“You’re sure?” Marianne said.
“I have to tell you.”
Forty-Five
Both boys were ten years old, although Burton was younger by four months. A few days before Christmas, Dan Rosenberry’s father decided he wanted to put up a live Christmas tree. His father told him that they had not been able to afford one since Dan was a baby. Things were different now. He had a good job and had been with the same company ten months, which was the longest Dan ever remembered his dad keeping a job.
His mother had worked steadily at a convenience store for a couple of months and had been sober when she went to work.
Instead of buying a tree, Randolph, Dan’s father, decided it would look nicer (and save money) to drive north of Atlanta to the mountains near Dawsonville. Dan’s father had heard that there were many good trees of the right size less than a mile off the road. They’re just waiting for someone to claim them.”
“But that’s stealing—”
“Shut your mouth,” Wanda Maxine Rosenberry said.
“I don’t plan to pay for no tree while they’re just standing alongside the road, begging for someone to take them.”
Dan knew better than to argue.
They took both Dan and his best friend for the big tree-hunting event. They also carried a large supply of beer and popped open one bottle after another.
Randolph drove his ten-year-old Honda Accord about twenty miles over the speed limit. Once in a while he’d get so caught up in his beer, the speed would drop down, but then he would abruptly speed up again.
Both boys knew it wasn’t wise to say anything. Dan had once commented on the speed, and Randolph slapped his son and sped up more. Dan never said anything again about it. Burton whispered that he felt better not looking at the speedometer.
Shortly after they left the south side of Atlanta, the first raindrops landed softly on the windshield and ran downward in hesitant streams. The farther north they drove, the more intense the rain became. Before long, hard spikes of rain made tuneless music against the top of the Honda. From the distant mountains came the ominous, rhythmic booming of a storm. It was getting worse.
“Heavy rain ain’t no big deal,” Randolph said. “Only sissies are afraid of a little wet stuff.”
The air had grown colder, and the rain turned to sleet. They were going steadily uphill and around tight curves, but Randolph didn’t slow down. Soon the barren trees were jacketed in glittering ice. Bare, black branches poked from beneath the outer layers like shattered bones.
“Honey, you might be going a little fast for the curves,” his wife said.
“Just shut up. Hand me another beer and leave the driving to me!”
The two boys sat in the backseat. Dan hugged himself and bunched into a corner.
“You cold?” Burton asked.
“A little.” His jacket was hardly warm enough for the temperature that hovered just above freezing. Randolph refused to use heat in the car. “Suck it in, boys!” he yelled back at them. “Cold weather makes you strong.”
“If I had a hundred extra pounds on my body, I’d feel the same way,” Burton whispered to his friend.
Dan’s teeth began to chatter.
Burton took off his heavy, hooded jacket. “Here, put this on. It’s plenty warm.”
“But you’ll get cold.”
“When I do, I’ll ask for it back,” Burton said.
Dan smiled gratefully and they exchanged jackets.
A little later, Randolph stopped on private property that was far enough from the main road or from any house so that no one would see them. He walked around and seemed not to notice the stinging sleet. The boys wanted to say in the car, but he wouldn’t let them. “See how a real man works,” Randolph said. He grabbed his gas-powered chain saw and paced an area of about fifty feet until he found exactly the tree he wanted. He circled the tree several times. Wanda Rosenberry pulled her cotton coat tighter. “Yeah, fine. Just get it.”
“This is some beauty,” he said and started the saw going. The sleet had not let up and a few snow flurries mingled with the sleet. The boys wanted to go back to the car. “Just stand there and see how a man works!” he repeated.
It took less than a minute for the tree to fall, and its icy blanket shattered on the ground.
He made the boys grab the top and help him carry the tree back to the car. “Don’t want to drag it on the ground,” he said. Burton had gloves and Dan didn’t. “Keep your hands in your pocket,” Burton whispered. “I’ll do it.” By then, he was also wearing the hooded jacket again.
Randolph tied the tree across the top of the car with the ropes through the two front windows. The trip going back was even colder with half an inch of space for the sleet to come into the vehicle.
Dan’s teeth began to chatter. The boys decided they would alternate wearing Burton’s jacket every ten minutes. Burton handed him his watch (Dan had none). “Put it on and you watch the time. When the ten minutes are up, you give me back the jacket and the watch.”
Dan smiled gratefully and said, “This makes a good game.”
Before they got back on the main road, both of Dan’s parents drank four more bottles of beer, and his mother opened a new case. They started driving south.
The flurries grew heavier. The windshield wipers could barely keep up with the white flakes. The more beer Dan’s parents put away, the more erratic the driving became. Several times Randolph swerved across the road into the other lane.
Burton opened his mouth to say something, but Dan put his hand on his sleeve and whispered, “Don’t. It will make it worse.”
“So what do we do?”
“Pray, I guess,” Dan said. He scrunched down in the seat behind his father, hoping that being out of the path of the wind and wearing the hooded jacket would help him warm up before he had to return it.
Events after that weren’t clear. The police report said that Randolph Rosenberry, age forty-nine, driving south on Georgia Highway 400, attempted to pass a slow-moving Ford pickup on an upward curve. He crossed the double yellow lines to make the pass. He barely passed the truck and reached the top of the incline when a school bus appeared heading north. Rosenberry pressed his foot on the brake. Either the car skidded on the icy road, or he turned the wheel too far to the right to get back into his lane. No one was sure about that part.
The car ran off the road and down an embankment. The police records stated the drop was ninety-eight feet. When the vehicle hit bottom, the speedometer stopped at eighty-six miles per hour. The Honda landed on its side with the passenger side smashed on the ground and glass spattered all through the car.
Both of Dan’s parents had been smoking. The report said that as far as they could tell, one or both of the cigarettes ignited their clothes or their upholstery. Within minutes after the car hit the bottom of the ravine, the entire interior of the car was aflame.
The driver of the bus stopped his vehicle and started to rush down the embankment. It was dangerous getting to the car. He fell twice. When he finally reached the burning car, the door behind the driver was partially open, so he reached inside and grabbed the first body he saw and carried it about twenty feet away. By then, two other men had also stopped and raced down to the scene.
Someone pulled out a second body—the driver. He was breathing and his arms flailed.
Because of the spread of the flames, the three men weren’t able to get to the other two people still inside the car. Someone rushed down to them with a fire extinguisher. It didn’t matter; their bodies were so badly burned that no one would have been able to recognize them.
The first survivor, a boy, was unconscious. His face was smashed from the impact, and heavy shards of glass were wedged into his face and skull. Third-degree burns covered both legs and later required grafting. On his arms were first-and second-degree burns. His right arm was broken, and he had contusions and minor lacerations all over his body.
The boy awakened in the hospital. His face
was wrapped in bandages and his arm in a sling. Every part of his body cried out in pain.
“Good afternoon,” the nurse said. “Are you ready to stay awake now?”
He nodded. “I—I don’t know what—”
“Shh, be quiet,” she said. “Your parents are in the waiting room. I’ll call them. They’ve been here almost around the clock.”
“Am I going to die?”
“No, you’re going to be fine.”
“My friend—”
“Shh, you rest now.” She checked his IV, flicked it with her finger. “Relax. You’re going to be fine, but you need to rest.”
He wanted to cry out and ask what happened, but he fell asleep.
When he awakened, the doctor was examining him. The nurse pulled the thermometer from his mouth. “Normal,” she said and smiled. “First time.”
“Well, you’ve had quite a journey, haven’t you?” the doctor asked.
“What happened?”
The doctor turned, and the boy saw the Burtons holding each other. “You tell him,” James Burton said.
“The car ran off the road,” the doctor said. “Your friend Dan died instantly; so did his mother. His father survived about two hours, and we couldn’t save him.”
“Just me?”
“Yes, only you,” the doctor said. “And we weren’t sure about you at first. Your injuries were quite substantial—”
The doctor patted the edge of the bed. “But you’ll be fine now. You’ll have to stay with us for a while, but I think we can fix you up.”
“Just me?” the boy asked again.
“Just you.” The doctor’s voice cracked as he added, “Your parents identified you because of your jacket and your watch with your name engraved on the backside. Your face was so badly damaged, no one would have been able to recognize you. By using pictures from your parents, we’ve tried to reconstruct your face. We can’t make you quite as pretty as—”
“When? When did it happen?” the boy asked.
“Six days ago,” the nurse said. “You’ve been unconscious most of the time.”
“Six days?” The boy heard the words, but the meaning eluded him. “I don’t understand.”
“Your parents tell us they call you Burton. Just rest, son. You’re alive.”
“But what about—”
“Your friend died, and so did his parents.”
“Dead? Dead?” the boy asked again.
He remembered nothing after that. He must have drifted off again. When he awakened, his room was dark. Only lights of the city shone into his room.
As the boy lay there, the meaning of the words sunk in. He was the only survivor. The doctor said that all three Rosenberrys were dead.
All three?
They think I’m Burton.
He lay quietly as that thought filled his mind. “They think I’m Burton,” he said aloud.
Forty-Six
Sleep eluded Dan for the rest of the night. “This isn’t right,” he kept saying to himself. “I’m Dan. I’m the only survivor. I can’t let them think I’m Burton.”
He was too worn out to do anything. In the morning he would tell them the truth. He had lost his parents; they had lost their son.
But as he drifted into sleep, he thought of what it would be like to be James Burton the Third.
He knew his parents hadn’t been good parents. He had seen too many examples of happy families, normal people like the Burtons. So many times he had yearned to have a family like that. He used to daydream that he had been adopted or stolen, and his real parents found him. They would love him, and he’d never have to worry about having decent clothes or enough food to eat.
He was almost asleep before he asked himself, “Why can’t I? Why can’t I become Burton? By the time they fix my face, no one will ever know.” They were about the same size, same color hair and eyes. People had sometimes called them brothers or even twins.
“No one will ever know.”
He said those words aloud several times.
“Besides, I don’t have anyplace to go.” Tears seeped out of his eyes. He felt he had never really had anyplace to go except the Burtons’. They lived in a big house only four streets away from the run-down apartment his parents rented. “They wouldn’t want me if they thought I was Dan.”
The two had been close friends since they met in first grade. Burton had no brothers or sisters. Dan was an only child. There had been a sister, but she died when he was three or four. If he had other relatives, he didn’t know about them.
“And the Burtons have nobody,” he said.
Again and again he thought about the situation. I don’t have anyone in the world who knows me. My parents are dead. And my old man was nothing but a drunk anyway. Mom was a little nicer, but she was just as bad a drunk.
“What do I have to go home to?” he asked aloud. “I don’t even have a place to go. Who would want me?”
He became suddenly alert and thought about the situation. If they believed he was Burton, he could have parents—real parents—people who would love him. He wouldn’t have to lie to the apartment manager about why they couldn’t pay the rent. He wouldn’t have to beg the owner of the liquor store to let his parents have just one more six-pack.
“I’m Burton,” he said aloud. “I’m James Burton the Third.”
For the next three hours he tried to think of everything Burton had told him and what he had observed in the home. “I’ll be Burton.”
His face was in such bad shape that it took four surgeries before Dan resembled the pictures of James Burton the Third. Nearly six weeks passed before he went “home.”
For a long time he tried not to think about what he had done. He became extremely quiet for several weeks. He tried to absorb as much information as he could about the family and especially about Burton. He didn’t want to make a mistake.
His “parents” took him to their church. After he became a believer, he went through a communicants’ class. The pastor assured him that if he confessed his sins, God had forgiven him.
“All my sins?” the boy asked. “Even the worst, worst sins in the whole world?”
“Yes, Burton, even the worst of the worst.”
It was the first time he had felt at peace since the surgery.
After that, the new Burton blossomed. His grades at school were near the top. Burton hadn’t been as good a student as Dan, so he emphasized how hard he studied so he could bring home better grades.
The Burtons never questioned his identity. They showered the same warmth and love on him that he had seen them display toward Burton.
He became a better listener, and for several years, he remained afraid that he would be exposed. But the pastor’s words slowly eased themselves into his heart. “I am forgiven,” he said. “Jesus Christ has forgiven every sin.”
Those words brought deep peace.
For a long time the pastor’s assurance had been enough. It wasn’t until he was in seminary that he began to think of the consequences. He had lied. He had deceived the Burtons.
He hadn’t told anyone except Roger Harden, who was dead. And then Julie, whom he loved.
Roger Harden had seen Burton’s grades. He had the eleventh highest grade-point average in his graduating class. Eleventh. He could have been number one, but he was afraid that would expose him.
Too late he realized that if he had made only a slightly better GPS, he would have received a full scholarship to Yale, something Roger Harden offered to only one student each year.
Harden sought him out and they talked for a long time. He was a man in his mid-fifties, and he had a way of listening to people that immediately enabled them to trust him. Burton liked Roger, and the older man offered him a scholarship to any school he wanted to attend. He chose Wheaton College, which is in a western suburb of Chicago.
Over the next two years, Dan-now-Burton felt a kinship with Roger. At Christmas after his first year, the student came home to Woodstock, where the Burton
s now lived. But the first opportunity he had, he visited Roger at his office in midtown Atlanta.
Roger spent nearly three hours with the young man.
“What’s wrong with you, son?” the man asked. “You look so sad.”
“I did something bad—really bad.”
It was the first time Dan felt he could trust someone with the truth. With tears streaming down his face, he told Roger Harden the truth.
“That’s not so bad. You want my suggestion?”
“Of course. It’s been a big burden all these years.”
“Say nothing. You can’t hurt anybody but your new parents, right?”
“But it’s not right. I lied. I stole their son’s identity.”
“So you want to tell them now? After all these years? As far as they are concerned, you’re their son. Don’t hurt them.”
Roger Harden needed almost an hour to persuade Burton not to tell.
With his head in his hands, Burton finished the story. “I love Julie, and I want to marry her. I need to make this right with God and with you. She said she wouldn’t marry me until I do. She pushed me to do the right thing.”
“I don’t want to marry him with this on his conscience,” I said. “I love him, and—and I know it hurts you—”
Burton paused and pulled out a handkerchief. “I’m sorry. So sorry. I love you, and I didn’t mean to hurt you or to deceive you—”
James pulled Burton to his feet. “We love you. We’ve always loved you. That can’t change.” He kissed Burton’s cheek. “Of course we forgive you.”
“But I’ve deceived you for nearly twenty years. I know this must hurt you—but I can’t—can’t live with the lie any longer.”
“We forgive you, Son. We love you. It makes no difference to us,” James said. “You have been our son. You are our son.”
Burton nodded slowly, and tears fell again. When he was able to talk again, he knelt in front of Marianne. “Please forgive—”
Everybody Called Her a Saint Page 19
