Crimson Palace Read Online Free PDF Page B

long for you to come home. Would you bring me some cold lemonade?"
    Shinonn went to the kitchen to get the lemonade and a cold cloth to wipe her mother’s warm brow. She couldn’t tell for sure if Rose was feverish or simply overheated. The house was an oven! Why in God’s good name did her mother insist on keeping the place closed up?
    Before returning to the stable, Shinonn stopped by the doctor’s office to ask him to look in on her mother.
    "It may just be my imagination, but Mum seems a bit flushed to me," she explained. "She’s so fragile, Doc. I really worry about her."
    "She’s probably fine, Shinonn. But I’ll be happy to stop by. You know I’m always happy to be of any help to you or your mother. The truth of it is, there has been a lot of the grippe going around lately, so I’d feel better if we didn’t take any chances."
    Shinonn felt a stab of fear race through her at the mention of influenza. In her weakened state, could Rose fight off such an illness?
    She was busy cleaning out stalls when Doc Miller stopped by the corral later that afternoon.
    "It’s not good news," he said as soon as he saw her. "Rose is showing all the classic symptoms of influenza. If we only had a hospital near where she could get the proper care! I’ll spend as much time with her as I can, but she really needs full time nursing."
    "It’s as bad as that? But she seemed only a little flushed at noon."
    "Her temperature has already climbed too high. And she’s beginning to develop a cough. The worst problem with this strain of the disease is that it often fills the lungs. If that happens the situation becomes critical."
    The doctor’s words sent a chill of apprehension through Shinonn. Not only was her mother already in a weakened condition, the daughter was well aware that Rose had long ago lost the will to live. She was certain her mother would welcome the opportunity to join her beloved Sean.
    "There’s only so much we can do for her, Shinonn," the doctor continued. "The rest is up to the good Lord and Rose herself."

    ***
    On a cold and blustery Sunday afternoon in late March, Rose Flannery was laid to her eternal rest next to her beloved husband. In the last few moments of life she had looked into her daughter’s eyes and spoken the most lucid words she had uttered in five years.
    "I’ll be with your da soon, Shinonn, my girl," she said with a peaceful smile on her lips. "I’ve been an awful chore to you since Sean died, haven’t I, girl? All you’ve done for me and never a word of thanks. I want you to know I’m grateful to you.
    "Ah, if only I could have seen me Patrick just this one last time."
    And then she was gone. Shinonn was denied that last chance to tell her mother she loved her.
    Her emotions were torn between grief and shock at realizing that Rose had known all along about her husband’s death and her son’s disappearance. Why had she preferred to ignore the daughter who loved and cared for her and pretend to be surrounded by a drunkard husband and a selfish good-for-nothing son? Could the answer be that she had chosen to live with those she truly loved?

    ***
    A small procession of mourners trailed silently across the windswept cemetery, gathering around the freshly dug grave. Next to the open grave stood the faded marker of Sean’s final resting place. Shinonn noted how the wooden fence that surrounded her family’s plot sagged along its northern border. It seemed a fitting statement, she thought sadly.
    After the preacher had given his short talk about eternity and how Rose as "now in a better place than we", Shinonn reached out and took the shovel Grady had carried for her. She began to heap the heavy soil onto the coffin lying deep within the hole. Several men stepped forward, offering to take the shovel from her hands but she waved them away.
    "No," she said, as Grady reached out to take the tool, "this is something I want to do myself. I thank you all for coming, and I know you want to help,