The Rebel (3 page)

Mary's father probably thought she was spending the night with a friend. After all, that's what Barbie's own parents thought. Shame flicked at her conscience. She'd lied to them. No point in putting up a fancy excuse for it, not to herself.

Mary stopped at the bottom of the porch steps, gripping the railing. “You don't have to come in with me.” She sounded very young and uncertain. “I won't tell on you.”

So maybe she did realize the cost Barbie would pay. For a moment she considered taking Mary up on the offer, but only for a moment. Whatever she was, she wasn't a coward.

“Come on.” She put her arm around the girl's waist. “We'll face them together.”

The door was already opening. Moses Kauffmann peered out, face questioning. “Who is it?” He spoke in Englisch, apparently thinking he saw two Englisch women coming to his door.

“It's Barbie Lapp, Moses. My friend and I brought Mary home.”

His gaze, fixed uncertainly on her, shifted to the slight figure next to her. Barbie saw the shock hit him, tightening his weathered face, sending him back a step with its impact.

“Mary.” His voice shook. “You'd best both come in.”

Barbie felt Mary tremble. In another moment she'd be weeping, but that might be the best thing she could do.

“Daadi . . .” she began.

Benuel Kauffmann appeared behind his father, taking in the situation with a glance. “What have you been up to?” Anger edged his voice. “Mary, I thought you could be trusted.”

Apparently Ben hadn't thought the same of her. Well, maybe that wasn't surprising. No doubt there were some in the church who thought Barbie Lapp was leaning too far on the other side of the line between Amish and not Amish. And Ben Kauffmann was well-known for his strict interpretation of the Ordnung, the agreed-upon rules by which their congregation lived.

Moses brushed past his son to come and grasp Mary's arm. She clung to Barbie, and so the three of them went together from the cool spring darkness into the warm, lighted kitchen. Despite the lack of a mother in the home, it was as clean and orderly as Barbie's mother's kitchen.

“Are you all right, Daughter?” Moses's tone was gentle, but his eyes behind his glasses were so filled with pain that it hurt Barbie to look at him.

“She's not all right. She's been drinking.” If Ben was similarly pained, he certainly hid it well. He glared at Barbie before focusing on his sister. “Where did you get those clothes? You are supposed to be with Sally Stoltzfus tonight. Don't tell me she took you out to some beer party.”

Mary shot a resentful glance at him. “I wasn't with Sally.”

Barbie felt a tremor go through the girl. Her face was white, and if she didn't lie down, in another moment she'd probably be throwing up.

“Mary's feeling pretty bad, I think. Maybe this could wait until tomorrow.” She addressed her words to Moses, figuring he was the more reasonable of the two.

“They won't listen!” The words burst out of Mary. “Nobody will listen!” Her pale face took on a greenish tinge. She clapped her hand over her mouth and raced for the stairs. They heard the thud of her feet on the steps.

Barbie would just as soon be out of here, but if Mary was indeed being sick upstairs, she might rather have another woman there. She took a tentative step. “Do you want me to help her?”

Moses straightened. “I'll go to her. How did you . . .”

“I saw that she was out of her depth,” Barbie said quickly. She had no desire to be the one to tell him exactly where his daughter had been or with whom. That was up to Mary. “I thought it best to intervene, and my friend and I brought her home.”

Moses nodded, apparently accepting the things that she didn't say. “Denke, Barbie. I'll go to her now.”

There didn't seem to be anything else useful she could do, so as he left the room, Barbie turned toward the door.

Ben's voice stopped her. “Where did you take my sister?”

She surveyed him, trying to keep a tight rein on her anger. Ben was tall for an Amish man, and he could be an imposing figure when he preached in worship despite his relative youth. His thick, reddish-brown hair was echoed in the beard that didn't hide his firm, uncompromising mouth. At the moment, she could plainly read condemnation in his brown eyes.

Well, she wasn't going to be intimidated by him. “I didn't take your sister anywhere. I saw her by accident.”

“Because you were in a place no self-respecting Amish woman should go. Is this how you spend your spare time now that you're working at that Englisch business, bringing shame to your family?”

His gesture took in her sweater and jeans, making her uncomfortably aware of how the clothes clung to her figure. The embarrassed heat in her cheeks lit the fuse to her anger.

“It's lucky for your sister that I happened to be where I was tonight.” She snapped the words at him, head up, and saw him blink as the truth of them hit him. “You'd best save your concern for your own household. And what's more, if you carry on like this with Mary, you'll probably drive her to even worse behavior.”

Before Ben could come up with another condemning remark, she stormed out of the house, welcoming the air against her hot cheeks.

Fuming, she yanked the car door open and slid inside. “We can go now.”

“Making a fast getaway?” Ashlee swung the car around on the grass and headed back down the lane. “What did they say to you?”

She took in a breath, reminding herself not to involve Ashlee any further in something she wouldn't understand. “Mary's father was okay. Her older brother was a bit touchy.”

That was putting it mildly. Her stomach churned. What would Ben do now? As her minister, he'd probably consider it his duty to speak to her parents about what he saw as her out-of-bounds behavior.

Well, be honest. It was out-of-bounds. But that didn't mean she wanted her parents hurt by it.

It had seemed such a silly thing at the time that Ashlee suggested it—just to spend a few hours pretending to be Englisch to see what it was like. But the consequences in the hands of Benuel Kauffmann could be painfully serious.

•   •   •

The
next afternoon, Ben reluctantly climbed down from his buggy at the café on the edge of town. He'd rather be almost anyplace but here. And on any other errand. But given what Mary had told Daad this morning, he had no choice but to speak to Barbie Lapp. Not just speak to her—apologize to her.

Daad had managed to get Mary to talk, and Ben saw how he'd struggled not to show the pain and shock her revelations caused. Ben gritted his teeth in frustration. He should have been able to spare Daad that task. Besides, as a minister of the Gmay, the local church district, chosen by God, it was his duty, wasn't it?

It occurred to him, not for the first time, that God might have been mistaken in choosing him. When Donna was alive, they'd faced the consequences of his choosing together. Without her, he seemed to fail more than he succeeded.

As he was doing right now. What he should do, as a minister of the church, was discuss the situation with the other ministers. Then two or three of them should call on the family of the offending party and seek a confession of the wrongdoing and a promise to change.

But he wasn't doing any of those things, because it was his own sister and father who would be affected, and he couldn't bear to hurt Daad any further. Which meant, like it or not, Barbie also escaped the consequences of her wrongdoing.

He'd made the decision, and he'd better get on with it. Gripping the handle of the door, he pulled it open and went inside.

As he'd hoped, the café wasn't very busy in the middle of the afternoon. Barbie, standing behind the cash register in
conversation with an Englisch server, looked up at the sound of the door opening. When she saw him, the welcoming smile slid from her face. She murmured something to the other woman, who looked at him with interest. Then Barbie came toward him.

“Benuel. May I help you?” Barbie contrived to act as if she were busy despite the fact that only two tables were occupied.

“We have to talk.” He clenched his teeth. That certain-sure didn't sound polite, but his embarrassment at his task didn't spare him any energy for idle chatter.

“Here?” She lifted her rounded chin as if in defiance. “This is my workplace. Can't it wait until later?”

“I think it best if we get this out of the way now. You can surely spare a few minutes to speak with me.” He gestured toward the empty tables.

Barbie's face tightened, but she nodded. “Very well.” She gestured toward a booth as far as possible from the occupied tables. “Sit down. I'll bring you a cup of coffee.”

“I don't want—”

“If you must talk with me here, you'll have to look like a patron.” The words contained a snap. “I don't want my boss coming down on me for entertaining people when I'm working.”

Entertaining
was hardly the word, but he understood her point. She owed it to her employer to give a day's work for a day's pay. Besides, it wouldn't be fair to get her in trouble with her boss just because he didn't think she should be working here.

Benuel jerked a nod and went quickly to the booth she'd indicated, aware of eyes following him. The café, located as it was on the far side of town from most Amish farms, was mostly patronized by Englisch customers. An Amish person was apparently rare enough to be stared at.

Why, then, had Barbie chosen to work here, when she could as easily have gotten a job at an Amish-run business? A sign of restlessness on her part? Sliding into the booth, he ignored the stares and began mentally to rehearse the words he'd say to her.

Barbie returned quickly, putting a mug of coffee in front of him with a smile that was probably automatic. She slid into the bench on the other side of the booth. “I only have fifteen minutes for my break.”

“This won't take that long.” He stared down at the coffee, discovering that the prepared words had vanished now that the moment had arrived.

Barbie stared at him, her bright blue eyes vaguely disapproving. “Are you sure? Have you timed your lecture?”

He gaped before realizing what she meant and then raised one eyebrow, feeling an unwelcome smile tugging at his lips. “Now you are the one jumping to conclusions, ain't so? Just as I did last night.”

She blinked, her lively features frozen. Then she nodded. “I take it Mary told you what happened.”

“She told our father.” Barbie couldn't possibly guess what that admission meant to him. “If you hadn't come to the rescue, those boys might have . . .” He stopped, not wanting to put it in words, and the anger he thought he'd conquered raised its head again.

Her expression sobered as she evidently remembered those moments. “There were three of them, all cocky and drunk. It's a bad combination.”

“Mary said you risked your own safety to help her.”

Barbie shrugged. “I don't think they'd have done anything to me, but if they'd made a move, I was ready to scream the place down, even if . . .”

He could fill in the rest of it. “Even if that made the whole thing public.”

“Ja.” Her full lips pressed together for an instant. “I would hate for my parents to know where I was. Do you intend to tell them?”

“That should be my duty as your minister, ain't so?” He gripped the coffee mug. “But Mary's action has made it more complicated. I've already seen how it's affected my father. How can I inflict more pain and humiliation on him?”

“I'm sorry.” Sympathy filled her eyes. “It hasn't been easy for him, raising a teenage girl without a woman in the house.”

“Ja. Mamm's death and then my Donna's . . . that changed everything. And obedience to the Ordnung is not as simple as I thought it on the day I was ordained.”

Barbie nodded, her lips lifting slightly. “Sometimes I have that feeling about growing up. It's not nearly as easy to tell right from wrong as I once expected it would be.”

Her understanding startled him. Ben had always thought Barbie as frivolous as a butterfly, flitting here and there and unable or unwilling to focus on religious duties.

Still, it was his duty to at least try to awaken her to the dangers of her present course.

“You were wrong to dress up in Englisch clothes. Wrong to go to a bar.”

Her gaze met his without flinching. “If I hadn't been there, I wouldn't have been able to help Mary.”

“Ja. I know.” He said the words heavily. God did indeed work in mysterious ways. He sucked in a breath, accepting the inevitable. “I won't tell your parents about it.”

She gave a quick nod. “Denke, Benuel. You don't need to
worry that anyone will hear of what happened with Mary from me. I'm just thankful she's all right.”

He frowned, the worry weighing on him. “I wish . . . Ach, it's not right to question God's will. But if Donna were here, I can't help but think she'd be able to deal with this . . . this rebellion of Mary's better than Daad or I.”

“I know.” Sudden sympathy filled Barbie's voice, and she leaned toward him. “Donna has left a big gap in so many lives. Your kinder . . .”

Pain made him grimace. “Abram and Libby don't even remember her. Well, they wouldn't. Abram was only two when Libby was born, and Donna passed two weeks later.”

He pressed his lips together, not wanting to talk about his loss, not wanting her to see his emptiness. He'd have to marry again, of course. It had been two years, and folks were wondering why he hadn't done it already.

“We do the best we can, Daad and I,” he said. “And my sister Sarah helps, but she has her own family to worry about. Besides, she and Mary have never gotten along too well.”

Barbie looked as if she were picturing his oldest sister, with her noisy laugh and bossy manner. “No, I guess not. Maybe . . .”