Orchard of Hope Read Online Free PDF

what. You talk it over with your folks, and if they say it’s okay, you can start next week.”
    “I don’t need to talk it over with my parents. My father said I could take whatever I found.” Noah held out his hand to Jocie’s dad again. “It’s a deal.”
    “Great.” Jocie’s dad shook Noah’s hand. “We’ll give it a trial run next week and see how it works for both of us.”
    “The lady out front might not be too happy about it,” Noah said.
    “Oh, Zella’s okay once you get to know her,” Jocie’s dad said with a quick look at Jocie to be sure she didn’t contradict him. “Right, Jocie?”
    “Sure, Dad. She keeps things straight around here. We’d be broke without her. If you don’t believe me, just ask her.”
    “She does keep us in the black. Now we better get on the road.”
    Noah walked out with them. As he passed Zella’s desk, he said, “Thanks for the bandages, ma’am.”
    “You’re perfectly welcome, I’m sure,” Zella said without looking up from her typewriter. “Will I need to lock up when I leave today, David?”
    “You’d better. We probably won’t be back till late, and then we’ll have to get Wes settled in at the house,” Jocie’s father said.
    “Very well,” Zella said, her eyes still on the paper in her typewriter. “I hope Wesley makes the trip all right.”
    “I think he’ll do fine if we can get him in the car with that cast,” Jocie’s dad said.
    Noah leaned over close to Jocie to whisper, “I guess I was lucky to only need a Band-Aid.”
    “I told you,” Jocie said.
    Out on the sidewalk, Noah got on his bike. “Thank you, Mr. Brooke, or should I call you Rev. Brooke? Jocie told me you’re a preacher.”
    “I am, but David will do fine while we’re working.”
    Noah hesitated a moment and then looked straight at Jocie’s father. “Jocie said you preached at that church out close to where we live, so maybe I should warn you that my mother might show up for church Sunday morning. She asked Mr. McMurtry about his church when we moved in.”
    “Well, that will be fine. She’ll certainly be welcome. Your whole family will be welcome.”
    Noah smiled a little. “Then in that case, she probably won’t come. My mama don’t necessarily like to go places where she’s welcome. She likes to go places where she has to make herself welcome.”

5
    The nurse who wheeled Wes to the front door of the hospital took one look at their car and frowned. “Didn’t anyone tell you Mr. Green would need an ambulance?”
    “I don’t think so. At least not that I can remember,” David said. “But my backseat’s pretty big.”
    The nurse mashed her mouth together in a thin line and made a sound somewhere between a snort and a sigh. It was just their luck that Nurse Army Boots was on duty. Wes had names for all of the nurses. Nurse Merry Sunshine was always smiling, Nurse Stinky had to be eating garlic three times a day to try to ward off germs, Nurse Maybe Someday never came when he rang the call button, and Nurse Sweetie-Pie talked baby talk to him.
    But Nurse Army Boots was definitely the worst of the bunch. She was bigger than Wes and Jocie’s dad put together and looked ready to knock aside anything and everything in her path in order to see that things got done her way. She’d already spent more than a half hour lecturing Jocie’s father on the care Wes was going to need when he got home, without even a glance toward Wes as if he couldn’t hear just because his leg was banged up. Then she shoved the mustard brown plastic washpan full of various other mysterious mustard brown plastic hospital stuff at Jocie and ordered her to make herself useful.
    Now Jocie tried to do just that by tucking the washpan under one arm and running around the wheelchair to swing open the car’s back door.
    “This is not going to work.” The nurse’s frown got deeper. “Surely you can see that Mr. Green cannot bend his leg to get in a car. I’m afraid he’ll have to