Susanna's Dream: The Lost Sisters of Pleasant Valley, Book Two by Marta Perry Read Free Book Online Page B

how to do it. How would he feel in such a situation? “I guess the thing to ask is whether you really want to find out, or just ignore it.”
    Susanna blinked back the tears. “At first I wanted to wipe it away. But I can’t, can I? I have to know. If my parents kept it from me all these years—well, I have to understand.”
    Little wonder she’d been upset, with an Englischer she hardly knew coming to her with such a tale. There were troubled people in the world, after all, and he was quite ready to believe this woman was one of them. But Adam and Lydia Beachy wouldn’t be involved in anything that wasn’t right.
    “If you were to go to Lydia Beachy . . .” he began.
    Susanna made a pushing-away gesture. “I don’t think I can. It was hard enough hearing it from Chloe.”
    He thought he understood. “You need someone who knows but isn’t so involved, ja? What about Bishop Mose?”
    “Bishop Mose?” she repeated, looking a bit confused.
    “The bishop over in Pleasant Valley,” he explained. “You can’t tell me this is going on among his people without his knowing about it.”
    “Chloe did say something about the bishop telling Lydia how to find me. So he must know about it.” Susanna rubbed her arms. “It’s just . . . ferhoodled, thinking other folks might know something about me that I don’t know myself.”
    Susanna was sounding more controlled, and she looked better, as if talking it over with him had helped her get a hold on the situation. The tears had gone, for now at least.
    “Talk to Bishop Mose, that’s my advice. You can depend on him to tell you the truth.” He hesitated, but discovered that he couldn’t leave Susanna’s worries so easily. She’d confided in him, and giving her advice meant taking on some responsibility. “I know him. I’ll go with you.”
    “I can’t ask you to go to so much trouble. Your store takes up your days.”
    “Ach, it will do my workers good to be in charge for a few hours.” If he was going to do this, he’d do it right. “I’ll send one of the girls from the store over to mind your shop tomorrow afternoon, just so Mamm doesn’t get any ideas about coming in. And I’ll see to a car. Just be ready about one, ja?”
    “But . . .” Susanna still looked troubled, but he wasn’t sure whether it was over the prospect of learning the truth or spending an afternoon in his company.
    “It’s the least my mother would expect, ain’t so?” He clasped her hand for an instant. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”
    He made a hasty retreat before she could argue. And all the way back to the shop, he wondered how it had happened that instead of giving Susanna an ultimatum about the shop, he’d ended up stuck with going to Pleasant Valley with her.
    * * *
    Chloe bent over a tomato plant, emulating Lydia’s actions as she picked plump, red tomatoes for slicing. The aroma teased her senses in a way a store-bought tomato never could.
    “Anyway, I’m sorry. I never should have attempted to tell Susanna the truth without having you there.”
    She’d arrived at Lydia and Adam’s farm that afternoon to confess what a mess she’d made of things and had found Lydia in her garden, picking vegetables for supper. The two boys were chasing each other through the apple orchard, followed by Shep, the mixed-breed dog who was devoted to them. The sound of a hammer in the barn gave away Adam’s location.
    Lydia had been quiet for so long that Chloe had begun to wish she’d yell, or scold, or something. But that wasn’t Lydia’s way. She finally straightened, stretching her back as if bending over had become more difficult in recent days. The Amish dress and apron might have been designed to hide a woman’s pregnancy, but nothing could hide the joy Lydia felt at being pregnant again at last.
    “Don’t worry yourself so much about it,” Lydia said. “It’s done now. It’s certain-sure that however we did it, the news would be a shock, I fear.”
    Chloe