Hello!

I'd like to thank all my reviewers:

LillieBillie90210

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Thank you all so much. All of you are very encouraging!

And on with chapter eight!

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CHAPTER 8

AGONY

It was very hard to continue on with life after Jenny had died. In fact it seemed almost impossible. It all had happened so quickly. One minute she was there the next she was gone. Patrick had cried himself to sleep about every night since the one when she had died. They had buried her next to the muddy pond. Mathew had made a nice looking head stone for the grave. This had been Patrick's first exprerience of death. He had been told about it. He read about it. He thought he understood it. But now he realized that he didn't know anything about it. He didn't understand it at all, until his mother had died, and even then it was to deep for him to grasp the meaning of.

It had been two weeks since that terrible day. Two of the most depressing weeks of Patrick's life. Patrick had decided to take a walk by himself down to his mother's grave. He had not been down there since her burial. When he got there he slowly approached the grave, half fearful that he would hear her banging at the coffin, shouting that she was not dead. He sat down in the snow looking at the grave the whole time, waiting for the tears to come streaming down his face again. But they didn't. All of a sudden that strange feeling as if someone's eyes were watching him creeped upon him. Slowly he turned, expecting to see his father, but instead to his surprise he saw Jeremy. He nodded slowly and turned his attention back to the grave.

Jeremy shuffled up next to him. "I heard 'bout your mother." He said, quietly. "I'm real sorry." Again Patrick nodded. Suddenly Jeremy seemed very impatient to say something. He plopped down next to Patrick, looking him in the eye and said; "Patrick I want you to listen to me, and listen to me good. Ever since I met you I knew you were different, I just couldn't put my finger on what it was. Now I know everything. Everything about you, maybe some stuff that you don't even know about yourself."

Patrick's head shot up. "What do you mean?"

"What I mean," Jeremy said very punctual. "Is that, when you were ice scatting with your mother, I came by to see if you were out, and when I saw her, I hid in the rushes, so that she would not see me. That's when she was telling you about her life. Now I know that you are a Jew." Jeremy spat the word out with disgust, stabbing another wound in Patrick's battered heart.

"Only part Jew." Patrick argued. "My mother was, but my father isn't."

"Oh, no, no, no!" Jeremy scoffed. "I thought I might know a little more than you. What about that baby, the one your mother said she had?"

"You think that baby was me?" Patrick asked.

"I know that baby was you." He said, matter-of-factly.

"No you don't. His name was Fagin. Mother told me so before she died." Patrick said, his voice rising.

"Have you ever heard of name changing?!" Jeremy exclaimed. "I told my father everything that I heard your mother tell you. He knows your whole family's history. In fact, everyone in town does. You know, I just can't believe... cor, if I knew... I just... "

"What do you know." Patrick cut in.

Jeremy brought his hand across his forehead. "Alright I guess I'll pick up where your mother left off: Jenny had they baby and named him Fagin. Your fathe- Sasha had run out of money at the time, and thought he would try to find some sort of work here. They would not let him because he was a Jew. Sasha tried to get on their good side. He changed all of you all's names, your mother's name which was Rachel, to Jenny and his name to Robert, and... Oh... yes... he changed little Fagin's name too... I bet you can't guess... Patrick...ha... how bought that!" He laughed, laughed! Patrick couldn't believe it. He had always thought of Jeremy as a nice considerate boy, but now! Oh! Patrick wished to hit him full in the face. He was so upset, he was unable to speak. But Jeremy calmed himself again and continued.

"But the towns people wouldn't let him have it. They gave him, did you hear that, generously gave him this piece of land and that little house of yours for free! Later your father came back to town and stole some food. But unfortunately for you though, he was caught. When he was brought to court him made this long story about how you all were starving for food, and that he did not get his crops planted in time... and on and on and on and on! In the end he was hung. And rightly so. But one of the policeman there, uhhh a Mr. Mathew Fall... stood up for your mother, so he was kicked out of town. And so what do you know... he married your mother and made her promise never to let you now the truth and you all lived happily ever after with you blind to the truth, until now. And so it all comes tragically crashing upon you, and it is all your parents fault. So my friend, I am here to tell you that I know the truth and have revealed it to you, and it is up to you if you want to believe it or not. I am now going to leave you. I am no longer your friend." And he left. He left just like that, without saying another word.

Again the tears came to Patrick's eyes running down his face, and he fell on his mother's grave, sobbing for her soul.

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When Patrick entered the house he half expected to see his mother in the kitchen making supper. But instead it was his father.

"Where've you been?" Mathew asked.

Patrick shrugged, and Mathew didn't bother him any further. He just set the corn mush on the table and motioned Patrick to sit down. When he had obeyed, Mathew said a short prayer, and begane to eat. But Patrick couldn't eat. He was so disgusted with Jeremy, his father, and life for that matter.

"Something bothering you, son?" Mathew quietly asked.

Patrick didn't know what to say at first, should he tell him what he knew? He silently debated this question for some time, before he just couldn't handle it any longer, it just all came out.

"Why couldn't you have told me the truth, instead of hiding it from me like you did?!" He exploded.

Mathew looked confused. "What truth?"

"What truth? What truth?! The truth about my whole life before you came along." Patrick then began to pour out the whole story of what Jenny had told him and about Jeremy and what he had told him too, and how both of them had left him. When he finally finished ranting and raving flopped back into his chair exhausted.

Mathew was quiet for a few minutes before he finally spoke. "I was hoping you would never find out." It was barely a whisper.

"You're not my real father?!"

Mathew shook his head.

Patrick looked down at his plate of food. What was going on in his life. What was God doing to him. Was He angry with him for something he had done? Now he felt upset with God too. Everything had all of a sudden taken a turn for the worst.

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Lying in bed that night Patrick decided on what to do. He would run away. Finish that trip to London that his real father and mother had started so long ago. Be his own person. With that thought in mind he begane to pack.

He pulled a small quilt that his Jenny had made him, out of his closet and set all his money in it, (which wasn't much, maybe a couple of pounds or so.) One pair of pants and shirt an extra pair of shoes and socks, a handkerchief and a couple of hair pins to remember his mother by. Once packed he scribbled a note to his father, and snuck down to the kitchen. He placed the note on the table, and packed a loaf of bread, a few apples and some vegetables. Then he took one last look around the house he had know since he could remember. Slowly he pulled open the front door and stole out into the night.

As the sun rose rosie over the hills, Patrick breathed in the fresh air. He felt refreshed and new. He felt like a different person. He was a different person. He was Fagin.

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Hope you all enjoyed it.

Cheero;)