Read Online Nancy and Plum by Betty MacDonald - Free Book Online Page A

disguise she has to wear.”
    Plum said, “Nancy, look at the low branch on that big maple tree. I’m going to run over there, jump up and grab it and take one great big swing. I bet it’ll be just like flying.”
    Nancy said, “Miss Gronk, I mean the Princess, won’t like it.”
    Plum said, “I don’t care. I just have to take one swing.” And like a little fawn she jumped over the fence, ran across the field and leapt up and grabbed the branch. The branch bent down and she got a good hold, then lifted her feet off the ground and the branch swung up and then down, then up and down. Plum felt like a leaf in the wind, like a little beetle on a blade of grass, like a bee on an apple blossom. She forgot all about Miss Gronk, about everything but the fact that it was spring and she was a little girl swinging in a tree.
    Then she heard Nancy calling, “Plum, come on. Miss Gronk will be mad as anything.”
    Plum took one last big swing that lifted her way up into the branches of the tree and then let go. Her hands were red and burning from holding on to the bark but she felt wonderful, alive and happy and wonderful.
    She called to Nancy, who was coming across the field toward her, “Come on, Nancy, take one swing. It’s like magic.”
    Nancy said, “Well, maybe just one. We can catch up to Miss Gronk in a second, she walks so slow.”
    She jumped and grabbed the branch and swung up, up, up into the tree, then way down to the ground, where Plum was waiting, her blue eyes bright with happiness. Nancy, too, feltlike a leaf, a bee on a flower and a flower in the wind. Again and again she swung and then Plum took a turn, then Nancy another turn and another and the time flew by and pretty soon they stopped to rest and realized that it was almost noon and Miss Gronk and the picnic were nowhere in sight.
    Grabbing their lunch bags, they jumped over the fence and ran down the road clear to the turnoff for Lookout Hill before they saw Miss Gronk and the Sunday-School class far ahead of them.
    “Oh, Nancy,” Plum wailed, “she isn’t going to Lookout Hill at all.”
    Nancy said, “I wonder if she saw the sign.”
    Plum said, “Of course she saw it. It’s about ten feet high. Where do you suppose she is going?”
    Nancy said, “I know. She’s going to the cemetery. See, she’s taking the hill past the church.”
    Plum said, “Well, I’m not going to a picnic in the cemetery. I’m going up Lookout Hill.”
    Nancy said, “Do we dare?”
    Plum said, “Yes, we dare. Here we go,” and she waved good-bye to Miss Gronk and the Sunday School and turned up the hill.
    The path to Lookout Hill was long and very steep but it led through the woods and the trees were shady and the pine needles were springy and there were bluebells in the crevices of the rocks. Nancy and Plum grew very tired and very hungry but they had made up their minds not to stop nor to eat their lunch until they reached the Lookout place. And they didn’t.
    About three o’clock Nancy said, “I wonder if we’re on the right path. We’ve been climbing for hours and we should be there now.”
    Plum said, “The sign said Lookout Hill and it pointed this way. Come on, I’ll race you around the next curve.”
    Nancy said, “You go on. I’m too tired.” Plum ran around the curve and came back calling, “We’re there! We’re there! Hurry up, you can see for a thousand miles!”
    Nancy grabbed Plum’s hand and together they ran around the last curve and then they were leaning against the old stone wall that marked Lookout Hill. Far, far down below them, a river was trying to wriggle its way out of a steep canyon. Over to the right, thick green hills crowded close to each other to share one filmy white cloud. To the left, as far as they could see, the land flowed into valleys that shaded from a pale watery green, through lime, emerald, jade, leaf, forest, to a dark, dark bluish-green, almost black. The rivers were like inky lines, the ponds like ink