neither,” Sarai agreed quietly. But he’d never be able to pay her father back, and it all seemed utterly hopeless.
“Does he feel the same thing you do?” Verna asked.
Sarai nodded. “We love each other.”
Verna put a hand over her heart. “Really?”
Sarai nodded again, not trusting herself to speak.
“You know how special that is, right?” Verna asked. “I’m older than you, and I’ve been praying for years for a good husband. Falling in love doesn’t come along every day. It hasn’t come along for me yet!”
Verna was silent for a moment, and then she turned toward Sarai. “Can I tell you something that embarrasses me?”
“Yah...” Sarai met her friend’s gaze.
“I used to dislike Englishers.” Color rose in her friend’s cheeks, and Verna dropped her gaze. “I was very bigoted. I thought they were wicked and heathen and just willfully blind to Gott’s ways. I didn’t like them. I wouldn’t talk to them at the market. I’d pretend I didn’t understand them or that I hadn’t heard them. I would glare at them and tell them to stop it when they tried to take pictures of me. I told myself it was because of our beliefs, but deep down it was just that I didn’t like them, and it was an excuse to say something sharp.”
“I remember you not being comfortable around them,” Sarai said.
“It went deeper.” Verna looked chagrined. “I’m only telling you this because I changed. Gott changed me, really. The bishop and that politician woman asked me if I’d teach the knitting class. I only started doing it because I needed the money, and they were willing to pay. I was scared at first. And I thought I wouldn’t like them simply because they were Englishers. But that class changed me. I was forced to talk to those Englisher young people, and they told me their own stories. As I got to know them—the very kind of Englishers that scared me most—I realized that they were just kinner. And...I won’t ever see Englishers the same way again. I’m not prejudiced anymore. They really are just like us. My point is people can change, Sarai. I did, and I won’t ever go back to being the same way I was again. We grow and we learn over time. We become better people. By the time we’re your grandmother’s age, may we be as sweet and saintly as she is!”
