Read Online On the riverside of promise by Vasileios Kalampakas - Free Book Online

it doesn’t always work. That’s why
sometimes I need this,” she said and showed Ethan a chain around
her neck, a simple unadorned St. Andrews cross on it. It looked
familiar. He felt the urge to take a closer look.
     
    “A cross? May I?”
     
    She nodded and took it off. Ethan took it in
his hand and it immediately felt more than familiar - he turned it
around and he saw the letters `A.N.W.’ etched on the backside. Andy
Nathaniel Whittmore. This was Andy’s cross.
     
    Thoughts and wishes mingled in one as they
raced to take control of his mouth. He tried but he couldn’t
remember the last time he had actually been at a loss. His face was
motionless, unable to look anything other than utterly
confounded.
     
    Nicole saw that and couldn’t help asking:
     
    “What is it? What’s bothering you?”
     
    “That cross. That’s Andy’s cross. My
brother’s.”
     
    “Your brother’s? That’s ridiculous,” she said
and looked scornfully away, unabashedly dismissive in her
expression.
     
    He didn’t give it a second thought. All the
constructed facade he had went to some considerable effort to
create suddenly felt completely worthless and immaterial.
     
    “It’s not,” he said and took off his own twin
cross and showed it to her. It wasn’t as polished and there was a
silver-grey patina all over it, but the initials ’E.R.W.’ stood out
clearly.
     
    “That’s for Ethan Roiel Whittmore. And that
cross of yours has Andy Nathaniel Whittmore carved on its back.
That’s my brother’s cross.”
     
    “But… You said your name is Richard Owls.
What’s this all about?”
     
    “Where did you get that cross?”
     
    “That’s my husband’s cross.”
     
    The connotation made Ethan blink twice. He
almost stuttered when he asked:
     
    “Andy? Andy got married? You’re his wife?
Where is he, what happened?”
     
    Ethan’s face became a mask of anxiety,
contorted and flushed. His breathing became shallower, as if he was
about to jump into an ice cold ocean of fear and doubt. Nicole’s
stare was fixed on the cross as she traced its edges. She spoke
then with a low, uneven voice, as if she was telling a story better
left unsaid:
     
    “Our camp was attacked. Tribal lords. Little
more than feral men, they came one day and wanted to loot
everything. Including the women. Some of us tried to put up a
fight. Perhaps it was a mistake. During the shooting, a few had the
chance to run away. Andy with some of the guides stayed behind to
buy us time. He was bleeding when… He… He gave me this cross. He
was a believer, you see. Funny, no?”
     
    Tears welled in her eyes but she did not cry,
even though it seemed like she should. Ethan saw how easily her
facade of a strict, haughty nurse had crumbled away when she
mentioned her husband. Thoughts about that camp ran around Ethan’s
head. A strange forlorn feeling of an idea formed up in his mind.
He told her then in his most steady, thoughtful voice:
     
    “I’m looking for Andy. All this, it’s just a
cover. I need you to tell me everything that happened that
day.”
     
    Her face suddenly became a bit pale. She
looked disturbed, stricken with sudden anxiety.
     
    “But Andy… He has barely mentioned you. What
is this? Some kind of sick joke?”
     
    “I’m being dead serious. I’m risking my hide
for this. I just want to find my brother, don’t you? You can’t give
up on him. We just can’t.”
     
    “But Andy’s… He was bleeding from his leg,
looking all pale when we… No, he’s just as good as dead. Those men
wouldn’t just… Animals, not men. You don’t know what it was
like!”
     
    “Have you given up on him already? He’s a
doctor for Christ’s sake, they’d need him alive, too useful to be
killed outright. There’s a really good chance he still lives,
Nicole.”
     
    “I can’t believe that right now. I just
can’t. I saw his eyes, Richard. I saw nothing but emptiness…”
     
    “Please, call me Ethan. Whatever you