Читать книгу The Amish Widow's New Love - Liz Tolsma - Страница 18

Chapter Six

The tang of pine and the sweetness of maple permeated the shed where Leroy Bontrager ran his woodworking shop. As Elam made his way through the building, he glided his hand down a length of quarter-sawn oak that had been sanded to a mirror-like smoothness. The whir of the gas-powered table saw welcomed him home. Ja, this is where he belonged. Construction, as he’d done while away, was building. Woodworking was creating.

“Hello, Leroy, are you here?”

Naomi’s father entered the main room from the back. He wiped dark stain from his fingers onto what must have been an old shirt. The heady odor of varnish hung about him. “Elam. Why are you here?”

Not the start he’d been hoping for given that first meeting between them. Maybe this wasn’t the best idea. “You’re hard at work, as always.” Several kitchen chairs sat in a row along one wall, as did a couple of bookshelves and a large dining room table with well-turned legs.

“Of course.”

“Daed told me you hired Solomon Mast to help after I left.”

“Aaron gives me a hand as much as he can, doing a few things from his chair. But I can’t run this place with the two of us. Solomon is a gut man, but still learning. He puts in a hard day’s work, and I appreciate that. But he doesn’t have the eye, the insight that you...”

Had Leroy been about to compliment him? “Naomi and I have been working on the auction. She said they’ve set the date for Joseph’s surgery.”