Free The Waltons 2 - Trouble on the Mountain by Robert Weverka Page B

quiet. Grandma’s lying down.”
    “What’s the matter? Is Grandma sick?”
    “No, she’s just worried about your grandpa.”
    “Do you think he got lost somewhere?” Elizabeth asked, “or that somebody kidnapped him?”
    “No, I don’t think that at all. I think he just went visiting somewhere and forgot how late it was getting. As soon as your Daddy and John-Boy get home they’ll go out and find him. Now you all run along.”
    Olivia went back to chopping vegetables after the children left, but her thoughts stayed on Grandpa. It was possible, she supposed, that he had gone visiting and forgotten the time. But she didn’t think that was likely, considering that he knew how much they needed those candles.
    The fact was, Olivia told herself, for a man Zebulon’s age, he worked far too hard. Sometimes, through the kitchen window, she had seen him lifting the ends of logs that must weigh two hundred pounds. And when John had to deliver wood in a hurry, Grandpa was always out there loading up the truck as if he were an eighteen-year-old boy. It was things like that that caused old men to drop dead from heart attacks.
    Olivia scraped the vegetables from the chopping board into a pot and set them on the stove. Then she dried her hands and went to the front door where she could see the road. But there was nobody coming.
    “The good Lord ain’t going to take me,” Grandpa always laughed. “He don’t want nobody so mean an’ ornery to upset ever’body up there in heaven. No sir, he’s going to wait till I’m so old and tired and weak I can’t give him no trouble. And that’ll be about twenty, thirty years from now, I reckon.”
    Olivia smiled grimly as she turned away from the door. She certainly hoped it would be twenty or thirty years from now.

V
    “W hy, Mr. Walton, I do believe we’ve bought just so many lovely things we won’t be able to get them all in the car.”
    “Perhaps two of us should sit in the back, and we can put all these packages in the front.”
    “No, no, we’ll manage, ladies.”
    It was the third stop they had made in Charlottesville, and this time Zebulon had to make two trips into the store to carry out all their purchases. After the millinery shop there had been the lingerie emporium, and then Moffat’s Department & Ladies’ Fashion Store. At the millinery shop they had bought several bolts of material to make themselves new dresses. At the lingerie emporium Zeb had waited discreetly in the car, and he had no idea what they had bought. But after an hour they came out with a dozen boxes and bags. An hour later, when they saw the gowns at Moffat’s, they decided not to make their dresses after all, but to buy them ready-made. So then there were hats and scarfs and a lot of other doodads to go along with the dresses.
    It was getting awfully late. At each stop Zeb had tactfully suggested that they ought to be starting for home, but the ladies had gone merrily about their business, oblivious to his concern. But now, with not one square inch of space left in the car, they would have to be on their way. It was already after supper time, and Zeb knew they would be worrying at home. But he expected it had all been worth it.
    Earlier in the day, Zeb had gotten only halfway to Ike’s store when the brilliant idea had hit him. Instead of getting candles and having everybody sitting around a half-dark house—with no radio or washing machine or electric iron—it would be a lot simpler for him to get two dollars and seventeen cents somewhere and just pay off the electric bill. And Zeb knew exactly where he could get the money. When the thought occurred to him, Zeb turned abruptly off the road and headed directly for the Baldwin sisters’ house.
    “Why, I declare,” Miss Emily said when she answered the door. “Look who’s here, Sister. It’s Zebulon Walton. And I’ll just bet he’s brought back Papa’s typewriting machine!”
    “No, Miss Emily. However, I’m sure John-Boy will