Through the Autumn Air Read online

  ACCLAIM FOR KELLY IRVIN

  “Kelly Irvin’s Through the Autumn Air is a poignant journey of friendship and second chances that will illustrate for readers that God blesses us with a true love for all seasons.”

  —Amy Clipston, bestselling author of Room on the Porch Swing

  “A moving and compelling tale about the power of grace and forgiveness that reminds us how we become strongest in our most broken moments.”

  —Library Journal for Upon a Spring Breeze

  “Irvin’s novel is an engaging story about despair, postnatal depression, God’s grace, and second chances.”

  —CBA Christian Market for Upon a Spring Breeze

  “A warm-hearted novel that is more than a romance, with lovable characters, including two innocent children caught in the red tape of government and two people willing to risk breaking both the Englisch and Amish law to help in whatever way they can. There are subplots that focus on the struggles of undocumented immigrants.”

  —RT Book Reviews, 4-star review of The Saddle Maker’s Son

  “Irvin has given her audience a continuation of The Beekeeper’s Son with complicated young characters who must define themselves.”

  —RT Book Reviews, 4-star review of The Bishop’s Son

  “Once I started reading The Bishop’s Son, it was difficult for me to put it down! This story of struggle, faith, and hope will draw you in to the final page . . . I have read countless stories of Amish men or women doubting their faith. I have never read a storyline quite like this one though. It was narrated with such heart. I was full invested in Jesse’s struggle. No doubt, what Jesse felt is often what modern-day Amish men and women must feel when they are at a crossroads in their faith. The story was brilliantly told and the struggle felt very real.”

  —Destination Amish

  “The awesome power of faith and family over personal desire dominates this beautifully woven masterpiece.”

  —Publishers Weekly, STARRED review of The Beekeeper’s Son

  “Storyteller extraordinaire Kelly Irvin’s tale of the Amish of Bee County will intrigue readers, who will want to eavesdrop on the lives of these characters on a regular basis.”

  —RT Reviews, 4 1/2 stars review of The Beekeeper’s Son

  “Something new and delightful in the Amish fiction genre, this story is set in the barren, dusty landscape of Bee County, TX . . . Irvin writes with great insight into the range and depth of human emotion. Her characters are believable and well developed, and her storytelling skills are superb. Recommend to readers who are looking for something a little different in Amish fiction.”

  —CBA Retailers + Resources for The Beekeeper’s Son

  “The Beekeeper’s Son is so well crafted. Each character is richly layered. I found myself deeply invested in the lives of both the King and Lantz families. I struggled as they struggled, laughed as they laughed—and even cried as they cried . . . This is one of the best novels I have read in the last six months. It’s a refreshing read and worth every penny. The Beekeeper’s Son is a keeper for your bookshelf!”

  —Destination Amish

  “Kelly Irvin’s The Beekeeper’s Son is a beautiful story of faith, hope, and second chances. Her characters are so real that they feel like old friends. Once you open the book, you won’t put it down until you’ve reached the last page.”

  —Amy Clipston, bestselling author of A Gift of Grace

  “The Beekeeper’s Son is a perfect depiction of how God makes all things beautiful in His way. Rich with vivid descriptions and characters you can immediately relate to, Kelly Irvin’s book is a must-read for Amish fans.”

  —Ruth Reid, bestselling author of A Miracle of Hope

  OTHER BOOKS BY KELLY IRVIN

  EVERY AMISH SEASON NOVELS

  Upon a Spring Breeze

  Beneath the Summer Sun

  THE AMISH OF BEE COUNTY NOVELS

  The Beekeeper’s Son

  The Bishop’s Son

  The Saddle Maker’s Son

  NOVELLAS BY KELLY IRVIN

  A Christmas Visitor in An Amish Christmas Gift

  Sweeter than Honey in An Amish Market

  One Sweet Kiss in An Amish Summer

  Snow Angels in An Amish Christmas Love

  A Midwife’s Dream in An Amish Heirloom

  ZONDERVAN

  Through the Autumn Air

  Copyright © 2018 by Kelly Irvin

  Requests for information should be addressed to:

  Zondervan, 3900 Sparks Dr. SE, Grand Rapids, Michigan 49546

  Epub Edition June 2018 9780310348184

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Names: Irvin, Kelly, author.

  Title: Through the autumn air / Kelly Irvin.

  Description: Grand Rapids, Michigan : Zondervan, [2018] | Series: An every Amish season novel ; 3

  Identifiers: LCCN 2018010070 | ISBN 9780310348146 (paperback)

  Subjects: LCSH: Amish--Fiction. | GSAFD: Christian fiction. | Love stories.

  Classification: LCC PS3609.R82 T48 2018 | DDC 813/.6--dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2018010070

  All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from The Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.™ Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide. www.zondervan.com

  Any internet addresses (websites, blogs, etc.) and telephone numbers in this book are offered as a resource. They are not intended in any way to be or imply an endorsement by Zondervan, nor does Zondervan vouch for the content of these sites and numbers for the life of this book.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means—electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, or any other—except for brief quotations in printed reviews, without the prior permission of the publisher.

  Publisher’s Note: This novel is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. All characters are fictional, and any similarity to people living or dead is purely coincidental.

  Printed in the United States of America

  18 19 20 21 22 / LSC / 20 19 18 17 16 15 14 13 12 11 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  Dedicated to my mother, Janice Elliott Lyne.

  You were a stay-at-home mom before it was called that.

  You know how to feed a family of seven with fifty recipes

  featuring hamburger, twenty-five recipes that start with Jell-O,

  and fifteen recipes for disguising eggplant. Love always.

  Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves receive from God. For just as we share abundantly in the sufferings of Christ, so also our comfort abounds through Christ.

  2 CORINTHIANS 1:3–5

  Now instead, you ought to forgive and comfort him, so that he will not be overwhelmed by excessive sorrow.

  2 CORINTHIANS 2:7

  DEUTSCH VOCABULARY*

  ach: oh

  aenti: aunt

  bopli, boplin: baby, babies

  bruder: brother

  daed: father

  danki: thank you

  dawdy haus: grandparents’ house

  dochder: daughter

  doplisch: clumsy

  eck: married couple’s corner table at wedding reception

  Englisch, Englischer: English or non-Amish

  fraa: wife

  Gelassenheit: yielding to God’s will; forsaking all selfishness

  Gmay: church distric
t

  Gott: God

  groossdaadi: grandpa

  groossmammi: grandma

  guder mariye: good morning

  gut: good

  hund: dog

  jah: yes

  kaffi: coffee

  kapp: head covering worn by Amish women

  kinner: children

  lieb: love

  mann: husband

  mudder: mother

  nee: no

  Ordnung: written and unwritten rules in an Amish district

  rumspringa: period of running around

  schweschder: sister

  suh: son

  wunderbarr: wonderful

  JAMES PORT, MISSOURI, FEATURED FAMILIES

  THE ROPPS:

  Mary Katherine (widow, husband was Moses)

  Thomas and Joanna—six children

  Dylan and Samantha—four children

  Dinah and Nathan Plank—four children

  Mary and Robert Shrock—four children

  Elijah and Nyla—three children

  Ellen and Luke Hostetler—three children

  Josiah and Hannah—two children

  Angus and Rebecca—one child

  Beulah and Jacob Burkholder

  Barbara and Joseph Beachy

  THE MILLERS:

  Ezekiel (widower, wife was Lucy)

  Leah and William Gingerich—Kenneth, 7; Caleb, 3; and Liliana, 18 months

  Carlene and Samuel Raber—three children

  John and Nora Miller—two children

  Andrew and Emma Miller—one child

  THE KAUFFMANS:

  Laura (widow, husband was Eli)

  Children all grown

  THE GRABERS:

  Leo and Jennie

  Matthew Troyer

  Celia Troyer

  Micah Troyer

  Cynthia Troyer

  Mark Troyer

  Elizabeth Troyer

  Francis Troyer

  Aidan and Bess Graber

  Joshua Weaver

  Leyla Graber

  THE WEAVERS:

  Solomon (minister) and Diana

  Elijah

  Luke and Jane—William

  Ruth and Dan Byler

  Sophie and Obediah Stultz—Esther, Lewis, Martin, and Angela

  Hazel and Isaac Plank—Rachel, Sarah, Levi, Gracie, Jonah

  OTHER FAMILIES:

  Freeman (bishop) and Dorothy Borntrager

  Cyrus (deacon) and Josephina

  Beachy—Iris, Joseph, Rueben,

  Samuel, Carl, Louella, Abigail

  CONTENTS

  Acclaim for Kelly Irvin

  Other Books by Kelly Irvin

  Deutsch Vocabulary

  James Port, Missouri, Featured Families

  One

  Two

  Three

  Four

  Five

  Six

  Seven

  Eight

  Nine

  Ten

  Eleven

  Twelve

  Thirteen

  Fourteen

  Fifteen

  Sixteen

  Seventeen

  Eighteen

  Nineteen

  Twenty

  Twenty-One

  Twenty-Two

  Twenty-Three

  Twenty-Four

  Twenty-Five

  Twenty-Six

  Twenty-Seven

  Twenty-Eight

  Twenty-Nine

  Thirty

  Thirty-One

  Thirty-Two

  Thirty-Three

  Thirty-Four

  Thirty-Five

  Thirty-Six

  Thirty-Seven

  Epilogue

  Discussion Questions

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  ONE

  At what point did a person realize that the special moments in life streak by in a flash, distilled into memories before they could be truly lived? Mary Katherine Ropp stood motionless in the middle of her kitchen, a platter holding a two-layer German chocolate cake covered in whipped cream cheese frosting nestled in her hands.

  The other women bustled in and out, serving two hundred wedding guests seated at tables set up in all the other rooms and spilling out across the broad expanse of the front yard. Serving spoons clinked on bowls. Pots banged. The fire in the wood-burning stove sizzled. Mary Katherine closed her eyes and inhaled the mingled scents of roasted chicken and dressing, gravy, coleslaw, freshly baked cookies, cakes, and bread.

  Like every mother, she’d imagined her daughter Barbara’s wedding day since the night of her birth, nineteen years earlier. She imagined the blue dress Barbara would don. The crispness of her white kapp. The way her eyes would tear up when the bishop took her hand and put it in her husband’s for the final blessing.

  A lump lodged in Mary Katherine’s throat. She breathed and wiped at her eyes. Oh, Moses, if only you could see this. Your youngest daughter is a bride today. She’s only a passable cook, she hates to sew, and she never knows when to stop talking, but Joseph loves her anyway.

  I’m here, Fraa. I see her. She sounds a lot like the girl I married. Gott has blessed us.

  Mary Katherine sighed at the imagined deep, always amused voice in her ear. Of course he was here. Even after seven years of widowhood, she could depend on Moses to be at her side. He would never forsake her.

  She needed to write these thoughts down. Her notebook lay on the counter, splotches of lemonade and chocolate frosting on the outside. She took two steps toward it.

  “What are you doing, Mudder?” Beulah’s voice sounded irked—which was nothing new.

  Mary Katherine turned to find daughter number four standing in the doorway. Her hands were full of dirty dishes and her face beet red with exertion. “You’re in my way, and Thomas is looking for you.”

  “Just taking a second to breathe.” Mary Katherine cleared her throat and edged away from the counter. Her habit of taking notes in the middle of life’s events baffled some of her loved ones. “Your bruder will have to wait until after the wedding to boss me around.”

  As her oldest son, Thomas considered himself the head of the house, even if he hadn’t lived in Mary Katherine’s house in many years. When it came to bossiness, he was much more like her than his easygoing father. Her other sons, being more like Moses, let him do the bossing. For the most part.

  “You know he only wants what’s best.” With her slightly rounded body, sandy-blonde hair, and blue eyes, Beulah was the spitting image of Mary Katherine when she was younger. “You’re always tired. If you moved into the dawdy haus, you’d have him and Joanna nearby. Do you really want to be alone in this big house? You know you don’t.”

  Everyone seemed to know what she wanted and what she needed, except Mary Katherine. If she was tired, it was only because of the wedding preparations, not because she needed to be put out to pasture at the mere age of sixty. During the two weeks since the wedding announcement for Barbara and Joseph Beachy at the church service, she had worked nonstop. Writing wedding invitations, cleaning and scrubbing the entire house, borrowing extra tables and chairs, stoves and refrigerators, pots and pans, buying groceries and baked goods they didn’t have time to make from scratch. Lining up the cooks and the servers. Praying that September’s fall weather would hold, allowing them to serve people outdoors.

  Plain weddings were simple, without adornment, but the receptions were mammoth in the sheer amount of food needed to serve all the guests who’d come to Jamesport, Missouri, from Ohio, Indiana, and as far away as Texas. It might make a much younger woman tired, but Mary Katherine only felt invigorated.

  That was her story and she was sticking to it. “I’m fine. Take this cake out to the tables outside.”

  “Fraidy cat!” Beulah deposited the dirty dishes on the counter but made no move to take the cake. “You can’t hide from him forever.”

  “Who are you hiding from?” Laura Kauffman trudged through the door with empty servin
g dishes in both hands. She might be seventy-two and a little hard of hearing in one ear, but she had avoided the pasture as well. She served as not only a good friend but an excellent example of how to live and grow after losing a husband. “Dottie? Why would you be hiding from Dottie? She’s looking for you.”

  Dottie Manchester, the Jamesport Branch Library’s only librarian and Mary Katherine’s closest Englisch friend, meant well, but she had a one-track mind and a penchant for taking the long road to make a short point. As much as Mary Katherine enjoyed a good chat, she didn’t have time right now. “I’ve got a lot on my plate at the moment.”

  Beulah snorted and Laura chuckled.

  “So to speak. You could eat the cake instead of serving it.” That bit of wisdom came from Jennie Graber, who stood at the sink washing dishes in an enormous plastic tub. She, too, had been a widow until she remarried a few months earlier. That she was exceedingly happy was apparent in the smile on her heart-shaped face and the sparkle in her pale-blue eyes. “You should pay attention. There might be someone else looking for you. Weddings make minds turn to romance.”

  The women giggled in a chorus that made them sound like young girls at their first singing, not mature women from every stage of life—from just married to a widowed great-grandmother. Mary Katherine couldn’t help herself. She rolled her eyes. “The last thing an old Plain woman thinks about is romance.”

  Not so. If memories of Moses’ sweet kisses rushing through her like a warm summer breeze could be called romantic, she was guilty. But she would never admit such foolishness, not even to her dearest friends.

  “Speak for yourself.” Laura plucked a roll from an overflowing basket with knuckles swollen with arthritis. “Besides, I think I spied a certain old Plain man staring at you during the service.”

  “You’re talking about Ezekiel, aren’t you?” Jennie was eager for her friends to find marital bliss again. “He did look distracted during Solomon’s message.”

  “You’re dreaming. Ezekiel thinks of nothing but his kinner and his restaurant.” Hoping her own distraction during the minister’s message hadn’t shown as well, Mary Katherine wiped tiny drops of sweat from her warm forehead with the back of her sleeve. Ezekiel had been a widower for about ten years. He was a kind man with a generous laugh. He always refilled her tea glass when she ate at the Purple Martin Café and always asked about her day—but then, he did that with everyone he served. “Anyway, I have too much to do to worry about such silliness.”