Cowboy Girl Annie Read Online Free PDF Page A

to bed with it on, and my hair fell
down to my shoulders. The jig was up as they say.
    I couldn't pull off the same thing
for a third time. Word spread like a wild brush fire from ranch to
ranch. Beware of the she male trying to get work as a cattle
puncher.” Annie sighed. “Now it's your turn to talk. What about
you, Skinny Jake? How did you wind up on the streets?”
    “ I lost a good job when the plastic
factory closed in southern Indiana, and then my wife walked out on
me when I couldn't find another job I was suitable for. I hitch
hiked to this town to look for work, but there wasn't any jobs to
be had that I had experience in.
    I wasn't cut out to be a thief so I
didn't have a choice but to try to fit in with the other homeless
people around here like you said,” Jake explained in a down hearted
tone.
    “ The two of us make quite a pair,
don't we?” Annie surmised, smiling sympathetically at Jake as she
patted him on the knee. “It's better to be a has been than a never
was is the way I see it.”
    “ You got that right. I reckon we are
an odd pair to boot,” he said, staring at the end of the alley.
“Speaking of being odd, here comes old Wild Jim.”
     

Chapter 7
     
    An old man with gray hair brushing
his shoulders and a long bushy Santa beard, pushed his cart along
the alley. He mumbled to himself and answered himself until he got
even with them.
    The loony old man's eyesight must be
poorly, Annie thought when Wild Jim stopped to stare at them
through squinted eyes. He seemed to be trying to figure out if he
knew them.
    She felt sorry for the old man,
knowing that he was just barely getting by. “It's Cowboy Girl Annie
and Skinny Jake. How you be, Wild Jim?”
    “ Fair. Only fair, but what do you
expect for an old man, says I,” he replied. “How be you,
woman?”
    “ I'm middlin'. Just middlin', Annie
replied, not wanting to sound better off than the old
man.
    “ You are lucky to be that, says I,”
Wild Jim grumbled. “Ain't you two got nothing better to do except
sit there on the ground doing nothing, says I? You will have plenty
of time to sit when you grow too old to make the rounds. I ought to
know what I'm talking about, says I.”
    “ Aw, Wild Jim, we were making the
rounds. We're just taking a break now. Everyone deserves a break
now and then,” Jake excused.
    “ Even you, Wild Jim. You want to sit
with us to rest yourself and jaw a spell?” Annie invited, patting
the ground beside her.
    The old man grunted his disdain.
“Says I, I ain't got nothing to jaw about that can't be said to you
on the move if you want to come along with me,” declared Wild Jim.
He pushed his cart on past them, mumbling to himself about how lazy
young people were these days.
    Annie shook her head as she frowned
at the old man's humped back.
    “ What are you thinking, Annie?” Jake
asked.
    “ That poor old man reminds me of one
of my ma's garden scarecrows. They would flap in the stiff breezes,
making all sorts of snappy noises which wasn't very affective.
Critters weren't a bit scared. They raided my ma's garden every
night until the vegetables were gone.”
    “ That about sizes up Wild Jim all
right. Everyone is so used to him nobody pays any attention to what
he says.” Jake watched the stooped man disappear along the
buildings on the street. “What you got planned for this
afternoon?”
    “ The usual rummaging, but first I
need to go by Jerry's Auto Shop. My shopping cart needs fixed,”
Annie told him.
    “ Wouldn't have anything to do with
those noisy squeaking noises that's been driving me crazy?” Jake
asked.
    “ You got it. My cart has a wheel
stuck. If I'm lucky I might find a pool of grease on the driveway I
can use to lubricate the wheel axle.
    Pushing that cart has purely
tuckered me out already this morning. I'm hurting between my
shoulders from all that hard work.” Annie stretched her back to
relieve a kink and her left shoulder joint popped.
    “ I haven't got anything