The Amish Midwife - By Mindy Starns Clark Page 0,73

The kitchen was open with white cabinets and gray Formica counters. Plants filled a window box above the sink. Jars of peaches, pears, and tomatoes filled an open floor-to-ceiling pantry cupboard off to the side.

I heard the back door open and what sounded like two people coming inside. A woman’s voice was speaking in Pennsylvania Dutch. She didn’t sound angry and she wasn’t loud, just firm. The man didn’t answer.

The woman was in the kitchen now, coming toward me around the table. She was tall and had the same austere appearance of many of the middle-aged Amish women I’d seen. Her sandy hair, just a strip of which was visible at the hairline, was balding at the center part and covered with a black bonnet. Her dress was the same pale blue as her eyes.

According to the family Bible, if this was Klara, she was my aunt.

She froze when she saw me, and I studied her face, expecting to see the same wild range of emotions I had observed the first time Marta laid eyes on me. Though Klara’s reaction was just as extreme as her sister’s had been, it wasn’t nearly so ambiguous. Where Marta had shown at least a flash of something akin to joy, this woman’s face exhibited nothing but a tightly controlled rage. Suddenly, her eyes began darting around the room, searching, I presumed, for someone who might have come with me.

“Lexie,” I said, stumbling to my feet. “I’m Lexie Jaeger. From Oregon.” I stepped around the couch. “Are you Klara?”

She simply nodded and put her hands behind her back.

“Then you must be Alexander,” I said to the man.

“I am,” he answered, meeting my eyes for a split second and then looking at the floor.

“I have questions—”

“You need to go,” Klara said.

“I want to see Mammi.”

“Mammi?” The tone of her voice jolted me.

“And Ada.” I squared my shoulders.

“No. You need to go.” She stepped toward the front door. “Now!”

I didn’t move but instead looked to Alexander. His head was turned, his attention directed toward something at the far end of the large room. Following his gaze, I spotted an open wooden staircase along the back wall. From somewhere above us, a female voice called out, “Who’s here?”

Dashing to the base of the stairs, Klara answered quickly in Pennsylvania Dutch. Then she turned back toward me, her features twisted in fury.

“You have no idea what you’re doing,” she hissed.

Again, I looked to Alexander, who was nodding. He, too, seemed to want me to go, though in his eyes I saw not anger but something more like pleading. Desperation. Whatever their individual reasons were, neither one wanted me here.

“I need to see Mammi,” I said softly to them both. Though this man in front of me may very well have been my own father, at the moment my grandmother would have to be my priority.

Klara’s eyebrows raised, two pale brown arches in a ruddy forehead. “No!”

“I have a right to see her. You know I do.”

While Alexander stood quietly by, Klara bustled forward and grabbed my hand. Her skin was rough and cold, and I tried to pull away but her grip was firm. Suddenly, she lunged for the front door, dragging me along.

“I want to know everything! I want to know about Giselle!” I exclaimed as I struggled against her, shocked that this older woman was much stronger than I.

“Mamm?”

As the steps of the staircase began to creak, Klara let out a deep growl and gave one last, powerful thrust, jerking open the front door and trying to push me through onto the porch. I managed to stop her by gripping each side of the door frame and holding on as tightly as I could.

“Mamm! What are you doing?”

Klara froze, and over her shoulder I could see a young Amish woman hurrying down the stairs. Her feet were bare. She wore a traditional dress but no apron, and her blond hair was pulled back in a bun, but no cap. Instantly, Klara released me. I seized the opportunity to move fully inside again, just beyond reach of her icy fingers, and plant my feet firmly, like a tree with roots shooting into the earth.

The woman was on the bottom step now. She was shorter than I, and thin, too thin. As she came closer, I saw that her eyes were brown, like mine, and we shared the same upturned nose.

“What’s going on?” Her voice was full of concern.

Klara smoothed her skirt and apron, and tucked a loose