Chapter 7
The family was in turmoil. There was no other way Moses could describe it.
Daet was silent and stony, which meant he was thinking things through.
Daet wasn’t a man who spoke quickly or rashly, and he wouldn’t do that for Dawdie’s will either.
But he was thinking, all the same. Mamm just looked nervous.
She’d burned the oatmeal that morning, and she watched Daet with a cautious look on her face.
In the dawdie hus that was built onto the side of the farmhouse, Moses had overheard his brother’s elevated voice as he ranted about the will.
Benuel was furious, and Sadie hadn’t said a word about it, but she would have an opinion, obviously.
She was smarter than to voice it to the rest of them while everyone’s emotions were still raw.
Dawdie had written them both out of the will, and it hurt.
Moses’s shovel scraped across the concrete as he scooped up the soiled hay from the stable floor.
Benuel was still angry, and Moses assumed that anger would be easier to feel right now than his own feelings of confusion and betrayal.
Unfortunately for him, Moses wasn’t mad.
He knew he wasn’t truly owed anything, because Dawdie could have decided to leave the farm to one of Moses’s cousins.
That had always been a remote possibility.
This was worse, though. He felt like his grandfather had rejected all of them, and he didn’t know what they’d done wrong.
The side door opened, and Benuel came inside the stable. With a morose look on his face, he leaned against the rail, watching Moses work.
“You want to pick up a shovel?” Moses said.
His brother sighed and headed over to grab another shovel. “I wonder if her family was in on it.”
Moses didn’t have to ask who he was talking about. Miri was the one they’d all been discussing since the reading of the will.
“What do you mean?”
“I wonder if they were all trying to soften Dawdie up, to get him to change his will for Miri?”
Miri’s family had known Dawdie pretty well. Miri had been good friends with him. Her daet pitched in to help Dawdie with odd jobs when Moses and Benuel were busy. They’d been part of a supportive community.
“Who does that?” Moses said.
“Who changes his will weeks before his death to leave the family land to the girl who made his soup?” Benuel shot back.
His brother had a point, but Moses shook his head. “We can’t start assuming that an entire family plotted against a sick old man to get his land, Benuel. That’s downright evil. These are fellow Amish Christians, and they looked as shocked at the will reading as we were.”
Moses knocked some sticky straw off his shovel with a clang against the concrete floor. Besides, they knew the Schrocks. They were solid people.
“What about Dawdie’s letter to us?” Benuel asked.
“I don’t know what he was talking about, either,” Moses said. “How on earth is this for the best? Did you offend him in the last couple of months? Because I don’t think I did.”
“I can’t think of anything I said or did.” Benuel started on the next stall. “Why would he change his mind?”
Moses didn’t answer, because he had no idea. It was going to be him or Benuel. They’d known it for years. That was why they were already working the farm. They knew the land and the herd so that when they took over, it could be seamless.
“Is it because we wanted to use part of the land for your tourist cabin rentals?” Moses asked.
Benuel shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe. Dawdie didn’t want anything to change, but the market is changing.
It’s harder to make a proper living on raising a small herd for market.
Everything costs more. We would have to change, too, if we wanted that farm to support two families, and tourists want a taste of a real Amish farm.
I could make a proper income for my own family with those rentals and lose . . . two fields? It makes sense.”
“If it was that, though, why not leave it to Leroy or Paul?” Moses asked.
Leroy and Paul were their cousins—a few years older, but neither had a house and land of their own yet. That would have kept the land in the Yoder family, at least. But they’d been passed over too. Was this less personal than he thought?
Outside, Moses could hear deep voices. Daet was talking to someone.
Moses went to the door and looked outside.
It was Bishop Hertzler—recognizable from his stout form and perfectly straight hat.
The men both had their arms crossed over their chests.
When Moses opened the door, Daet looked up and beckoned to him.
“Daet wants me,” Moses said, putting down his shovel and wiping his hands on the front of his pants before heading out to where the men were talking. Benuel came to the stable door and leaned against the frame.
“Moses, the bishop wanted to speak with you,” Daet said.
“Me?”
Moses did a quick mental tally of any infractions he might have committed over the last little while. Even during the reading of the will gathering, he’d kept his mouth shut. That had to count for something.
“Yah, I came by to see you, Moses.” The older man gave him a cordial nod. “How are you?”
“I’m all right.” That wasn’t entirely true. He’d slept terribly, he was hurt over his grandfather’s decision about the farm, and he wanted answers.
“Yah? Are you?” Bishop Hertzler cocked his head to one side, eyeing him speculatively. “You don’t look like you slept, sohn.”
“I didn’t,” Moses admitted.
The bishop angled his head toward the gravel drive, and Moses fell into step next to him as they walked a little way off for some privacy.
The gravel on the shade-dappled drive crunched under his boots, and he glanced at the bishop out of the corner of his eye.
The bishop was a busy man with his own farm, his own family, and the burden of pastoral duties.
He didn’t normally visit just for a friendly chat.
He came to set a church member straight on a certain issue.
Period. But the older man stayed quiet, and so did Moses.
“How is the family?” the bishop asked after a moment. He stopped, turning to face Moses.
“Hurt. Grieving. Confused.” That was the honest answer.
Bishop Hertzler nodded slowly. “Your grandfather knew it would be that way. I asked him to discuss this with all of you before he passed, but he didn’t want to.”
“Do you know why?”
“Didn’t the letter explain?” the bishop asked.
“No. It said it was for the best. That was it. That doesn’t explain a thing.”
Bishop Hertzler shook his head. “He didn’t tell me much either. He said he’d changed his mind and that he thought Miri would be a good steward of the land. He was quite fond of that girl, you know.”
“Yah. It seems.” Moses couldn’t help the slight acid in his tone.
“You had to know that Miri was a good friend to your grandfather.”
“Of course she was. He liked her spunk. She loved cattle, too, and I think he felt sorry for her because her family didn’t have land. But that’s not a reason to cut your family out of the line of inheritance.”
“Are you angry?”
Moses shrugged. “Yah, a little. My daet grew up on my grandfather’s farm.
I spent so many days there helping Dawdie and eating Mammi’s good cooking.
And for years Dawdie told Daet that the farm was going to us.
Benuel and I had plans for the land and for working together.
It would have given our family more space to spread out.
We were both looking forward to that—we needed it. ”
“With Benuel and Sadie being newly married, I can see how some privacy might be desirable.”
“Yah, so . . . we’re upset,” Moses said.
“Do you accept the will?”
“I don’t have much choice, do I?”
Contesting the will would be the same as calling the bishop a liar. If the bishop couldn’t be trusted, he’d have to be removed from his pastoral position. It could be done, but it would rock the entire community. There might not be a community left at the end of it.
“Do you believe me that your grandfather was of sound mind and for his own reasons wanted to leave the land to Miri?”
“I don’t think you’re lying,” Moses replied.
“That’s a start.” The bishop sucked a deep breath through his nose and compressed his lips. “As your bishop, I am going to ask you to do something, Moses. You won’t like it, but I’m going to ask it of you anyway.”
As the bishop. Not as a friend. Not as a neighbor.
“What is that?” he asked warily.
“I want you to help Miri at the farm for the next couple of months while she sorts things out. She can’t run an entire farm alone, and she’ll need to hire some workers or find some family willing to step in for the long-term.
That will take time to figure out, and as her community, we need to support her in the process. ”
“You want me to . . . be her farmhand?” Moses asked incredulously.
“Yah.” Bishop Hertzler met his gaze without a waver. “I do.”
“Why me?”
Why not any number of able-bodied young men in their community who would have both time and ability to pitch in?
“Because I think it will help you to forgive her. This is a shock, but spending time with her and helping her as a good Christian will help you to see her as a human being in a difficult situation. In a community like ours, there isn’t room for bad blood between two families.
While I’d hoped your grandfather would discuss this with all of you himself to avoid hard feelings, he didn’t.
And I believe this will give you and Miri a chance to see each other honestly.
Miri is a good woman, Moses. She’s decent, honest, and kind. And this wasn’t her idea.”
“Why are you choosing me and not Benuel?”
“Because you have a cooler head than your brother, and working alone with a single woman wouldn’t be good for his new marriage.”
The bishop was ever the pragmatic one. Moses wasn’t sure if this assignment should be taken as a compliment or not. But the bishop had chosen him to step in and provide aid for an Amish neighbor who needed help.
“Moses, in times of grief and strong emotion, people can react badly,” Bishop Hertzler said slowly.
“I’ve heard of communities splitting over situations like this one, and I want healing between your families.
I want Shepherd’s Hill to be an example of Christian unity, not another tale of warning.
This is a terrible shock to your entire family, but it was the choice your grandfather made, and I had to honor it.
This is going to feel incredibly unfair to you and your brother as well.
You’ll need to make new plans, find new paths forward, and after much prayer of my own over the last few weeks, I have come to the conclusion that this is your best chance of making peace. ”
“Did she manipulate my grandfather into changing his will?” Moses asked, meeting the older man’s gaze.
“Nee, Moses. I really don’t think so. She looked as shocked as you were when I read the will. And I was watching.”
Moses sighed. “When do you want me to go?”
“Chores wait for no one,” Bishop Hertzler said with a shrug. “Being there in time for evening chores would help her a great deal. She’s good with cattle, but she’s still just one woman on her own. She can’t do this by herself.”
She couldn’t. Moses knew that, but he still felt the sting of this obligation thrust upon him. He’d lost his inheritance, and now he had to go help run a farm that would never be his.
“You’re a good man, Moses. I expect this to be difficult, but at the end of it, I think you’ll be glad you did it.”
Moses disagreed with that, but when the bishop asked a man to step in and help, that man did as he was asked.
Amish men helped their neighbors, and they turned the other cheek.
But mucking out stalls for Miri was going to be harder still because that inheritance wasn’t just about more space or money.
Moses loved that farm—the fields, the buildings, the little house packed full of generations of memories. He loved it.
And now every last acre belonged to Miri Schrock.