Raymie Nightingale Read Online Free PDF

Raymie’s hand and led her up a flight of stairs and into a room where the floor was polished and shining so brightly that it didn’t look like a floor at all. It looked like a lake.
    Raymie’s heart thudded and skipped.
    She had the feeling that she was going to understand things, finally, at last. She had this feeling often, that some truth was going to be revealed to her. She had felt it in the Tag and Bag parking lot with Mr. Staphopoulos when he was telling her good-bye. She had felt it earlier that day, standing with Beverly and Louisiana in Ida Nee’s backyard. Sometimes she felt it when she was sitting at Mrs. Borkowski’s feet.
    But so far, the feeling had never really panned out.
    The truth had never revealed itself.
    But maybe this time would be different.
    The room expanded. The brightness got brighter. Raymie thought about safecracking and sabotaging and the Flying Elefantes. She thought about her father sitting in the diner with Lee Ann Dickerson. She thought about Edgar the drowning dummy and gigantic seabirds with wings like angels. She thought about all the things she didn’t understand but wanted to.
    And then the sun went behind a cloud and the lake turned back into a floor and Martha said, “Let’s just go talk to Isabelle,” and it was all over. The feeling of almost understanding was gone, and Raymie didn’t know any more than she had before.
    Martha led Raymie over to an old lady sitting in a wheelchair parked by a window.
    “Isabelle’s eyesight is not what it once was,” said Martha, “so she is not able to read like she used to.”
    “I can read just fine,” said Isabelle.
    “Well, that is just not true, Isabelle,” said Martha. “You are as blind as a bat.”
    Isabelle made a fist with her right hand and brought it down on the arm of the wheelchair.
Wham, wham, wham.
“Don’t bother me, Martha,” she said. She was a tiny woman and her hair was pure white, and someone had braided it into a complicated crown on top of her head so that she looked like a fairy godmother. Her eyes were very blue.
    Martha turned to Raymie. “What’s your name, child?” she asked.
    Raymie had never been called “child” before. She knew that she was a child, of course, but there was something oddly comforting about someone addressing the situation directly.
    “I’m Raymie,” she said.
    “Isabelle,” said Martha. “This is Raymie.”
    “So what?” said Isabelle.
    “She would like to read to you about the life of Florence Nightingale.”
    “You’re kidding,” said Isabelle.
    “Isabelle,” said Martha, “please. The child wants to do a good deed.”
    Isabelle looked up at Raymie. Her eyes were bright. She didn’t look like she was as blind as a bat. It was more like she had X-ray vision.
    Raymie could feel Isabelle looking right inside her.
    She squinched up her soul as small as she could and pushed it to one side, so that it was hidden.
    “A good deed?” said Isabelle. “Why do you want to do a good deed? What is your purpose exactly?”
    Her purpose? Was that the same thing as an objective?
    Raymie flexed her toes.
    “Just, um, to do a good deed,” she said.
    Isabelle kept staring at her. Raymie stared back. She made her soul smaller and smaller. She imagined it becoming as tiny as the period at the end of a sentence. No one would ever find it.
    “Fine,” said Isabelle after what seemed like a very long time. “Who cares? Read to me about Florence Nightingale.”
    “Isn’t that wonderful?” said Martha to Raymie. “Isabelle would like to learn about Florence Nightingale.”

“I couldn’t care less about Florence Nightingale,” said Isabelle as Raymie pushed her wheelchair down a long hallway lined with closed doors. “Do-gooders don’t interest me. They are the least interesting people on the planet. And Florence Nightingale was a do-gooder if there ever was one.”
    “Okay,” said Raymie, because she couldn’t think of anything else to say. Also, it was hard to