Anna Schmidt - Family Blessings

Pleasant nodded and turned to go back inside the bakery’s kitchen. It’s a start, she thought.

“I could still use an assistant,” Jeremiah called and her step faltered. “Maybe we could see how painting the porch post works out and then …”

“My offer is simply that of a neighbor wishing to help another neighbor,” Pleasant said stiffly.

“Got that part,” Jeremiah said, moving closer, twirling the broom handle through his fingers and grinning. “But you’ll soon learn that I don’t give up easily, Pleasant.”

It was the second time he had used her given name that morning. It was as if he were testing her. She smiled sweetly, the way she had seen her half sister Greta smile when she was determined to have her way. “And in time you will learn, Herr Troyer, that I do not make decisions lightly and I will always do what I think is best for my children.”

She turned to leave but realized that he was propping the broom against the wall and intended to follow her inside.

“How’s the cone recipe coming?” he asked as he held the door for her and then followed her into the kitchen.

“I expect to have some samples for you to try by the end of the week,” she said. “They would best be tested with ice cream since the flavors will have to mingle.”

He nodded and took a seat on one of the stools that Gunther kept in the kitchen.

Make yourself at home, she thought, exasperated by his assumption that his presence was welcome.

“How about this? You let me know as soon as you have something that you think might work and I’ll make up three different flavors so we can try the various combinations. We can have a tasting party.”

She opened her mouth to refuse, but then thought, Why not? It would be a special treat for the children. “All right,” she replied, placing the braided egg loaves on pans.

His silence was unusual so she glanced up and saw him studying her, a half frown on his forehead and a half smile on his lips. “You do surprise me, Pleasant,” he said and then the smile won and blossomed into a full-fledged grin. “End of the week then.”

And the man actually winked at her as he pushed himself to his feet and left her standing there, a pan of unbaked egg bread half in and half out of the oven.

Jeremiah sat at his desk and watched the Obermeier boy painting the porch column. He was meticulous in the work, going back over a section that did not meet his standards for perfection. Jeremiah remembered his own painstaking attention to detail in the years he’d spent living with his father’s brother. For him it had come from knowing that if he failed to do a job to the exacting standards his uncle had set for him, he would have to do it again or worse, he would be punished.

Had Rolf’s father been a man like Jeremiah’s uncle? Did that explain the boy’s reticence?

“Maybe the kid’s just shy,” Jeremiah muttered as he pushed his chair away from the desk. He had to stop seeing his uncle in every adult and himself in every quiet child. He took down his hat from the wooden peg near the door and went outside. “Good job,” he said.

Rolf stepped away for a moment and surveyed his work. “Missed a spot,” he muttered and bent to cover it before turning his attention to the next side of the square column.

“How’s school?” Jeremiah sat on the edge of the porch.

“Gut.” Rolf lapsed naturally into the Pennsylvania Dutch that Jeremiah assumed was most often spoken at home.

“What are you studying?”

Sticking with his native tongue, Rolf listed the subjects. “Arithmetic, history, geography.”

“Your classes are conducted in English?” Jeremiah assumed this might be the case since it was a common way to prepare young people for dealing with those outside the Amish community.

“Ja.”

“Does your mother use English at home?”

The paintbrush faltered for a moment. “My stepmother does—yes.”

Jeremiah considered the correction. Did it mean that Rolf resented Pleasant or simply that he felt a loyalty to his own mother? “I was about your age when my father died. Tougher on you, I expect, losing both your parents.”

This time, Rolf looked at him as if trying to decide where this conversation might be headed. “Mama is good to us,” he murmured, his tone slightly defensive.

Jeremiah let the silence settle around them for a long moment. “Do you like ice cream, Rolf?”

“Ja.”

“Me, too. I’ve been working on a new flavor. How about tasting it for me and telling me what you think?”

Rolf continued his long brush strokes. “I should ask permission first.”

Jeremiah covered a smile by glancing away toward the bakery. “That’s probably best. Your sister’s helping out at the bakery, is she?”

Rolf nodded. “After school she watches my brothers until Mama gets everything ready for tomorrow’s baking, then we all go home together.”

“Well, then the way I see it we’ve got ourselves a bunch of tasters. You finish up there and go get your mama and sister and brothers while I go get dishes and spoons and the ice cream.”

“You want me to bring them over here?” The kid’s eyes widened.

“Well, sure. I mean that’s where the ice cream is.”

Rolf’s hand shook slightly as he returned to his painting, now going over an area he’d covered adequately.

“Or I could go over and get the others while you clean up here. Looks to me like you’ve finished.” Without waiting for the boy’s reply he headed for the kitchen entrance to the bakery.

Through the open door he could hear the lively chatter of the twins and the clatter of the large metal pans and bowls that Pleasant used for making the breads and rolls she baked each morning. As he got closer, he could hear the low murmur of voices—Pleasant’s and the girl’s. Bettina, he reminded himself.

“Hello?” he called as much to give fair warning of his approach as to deliver a greeting.

Two pairs of small feet padded across the bakery floor at a run while everything else went silent.

“Well, hello there,” he said when the twins lined up at the door and stared out at him. “Is your mother here?”

“Is there a problem, Herr Troyer?” Pleasant glanced anxiously past him to where Rolf was cleaning the paintbrush.

Now why would she automatically assume that?

Jeremiah thought. “Actually, I’ve come to ask another favor.”

She waited, wiping her hands on the dish towel she held while the twins glanced from him to her and back to him.

“If we can be of help,” Pleasant said, “we’re more than …”

“I have this new flavor of ice cream I’ve concocted—vanilla with bits of mango mixed in. I wondered if you and the children might taste it for me and give me your honest opinion.”

The twins did not wait for her reply, but opened the screen door and burst out onto the back porch of the bakery seemingly ready to follow him anywhere as long as he held to his promise of ice cream.

“Boys,” Pleasant chided, then turned her attention back to Jeremiah. “I thought we had agreed on the end of the week. There is no possible way that I will have anything ready by …”

“You’d be doing me a great favor,” Jeremiah continued as if her protests had nothing to do with the topic at hand. “While you’re developing the cone recipe, don’t forget that I need to be working on special flavors for the ice cream. We can’t just offer the standard flavors, after all. Besides, I tend to be far too lenient when it comes to my own tastes for flavors.”

Bettina had joined Pleasant on the porch and she was smiling up at him. “What other flavors have you invented, Herr Troyer?” she asked.