Preston Miller

He was born in Miller's mansion when the mistress was asleep The secret son of the chambermaid and master They sent him into hidin' for his schoolin' and his keep With the Carlysles and the other lucky bastards Now his toady tutors fawn and praise the man that he's become Though he's taken to the laudenum and faro He walks the streets like velvet death with his daddy's money on his breath And a shame he cannot shake down in his marrow When day fades to black you must not listen to the killer Pretty voices keep you beautiful and bound 'Cause it's simple, sorry fact of your existence, Preston Miller Is enough to bring this house of evil down One night upon some drunken dare he writes his absent sire Sayin', "Father I would fain come home to meet thee" And though his worthless friends guffaw this sudden show of fire Another round of bourbon and it's easy And this letter finds his father in his tower far away And the hoary claw that holds it shakes and trembles Is it grief over a life misspent, or love or greed or mere contempt Or something darker stirring in his temples? When day fades to black you must not listen to the killer Pretty voices keep you beautiful and bound 'Cause it's simple, sorry fact of your existence, Preston Miller Is enough to bring this house of evil down, down, down A week gone by, he's wakened by a knockin' at his door And he drags himself half-wasted to the threshold It's a message in his father's quill sayin', "Meet me scion, if you will At the very stroke of midnight in the meadow" Now he has combed his laggard locks and hired a comely roan And he's met his comrade fops around the fountain And he's bidden each a grand goodbye and he's cantered off alone To meet his aged father in the mountains When day fades to black you must not listen to the killer Pretty voices keep you beautiful and bound 'Cause it's simple, sorry fact of your existence, Preston Miller Is enough to bring this house of evil down, down, down "Oh father dear come out, come out, I honor thee tonight" He shouts as he goes weavin' in the saddle He sees the stars go blinkin' by like the twinkle in a trollop's eye And six riders riding madly in the shadows This mornin' sailed a ship of fools across a sea of gin With a blind and grinning reaper at the tiller And it drove an aging Jacob to his lone and bitter end And a bullet through the brain of Preston Miller