August 3, 1899

You were in jail? Why?

Well, I was starving so I stole some food.

All right, I admit it: I lied to Les and Dave about why I was in the Refuge. But I couldn't exactly tell them the truth about my father, could I? When you're on your own, a kid on the streets of Manhattan, you can't exactly let on about any family members you might not want your friends to know you've got. It's an unspoken rule. So of course I fed them the bit about my leaving for Santa Fe as soon as my parents sent for me. Ha. Parents.

One truth about me is that I have no obsession with Santa Fe whatsoever. I had to come up with a place for my parents to be, right? So here's what I did: I fished around for a map of the States, closed my eyes, pointed, and there you go. Santa Fe officially became my dream destination, my goal in life. To complete the illusion, I picked up a cowboy hat, a bandanna, and a copy of Western Jim at the general store when I was eleven. That's when the fellas started to call me Cowboy, and that's when I began the attempt to convince myself to believe my own lies.

Heck, Francis Sullivan didn't sound like the name of a street kid, so I even changed that. All right, so I was a spoiled rich kid back in the old days. That didn't mean the fellas had to know. To have been rich when you were young is like a crime to them. Too bad the fellas had to find out my real name at the trial, and too bad they all found out that my mother is dead and that my father is a low-life.

The truth is, my father killed my mother. He committed the perfect murder, if you will, and covered his tracks very well. So well, in fact, that he got himself appointed warden.

This is the one truth that I managed to hide from Dave, and I still don't know to this day how he never figured it out. For one, Snyder (whose real name, in fact, is Abe Sullivan) followed me around constantly in vain attempts to catch me. What normal, everyday warden stays obsessively on the trail of one kid for years? The truth is, I lived with him in the Refuge until I was eleven. He kept me locked in the cell next door to his office because I knew that he'd killed Mother and I had threatened to tell the bulls. Unfortunately, when I caught the ride out in Roosevelt's carriage, I realized that the bulls would never believe a kid who they knew had been in the Refuge. They would just think that I was making up stuff and send me right back to Snyder. That was a place I never wanted to be again. Too bad I don't have the best luck, because after the rally I was right back in there, locked up in my cell once again.

Then, at the trial, Snyder shoved himself before the judge to speak on my behalf. He made up something about my "father" being in jail. After all those years, he was still covering his tracks. I'll never forget the look on Dave's face. He bought that, too. Dave is one gullible sucker. Almost everything he knows about me is a lie. My father is a good liar; I guess that's the one trait I inherited from him.

Luckily, after the strike was over, the law found out about Snyder's dealings with the Refuge children and took him away. It's only a matter of time before he comes after me again, and this time I doubt he'll think twice about letting me live past my eighteenth birthday.

Suddenly, Santa Fe seems like a good idea.