This Tender Land Read Online Free PDF Page A

wash off the dust and dirt while she prepared supper. We stripped off our clothes and jumped right in. We’d been sweating all afternoon under a hot sun, and the cool water of the Gilead felt like heaven. We hadn’t been in the river long when Emmy called from the bank, “Can we canoe now?”
    We made her turn around while we climbed out and put our clothes on. Then Albert and Mose lifted the canoe from the little rack at the river’s edge where Mr. Frost had always kept it, and they slipped it into the Gilead. I grabbed the two paddles. Emmy got intothe middle with me, while Albert and Mose each took a paddle and their places in the bow and stern, and we set off.
    The Gilead was only ten yards wide and the current was steady but gentle. We canoed east for a while, under the overhang of the trees. The river and the land on both sides were quiet.
    “This is nice,” Emmy said. “I wish we could go on like this forever.”
    “All the way to the Mississippi?” I said.
    Mose laid his paddle across the gunwales and signed, All the way to the ocean.
    Albert shook his head. “We’d never make it in a canoe.”
    “But we can dream,” I said.
    We turned around and headed back upstream to the Frost farmstead. We set the canoe on the rack beside the river, stowed the paddles underneath, and headed toward the farmhouse.
    That’s when we got the bad news.

CHAPTER FOUR
    WE ALL RECOGNIZED the Brickmans’ automobile, a silver Franklin Club Sedan. It was covered with dust from the back roads and sat in the middle of the dirt lane like a big, hungry lion.
    “Oh, brother,” Albert said. “We’re in for it now.”
    Mose signed, Run .
    “But Mr. Brickman gave his okay for us to work here today,” I said.
    Albert’s mouth was set in a hard line. “It’s not Mr. Brickman I’m worried about.”
    They were seated in what Mrs. Frost called the parlor, a small sitting room with a sofa and two floral upholstered chairs. On the mantel above the little fireplace sat a framed photograph of Mr. and Mrs. Frost with Emmy between them, all of them looking as happy as any of us who had no family thought a family ought to be.
    “Ah, there you are at last,” the Black Witch said, as if we’d been gone a dozen years and our return delighted her no end. “Did you enjoy your boat outing?”
    Albert said, “Emmy wanted to go, and we couldn’t let her be on the river alone.”
    “Of course you couldn’t,” Mrs. Brickman agreed. “And how much more enjoyable boating on a river instead of working in a hayfield, yes?” She turned her smile on me, and I expected any moment to see a little forked tongue slip from between her lips.
    “The boys worked very hard for me today,” Mrs. Frost said. “Moses cut all my orchard grass, and the three of them together put up the rabbit fence around my garden. I would have been absolutely lost without them. Thank you, Clyde, for allowing me to have them for the day.”
    Mr. Brickman glanced at his wife, and the thin smile that had come to his lips quickly died.
    “My Clyde is nothing if not softhearted,” Mrs. Brickman said. “A failing, I fear, when dealing with children who need to be guided with a strong hand.” She put down her glass of iced tea. “We should be off or the boys will miss their dinner.”
    “I had planned to feed them here before taking them back,” Mrs. Frost said.
    “No, no, my dear. I won’t hear of it. They’ll eat with the others at school. And it’s movie night. We wouldn’t want them to miss that, would we?” She stood, rising from the parlor chair like a curl of black smoke. “Come, Clyde.”
    “Thank you, boys.” Mrs. Frost gave us an encouraging smile as she saw us out.
    “Bye, Odie,” Emmy said. “Bye, Mose. Bye, Albert.”
    My brother held the car door open for Mrs. Brickman, then he and Mose and I climbed into the backseat while Mr. Brickman settled himself behind the wheel of the Franklin. Mrs. Frost stood in the lane, Emmy beside her, small lips