The Last Darling Read Online Free PDF Page A

the past to consider their mother’s future.
    He did not think of the priest who might be his father again until that day when he saw the bloody image of Jesus painted, miraculously, on the pregnant woman’s belly. How she could stand after getting shot was a miracle in itself and he knew his sign and hopes had been realized. He immediately decided to surrender to a power that was greater than himself.
    Neither Clover, Francis, or the authorities would learn the reason for the man’s sudden surrender. His brothers pleaded and pulled at him, but he would not move, and they were forced to flee without him. The police would immediately arrest him and he would fully cooperate and confess to everything, not lying, but also not implicating his brothers. He would spend twenty years in prison preaching the virtues of Jesus Christ and daily praying for the salvation and safety of his saint, Clover Darling.
    On his release, he would form a small church that would grow into a televangelistic conglomerate stretching across the globe. His sermons would be translated into eight different languages and his books would go on to sell millions of copies. At the age of forty-seven he would confront his would-be father, the bishop, only to discover that the bishop was born with a genetic defect making it impossible for him to have children. The news would be devastating and the once young bank robber would spend the rest of his life, a meager five years, in a state of confusion and doubt, not preaching a single word up to his death.
    His four brothers, after escaping with the money, took their mother and fled to Europe. Their fortune was large enough to completely restore their mother’s beauty, but when she discovered how they acquired their wealth, she refused every operation they offered. With little else to do, they invested almost everything they had into a French vineyard and spent the rest of their days making and selling wine. They refused to learn the language and instead hired a permanent translator to live and work with them. The translator was an old man known for his subtle kindness and large bulbous nose. He was blind in one eye after a tenuous bar fight and walked with a limp due to an almost deadly case of frostbite. His many misadventures had given him a calm and wonderfully quiet demeanor. He fell in love with the grotesque woman and, eventually, he not only shared a roof with her, but also a bed. They never married, but also never parted, dying on the same day and only moments apart.
    Clover and Francis would never learn of these events, and in fact, the bank robbery would have little effect on their financial and emotional outlook for The Five Desperados had failed to inspect, or even notice, the two pillowcases slung over Francis’ shoulder. The banks in the region had suffered several blows over the course of the year, starting with an exploding package that nearly killed a board member, to an accidental fire that claimed half a building – not to mention a series of failed investments and a generally slow economy. The robberies were the last in a long list of problems, which is why, when the teller saw two pillowcases full of cash, the CEO instructed her to open an account immediately and without the regular precautions.
    It was in this way Clover and Francis unknowingly revitalized the local economy and returned the Wall Street mogul’s money into the banking system he so despised. The CEO, a man by the name of Thomas Stearns, was so grateful for the influx of cash (that most definitely saved his job and reputation) that he wrote Clover and Francis a series of poems, delivering one every Friday over the course of the following year.
    Thomas Stearns had inherited his small fortune and career from his father, who had inherited it from his father before him, who had in turn inherited it from his father before him and so on, liberally tracing their lineage and finances to the Mayflower. Their lineage was, at most, half