Heaven Read Online Free PDF Page B

you been standing there long?”
    “Only a few seconds,” I lied, for it had been more than that. “Tom ran to fetch Our Jane and Keith and bring them here. They’ll be afraid if one or the other of us doesn’t show up to walk them home.”
    “What about Fanny? Doesn’t she do her share?”
    “Well,” I began falteringly, trying to be protective of Fanny just because she was my sister, “sometimes Fanny gets distracted and forgets.”
    Miss Deale smiled. “I realize you have a long walk home, so I won’t wait for Tom to return. I’ve spoken to the school-board members about the two of you, hoping to convince them to allow you to take books home to study, but they are adamant, and said if they give you two special privileges, they will have to give allthe students free books. So I am going to allow you to use
my
books.”
    I stared at her in surprise. “But won’t you need them?”
    “No … there are others I can use. From now on, you can use them, and please take as many books from the library as you care to read in one week. Of course you’ll have to respect those books and keep them clean, and return them when they’re due.”
    I was so thrilled I could have shouted.
“All
the books we can read in a week? Miss Deale, we won’t have arms strong enough to carry so many!”
    She laughed, and, strangely, tears came to her eyes. “I could have guessed you’d say something like that.” She beamed at Tom as he came in carrying Our Jane, who appeared exhausted, and leading Keith by the hand. “Tom, I think you already have your arms full, and won’t be able to carry home books.”
    Dazed-looking, he stared at her. “Ya mean we kin take home books? Not have to pay for them?”
    “That’s right, Tom. And pick up a few for Our Jane and Keith, and even Fanny.”
    “Fanny won’t read em,” said Tom, his eyes lighting up, “but Heavenly and I sure will!”
    We went home that day with five books to read, and four to study. Keith did his bit by carrying two books so neither Tom nor I would refuse to carry Our Jane when she grew tired. It worried me to see how white she grew after only a few steps uphill.
    Tagging along behind came Fanny with her boyfriends swarming like bees around the sweetest flower. I had only a devoted brother. Keith lagged about twenty yards behind Fanny and her friends, reluctant to stay with us, but not for the same reasons as Fanny. Keith was in love with nature, with the sights, sounds, and smells of earth, wind, forest, and, most of all, animals. I glanced behind to check, and saw he was soabsorbed in studying the bark of a tree he didn’t hear me calling his name. “Keith, hurry up!”
    He ran a short way before he stopped to pick up a dead bird, examining it with careful hands and observant eyes. If we didn’t constantly remind him where he was, he would be left far behind, and never find his way home. Strange how absentminded Keith was, never noticing where he was, only where the objects of his interest grew, lived, or visited.
    “Which is heavier, Tom, the books or Our Jane?” I asked, lugging along six.
    “The books,” he said quickly, setting down our frail sister so I could empty my arms of books and pick up Our Jane.
    “What are we gonna do, Ma?” Tom asked when we reached our cabin, where the smoke belched out and reddened our eyes immediately. “She gets so tired, yet she needs to go to school.”
    Sarah looked deep into Our Jane’s tired eyes, touched her pale face, then gently picked up her youngest and carried her into the big bed and laid her down. “What she needs is a doctor, but we kin’t afford it. That’s what makes me so damned mad with yer pa. He’s got money fer booze, an money fer women … but none fer doctors to heal his own.”
    How bitter she sounded.
    Every Sunday night I had nightmares. The same one repeated over and over, until I grew to hate Sunday nights, I dreamed I was all alone in the cabin, snowed in and alone. Every time the dream