Rorey's Secret Read Online Free Page A

nodded. Just yesterday, I’d finished reading a Dickens novel to him. He’d be anxious to have something new in the house, even if he couldn’t read it for himself. And besides, it was Friday. He always went to see the schoolteacher on Fridays, begging a book or a map or something for me to go over with him at home. I should have remembered that. Franky was always hungry for something more.
    William sneered. “Why’s he bother?”
    Willy had always hated school and didn’t go anymore unless his father made him, which was far too seldom. Today none of the older boys had gone. Like most of the teenagers in the district, they were helping with harvest.
    “Franky likes books,” I told them. “You boys should read, or at least listen, more often.”
    Robert and William both frowned. Somehow they’d gotten the notion that it was babyish to be read to and sissy to be caught with a book on your own. From Willy, such an attitude wasn’t any real surprise. But my own son? He’d always been such a good student.
    Rorey sided with them. “I don’t know how Franky can stand that stuff you read to him. It’s dead dull, if you ask me.”
    “And stupid,” Willy added. “Franky just don’t want to admit he’s stupid.”
    Even from the corner of my eye I could see little Emmie Grace turning her face toward me. Her father, Franky’s father, had come in and was standing right beside me, taking a whiff of that chicken, and he didn’t say anything. But I couldn’t let it go.
    “I don’t want to hear another such word in my house,” I told them. “There’s not one of you stupid nor even Julia close to it, and I don’t want to hear of it again! You know Franky. You know he’s got a special talent, and he’s sharp as a tack—”
    “I sure have appreciated you and Samuel feelin’ that way,” George finally decided to break in. “Don’t know what Franky’d ever a’ had otherwise, if you know what I mean.”
    I was suddenly so mad I could have hit him with the pot holder I had in my hand. How could he be so blind? Instead of standing up for his precious son and rebuking William’s cruelty, he was practically endorsing the unkind words! Didn’t know what Franky would’ve had? Indeed! I happened to know that George didn’t read any better than his son, though he claimed it was because he’d never been to school.
    “Way I see it, your Samuel give Franky a future,” George continued. “Folks is startin’ to know his work now.”
    “The whole business was Franky’s idea,” I reminded him. “WH Hardwoods might never have happened—”
    “Do you want walnuts sprinkled on the cake?” Katie suddenly asked.
    “Sure,” William told her. “Do what you want.”
    I looked at both of them and back over at George and decided to let it drop about Franky for now. There were other things to think about, and it wasn’t helping anyone to have me arguing with George Hammond.
    I started wondering just exactly how long ago Ben and Samuel had left and when they could possibly be getting back. They had about ten miles to the doctor, and maybe a stop for Mrs. Pratt. It’d be a while, unfortunately.
    We set out all the food buffet style, since there wasn’t room for everyone at the table. Folks could sit wherever they wanted to. Kirk and William were itching to get started and pretty upset at Franky for the delay. He should’ve been here long ago, they thought, since he’d left to find the schoolteacher way before they started for home.
    Oh, well, I thought. He’s surely on the way. Their house wasn’t very far. And Elvira Post wouldn’t keep him long, with her ailing husband wanting supper. She seemed uncomfortable around Franky most of the time anyway, though she freely supplied him with books. He couldn’t be much longer.
    I went in to check on Thelma while we waited. She was sweating again, but the labor pains seemed no worse. William and Robert impatiently started a game of checkers. Rorey traipsed around the