Love Finds You in Amana Iowa by Melanie Dobson Page B

devastated to watch the woman he’d pledged his life to laughing with another man, a man clearly enamored by her.
    The wagon master took the six or so steps over to Matthias. “My name’s Faust.”
    Matthias reached out his hand for a firm shake before he folded his arms over his chest.
    “Did you two quarrel already?” Faust asked.
    “Amalie and I always quarrel,” he blurted, and then he wished he hadn’t spoken. It was none of this man’s business whom he fought with or why.
    “I wouldn’t let her be angry too long,” Faust said. “She might start looking to marry someone else.”
    Matthias almost said that was fine with him, but that would have been an outright lie. His relationship with Amalie was too complicated for him to understand, much less explain to a stranger.
    “Amalie can marry whom she pleases,” he replied.
    Faust’s eyebrows climbed with disbelief. “You better be careful, my friend. You might lose her.”
    “She’s not mine to lose,” he muttered as he turned away from the man.
    The bell rang for the noon meal, but instead of swarming to the kitchen house with the others, Matthias stole through the back streets of the village. He didn’t want to see Amalie again, nor did he want to answer any questions about her kitchen.
    Some of the men would spend the rest of their day visiting with those who’d arrived, listening to news from Ebenezer and of their travels. But most of the people Matthias loved wouldn’t arrive in the Kolonie until next month, so there was nothing else for him to do except return to the woolen mill.
    It took less than ten minutes for him to reach the mill. Inside he climbed the ladder to the second floor of the structure and walked to his tool chest at the side of the room—a gift crafted by Friedrich’s Vater and given to Matthias when he turned sixteen.
    He reached under the top drawers and dug through the planes and joiners until he found his jack plane. As families reunited across their village, as Friedrich was off someplace fighting this war, Matthias pressed out his frustration across a floorboard until it was smooth. Then he moved to the next piece of wood.
    At least he had plenty of work to do in the mill. Someone else would have to build Amalie Wiese her new kitchen.
    * * * * *
    The moment Amalie rounded the corner, she bent over, grasping herself around the waist. A sharp pain bludgeoned her belly and shot through her entire body as she struggled to breathe. Friedrich Vinzenz had left her. Instead of waiting to marry her, or even waiting to say good-bye, he had gone off to war.
    Amalie collapsed back against a stone wall as she tried—and failed—to steady her breathing.
    How could Friedrich have done this to her? He said he would be here, waiting for her when she arrived from New York. He had to know the news of his departure would devastate her.
    She wrapped her arms around her chest, forcing herself to breath more slowly. In and out.
    Could it be that the thought of marrying her was so bad, the only way he could get away was by joining the infantry? Perhaps he left all of them because of her. Because he didn’t want her as a wife. He’d run away before she arrived, left her behind, and given his best friend the job of telling her he was gone.
    As a woman turned the corner toward her, Amalie pushed away from the wall to tug her sunbonnet low over her face. If the villagers didn’t recognize her, maybe they would stop welcoming her to Amana and stop watching for her reaction about Friedrich’s decision.
    The bell rang out again, and she forced her legs to start walking toward the kitchen house. She would find one of the elders and ask where her new kitchen was located. As long as her hands stayed busy, she wouldn’t have to think about her loss or her future.
    As she climbed the steps to the dining room, she pushed her sunbonnet back over her shoulders and walked through the narrow door with her head held high. People filled the dining room, and