Abram's Daughters 02 The Betrayal by Unknown Read Free Book Online Page A

;in accept you readin' geography books, imagining
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    what it's like to travel round the continent and all, but made up tales?"
    Sighing, Mary Ruth wondered how to explain. "Heic This is what readin' stories is like to me. It's findin' a sprini; in the midst of a barren land. Just when I think I might \\y and die of thirst, I stumble onto this fresh, cold water, and I'm suddenly given new life 'cause I can and do drink to my heart's content."
    Now Hannah was beside herself, seemed to Mary Rulli. She was staring down at the buggy floor, eyes blinking ami glistening to beat the band. I
    "Aw, what's a-matter, Hannah?" 1
    "I wish I could understand what you mean. That's all II best be sayin'." I
    The fact they didn't share a great love for reading w;i|J beside the point. Hannah was clearly pained by Mary Ruth's I revelation that she was obsessed with books, especially fiction. I I wish I'd never said a word, she thought. I
    She leaned over and tipped her head toward her twin's, I their white prayer bonnets forming a double heart as the horse I pulled them toward Strasburg. I
    While Mary Ruth hurried across the street to the library, ] Hannah made a beeline to the gift shop with her basketful of] newly embroidered handkerchiefs in hand. Happily, she received her payment from the owner, Frances Brubaker, a short, petite woman in her thirties, Hannah guessed. Then she counted out forty more cotton hankies, a third of which showcased embroidered bumblebees this time. The rest wciv
    birds' nests with pale blue eggs nestled inside, and there were
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    iniiluMN of fruit, too all colors. She had decided it was H ntllvh something different than the birds and multii' l butterflies of the last grouping.
    ' >'||d she was there, two English women came into the
    -in more talkative than the other. Both were oohing K .liliyj over the various items, as if never having laid eyes
    I 'ulinnde" things, which was the word they kept repeat-
    1 I (Ills somewhat reverently. They spotted Hannah near I i'ilt'1' and took an immediate interest, peering over at I: 'Till times, unashamed at their curiosity. Each time,
    i 11, Aw had to look away, suffering the same uncontrol-
    1< i "linn of shyness she had while tending to the roadside     | 11 Amishwoman with several children in tow came into | 11 11ie other day," Frances addressed her from behind | Miner. "She was looking to buy a whole bunch of | leivd hankies. But she specifically requested cutuiork | I'lc.ry, like the one she brought to show me." I i ' iniiiih was "surprised at this. "What did it look like?"
    I r||, ii had a dainty emerald-and-gold butterfly sewn
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    I ilie corner."
    j . ml cutwork, you say?"
    I ! 11Hi's nodded. "The customer was very interested in it,
    1 ' 'lhing else would do. She said she wants to give a quani ilu-m away on her son's wedding day . . . that she'd stop
    in .i month or so. Could you duplicate a hankie like that
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    I ' liiyho so if I could see it." Hannah found this more
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    curious than she cared to say. Truth was, she'd made only our such cutwork butterfly hankie in her life. And awful pretty, il she thought so herself. She'd given it, along with cross stitched pillowcases, as a gift three years ago to Sadie on lu-i sixteenth birthday. Sadie's reaction had been one of such j< iy Hannah decided it should remain extra special. Never again would she make the cutwork style on any of her other h;in kies, either for sale or for gifts, in honor of Sadie's turninr. courting age.
    "I would make most anything else . . . just not a handkn chief like that." She wondered who the woman had been, ask ing about a handkerchief so surprisingly similar to Sadie', own. But she kept her peace and said no more.
    Still, she couldn't stop thinking how peculiar