Walking on Water: A Novel by Richard Paul Evans Read Free Book Online

complaining became intolerable, and she blamed Finn for their family’s suffering. According to Finn’s journal, he was kicked out of their marital bed. Genevieve was cruel.
    Genny was at me again tonight. I long for her affection but am utterly alone in my failure.
    —Diary of Finn Christoffersen
    Genevieve moved in with her aunt and uncle while Finn, with a thirty-five-dollar loan from Genevieve’s uncle,returned to Butte to attempt to resurrect his former store. Unfortunately, the Depression had affected Butte even more than Seattle, and rebuilding his store was more difficult than Finn had hoped. He was lonely and wrote Genevieve daily, entreating her to bring the children and come and be with him, but only once did she answer his letters. She wrote,
    Do not think to win me back until you are man enough to support your wife and children.
    Finn lived in the direst of circumstances, sending what little profit the store generated to Genevieve and the children. In the cold Montana winters he slept on the potatoes to keep them from spoiling. After eight months of loneliness he met a woman, the widow of the town’s constable. She would come to the store daily, sometimes just to talk. Both were hungry for affection. They had an affair, and the woman became pregnant with Finn’s child.
    Around that same time Genevieve’s aunt and uncle grew weary of their demanding niece and sent her back to Butte to be with her husband. When Genevieve learned of her husband’s infidelity, she did what she could to punish him. She made him sleep at the store and would not allow him to eat with the family. During this time, Peter, now eight, and Thomas, seven, worked with their father at the store. As much as Finn begged for his wife’s forgiveness, it never came.
    I must wonder if I am to ever have Genny’s love again. I have despaired of it. If I were a dog I would receive more affection.
    —Diary of Finn Christoffersen
    After several difficult years of Genevieve’s cruel treatment, Finn, struggling with guilt, loneliness, and despairat not being able to adequately provide for his wife and family, decided that they all would be better off with the insurance money from his death. He shot himself in the head. His body was found by his oldest son, Peter.
    Because Finn had committed suicide, his body was not allowed to be buried in the cemetery near his parents but was buried by Peter and a neighbor in a nearby wooded area. A wooden cross was constructed, but it has been lost to time and no one today knows for certain where my grandfather’s body lies.
    I set the book down, both disturbed and fascinated by what I had read. Like my great-grandfather, I had gone to Seattle to seek my fortune. And, when things turned, I had also considered taking my life. I now better understood my father’s interest in discerning and recording this history. It was a way to understand himself. In a way, I had walked thousands of miles for the same reason.
    I looked over at the clock. It was late, and it had already been a long day. I turned off the light, then lay back in my bed, my thoughts drifting from the past to the present and the future. I thought about Nicole asking about Falene. Then I thought about Falene and wondered what she’d been doing since she’d left me in St. Louis. Most of all, I wondered what McKale would think of it all and, if she were here, what she’d tell me to do. But that was nonsense. If she were here to tell me what to do, there would be no question of what to do.
    “Why did you leave me, Mickey?” I said to the darkness. I closed my eyes and went to sleep.

CHAPTER
Nine
    I now remember why I stopped playing chess with my father. I feel less like a sparring partner than a punching bag.
    Alan Christoffersen’s diary

The first thing my father said to me the next morning was, “I had a dream last night.”
    I sat down in the chair next to his bed, expecting him to tell me about it, but he didn’t. I had brought with me