Anastasia Has the Answers Read Online Free PDF

It's
not
always true that the man is just trying to find a substitute mother!"
    Gertrude started to laugh. "All right," she said, "I'll remember that. And if I meet a younger man—maybe seventy-three—I certainly won't back off for fear of what people might say. But I don't think your Uncle George is the one, Anastasia. And it's a little too soon, anyway, for George. Give him a little time, Anastasia. Your Aunt Rose has only been gone four days."
    "Yeah, you're right," Anastasia said.
    "But thank you," Gertrude added, as she turned to go on into her own yard. "Thank you for thinking of me."
    Anastasia thought it over as she went back to the kitchen door, and she knew that Gertrude
was
correct. It was too soon. This was Thursday night. She'd give Uncle George a few more days.
    ***
    "There! Got it!" Myron Krupnik called. "Pull it tight now!"
    Anastasia stood in the door of the garage, with her mother, watching. It was Friday afternoon. Uncle George was up at the top of an extension ladder, one arm wrapped around the ceiling beam, as he tied the thick rope. Below him, on the floor, Anastasia's father was steadying the bottom of the rope and calling directions.
    "Are you sure this is going to be safe?" asked Mrs. Krupnik apprehensively. "Don't forget that Sam already fell out of a second-story window once. I don't think I can deal with
another
skull fracture. That rope is awfully high."
    "It's not nearly as high as the one in the gym," Anastasia told her. "Anyway, I never get more than two feet off the ground. I don't think you can fracture your skull if you only fall two feet."
    "It's good and tight!" Uncle George called from the top of the ladder. He yanked at the rope a few times. "Look at that! It would hold an elephant!"
    Sam appeared at the garage door. "An elephant can't climb a rope," he remarked. "Maybe a snake could, or a monkey. But not an elephant."
    George laughed and started down the ladder while Anastasia's father held it steady. "Where did you come from, Sam?" he asked. "You should have seen me up there, like an acrobat."
    Sam sat down on the floor of the garage and pulled off one sneaker. He tilted it and dumped out some sand. "I was in my sandbox," he explained to his uncle. "I was making a sedentary in my sandbox. Here, look." He reached into the pocket of his overalls and pulled out GI Joe. "This is poor dea—"
    Anastasia interrupted hastily. "Thanks, Uncle George. Thanks, Dad. Now I can practice. Maybe I'll get a decent grade in gym if I learn to climb a rope."
    "We used to have to climb ropes in gym," Mrs.
Krupnik said. "I wonder if I can still..."
    She put down the flowerpot she was holding, eyed the rope, and leaped upward suddenly. It was the most amazing thing Anastasia had seen in a long time: her mother leaping into the air, grabbing the rope, and dangling there for a moment. Then she wrapped her legs around, caught the rope in her feet—exactly the way Ms. Willoughby demonstrated,
exactly
the way Anastasia couldn't do it—and up she went, all the way to the ceiling.
    "
The Ascent of Woman,
" Anastasia's father said. "What a great book title!"
    Back down came Katherine Krupnik, and she jumped off the rope, panting. "What do you think?" she asked proudly. "Great athlete here, or what?"
    Anastasia didn't say anything. But no one noticed.
    "My turn!" her father said. And off he went, and up he went—in about two seconds. He was so tall that he got a head start. Back down, he dropped from the rope, laughing, and took his pipe from his pocket. "It's all this pipe-smoking that keeps me in such great shape," he said. "How about you, George? You're a former U.S. Marine!"
    Uncle George took a deep breath, brushed his hands together, measured the rope with his eyes, and jumped and grabbed. In a flash he was up at the ceiling and back down.
    Anastasia still hadn't said anything.
    "Now me!" called Sam. He put his GI Joe on the floor and held up his hands. "Now me!"
    Mrs. Krupnik picked Sam up and held him so