Wonderful Lonesome Read online

  © 2014 by Olivia Newport

  Print ISBN 978-1-62836-631-0

  eBook Editions:

  Adobe Digital Edition (.epub) 978-1-63058-602-7

  Kindle and MobiPocket Edition (.prc) 978-1-63058-603-4

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted for commercial purposes, except for brief quotations in printed reviews, without written permission of the publisher.

  All scripture quotations are taken from the King James Version of the Bible.

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. Any similarity to actual people, organizations, and/or events is purely coincidental.

  Cover design: Faceout Studio, www.faceoutstudio.com

  Published by Shiloh Run Press, an imprint of Barbour Publishing, Inc., P.O. Box 719, Uhrichsville, Ohio 44683, www.shilohrunpress.com.

  Our mission is to publish and distribute inspirational products offering exceptional value and biblical encouragement to the masses.

  Printed in the United States of America.

  Table of Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Author’s Note

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  Elbert County, Colorado

  May 1914

  The front right wagon wheel, below Abigail Weaver, dipped sharply then lurched out of the hole. At its creak, she winced and eyed Willem Peters on the bench beside her.

  Willem pulled the reins in, and the dark stallion responded. “I’d better look.”

  Willem dropped off the bench, stepped mindfully over the hitch, and squatted to inspect the bent hickory wheel.

  Abbie twisted to watch. “Did it break?”

  Willem scratched his forehead with his middle finger. “Not that I can see. Maybe the back side of one of the spokes cracked.”

  Abbie expelled a breath. “When did that hole happen anyway?”

  “Who can say? At least it doesn’t seem too deep.” Willem stood. “We will be all right.”

  We will be all right. Willem’s favorite expression.

  Willem hoisted himself up to the bench. “There’s an English wheel maker in Limon. I can ask him to take a look while you wait for Ruthanna’s train.”

  Abbie nodded, glad to have Willem beside her again. He clicked his tongue and the horse began to move. Limon was only another two miles.

  “Do you have your mother’s list for Gates Mercantile?” Willem asked.

  “She hates having to buy flour.” Abbie squinted her brown eyes. “It’s like losing last year’s wheat all over again.”

  “Your family is not alone in losing the crop. We all feel it.”

  “I know. I hope they’ll take her eggs in payment.”

  “They always do. Everybody needs eggs.” Willem glanced at Abbie. “Do you think your mother wants to go home?”

  Abbie shook her light brown-haired head. “Colorado is home now. She wants to be here as much as I do. I think she’s written to every relative we have, though.” Abbie reached into the leather bag and ran her fingers along the ridges of the coarse envelopes.

  “I promised Albert Miller I would check for his mail. Remind me, please.”

  Abbie turned her face away and allowed herself a small smile. She liked it when Willem said things like that, the way he depended on her in the mundane.

  “Where first?” Willem raised his green eyes in the direction of Limon. “Mercantile? Feed store? Post office? Wheel maker?”

  “Someday we’ll be able to do more of those things for ourselves.” Abbie set her jaw. “Once a few more families join our settlement, we’ll have the tradesmen to provide what we need.”

  “Speaking of tradesmen, remind me to check with our very own cobbler about my new boots. We’re blessed to have someone to make our shoes.”

  “God is gut.” Abbie peered toward the outline of Limon. “How much time do we have before Ruthanna’s train?”

  “I’ll tell you what. Give me your list and letters, and I’ll drop you at the station and start on the errands. That way you can enjoy Ruthanna. She’ll be ready to talk your ear off as usual.”

  “That’s one of the things I love about her.” Abbie smiled. “Does it count if I remind you now to pick up the Millers’ mail?”

  One of Willem’s cheeks twitched in amusement. “No one can accuse you of not fulfilling your promises.”

  Abbie stood on the platform and bent at the waist, back straight, to peer down the tracks. Her dark dress seemed somber among the spray of colors and hats of English women preparing to board trains, but the sensation was fleeting. Abbie had no wish to be English. Perhaps Ruthanna would bring news of other families who wanted to join the settlement. The price of land was certainly attractive. Abbie’s father had put his savings into his Colorado farm and tripled the acreage he had owned in Ohio. Willem had rented his acres in Ohio, but here he was a landowner. Every family in the settlement had a similar story.

  Twenty-four trains a day shuddered into this station. Limon, Colorado, was on the Union Pacific line as well as the Rock Island. As much as Abbie wanted her Amish church members to be able to take care of their own needs and provide for each other, she knew this town of five hundred was crucial to the settlement’s survival. The trains made the distance from their families seem less daunting.

  Distant rumbling turned thunderous as the train approached. Abbie sucked in her bottom lip, her stomach fluttering. Four weeks without her best friend was too much time apart. Ruthanna’s only letter in that interim had revealed she would travel with cousins into western Kansas and then continue to Limon alone and arrive on this day. Brakes squealed now as the mass of steel slowed to a lumber and halted. Abbie scanned in both directions, not knowing which train car Ruthanna would emerge from. She did know that Ruthanna’s favorite apron to wear over her black dress was the blue one. Abbie instinctively looked for fabric dyed in this distinctive Amish shade. Her intuition was rewarded when her friend stepped off the train just two cars forward of where Abbie stood.

  In only seconds, they locked in an embrace that wobbled from side to side.

  Ruthanna finally pulled back, her blue eyes gleaming under white blond hair. “I’m thrilled to see you, of course, but where is Eber?”

  Of course Ruthanna would have been expecting her husband to meet the train. “He’s under the weather,” Abbie said.

  “Eber is
ill?”

  “Just the last few days, but it keeps him up at night. I saw him this morning and sent him back to bed. He was pale as a corpse, and Willem was coming into town anyway.”

  Concern flushed through Ruthanna’s face.

  “He’ll be fine, Ruthanna.”

  “You sound like Willem. I should not have left Eber.”

  “Of course you should have.” Abbie picked up Ruthanna’s small suitcase and they began walking. “You must insist that he hire some help, though. A bit more rest would work wonders. Now tell me all about Pennsylvania.”

  Ruthanna’s face brightened. She put her hand on a gently rounding belly. “I am so glad I waited to tell my parents about the baby in person.”

  Abbie grinned. “Your daed loves the kinner.”

  “Now they will have to visit us. Perhaps next spring, after they can see how well we’ve done with this year’s harvest. They cannot resist a grandchild.”

  Ruthanna adjusted her kapp. The train ride had worn her out more than she wanted to admit to Abbie. She had seen other women sick while they were with child, but she had not known how exhausting it could be to fight the nausea for hours on end. At night she slept in exhaustion, but still she dragged through the days.

  “Have you heard of anyone who wants to come and join us?”

  Abbie’s question was just what Ruthanna expected. “Not precisely.”

  “Is anyone even considering it?”

  Ruthanna sighed. “Everyone thought we would have a minister by now.”

  “So did we. We have twelve households—some of them are even three generations. That’s enough for our own minister.”

  “I’m not sure anyone else will come until we have a minister. They have a hard time imagining how we can go an entire year without a church service and communion.” Ruthanna inhaled the loose dirt that always hung in the air on the Colorado plain and coughed. This did nothing to settle her stomach.

  “I suppose I cannot blame them,” Abbie said, “but surely God could put the call on a minister to visit us more often until someone from our congregation can be ordained. I shall pray more fervently.”

  Ruthanna moistened her lips with what little saliva she could muster. “Also, everyone knows what happened to last year’s crops. I received many questions about that as well.”

  “But that is not fair. Even farmers in Pennsylvania or Ohio can lose a crop if the weather is not favorable.”

  “You have to admit that the advertisements that brought us out here failed to mention some important factors.”

  Abbie waved a hand. “I do not believe anyone intended to deceive. The first men did not yet know for themselves how little rain there was. Acres and acres of land were available with no need to clear thousands of trees before planting. A new family can get a crop in the first spring they are here. Certainly that’s still an attractive truth.”

  Ruthanna smiled and put a tongue in the corner of her mouth. “You are nothing if not persistent, Abigail Weaver. I cannot think of anyone who wants our settlement to succeed more than you do.”

  “We are so close! A few more families, a minister, a good crop this year.”

  Abbie’s pace had quickened with her enthusiasm, and Ruthanna could not keep up. “Abbie, I need some cold refreshment and a place to sit that is not in motion.”

  “Of course! We can find a bench inside the depot. Willem will look for us there anyway. And we can talk about something happier.”

  Willem watched the two heads bent toward each other as he held the door for a couple leaving the depot with four children stringing behind them. With a tall tin cup in her hand, Ruthanna looked relaxed. Eber had done well to marry her. Ruthanna balanced Eber’s subdued demeanor with an exuberance that allowed her to talk to anyone about anything. Between them they had all the traits an Amish household would need to survive on the Colorado plain. Twenty years from now, Willem predicted, they would be watching their firstborn son take a bride in a congregation with three ministers, and they would be hard put to squelch their pride. Demut, they would remind each other. Humility.

  Willem certainly hoped it would be so. Perhaps he and Abbie would follow soon enough. Maybe their daughter would love Eber and Ruthanna’s son. A new generation would rise up from the dust of their parents’ acreage. Gottes wille. God’s will. May it be so.

  As he walked toward the two friends, Ruthanna’s face cheered and incited Willem’s curiosity about what the women were discussing. A few seconds later Abbie smiled as well. No doubt Abbie was hanging on every word Ruthanna said, listening to stories, news, information, even gossip from the congregations their two families had left behind when they decided to settle in new territory. Abbie was the intense one. Ruthanna brought her the same balance she brought Eber. Abbie’s shoulders now dropped, as if for a few minutes she had released her load. Willem wished she would do that more often. Her head turned toward him in a serendipitous way, and he waved.

  “The wanderer has come home.” When he reached them, Willem grinned and picked up Ruthanna’s suitcase. “I’m sure Eber is anxious to see you.”

  “Did you mail the letters?” Abbie asked.

  “Yes.”

  “And pick up the Millers’ mail?”

  “Under the wagon bench.”

  “And my mother’s flour and pickles?”

  “Sugar, dry beans, and baking powder, too.”

  “And the wheel maker?”

  “No cracks. A squeaky axle.”

  Ruthanna laughed. “You two are quite a pair.”

  Willem gave her a half smile. Most of the community—both Amish and English—paired him with Abbie. Many expected him to make a proposal in the fall, after the harvest. After all, he was twenty-six and she was twenty-three, well old enough to begin their own household.

  “That’s Rudy Stutzman in the ticket line,” Abbie said.

  Willem glanced toward the counter. Abbie scowled, stood, and marched toward the window. Whatever Rudy’s reasons were for being there, his explanation was not likely to satisfy Abbie. Willem admitted his own curiosity and made no move to constrain Abbie.

  Rudy, I hadn’t heard you planned to travel.”

  Rudy jumped at the sound of Abbie’s voice. “I thought I might make some inquiries about the price of fares.”

  “Are your parents unwell?” Abbie asked. Rudy had few extended family members, she knew, but he had come west with the blessing of his parents. They would have his two younger brothers to care for them as they aged.

  “My family is well. Thank you for asking.”

  “Visiting someone?” Abbie said. Rudy’s pitch sounded distant.

  “No, I don’t think so.”

  “Next,” the ticket agent called.

  Rudy stepped forward. The angle of one shoulder raised a wall between them. When he leaned in to speak to the agent, Abbie could not hear his words.

  “Are you sure you just want a one-way ticket?” the agent said at a volume anyone within twelve feet would have heard.

  Abbie stepped forward and grabbed Rudy’s wrist. “No. Don’t do this.” Rudy glanced at her grip, and Abbie released it.

  “Sir?” the agent said. Two people in line behind Rudy raised their eyebrows.

  Rudy sighed and said to the ticket agent, “Perhaps for today you could just tell me what the cost is.”

  “One way all the way to Indiana?”

  Rudy nodded. Abbie’s heart sank.

  The agent consulted a chart and announced the price.

  “Thank you.” Rudy stepped aside and Abbie followed.

  “One way, Rudy?”

  “Abigail, not everyone is as stalwart as you are. After four or five years, some of us are admitting that this is a lot harder than we thought it would be.”

  “We’re all in this together, Rudy. We all need each other. That includes you.”

  “I am alone,” Rudy said. “Willem and I, and Widower Samuels. What good is it for us to have a farm or dairy if we cannot keep up with the
work?”

  “Then hire somebody to help.”

  “No Amish families can spare their young men. My cash is in my land. I have nothing to pay an English with until the fall harvest. I only have what I make selling them milk.”

  “All the more reason to stay and make a go of it. You cannot just get on a train and leave your land and milk cows.” Abbie’s heart pounded. As far as she could influence anyone, she would not let a single settler give up.

  “I thought I would make a listing with a land agent. I may not get back everything I put in, but I would have something.”

  “You know it is not our way to abandon each other in times of need. Speak to some of the other men. They will help you.”

  “The need is greater than we are,” Rudy muttered.

  “That is not true. That is never true.” Below the hem of her skirt, Abbie lifted a foot and let it drop against the depot’s oak decking.

  Rudy looked past Abbie’s shoulder. “I see Willem. Is he waiting for you?”

  “Yes. We came to pick up Ruthanna. Eber is feeling poorly, but you can be sure no one is going to let his farm fail either.”

  “You cannot fight God’s will, Abbie.”

  “You think it is God’s will for us to fail?” Abbie refused to believe the settlers had obediently followed God into a new opportunity only to be forsaken.

  “It must be,” Rudy said. “It would take a miracle for us to succeed.”

  “Then a miracle we will have. Believe!”

  Rudy leaned back against the wall. He had known plenty of stubborn people in his twenty-eight years, but none was a match for Abigail Weaver. He appreciated how hard she worked helping to bake and clean for the single men of the Amish community, but when she crawled into bed at night, she still slept under her parents’ roof. He and Willem had ventured west without parents or wives. Rudy wasn’t sure Abbie understood the risk they had taken.

  And Willem, apparently, did not understand his ability to make Abbie happy or they would have wed two years ago.

  “Abbie,” Rudy said, “you are an example of great faith, but there is something to be said for realism as well.”

  “Not today. This is not the day that you are giving up.”

  Her dark eyes bore into him, and his resolve went soft. “You’re right. One day at a time.”