Andrew Klavan - True Crime

And then Luther turned.

… a man is the creature who can say “No,” he thought, and then he came to himself.

The Superintendent of Osage State Correctional Facility was dismayed to find his attention had wandered. He came to himself as if he had been standing there fast asleep, dreaming. He did not know where his mind had gone to, what he had been thinking about. But when he raised his head, he saw that the second hand had gone a full minute round the dial and was now edging down again toward twelve-oh-two and thirty seconds, then on.

It was a matter of pride, that’s all. These things didn’t have to be exact: they had all day to do the execution legally. But everything had been going smoothly, and everyone had been waiting on him, and he had meant to give the nod at precisely twelve-oh-one and he had-what? — drifted off at the crucial instant, drifted away on some line of reasoning or fantasy-he did not know, he could not remember what. He felt the whole machine, of which he was a central part, holding fire, standing still, because his cog had forgotten to turn. He was downright aggravated with himself.

It was only twelve-oh-two and thirty-seven seconds when Luther remembered to do his job. But as far as the Superintendent of Osage Prison was concerned, that was ninety-seven seconds too goddamned late.

He turned and nodded deeply to the mirror.

But by that time, the black phone was ringing.

Forever after, Reuben Skycock could raise a pretty good laugh when he described how quickly, how gracefully the pachydermous Arnold McCardle could move when he had a mind to. Because Luther nodded and the phone rang almost together, and McCardle not only snapped the handset off its cradle with one hand but stretched enormously across the little storeroom with the other and shoved the nervous Frick away from the machine. Frack was faster and jumped back from the button the instant he heard the bell, throwing his hands into the air as if he had been placed under arrest.

Arnold McCardle listened at the black phone for a long moment, and said, “I read you.” Then, without replacing the receiver, he reached over to press the button on the intercom.

“We got a governor’s stay,” he said evenly. “We’re gonna stand down.”

“Stand down! We’re standing down!” shouted Zachary Platt, throwing his hands up, his palms out, as if to hold them all physically from the edge of a cliff.

For a moment, Luther Plunkitt did not react, only stood where he was and smiled blandly. Then, slowly, he lifted his thumb and ran it over the smile, wiping an imperceptible drop of spittle from his lips.

What was strange, he told me later-one thing that was strange-was how long that moment lasted to him. It seemed to him that so much happened, and it seemed to him that he had time to see it all. He saw Zachary Platt shoving his palms at him, stepping out of his corner urgently, babbling, “Governor’s stay, the governor, a stay, we gay a gay, stay …” He saw Frank Beachum’s head snap forward, his entire body shudder violently beneath the sheet; Frank’s head keeled to one side as his neck went slack; he shut his eyes tight, and convulsed. Then he let out a harsh sob and began weeping, the tears squeezing out from under his lashes, running sideways over his nose, into his mouth.

And still, the moment went on. Luther looked up, looked at the witness window. He saw Bonnie there. She was coming to her feet. Driving off the bench to her feet. She hurled herself against the glass. Luther heard the dull thud as she hit. He saw her palms going white as they pressed against it, the side of her face flattening, the glass fogging with her breath as, even through the soundproofing, Luther heard her scream out, “Frank! Frank!” Then he saw her crumble. Her knees buckled and she sank down, falling over to the side. The black preacher who’d been sitting next to her was on his feet now too, catching her in his arms, drawing her back to the bench.

Luther turned his head until he faced the mirrored window to his right. His eyes passed over the clock as he turned and it was only twelve-oh-two thirty-eight. Then he saw his own reflection, the marbly gray eyes deep in the putty face, the meaningless smile.

And all that was strange, he told me. But there was something even stranger still.

The thing that was truly weird as far as Luther was concerned, was this sense he had, this very clear sense, that he was not alone in his own mind at that moment. He did not believe in telepathy or ESP or any of that garbage. And yet he had to admit he felt just then as if someone else was with him inside his own head. He felt he could communicate with that other person, no matter the distance between them, merely by thinking.

So he nodded, smiling blandly, and he thought, without really knowing why: Okay, Everett. Okay .

And aloud, he said, with an easy drawl, “I guess we’ll be standing down.”

The last time I saw Frank Beachum was that December. It was cold: it was bone-ass cold, I remember. Even the memory of the summer’s heat was gone. It had been snowing off and on for about a week and the streets were a mess, the curb covered in massive drifts, the corners flooding with slush.

I was in a black mood; a black, black mood indeed. I had just gone another fifteen rounds with Barbara’s lawyer and could not get her to explain to me how I was supposed to pay for the sins of all mankind and still make my rent next month. The lawyer didn’t seem to give a damn, and Barbara, who had been reasonable enough at first, seemed now to be floating in the current of the attorney’s bitterness and greed and going along with whatever she said. It was becoming clear that this was not going to be an amicable divorce.

It was getting close to Christmas, I guess, because I remember I went to the mall at Union Station that day to pick up a present for Davy. The snow was coming down again, hard, and my poor reconstructed Tempo was practically drowning in the slush that was kicking up into its engine.

The mall was packed. I had to park at the farthest end of the lot, which didn’t improve my mood any. I pulled my raincoat up around my ears, and hunched down into it as I walked through the insidious chill and the tumbling snow. The station, with its long, gable-peaked Romanesque front and its tall, thin double-towered clock minaret was supposed to look merry, I suppose. Lights and wreaths and multicolored Christmas tinsel hanging from it. And children bouncing around a carousel with its pastel horses spinning in one corner of the parking lot, and jolly carols droning out of its organ above the wet hiss of traffic.

My hands jammed in my pocket, my head down to keep the snow off my glasses, I crossed the wide lot to the entrance. There were children there too, a choir of little girls, singing carols, their mouths like O’s, their cheeks scarlet. And a little beyond them, stood a rather disheveled-looking Santa Claus-a black guy in a colorless overcoat, with a red elf’s cap dripping down the side of his face.

As I got close, I heard him calling to the passersby, holding a can out to them, turning with them as they walked on, ignoring him.

“Gimme some charity,” he was saying. “Gimme some charity here on toast. It’s for children or something. It’s an official charity. Gimme some of that charity. You got money. You got money on toast. Give some of that money to charity.”

“Hey, wait a minute,” I said.

As I strode toward him through the snow I caught the whiff of piss and wine on the arctic air. I felt the low simmer of my rage boil over. I reached the guy and shoved his shoulder with the heel of my palm.

“Hey,” I said, “what is this? You’re not Santa Claus, you’re the Pussy Man. What the hell d’you think you’re doing?”