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Back The Short Drop
Chapters (61)
  1. Title Page
  2. Copyright Page
  3. Dedication
  4. CONTENTS
  5. START READING
  6. PART ONE
  7. CHAPTER ONE
  8. CHAPTER TWO
  9. CHAPTER THREE
  10. CHAPTER FOUR
  11. CHAPTER FIVE
  12. CHAPTER SIX
  13. CHAPTER SEVEN
  14. CHAPTER EIGHT
  15. CHAPTER NINE
  16. CHAPTER TEN
  17. CHAPTER ELEVEN
  18. CHAPTER TWELVE
  19. CHAPTER THIRTEEN
  20. CHAPTER FOURTEEN
  21. CHAPTER FIFTEEN
  22. PART TWO
  23. CHAPTER SIXTEEN
  24. CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
  25. CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
  26. CHAPTER NINETEEN
  27. CHAPTER TWENTY
  28. CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
  29. CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
  30. CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
  31. CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
  32. CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
  33. CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
  34. CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
  35. CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
  36. CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
  37. CHAPTER THIRTY
  38. CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
  39. CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
  40. CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
  41. CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
  42. CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
  43. CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
  44. CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
  45. CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
  46. CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
  47. CHAPTER FORTY
  48. CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
  49. PART THREE
  50. CHAPTER FORTY-TWO
  51. CHAPTER FORTY-THREE
  52. CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR
  53. CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE
  54. CHAPTER FORTY-SIX
  55. CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN
  56. CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT
  57. CHAPTER FORTY-NINE
  58. CHAPTER FIFTY
  59. EPILOGUE
  60. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
  61. ABOUT THE AUTHOR

In the folder were more than thirty files, each named for the year in which it had been written. The earliest dated back to the late seventies. In total, they covered Duke Vaughn’s life from university, through his rise in politics, up to his “suicide,” running to well more than two million words. Some entries were incredibly short: “October 7, 1987—I hate canvassing for voters. I hate it,” read one from a campaign trail. Others were much more serious and went on for pages. The writing became insightful and articulate. Encounters with party bigwigs, legislation Duke had been involved with, philosophical musings on politics.

Gibson opened a program that would search all the documents simultaneously for keywords. He typed in “baseball” and waited while the machine combed through his father’s journals. It came back with close to two thousand matches. Gibson frowned and added “Suzanne” and “Gibson” to his search. The program did its work again and dinged to announce it had finished. A single match this time.

On the surface it was perfectly innocuous—an outing to a baseball game cut short by a difficult child. Gibson read slowly, hearing his father’s voice in the words, listening for anything out of the ordinary. But it sounded merely like a man concerned for his friend’s daughter. Gibson came to the part when Bear really flipped out. It matched his recollection until a part came that he didn’t remember:

I’d arranged a face-to-face with Martinez. Social. Low pressure. A chance for Ben to clear the air with the Whip after we broke ranks on the unemployment bill. It was the right call, but it’s cost us. Midterms were eighteen months out, but we needed to pave over the cracks now.

Hard to do the way Suzanne was behaving. Decision time. Ben wanted to postpone, but I’d worn holes in the knees of a good suit getting the meeting. It was happening. So it was agreed that I’d take Suzanne back to Virginia. George would stay with Gibson and Ben. Felt badly leaving Gibson behind, but the Whip had a son about his age. Made sense, and from what I was told, Gibson knocked it out of the park. Kid’s got a future.