Read Online The Digger's Rest by K. Patrick Malone - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: K. Patrick Malone
Ads: Link
a
furor, damaging the family’s reputation beyond repair. It would all
come out, what she had done, how she had treated that girl and
worst of all…the bribe; then all of it would ruin everything she
had done to lay the groundwork for Julian the fourth’s political
career.
As Annabelle tried to grasp what she was
seeing on that cover, her thoughts rocketed through her mind like a
ricocheting bullet caught in a lead box. She felt the small
capillaries in her brain begin to constrict, then seize, one after
another until they joined into one last, great spasm. Annabelle
Bramson died at age eighty-three with the last face she would ever
see being the grandson she never knew and would have hated even if
she had.
After his mother’s funeral, Julian Bramson
the Third tried to go on with life as if nothing had happened. He
counted himself lucky at first that he was the one to find his
mother’s body, clutching Time Magazine in her frozen, claw-like
hand. So he took it. The last thing he needed was for that cover to
get into the hands of a servant who might get it into their greedy
little head to go to the cheap newspapers that specialized in
spreading scandal with what had happened. He could see it now.
“Boston Society Matron, Annabelle Bramson, Dies Clutching Photo of
Unknown Grandson. Shock of Discovery Causes Fatal Stroke.”
Beads of sweat broke out on his
forehead whenever he thought about it. But then something happened.
The night after his mother was buried, Julian Bramson the Third
went to bed as he would any other night, his wife in a separate bed
next to his, and tried to go to sleep. But every time he closed his
eyes, he didn’t see the usual darkness of his closed lids. Instead
he saw the twenty-three-year-old face of Melanie Woodward, the way
she looked the last time he saw her, broken and alone. He got up
every half hour that night to look at that magazine cover, He has her hair and her eyes, he
thought to himself every time he looked at it. That was the
beginning of the haunting of Julian Bramson the Third, one that
would last for seven years, until he couldn’t stand it any longer
and decided he had to meet their son after almost forty years of
abandonment.
During those seven years he tried to
rationalize it in his mind, what he’d done and why, but he still
couldn’t find his way around it. He could never have seen himself
giving up all that he had, and would have, to live in some cramped
apartment with some farm girl from Ohio, having to actually work
for a living and listening to a screaming baby.
Night after night he tried to convince
himself that he did the only thing he could have, and that was what
his mother told him to do. He married a girl she’d picked out for
him within a year and got her pregnant as soon as was humanly
possible to cover the guilt of what he had done in New York,
forgetting that he’d ever been there. But seeing Melanie’s face
night after night every time he closed his eyes would not let him
rest, so after almost seven years of sleepless nights following his
mother’s death, Julian Bramson the Third booked a flight to New
York to finally meet his past, face to face.
Chapter VI
FATHER’S DAY (or Who’s Your Daddy?)
When you cried I'd wipe away all of your
tears, When you'd scream I'd fight away all of your fears I held
your hand through all of these years but you still have...all of
me
My Immortal,
……… As performed by
Evanescence
“ Please show the gentleman in, Alida,”
Jack said stiffly into the intercom, never once considering even
the remotest possibility of this particular visit; but having been
pulled out of where he was at that point in his memory, he was
ripe, rare and ready for the encounter.
He stood up and went toward the door,
suddenly taken back to an earlier time recollected only moments
before, that Christmas Eve in 1986, holding that sad boy in his
arms, rocking him and praying with all his might that he’d tied
furor, damaging the family’s reputation beyond repair. It would all
come out, what she had done, how she had treated that girl and
worst of all…the bribe; then all of it would ruin everything she
had done to lay the groundwork for Julian the fourth’s political
career.
As Annabelle tried to grasp what she was
seeing on that cover, her thoughts rocketed through her mind like a
ricocheting bullet caught in a lead box. She felt the small
capillaries in her brain begin to constrict, then seize, one after
another until they joined into one last, great spasm. Annabelle
Bramson died at age eighty-three with the last face she would ever
see being the grandson she never knew and would have hated even if
she had.
After his mother’s funeral, Julian Bramson
the Third tried to go on with life as if nothing had happened. He
counted himself lucky at first that he was the one to find his
mother’s body, clutching Time Magazine in her frozen, claw-like
hand. So he took it. The last thing he needed was for that cover to
get into the hands of a servant who might get it into their greedy
little head to go to the cheap newspapers that specialized in
spreading scandal with what had happened. He could see it now.
“Boston Society Matron, Annabelle Bramson, Dies Clutching Photo of
Unknown Grandson. Shock of Discovery Causes Fatal Stroke.”
Beads of sweat broke out on his
forehead whenever he thought about it. But then something happened.
The night after his mother was buried, Julian Bramson the Third
went to bed as he would any other night, his wife in a separate bed
next to his, and tried to go to sleep. But every time he closed his
eyes, he didn’t see the usual darkness of his closed lids. Instead
he saw the twenty-three-year-old face of Melanie Woodward, the way
she looked the last time he saw her, broken and alone. He got up
every half hour that night to look at that magazine cover, He has her hair and her eyes, he
thought to himself every time he looked at it. That was the
beginning of the haunting of Julian Bramson the Third, one that
would last for seven years, until he couldn’t stand it any longer
and decided he had to meet their son after almost forty years of
abandonment.
During those seven years he tried to
rationalize it in his mind, what he’d done and why, but he still
couldn’t find his way around it. He could never have seen himself
giving up all that he had, and would have, to live in some cramped
apartment with some farm girl from Ohio, having to actually work
for a living and listening to a screaming baby.
Night after night he tried to convince
himself that he did the only thing he could have, and that was what
his mother told him to do. He married a girl she’d picked out for
him within a year and got her pregnant as soon as was humanly
possible to cover the guilt of what he had done in New York,
forgetting that he’d ever been there. But seeing Melanie’s face
night after night every time he closed his eyes would not let him
rest, so after almost seven years of sleepless nights following his
mother’s death, Julian Bramson the Third booked a flight to New
York to finally meet his past, face to face.
Chapter VI
FATHER’S DAY (or Who’s Your Daddy?)
When you cried I'd wipe away all of your
tears, When you'd scream I'd fight away all of your fears I held
your hand through all of these years but you still have...all of
me
My Immortal,
……… As performed by
Evanescence
“ Please show the gentleman in, Alida,”
Jack said stiffly into the intercom, never once considering even
the remotest possibility of this particular visit; but having been
pulled out of where he was at that point in his memory, he was
ripe, rare and ready for the encounter.
He stood up and went toward the door,
suddenly taken back to an earlier time recollected only moments
before, that Christmas Eve in 1986, holding that sad boy in his
arms, rocking him and praying with all his might that he’d tied
Similar Books
