The Wonder of Your Love - By Beth Wiseman Page 0,26
times, but for reasons she wasn’t sure of, she never did. “You take care, Arnold.”
“You, too, Martha.”
She hung up the phone as another tear rolled down her cheek. She clicked on the lamp on the table. Nightfall was settling in, and normally she would have been at Katie Ann’s by now. She hated to miss a day with Katie Ann and Jonas, but Katie Ann would know something was wrong, and that girl had enough on her plate. She didn’t need to be worrying about Martha.
And curiosity was nipping at her, making her wonder how Katie Ann’s visit with that hussy Lucy had gone. Martha was still sure that Lucy had come calling for money.
KATIE ANN WATCHED Jonas sleep, her own eyelids growing heavy. She tucked his small quilt around him and made sure he was warm enough, then forced herself to leave his bedroom. She wondered if there would ever come a time when she wouldn’t worry so much about him. God had taken Ivan away, and the thought of losing Jonas, too, was more than she could bear. All this fear and worry went against everything she’d been taught. She knew the only way to bring peace and calm was to believe in God’s will, to pray about it. She was sure she couldn’t trust another man the way she’d trusted Ivan, but had she stopped trusting the Lord as well?
In the living room, she lifted the lantern until a reflection lit the clock on the wall. Surely if there had been a problem at the doctor, Martha would have been at her house in an instant. Katie Ann would have showered her with sympathy, even though she suspected that Martha simply had a bad cold. Probably best that she didn’t come over and expose Jonas. Martha went to bed early, so it was too late to call her, but Katie Ann decided to go out to the barn to see if she had left a message on the answering machine.
A light snow dusted her black coat as she walked across the yard. She pushed the barn door open, waking some of the residents. One of the pigs snorted as a chicken flapped across the space in front of her. But nestled in the corner on the quilt, Dash slept peacefully.
Katie Ann tiptoed to the workbench and shone the light from the lantern onto the answering machine. No messages. She leaned down, hoping to pet the sleek black cat. But as her hand drew near, the animal hissed, and within seconds he resembled a porcupine, every hair on his body standing straight up.
“It’s okay, fellow. You can trust me.” But the cat hissed again, cowered for a moment, then leapt underneath the workbench and around the corner where he’d retreated before. She reached into her pocket and pulled out some leftover scrapple she’d put in a plastic container, unsure if the cat would be interested in the cornmeal mush.
After giving each of the four horses a quick scratch on the nose, she made her way back to the house. She checked on Jonas, who was sleeping soundly. He was still having bouts with a gassy tummy, but Katie Ann had been practicing Eli’s technique, which continued to work well. She carried the lantern back into the living room and placed it on the coffee table in front of her, then sat down on the couch with a book. It was so quiet, except for a coyote howling in the distance. After only a few minutes of reading, she felt fidgety, so she got up and put another log on the fire.
It was bizarre. Ivan always had a good business sense about him, and buying a new house before he sold the old one just didn’t make any sense. She knew Martha would scold her for giving Lucy money, but someone had given Katie Ann money when she needed it the most, so it seemed the right thing to do. Or had she done it to ease her own conscience because she couldn’t forgive Lucy, or Ivan? Was it her way of trying to get right with God? She wasn’t sure, but she hoped that it was enough money to keep Lucy far away from Canaan.
LUCY SAT AT the airport, waiting for her flight to board. She kept thinking about Katie Ann’s generosity, and she wondered whatever had made Ivan choose her over his wife. The woman seemed so unselfish and filled with goodness. Lucy, on the other hand,