The Tempted Soul Read online

  So, when Melvin sat back in his chair with a sigh of satisfaction, Carrie was ready with a pan of apple crumble—his favorite dessert. She even had heavy cream to pour on top of it—a luxury she had cajoled out of Moses Yoder’s wife the day before.

  “I wonder what the rich folks are eating tonight?” Melvin said around the first big spoonful. “It can’t be anything better than this meal.”

  “You always say that, even when it’s only scrambled eggs.” She ran her fingers up his arm and squeezed affectionately.

  “I always say it because I always wonder. If the way to a man’s heart is through his stomach, you’ve certainly captured mine, Liebschdi.”

  “Is that all that captured it?” she teased. His bowl was empty already, so she dished him another.

  “I think you know. At this moment, I am a happy man.” He waved his spoon to encompass the kitchen, the house, and the world outside. “I have everything I need.”

  Here was her opportunity, dropped into her lap like a present. God must really be in this. There was no other explanation.

  “What about the things we want?” she asked softly.

  He knew what she meant, of course he did. It was a subject that had come up so often there was no need to explain any further.

  “What we want is in God’s hands,” he said gently. “I hope we are both willing for that.”

  “But what if God is encouraging us to find another way?” she asked softly. “I’ve been seeing signs lately that maybe He might be.”

  “What signs?”

  She told him about the conversation in the fabric store, about the library books, about the possibilities that lay out there for them if only they would reach out and try. “At my last appointment, back in August, the doctor said there was no reason I couldn’t conceive and carry a child. So Melvin, maybe, just maybe, we might visit the doctor and see if she says the same thing about you?”

  Through her whole speech he had watched her gravely, not interrupting. That was one of the things she loved about him. She’d heard many a man interrupt to correct or contradict or simply cut off a woman in mid speech. Melvin never did that. He always listened, and when he was ready to speak, he did so.

  Now his eyes looked shadowed. “I should go to the doctor?”

  “In my reading in the library, I learned that one of the things that can prevent conception is if the man’s sperm aren’t strong enough to swim all the way to the egg. In that case, there’s something called IVF—in vitro fertile”—her tongue stumbled on the unfamiliar word—“fertilization. In the hospital they bring the sperm to the egg outside the body, and then put it back inside the womb to grow.”

  “That is impossible.”

  “Nei, truly,” she said eagerly. “I can borrow the book that shows you the pictures of how it’s—”

  “I don’t care what a book says. Carrie, how can you consider such an unnatural thing?”

  Again she felt that sensation of being pushed away by a hand laid right over her heart. Carrie took a deep, steadying breath. “It’s not really unnatural. These would be my eggs, your sperm, my body in which to grow. The procedure only shortens the distance between the first and the second, so that the third can happen.”

  “The only thing I see happening here is that you believe the fault lies with me.”

  “Melvin, nei, that’s not so. That’s why we should go to the doctor, to find out for sure.”

  “And then what? Walk into the lab and—and have relations with each other on a hospital bed?”

  The heat of embarrassment scalded her cheeks, as no doubt he had intended. “Of course not. The egg is removed from me in surgery, and you provide sperm in a private room. They—” Oh, how could she say this? “They provide worldly men with magazines to make it easier, but you would not do that, of course.”

  “I will not do any of it!” He pushed the chair back, and before she knew it, she had jumped to her feet, too. “This is crazy. Unnatural. If I had known you were gadding about today, filling your head with this worldly nonsense, I would have locked you in!”

  She reared back. “The door locks from the inside.”

  “You know what I mean. I forbid you to speak of this to me anymore.”

  “Melvin—”

  “And I forbid you to go back to the library and read any more about this. It is obscene. Shameful.”

  “It’s just a procedure.”

  “It’s your own will, Carrie, going up against the will of God. And you know who will win that battle.”

  “I know who is winning this one, if loudness counts for anything.”

  He took a deep breath, and she could see him wrestle his temper under control. “I do not want to fight.” The words almost sounded choked by that very control.

  “I don’t, either. But Melvin…” Her eyes were already swimming with tears, and one spilled over to track down her cheek. “You know what this means to me. To us. Will you not even talk with the doctor about it? Words will not harm anything.”

  “Words have done enough harm tonight. You have put images in my head that will take serious prayer to get rid of.”

  Why did he insist in making this about his service to God? “Millions of babies have been born this way, my dearest. It’s not the unnatural thing you think it is.”

  He gazed at her for a long moment. “In all our years together, I have never once been afraid for your soul. Until now.”

  “My soul? Melvin, if we could have a child, no matter how, my soul would rejoice and flourish.” As opposed to now, when her soul sometimes seemed as gray and wan as the cloudy skies of October.

  “The wicked flourish like the green bay tree.”

  The tear had dried on her cheek, leaving a narrow track that felt stiff as her eyes widened. “Are you calling me wicked?”

  “I’m just telling the truth. If you feel convicted by it, that should tell you something.”

  “I am not wicked. I just want a baby, like every other married woman in Whinburg. Why is that so impossible? And why is trying something new so sinful?”

  “If you cannot or will not see why, then there is no use my talking about it anymore.” He pushed his bowl away, the second helping only half gone. She had never seen him leave food uneaten, ever.

  “But we must talk about it.” Despair choked off the words.

  “Not now. Not later.” He paused in the kitchen doorway. “Put this out of your head, Carrie, and come and pray with me about it.”

  But she could not. If she knelt beside him, she would only pray for this thing she wanted so badly. He would pray that it would be cleansed from her soul, and all God would hear would be two conflicting appeals. What good would that do?

  “I have to clean up the kitchen.”

  “After, then.”

  But he got no reply, only the clashing of pots and cutlery as she ran water into the sink as hard and hot as it would go.

  * * *

  Carrie could count on the fingers of one hand the number of times she and Melvin had quarreled. The few times they had fought were over silly things—the way he drove on the county highway (far faster than necessary, in her opinion), or the time she’d miscalculated while cutting his hair and neither of them had noticed until they were on their way to church. Little spats over little things were easily made up, and the words her father had said to her on the morning of her wedding had remained like the pretty lace tablecloth in her hope chest, there for when it might be needed, but until now, unused.

  Let not the sun go down upon your wrath. Do not go to bed angry with one another, or you will wake in the morning with cold ash.

  She cleaned the kitchen within an inch of its life until finally Melvin decided he couldn’t outwait her, and went upstairs first. She had broached the sore subject and offended him; it was her place to tell him she was sorry and ask forgiveness.

  But it was the same as with Amelia this afternoon—she had not really done anything wrong, so how could she apologize? Wanting someth
ing good and right and offering a plan to achieve it wasn’t wicked.

  But the fact remained that he was offended—or at least, gravely disappointed in her. They had almost never allowed each other to go to sleep angry, and if they did, all was forgiven with a kiss in the morning. But tonight…

  Carrie hung up the washcloth when there was nothing left to clean, and took the lamp upstairs with her.

  Melvin was already in bed, lying on his side facing the window. Away from her.

  All right. She had expected that. She took off her apron and dress and hung them up, then slipped into her warm flannel nightgown—the one with the tiny eyelet frill around the yoke. The Ordnung in many districts stipulated that plain dressing extended even to nightwear, but she had always been glad that Bishop Daniel, while he was vocal about externals like house colors and the number of reflectors on buggies, kept diffidently quiet about things that were extremely private. Maybe Mary Lapp went to bed in a silk nightie with satin ribbons. No one would ever know, and Bishop Daniel wasn’t about to tell—or go looking in other people’s houses to make sure the standards were kept.

  Carrie shook her wandering thoughts into order, and sat gingerly on the edge of the bed, in the crook of Melvin’s body where his knees bent.

  “Liebschdi,” she said softly. “Please don’t be angry with me. I can’t bear it.”

  Silence, except for his breathing. He was not asleep; she knew the cadence of his every breath, and these were not the long, relaxed breaths of sleep.

  “Melvin? We have not prayed together.”

  “I have said my prayers.”

  She bit her lip as a spurt of pain arrowed through her. “You did not wait for me? We always pray together when you’re home.”

  “I prayed for you.”

  “I like it better when you pray with me.”

  For answer, he moved away from her, closer to the middle of the bed.

  Fine. He was determined to be angry. Very well, then, she would say her prayers on her own side, and they would make it up in the morning. Silently, she got up, but when she settled onto her knees on her side, the floor seemed so hard she could hardly concentrate.

  Dear Lord, thank You for opening up another way to me and for giving me the eyes to see it. Please help Melvin see it, too, so that we can stand together in this matter. It’s clear we must do it together. Help him to see this is the only way if we hope ever to be parents. Help him see this is Your will, no matter what he thinks or the bishop thinks.

  And Lord, I pray he would forgive me for upsetting him and see beyond it to what You want for both of us—to be a family and have little souls to care for and bring up in Your love.

  Amen.

  * * *

  Carrie woke to the sound of rain hard on the roof, and snuggled deeper under the quilts. On mornings like this the woodstove downstairs was nothing short of a blessing. It would be a good day to cook down the last of the apples and get them into the canner. The house would smell wonderful when Melvin got home from work.

  Poor man, having to hitch up and go into town on a day like today. She reached over to his side of the bed.

  And found it empty.

  Shoving the covers off her face, she gaped at the tousled sheets, then looked wildly around the room. He never left their bed without a kiss. Never.

  She tossed on her dressing gown and knotted it as she padded barefoot down the stairs. “Melvin?”

  “In here.” He stood at the counter, pouring a cup of coffee. The clock over the door said 5:45 a.m.

  “You’re up early. Is there a big project at work?”

  “No. I just couldn’t sleep.”

  Her rest hadn’t been the best, either. She slipped her arms around his waist and laid her head on his back, the clean cotton of his green shirt crisp under her cheek. “It was my fault.” Her poor attitude of last night seemed foolish in the light of those cold sheets. “Forgive me.”

  And to her enormous relief, he turned and wrapped her in a hug. “I already have, Liebschdi. I had to, last night, before I could pray.”

  You might have told me so, and I would have known the sun hadn’t set on your anger. But she kept the words back—words that might upset this moment of hard-won peace.

  She released her hold and went to the refrigerator. “We have cream for your coffee this morning.”

  “What about you, Carrie?”

  “Oh ja, I’ll have some, too. What a treat.”

  “I didn’t mean cream, I meant prayer. Were you able to approach God last night?”

  She nodded as she poured a dollop into the mug he held out to her. The silence stretched out as she poured her own, and when she sat in her place at his right hand to take her first, satisfying sip, his gaze had not left her. “What?”

  Something changed in his eyes, and his lashes dipped. “Nothing. It’s just as well I have an early start today. We’re expecting a load of lumber early at Brian’s, for that dining suite. The buyer decided it wasn’t such a rush after all, but he still wants us to make it.”

  Sensitive to his moods, she was always glad to see his satisfaction in the word “us.” It was gut he had work he liked, and a good business to be part of. The solitary work of a farmer was just not what he was cut out for.

  “You’ll be home at the usual time?”

  He looked down at the tabletop. “Ja.”

  Was he waiting for something? She had asked forgiveness and received it. What more could there be?

  “I’ll start breakfast, then.” She began to get up, but he covered her hand with his.

  “Carrie, how can this be true?”

  She settled into her chair. He had lost her again. “How can what be true?”

  “That you could pray, believing as you do that this medical scheme is acceptable in the eyes of God.”

  What answer did he want from her? She did believe that, no matter what everyone thought. “It’s as you say.”

  “But how can you think so?”

  “I think the blessing of the child is worth the inconvenience of the way it’s conceived.”

  “Inconvenience?” he whispered. “Is that all this blasphemy is to you? An inconvenience?”

  She pressed her molars together and breathed a prayer for a soft answer, even though her head was uncovered and her Kapp upstairs. “If you forgave me for these thoughts last night, why are you bringing them up again?”

  “Because I thought that when you knelt before God, He would have changed your heart. Or maybe I should say your mind, because clearly it’s man’s thinking at work here, not God’s.”

  “And you know how God thinks?”

  “Of course not. The Bible says His thinking is far above ours.”

  “Then where in the Bible does it say that IVF is wrong?”

  His jaw firmed and his lips thinned in the way they did when he was coming to the limits of his patience. “It does not, of course, as you know very well. But the Ordnung—”

  “There is nothing in the Ordnung about it, either, and if you didn’t know that before, when we go into the Abstellung at Council Meeting in three weeks and Bishop Daniel goes over it, you’ll know then.”

  “And of course he’ll say nothing about it. Because such a thing is not covered. Because no one has ever wanted to do it. No one has ever been bold and proud enough to put herself above God on this matter!”

  Carrie glared at him, so angry she dared not speak.

  “And when he asks you if you are ready for Communion, Fraa, what will you tell him?”

  “I will tell him I am.” Carrie lifted her chin. “I will have done no wrong, even if I do go to the doctor and ask her questions about it.”

  “Then you will not be in unity with the Gmee,” he said slowly. “You cannot take Communion if you have a quarrel with even one person.”

  “And are you that one person? Are you going to bring this up in public?”

  “Of course not. We must resolve it well beforehand so we can take the bread and the cup wi
th peace in our hearts. We must be right with God.”

  “Or must we just be right?”

  “I don’t know what you mean.” He pushed back from the table as though he meant to leave without his breakfast.

  “Where are you going? You haven’t eaten yet.”

  “I’m not hungry. I must go. Someone has to meet the truck.”

  At six in the morning?

  She tried to kiss him good-bye. And he let her. But she may as well have kissed a fence post for all the joy it gave either of them.

  Chapter 10

  By two o’clock, Carrie had finished two dozen quarts of applesauce, gently flavored with cinnamon, and lined them up in rosy rows on the counter. The kitchen smelled just as she’d imagined…which was about the only lovely thing about the day.

  With a sigh, she settled at the table with a cup of tea, a piece of apple crumble drowned in cream, and pencil and paper. If she was to make Emma’s wedding cake, she would need to take a trip to town to buy the ingredients she didn’t have on hand, and to refresh her supply of food coloring for the bird cutouts.

  So when a buggy rattled into the yard and footsteps came up the porch stairs, she laid her pencil down on the paper with a snap. Who was this, now? And how fast could she send them on their way so she could catch the bus?

  “Ischt mir,” Joshua said cheerfully, opening the kitchen door and leaning in. “Hey, that looks good. Any chance of a helping before I get started on the barn?”

  “You’re working today?” she said, a little blankly. She’d forgotten all about him, as thoroughly as if he’d never been born.

  “Melvin asked me to help him replace the loft floor before someone falls through it. By the time I’m done, the Youngie will be able to hold a hoedown up there.”

  So much for the bus. Mentally, she waved good-bye to it and moved her list off the table.

  “That’s not very likely,” she said dryly. She beckoned him in and dished up a good helping of crumble. No cream. That was for Melvin’s dessert tonight, and Joshua could comment if he wanted to, he wasn’t getting any.