Blossoms and the Green Phantom by Betsy Byars Read Free Book Online Page B

This was what their father always used to do to make them shut up, and it worked.
    Vern turned. He walked stiffly out of the room, out of the house, across the yard, and kicked the first tree he came to.
    Pap watched the sun go down from inside the Dumpster. It was a big red sun that hung over the purple ridges of mountains for a long time. Then it dropped with amazing speed behind the peaks and out of sight.
    Pap felt a chill touch his bones.
    “Boys,” he said, but he was speaking more to himself than to the dogs, “I wonder if we’ll still be here in the morning when the sun comes up.”
    Then he sat down on the garbage bag to wait out the night.

CHAPTER 13
Up, Up, and Away
    “Now, you’ve got everything?”
    “Yes.” Junior felt he had now answered that question at least a hundred times.
    “You’re sure?”
    “Yes.”
    “Maggie, does he have everything?”
    “Yes, Mom, Ralphie checked.”
    Vicki Blossom looked at the wagon where the Green Phantom was folded. The canister of helium was tied on top. “I just wish I could go with you to make sure—”
    “Mom, we’ll be fine.”
    “I wish you’d wait till tomorrow night, Junior.”
    “Yeah, Junior,” Vern said quickly, “because don’t you want Michael to see it? Maybe Michael can come tomorrow night.”
    Junior shook his head the way he did every time delay was mentioned. Vicki Blossom knelt beside him and put her hands on his shoulders. “Junior, you do understand why I can’t come, don’t you?”
    “Yes,” Junior said. He pulled away from her impatiently. The sun was setting. In a half hour it would be dark enough to launch.
    His mother did not let him go. Junior sighed. “You can’t come,” he repeated, as if it were something he had learned by heart, “because Pap’s missing and you need to wait by the phone.”
    “Yes,” she said.
    “But you’re going to watch from the porch, and you know you’ll get to see it. And if you do see it, you’ll tell me all about it when I get home.”
    Vicki Blossom smiled. “Well, you better get going.”
    That was what Junior had been trying to do. He picked up the handle of the wagon and began to pull it toward the woods. They had all agreed that the only place for the launch was Owl’s Cliff, the highest point of land in the county. From Owl’s Cliff the Green Phantom would float directly toward the city of Alderson.
    Junior squared his shoulders for the journey. Owl’s Cliff was a long way, and Junior was determined to pull the wagon by himself.
    Vicki Blossom watched Junior and company disappear into the woods. She put her hands in her pockets and, shoulders sagging, sat down on the steps. She had a double feeling of doom—about her father-in-law and her son, and there was nothing she could do for either one of them. She wrapped her arms around her knees, as if for protection.
    Junior pulled the wagon down the hill, through the chill waters of Snake Creek, under the broken rail fence. When he started up Furnace Hill, he said graciously, “Someone else can have a turn.”
    It was cold in the Dumpster. After the sun set, the warmth began to leave the metal sides, and Pap felt chilled. His lumber jacket was in the truck, but of course that didn’t help him.
    With the sun’s warmth had gone the color. There was still enough light to see by, but everything Pap saw was a dull gray. Pap felt increasingly tired, cold, and depressed. He wiped his face on his sleeve. He didn’t even have the energy to pull out his handkerchief anymore.
    On his lap the puppy began to shiver. “Gets cold quick, don’t it,” Pap said, “and you know who the cold bothers most, don’t you?”
    The puppy curled himself into a tighter ball.
    Pap sighed. “It bothers the very young like you, and the very old like me.”
    The Phantom had been unfolded, spread out on the grass, and filled with helium. Junior had even generously allowed Ralphie to help put in the helium. Well, maybe not generously. At first he had said