I have not been all that much help lately. For I am barely able to get around on my own less than usual--let alone have enough strength left to let her lean on me for more than balance.
All of this has made getting her out and back in the house to go get her paracentesis treatments an exercise in pure terror. I was able to get her out to the car without a whole lot of extra drama on October 27th, but getting her back up into the the house was another matter entirely. For she made it up the one step up into the breezeway, but she could not make it all the way up the two steps from the breezeway into the house. Oh, she made it onto the door frame, but she could not actually stand up on her feet all of the way. When I went to let her down on the edge, she lost her balance and tumbled down onto the concrete floor of the breezeway. She was not seriously hurt, but an ambulance crew had to be called to pick her up and get her to her recliner. This is the fourth or fifth time they have had to come out, but it is the first time in well over a year.
They had taken 10 liters of excessive out of her while leaving at least 4-5 more because it being a new doctor. It was recommended that she come back in a week, which was faster than either one of us wanted to contemplate.
Ah, but I had a plan to get her back into the house much easier the next time. It required a come-along and nylon two straps that I purchased and received from Amazon at a very reasonable price and in-time. We already had some steel-reinforced boards that had been used as portable bookshelves at where Arlynda had worked several years ago. I was going to put a couple of them down to use as a ramp and winch her into the house in her wheelchair. As with almost everything else I have went to do the last few years, setting up was a lot harder than I anticipated. It took over three hours to get the come-along cable pulled all of the way out, and this is a tool that I am intimately familiar with from my days of building fence back before I started driving a truck. I do not know if the problem was because of it being so cheap or my head just not working right, but I was beyond exhausted be the time I had the cable pulled out, the tow straps put in place and the ramp ready to be put down when we went to get back inside of the house.
What I had not planned for was it being nearly impossible to get her out to the car. She barely had enough strength to get down the steps into the breezeway while hanging onto me, but she could not make it down the step from the breezeway to the concrete in front of our house. I pushed her wheelchair as close as possible to the front door to the breezeway while she was hanging onto the door frame, but when she went to lower herself down into the wheelchair, she could only get her left cheek in. After what seemed to be hours of her trying to push herself all of the way in the wheelchair and us begging our Heavenly Father for help, she made it well enough to get her pushed to the car. Thankfully, she still had enough strength to push herself up out the wheelchair and get behind the wheel of the car. I do not trust my eyesight enough to allow me to drive on the road. I was able to get her into the hospital entrance for where they do paracentesises without a lot of trouble, and around two hours later, she came out without 12 liters of excess fluid, with 4-5 more left in her abdomen.
Have you ever felt fairly confident while feeling scared to death? This is what I was going through on the way back to the house. Arlynda suggested putting down one of the bricks I was going to use to brace the makeshift ramp from the breezeway into the house on the ground next to the one step up into the breezeway to make the steps not be so high. This worked well, and I had her sitting in her wheelchair in the breezeway while I set up the ramp, tow straps and the come-along. It was going to work, but I did not count on there being so much stretch to the tow straps, and this did not allow for enough travel from the come-along to get her all of the way into the house. I was at the edge of being completely distraught when Arlynda suggested that I put down a brick next to the two steps up into the house like I had the step up into the breezeway and place a sturdy kitchen table chair with the back towards the doorway so that she could use the chair (with me sitting in it) to pull herself all of the way into the house. I did as she instructed and while I was sitting there fighting hysterics, she was up into the house.
All of that went down last Wednesday (November 8th) and around an hour after we were home, he liver doctor's office called and told Arlynda that she could go back on a higher dose of one of her diuretics. She had to go see another doctor to finalize the process to get her an electric wheelchair last Friday (November 10th) and that went as well as Wednesday was awful. She had lost over 40 pounds and could even pick her feet up into the car unassisted!
No, she has not started practicing her line-dancing again, but she is definitely in better spirits. So am I for the most part, but my energy level is lower than usual. That and me starting to write on Little Lost Leon again has had me being mostly socially inaccessible the last couple of months. I have been a little more active on Facebook because of my oldest daughter's husband being in and out of the hospital, but I have not been visiting any of your sites, which I really do miss.
The writing process with Little Lost Leon has been going slower than it did for the others. I suppose it will even out to be about the same in the end, but instead of writing all of the book and do going back to make changes 4-5 times, I am concentrating on getting each paragraph right before moving on. This has resulted in just completing the first chapter and about half of the second one so far. I will include the first chapter here as a tease.
The book is destined to have a very happy ending, but be thou forewarned that most or it contains varying degrees of darkness. The first chapter is exceedingly dark. Therefore, if your mind is not in a good place right now, I highly recommend not proceeding further.
Little
Lost Leon
Chapter
1
This
is the story of Little Lost Leon, which is actually a somewhat
misleading nickname. For it is true that he was very young and
rather small for his age when people started calling him this, but
Leon was never really lost in a geographical-sense. It was in an
emotional-sense, however, an entirely different story. Therefore, we
must start at the behinning of that story in order to properly
present the full story of Little Lost Leon.
Alfred
and Ruby were as close as a brother and sister could ever be. A more
cynical soul would insist that they had to be so close to survive the
torturous abuse regularly administered by their father, but they
genuinely had a very deep affection for one another.
Their
father's name was Manfred, and he did indeed have an exceedingly black heart. For
he hid it well when it suited him, and he was not opposed to turning
on the charm when bullying would not be as effective to accomplish
his objective.
I
suppose it is arguable that Manfred grew up in an environment that
cultivated such despicable behavior. For his mother died while
giving birth to him, and his father spent a great deal of his
remaining years spoiling his only child.
Manfred's
father certainly did not intend to raise a rotten son. It was just
that he had been so looking forward to finally becoming a father, and
it helped ease the excruciating pain he felt over losing his beloved
wife to cater to the boy's every whim.
Manfred's
father most definitely had the resources to do so. For he founded
Shire and had made a small fortune supplying wooden barrels to
distillers far and wide, which grew into a huge forune manufacturing
wagons, stage coaches and fine carriages, as well as some of the
finest furniture ever designed.
Manfred
enjoyed the gifts showered upon him by his father, but what he truly
lusted after was power. To hold the fate of someone's life in his
hands held more value to him than all of the gold in the world, but
he recognized that the great wealh at this disposal was a means to
his end.
Manfred's
first experience with how intoxicating power was to him occurred when
the house servants scurried to meet his demands, and it quickly
became a game to him to see just how much abuse they would take.
Since they all truly loved his father, they took a lot.
Manfred's
father was very endearing to all of his employees. Aside from paying
them very well, he treated them all with great respect. For he humbly
made requests instead of demanding for this or that be done, which
made his employees most willing to go above and beyond the call of
duty.
Manfred
found his father's attitude thoroughly disgusting and counted the
days to when he could take control of his father's empire. In the
meantime, he focused his attention upon learning as much as he could
about his father's business interests in order to better recognize
opportunities ripe fpr exploitation. He also studied how other
titans of industry achieved and held their power. He was especially
impressed with slave-holders and those who treated their poorly-paid
workers like slaves.
As
it came to pass, Manfred did not have to bide his time nearly as long
as he had calculated. For while out on the family lake in a boat
fishing with his father, his father fell overboard and drowned.
No,
Manfred had nothing to do with it. For it truly was an accident, but
Manfred could have been prosecuted for at least depraved
indifference. For all it would have taken to save his father from
drowning was postioning the boat where Manfred could pull him to the
side and paddle back to shore, which he was perfectly capable of
doing. Whereas, Manfred just sat there in the boat and watched his
father floundering in the water until his head sank below the surface
for the last time. Ah, but there were no independent witnessess to
come forward, and Manfred was not inclined to feel any guilt—let
alone enough to compel a confession.
In
fact, Manfred found it hilarious that his father had a hand in his
own demise—albeit indirectly. For the beer his father was drinking
too much of in celebration of his son's eighteenth birthday had been
aged in a Shire barrel and hauled in a Shire wagon. Furthermore, the
revelry led to the impromptu midnight fishing excursion upon the lake
formed from damming a creek running through Rainbow's End, which was
the name his father gave to the seculded estate he resided at with
his family located around a mile away from the Shire complex.
Several
of his father's close friends and business associates still demanded
a thorough investigation be conducted, but the authorites shied away.
For they did not want to risk losing any of the substantial amount
of tax revenue they had been collecting from his father and wanted to
contiune to collect from Manfred.
To
say that Manfred was ecstatic over what he considered to be his good
luck would be quite an understatement. For he had inherited more
money than most people could ever spend in a lifetime, as well as
hundreds of employees and their dependents to toy with like a cat
does with a mouse.
Although,
Manfred soon tired of treating his emplyees like slaves. For it was
simply too easy to him, and he hungered for much more challenging
game to savor.
No,
that is not meant to be taken literally. For Manfred had no taste
for cannibalism. Although, the initiation rite into the underground
cabal he was a member of involved taking a bite of the heart of a
potential enemy he had just cut out while the person was still alive.
Manfred
had chosen the seven year-old son of one of his father's old business
rivals, who was actually more of a friend than a rival. Manfred
would have much preferred totally enslaving the boy's mind, body and
soul, but he recognized that some rules were worth observing. For
the underground cabal promised to be an excellent source of
information not widely distributed.
The
cabal was indeed underground in every sense of the word. For
gatherings were held four times a year in a cave with a hidden
entrance and tunnels dug as possible escape routes. Membership was
by invitation only, and only those greatly interested in things
polite society found intolerable were invited.
During
one of the gatherings, he learned about female circumcision. Manfred
could see where it could have its advantages, but the thought of
still being able to sexually arouse a woman after thoroughly
brutalizing her in other ways aroused him even more.
After
agonizing over every detail for months, which was much more a labor
of love than a burden to him, Manfred was finally ready to start
implementing his master plan in earnest. The first few steps could
be completed in short order, and he looked forward to spending the
rest of his life basking in the glory of his accomplishments.
The
first step was the secret purchase of a very rough piece of land
around five miles away from Rainbow's End and the Shire complex to
prevent prying eyes from seeing too much. Manfred accomplished this
by promising a long-time employee that he would be given clear title
to the land after he completed the establishment of a Shire branch
overseas, which should not take konger than five years. The man was
then given the money to make the purchase in his own name, with a
rider attached stipulating the reassignment of the title to Manfred
if the man did not complete his assignment.
As
soon as the paperwork was filed, Manfred killed the man and
dismembered the body. He next dissolved the flesh in a vat of lye,
ran the bones through a hammermill and scattered the remains over a
sizable part of his newly-acquired property.
It
should not be discounted that an evil genius is still a genius, and
Manfred was indeed an evil genius. For he chose to use lye to dissolve the body parts instead of sulfuric acid because he could produce the
lye himself without attracting any unwelcome attention. Whereas, a
large enough purchase of sulfuric acid would undoubtedly attract a
lot of unwelcome attention. Since too much bone would still remain,
he pulverized them in a common piece of machinery generally used to
process large grains, like dried corn.
Oh,
but the memories of others could not be so easily disposed of.
Therefore, Manfred chose someone who did not have any immediate
family left in the area in order to avoid the person being missed to
the extent of too many questions being asked, which would undoubtedly
lead to a hunt for him. Specifying an extended stay far away
bolstered this precaution.
At
the end of a trail off of the main road was an abandoned homestead
with some outbuildings of various sizes that was perfect for what
Manfred wanted to accomplish. For the homestead was situated where
one had to really want to go, and it would not take much to get
ready.
Signs
were posted warning uninvited visitors to proceed at their own peril
along the trail, which was barely wide enough to accommodate a wagon.
There was once a new tax assessor who ignored the warning. For he was focused upon assessing if enough property tax was being
collected. He was never heard from again, and no formal
investigation was conducted after Manfred strongly voiced his opinion
against one. Yes, some were rather curious about why he would, but
they thought better of pursuing the matter.
The
next step was finding a fair maiden suitable for conditioning.
Manfred stumbled some with this step. For the first one he chose
proved more willing to die than conform to his will. Despite his
bitter disappointment, Manfred was all to happy to oblige and dispose
of the body in his usual way. Then the same thing happened
again...and again...and again.
What
is widely misunderstood is that one of the most significant aspects
to true genius is the ability to recognize and correct incorrect
thinking in spite of conventional wisdom. Consistent with this fact,
it was becoming clearly obvious to Manfred that he needed to adjust
his search parameters.
Manfred
had been sifting the dregs of society in a town around fifty miles away. He met the first two women
in different bars down by the docks, and the next two walking the
streets outside of different bars in a different part of town. His
thinking was that such women would consider it very fortunate to be
rescued from a life so full of despair and would be eager to do
anything to avoid being sent back. The trouble was that what Manfred
started subjecting them to more and more of was the proverbial last
straw that broke the back of their will to live.
Manfred
considered it pure serendipity that he wandered upon a traveling tent
revival one day. For standing outside of the entrance inviting
people in to hear the Good News was a young woman of exceptional
grace and charm by the name of Amelia.
Manfred
entered the large tent and sat in the back. He frequently glanced
over his shoulder to look at Amelia during the sermon, and he
caught her looking back at him with a smile on her face every time. The smile
grew wider as the evening progressed.
After
the sermon was over, Manfred asked Amelia to come sit with him and
talk. They talked for hours, and the more he listened to her talk
about her faith, the more he realized the error of his ways. Well,
at least in one respect.
You
see, Manfred had never had any use for religion of any sort. Of
course, it is arguable that he was actually very religious. For
Manfred considered himself to be a devout Darwinist and strict
adherent to the law of the jungle, but despite how tasty Amelia
looked to him at first sight, he had never considered just how much
religion could enhance the flavor of his prey.
Manfred
knew that he needed to learn as much possible about something in
order to fully exploit it, and Amelia was proving to be an excellent
teacher of her Christianity. By the end of that first encounter,
Manfred had fallen deeply in love. Not necessarily with Amelia, but
most definitely with her beliefs and how well they blended with his
original recipe. A Christian wife being subject to her husband and
forbidden from committing suicide made his mouth water.
Manfred
was having to do a lot of things differently in order to securely
ensnare Amelia. For he only had to talk for an hour or so to
convince the others to willingly come with him. Whereas, just the
first encounter with Amelia had lasted around twelve hours, and it
would take several more hours to get to the next step.
The
next step was to formally meet and receive the blessing of Amelia's
parents. Her father was the primary evangelist of the traveling tent
revival, and her mother led the choir. They had been away on a short
missionary trip to a more remote region nearby when Manfred first met
Amelia, but they were back by the end of the week.
Amelia's
parents were concerned about Manfred being almost twice their
daughter's age. For she was still in her teens, but they could see
how happy he made her.
Amelia's
parents were even more concerned about Manfred claiming to have been
just called as a missionary to Africa, which was to begin as soon as
the reception after the wedding ceremony was over. For he was just a
newborn from a Christian perspective, and they believed only those
very mature in their faith should undertake such a challenge.
Manfred
put their minds at ease by boldly proclaiming, "If the Lord is
with him and Amelia, no one can stand against them, and unless
they fall into unrepentant sin, surely the Lord will be with them
always." He poured it on even thicker by telling them, "I
was a sinner beyond measure when I first attended your tent revival,
but your daughter led me out of the darkness and into the Light.
Now, if she is able to soothe the savage soul of someone such as I
was, who can she not reach?" The extravagant wedding Amelia
had dreamed of since she was a little girl was held three months
later.
Amelia
could not remember a time when she was happier as she sat next to her
newlywed husband driving a wagon to pick up some supplies to take on
their African missionary trip. It actually made her feel a little
guilty. For feeling the love of God in her heart should make her the
happiest, but she was fairly sure He understood. After all, she
would have never met and married Manfred if He had not brought them
together.
Manfred
was not feeling too bad, himself. For Heaven's Gate was just a few
more miles away, and he was quite confident that Amelia would
satisfy all of his despicable desires.
Calling
his place with the abandoned homestead Heaven's Gate was an inside joke to Manfred. For he absolutely rejected the notion of
Heaven and Hell actually existing as presented by religious doctrine,
but he did like the idea of Heaven and Hell being what one made them.
To further connect the dots, his Heaven was Hell to most, and this
tickled his fancy in a very twisted sort of way.
The
beatings began as soon as Manfred gently carried Amelia over the
threshold of the cabin and roughly threw her down on the floor of the
front room. I will not go into much detail. For the horrors
Amelia was subjected to should remain unspeakable, but I can reveal
that Manfred did back off some when it became obvious that she was
with child.
What
did not ease was the chores Amelia had to perform each day. They
included preparing meals with the foodstuffs Manfred would bring from
the storehouses at Rainbow's End. He usually made the trip once a
week and was careful not to attract any unwelcome attention. Since
the employees at Rainbow's End would dive for cover whenever they saw
him coming and stay hid until he demanded of them to present
themselves, he could usually come and go without being approached.
In regards to being spied on, his employees had been taught the very
hard way that curiosity kills more than cats.
Another
one of Amelia's chores was cleaning the house, which was mostly
after herself. For one of Manfred's most effective conditioning
tools was a narrow leather strap that would draw blood after a few well-placed blows, and this blood would splatter on the walls and floor. It
would sometimes take hours of scrubbing with a lye solution to remove
it all.
Of
course, the blood would stain the clothes of both, and Amelia was
required to wash them completely clean. She would not be allowed to
wear clothes for a week when she failed to remove all of the stains.
Yes,
Manfred was indeed diabolical to the bone. For even as bad as the
physical abuse was, the mental/spiritual abuse was even worse on
Amelia by him using her primary source of strength against her.
Manfred
had become quite versed on the content of the Bible before they were
married. Now that they were married, he would force Amelia to read
out loud certain passages emphasizing how nothing can happen unless
the Lord God Almighty wanted it to, along with passages about it
being the righteous duty of a good Christian wife to always be
subservient unto her husband.
When
Manfred would sarcastically ask if there was anything she would like
to refute about what she had just read, Amlia would remain silent.
This had more to do with her simply not having anything to say in
rebuttal than being too afraid to speak up.
Manfred
could hardly contain his delight. For Amelia's faith had clearly
failed her, but even with her spirit appearing to be completely
broken, she remained alive and available for his good pleasure.
Manfred
had told Amelia early on that he would kill her and the baby if she
failed to provide him with a healthy son. Amelia evidently was not
as completely broken as she appeared to be. For she secretly
cherished the possibility of their early demise at his hands.
As
the time drew nigh, Manfred hired a midwife to take care of any
potential complications with the birth. She was an older woman with
no remaining family in the area, who had been hired through a third
party to keep Manfred's involvement secret. He killed her and
disposed of the body in his usual way after her work was done.
Amelia
gave birth to a very healthy boy by the name of Alfred. Manfred had
already named him beforehand, and it was another inside joke to him.
For he had no doubt about being able to completely possess the boy's
mind, body and soul like he had his mother, but he did not want to
make it too obvious to the rest of the world. Well, at least not
yet. Oh, if you do not get it, Alfred was meant to stand for
Allfred.
The
birth of Alfred was rather bittersweet to Amelia. For his smile
shined like a beacon in a world so full of darkness, but she had been
dreaming of this awful existence coming to an end by now.
Amealia
even seriously considered killing Alfred and herself, but she
believed that this would surely condemn her to an eternity in the
real Hell. Nonetheless, she did take some comfort in thinking that
there was no way it could be worse than what she was enduring from
Manfred.
Amelia
hoped that it would not be as bad for Alfred, and it was not—at
least not directly. For the older he became, the more his mother's
beatings hurt him.
No,
it did not take long for Alfred to learn that it would just make
matters worse for them both to try to openly defend his mother against his
father's assaults. Oh, Manfred first considered it high
entertainment to see this toddler trying to shield his mother from
receiving anymore blows from the strap, but it stopped being so funny
when Alfred managed to burn his father's leg with a hot poker from
the fireplace. Manfred almost killed both Alfred and Amelia in a
blind rage.
Alfred's
conditioning began in earnest as soon as he recovered enough from his
first severe beating. During many of the sessions, Manfred would
make Amelia chant, "Spare the rod, spoil the child."
Alfred
soon proved to be of enormous help to his mother with doing her
chores. This freed up some time for Amelia to start secretly
teaching him as much as she knew about reading, writing and basic
arithmetic.
Alfred
especially loved caring for the matched set of Shire draft horses his
father used to pull his wagon. He would sneak apples out to them,
and they would start whinying and prancing about in their stalls as
soon as Alfred entered the barn.
Amelia
had three miscarriages after giving birth to Alfred. She hoped to
never deliver another child, but Manfred eased off enough on her
beatings to allow for a full term to be completed.
Manfred
did not hire a midwife this time, and he was gone after more supplies
when Amelia gave birth. A crashing wave of terror engulfed her when
she saw her newborn daughter.
Amelia
did not know what to do. She truly believed that Manfred would make
good on his threat to kill her and the baby girl, which was not such
a bad thought. For this would finally put an end to her torture, and
stop it before it really began for her daughter. Nonetheless, she
could not bear the thought of what would probably happen to her
beloved Alfred after his father was left with only him to focus upon.
Alfred had been doing a good job of pretending to be fairly well
conditioned, but Amelia was afraid that it would not be enough to
sufficiently appease his father.
Amelia's
head was spinning too much to fully collect her thoughts for what
seemed to her to be a long, long time. She was finally able to
instruct Alfred to take his little sister out to the barn and hide
her in the pile of straw used as fresh bedding for the horses. She
managed a little smile in recognition of the irony to having her
daughter hid in a pile of straw and her birth being the proverbial
last straw that would break the back of her husband's self-control,
and she hoped that he would kill her and both of their children in
the blind rage that would surely ensue.
Manfred
charged into the cabin carrying his daughter by her right leg and
flung her across the room toward the fireplace. Alfred was able to
catch his little sister before she landed in the fire, but he could
only watch in horror as his father drug his mother out of the cabin
by her hair. He did not hear his mother utter a sound, and he never
saw her again. Alfred was not yet five years-old.
Manfred
went back into the cabin fully intending to put the baby girl out of
his misery, but he stopped short when he saw how tenderly Alfred was
holding his little sister. For Manfred held out hope that Alfred
could be molded into what he considered to be the perfect son with
more conditioning, and his little sister looked like the leverage to
use against any resistance the boy might harbor.
Both
of the horses used to pull the wagon were mares, and one had just had
a foal. So, there was milk with colostrum for the baby.
Alfred
was not taught about such by their mother. He just observed how much
the foal craved the milk and speculated that it must contain
essential nutrients, which might be also good for his little sister.
She thrived on it, along with more typical food items Alfred mashed
to make it easier for her to ingest and digest.
Alfred
was even more of a genius than their father. For he could master
something after watching it being done once. Moreover, he could make
adjustments to the process that would result in improvements most had never thought of.
In
sharp contrast to their father, Alfred was highly sensitive to the
needs and wants of others, and he would always strive to meet them
when possible. He never condemned another for their shortcomings,
and it was completely against his nature to seek to force others to
do things against their will.
Unfortunately,
their father recognized all of that in his son and sought to take full
advantage of it. This created a lot of conflict within Alfred, and
there was many a night when he cried himself to sleep.
Alfred's
little sister had been born with fairly long red hair covering her
head, as well as a smile bright enough to lighten even the darkest of
moods. Therefore, Alfred concluded that Ruby was the perfect name
for her—even though it would undoubtedly leave a hint of
bittersweet upon his tongue every time he spoke it. For it would be
in reference to a gold necklace studded with rubies that seemed to
glow like embers in a fire pit that their mother had once coveted.
The
full story to the necklace was told to Alfred by their mother during
a lesson about the seven deadly sins listed in the Bible. She had
seen it around the lovely neck of a lady riding in a carriage fit for
a princess that was being driven past the traveling tent revival
their mother's parents were in charge of. The lady in the carriage
had been looking at their mother standing outside of the entrance to
the tent, and had smiled sweetly when she saw their mother looking
back at her. Their mother immediately felt awful for wanting
something another had been given.
Their
father never acknowledged the name his son had given his daughter.
He just called her girl. Alfred and Ruby both wished their father
would never acknoledgedge either one of their existences at all.
Manfred
knew just how far to take the beatings without doing any permanent
physical damage, but the blood aways flowed down the back of their
legs before they were over. Sometimes he beat them just for his own
good pleasure. Needless to say, the hideous scars left on their
souls were permaanent.
As
Ruby grew older, Alfred taught her how to cook and clean well enough
to appease their father when it was possible. Alfred also secretly
taught her how to read, write and count like their mother had done
for him.
Alfred
was worried that Ruby might slip up and make their father aware of
their very rudimentary education. For Manfred wanted his children to
be completely dependent upon him for everything, and being educated
might encourage them to think that they could function on their own.
Fortunately, Ruby always played as dumb around their father as her
big brother did.
It
was not always an act. For Ruby was generally as dim-witted as
Alfred was bright, but her heart was every bit as good as his.
The
days passed like sorghum molasses flowed during cold weather, and
both children dreamed of leaving their hellish existences far behind.
Alfred had been quite confident for some time that he could easily
make good on his own escape. For years of decadent living had taken
a great toll upon their father's overall health, but he feared that
Ruby was too frail. So, he would wait until she was strong enough.
By
the time Ruby reached ten years of age, she was unwilling to wait
much longer. For she had noticed a certain look becoming more and
more prnounced in their father's eye when he watched her doing chores
around the house. She did not understand just exactly what this
could mean, but she had a very omnious feeling growing in the pit of
her stomach.
One
of the wisest things Alfred had done up to that point was keep his
brilliance obscured from their father's sight. For Alfred did not
want to be perceived as threat to his master plan, but it sometimes
felt so good to push their father past the boundaries of his comfort
zone. Besides, the beatings were far less severe when he was too
tired to swing his favorite leather strap or whatever he could get
his hands on at the time with the usual amount of force and
repetition. This was one of those times.
Ruby
recognized that it was probably now or never while watching their
father chase after Alfred with a wooden barrel stave in his hand and
blood in his eye. For at the point where Alfred usually doubled back
toward the house to keep their father's attention focused upon him
and spare her from being too much on the receiving end of his wrath,
Alfred kept going away from the house.
When
they were out of sight, Ruby took off as fast as she could run down
the trail that led from the cabin to the main road. She did not know
this because neither her or her brother had been allowed to travel
down the trail, but it went in the opposite direction of where Alfred
was heading with their father not far behind.
Ruby
made it out to the main road and turned downhill toward the south.
She desperately wanted to keep going, but her spindly legs were
telling her that they would not go much farther without some rest.
She spotted a thick patch of tall grass beside the road and decided
to hide in it for a little while.
Riding
upon a dark wave of physical and emotional exhaustion washing over
Ruby was the thought that surely her beloved brother did not have
much longer to live if he did not make good on his own escape. She
started to visibly shake as the tears flowed down her cheeks.
Ruby
was tired to the point of her bones aching, but she fought with all
of her remaining strength to stay awake. For she so wanted to see
her big brother coming down the road to find her. Weariness won the
battle, though.
It
so happened that Alfred did not have to make good on his own escape.
For while their father was chasing him, their father started gasping heavily for
breath. As their father turned around to head back to the house, he
grabbed at his chest and collapsed in a heap.
Alfred
had already stopped running away, but he remained where he was at for
quite some time while keeping a wary eye upon their father, who lay
motionless where he had fell. It looked like he was not breathing to
Alfred, but he was deathly afraid their father was merely
pretending to be dead so he could grab Alfred when he came close
enough.
Alfred
finally started to approach their father with great caution, and
after poking him really hard with the barrel stave, Alfred could see
that there was no trick being played. Their father was indeed dead.
Alfred
wanted to immediately rush back to the cabin to tell Ruby the good
news, but it was hard for him to wrap his head around the truth being
that the nightmare might be finally over. He had to make sure before
heading back to the house to tell Ruby.
Alfred
struggled with his dilemma for a few moments and decided to drag
their father's lifeless body over to a low place in the ground
nearby. He then piled rocks over the body until there was a sizable
mound. No, their father was not going to be able to crawl out from
his makeshift grave. Alfred planned on coming back to add even larger
stones to the pile just to be more securely on the safe side, but he
now needed to go tell Ruby that they were finally free.
Ruby
awoke to the loud sound of wooden wagon wheels creaking. It also
felt like she was being jostled some in the back of a moving wagon,
but she could not see for sure because her eyelids were simply too
heavy to raise. Just before drifting back into a deep sleep, a smile
crossed her face while thinking that Alfred must of escaped and
driven their father's wagon to pick her up. For surely she would
have been writhing in agony by then if he had not.
Alfred
made it back to the cabin to find Ruby not there. He next searched
the barn and the rest of the outbuildings to no avail.
Alfred
finally spotted her footprints in the dust on the trail heading away
from the cabin, and he tracked her to where she had lain in the tall
grass. This is where she appeared to disappear. There were some
adult boot-prints coming from where it looked like a wagon had
recently passed, and the boot-prints were a little deeper on the way back to the
road from the patch of tall grass. Alfred could only hope that
whoever had came upon Ruby had good intentions as he followed the
wagon tracks toward what he would soon discover as being more than he
could have ever imagined.
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