Read The Englisher for Free Online Page B

And your daughter.’’
    ‘‘Oh?’’
    ‘‘Essie Ann’s the full name.’’
    Jesse and Zeke turned and walked together, not saying any more as Jesse pulled a cigar from his frock coat. He offered it to the downtrodden new father, who, even though he was known to dislike the smooth, sweet aroma, accepted it gratefully.
    Ben had been driving in broad circles around the vicinity of Annie’s house for more than an hour, enjoying the wintry countryside, lost in reverie. He decided to drive down Route 30, stopping long enough for lunch at a Bob Evans restaurant.
    Resuming his aimless driving, he listened to WDRE, 103.9, out of Philly, all the while stopping frequently on the most deserted roads to take digital pictures of various snowscapes— an old corncrib and wooden windmill, and outbuildings where snow clung to rugged stone structures.
    But it was the virtually never-ending fields, stretching away from the road on either side—corn and tobacco fields dormant beneath a foot of snow—that reminded him of home. I’ll give Mom and Dad a call tonight , he decided.
    Having made it a point to know precisely where Annie Zook and her family resided, Ben had driven past the tall farmhouse several times in the space of a few days. A slowmoving peahen wandering onto the slushy road had intrigued him. He had stopped the car to watch the large bird strut in slow motion.
    Annie raises peacocks , he thought, recalling the interesting tidbits he’d gathered while having supper at Irvin and Julia Ranck’s. Not chickens or pigs, but peahens and their young .
    Now he found himself watching an Amish father pull four small children on a long wooden sled, mesmerized by the man and his plump wife as they picked their way over the plowed roadside, bundled up in their black garb, including the mother’s winter hat, a candlesnuffer style he’d seen in parts of Kentucky, as well.
    They must be headed home for milking .
    Later he went in search of the area’s historic bridges. He had done some initial checking on the Internet and had printed out a listing of Lancaster County covered bridges, complete with colorful pictures and descriptions of each. There was the picturesque Pinetown covered bridge built in the late 1800s northeast of Landis Valley on Bridge Road, as well as the Hunsecker Mill Bridge on Hunsecker Road, damaged due to a tractor-trailer hitting the overhead support beam and steel rods, leaving a splintered mess of wood and twisted metal in its wake. Originally constructed in the mid-1800s but rebuilt after Hurricane Agnes destroyed it in 1972, the bridge had been fraught with troubles. Several of his tack shop customers had told hush-hush stories about vandals attempting to cut up the bridge and carry it away. It was the longest single-span covered bridge in Pennsylvania, as well as one of the newest, and was featured on the cover of the state’s transportation map, attracting many tourists.
    But it was not the folklore of just any bridge Ben was after, nor the fact that it was the two hundredth anniversary of the nation’s covered bridges that spurred him on. He believed in his gut he would know the one bridge he had come in search of when he saw it.
    Creeping along on Belmont Road, past the weathered wood siding of the Progressive Shoe Store on the right, he slowed the car as a stately covered bridge came into view. He pulled off the road and set the brake. Slowly he surveyed the long expanse of the bridge with barn-red planked sides, spanning Pequea Creek. A kissing bridge popped into his mind, and he wondered where that had come from.
    He reached into his jeans pocket and pulled out his wallet, then removed a folded picture. He opened it and compared it to the landscape before him—the gray stone abutments and the wide creek, now frozen, beneath the wooden bridge. He was also very aware of the stark black grove of trees to the left of the bridge, down along an embankment, although he was uncertain as to why. Everything