The Keeper Read Online Free PDF

came face-to-face with a tall, thin woman, with wiry hair the color of nickels and dimes, staring down at M.K.
    “I’m Mary Kate,” M.K. said timidly. “But you could call me M.K. If you like. That’s what my family calls me . . .” Her voice drizzled to a stop. “You must be . . . Fern.”
    “I am,” the woman said. She stood surveying the room. She was all business. Her eyes were a pair of pale-blue flints striking cold sparks, and she had a look on her face like she was sizing M.K. up and filing her under Trouble—a look M.K. was rather accustomed to from her schoolteacher. “New rule. No one is allowed in the refrigerator.”
    “But—”
    “I spent the afternoon cleaning and organizing it. It was a disaster.” Fern frowned. “And now the milk isn’t in the right place. And the eggs. Why would anybody move the eggs?” She straightened everything and wiped the shelf with a dish towel. “They don’t belong on that shelf!” A storm cloud seemed to form over Fern’s head, threatening to shed cold sleet all over the room.
    Talking around a mouthful of cookie, M.K. mumbled, “The eggs were in front of the milk.”
    Fern eyed the second cookie beside M.K.’s glass of milk. “One snack after school. Then nothing until dinner.”
    M.K. slid the extra cookie back on the cooling rack.
    “And there’s a smudge on the door handle!” Fern rubbed the handle of the refrigerator with her dish towel as if polishing fine silver.
    The large kitchen suddenly began to feel small and confining as Fern’s opinions began to take up residence. M.K. quietly backed toward the door while Fern’s attention was focused on the smudge. She sat on the kitchen porch steps and finished up her cookie and milk. She dipped the cookie into the milk and took the last bite, savoring it because she knew she wouldn’t be able to help herself to another. Fern was guarding them like a raccoon with her kits.
    M.K. pondered Fern’s no-one-in-the-refrigerator rule and wondered if there would be more rules to follow. No one in the refrigerator? She would starve! She would grow weaker and weaker, languishing away, until she died from malnutrition. Tragic possibilities always lurked near the front of M.K.’s mind, just behind her common sense. “This is outrageous!” she hissed to nobody in particular.
    M.K. didn’t like change. In her eleven years, she had already discovered that when things changed, they always changed for the worst. Life as she knew it was over.

    Sadie finished filling the water bucket for the buggy horse, turned off the hose spigot, and went to find Menno. She followed the tuneless humming that led to him, sitting in an empty horse stall that doubled as a maternity ward for his dog, Lulu. Menno’s back was against the wall, and two yellow puppies were nestled in his arms.
    Sadie leaned against the bars of the stall. “I’m amazed Lulu will let you hold them. M.K. said she won’t let her near them.”
    “That’s because M.K. moves too fast, Sadie,” Menno said in his slow, deliberate way. “She’s always in a hurry. She makes Lulu nervous. Lulu likes things calm.”
    “Are you going to put up a ‘puppies for sale’ sign down by Julia’s stand?”
    “No.”
    “Dad said you can’t keep them, Menno.”
    “I know. But I need to find the right home for each one. And then I need to make sure the puppies are happy. Dogs pick their master, you know.” He shifted a little against the wall. “Come, look at this, Sadie.” He pointed his jaw at the puppy tucked in his elbow. “Does that eye look . . . ,” he searched for the word, “. . . gummy?”
    Sadie examined the puppy’s eye. “Might just be a little sleep in its eye. I’ll check it again later today.” She didn’t see anything wrong with the puppy’s eyes, but there wasn’t anything she would deny Menno. She adored him.
    Sadie looked at her brother. Menno resembled Julia far more than Sadie—he was tall and slender, with thick,