"Dad, I would like to come home . . . if you will have me." Jerry was stunned. He put the paper down, stood to his feet, embraced him, something he hadn't done for years, and said,
"Welcome home, son."
Johnny poured his heart out to his parents. He confessed that he had stolen, taken drugs; that he had been a fool to waste his life as he did. Then he turned to his father and said,
"Dad, more than anything else, I feel bad that Granddad’s gun was stolen. You have had it since the war, and I know how much it meant to you."
Jerry smiled,
"Son, that gun means nothing to me compared to you. An old friend told me what you were doing to yourself, and I thought we had lost you. I don't care what you've done, you are still alive and that's all that matters."
The next evening Johnny's mouth dropped open as he sat in the living room. Once again, he couldn't believe what he had just seen on television. Lee Harvey Oswald, the man accused of assassinating the President, had been shot to death, and a newsman caught the incident on film. He leaned forward and glared at the slow motion replay . . . at the man with the gun and the black‑rimmed hat and hollered,
"I know that man. That's Jack Ruby! He is the owner of the nightclub where…"
Johnny stopped mid-sentence as the anchor man came back on the scene, and gave details on how the Dallas strip‑club owner had walked down a ramp with fifty reporters and had suddenly shot and killed Lee Harvey Oswald as he was being transported by police to a bullet‑proof van. Then the newscaster said,
"Ruby used a snub‑nosed gun which fired a .38 caliber bullet and pierced Oswald's left side."
To be continued...
