Maurice Procter - Murder Somewhere in This City

In the execution shed there waited the fortunate people who were privileged to witness an execution, and the less fortunate who were compelled to witness it. Outside the prison gates, a considerable crowd waited to see the posting of the notice which would say that justice had been done. In the rows of cells, convicts gnawed their knuckles and waited for the spark of hysteria, the single shout which could start a riot.

Starling’s pride did not carry him up the steps of the scaffold. The executioners had to assist him. “Stick to it. You’re doing all right,” murmured the hangman, who understood.

The encouragement helped Starling. In his extremity it made him the hangman’s creature. He did as he was told. He managed to make his shaking legs support him when they stood him on the three-way trapdoor.

Now was the time for speed. The hangman slipped a white hood over Starling’s head, then he adjusted the rope with quick professional care. The assistant took the remaining length of the strap and began to secure it around Starling’s ankles. But his adroitness seemed to have left him. He fumbled.

Starling realized that the last moment was near. It was suffocating knowledge. His heart pounded and he could hardly breathe. The moment would come when the assistant had fastened his ankles and moved away. It would be the last agony of waiting for the drop. Starling knew he could never bear it. He would lose all control. He would scream, hop from the trap, fall over.

“You’re doing fine,” came a reassuring whisper.

A half second later the hangman extended his mercy to the condemned man. While his assistant still crouched fumbling on the trap, he pressed the release. The trap fell away and Starling dropped. And according to plan the assistant dropped too, onto the soft sand beneath the scaffold. Starling had been spared the last brief time of dreadful waiting. Before he could know that moment, he was beyond knowledge and beyond pain.

The prison clock began to boom the hour of nine. The condemned man had died with fortitude.

The day-the January day-of Don Starling’s execution was the day before Harry Martineau was due to return to duty after a long disablement and convalescence. In the morning he arose at eight-thirty and prepared to breakfast at leisure, but he knew what day it was and his mood was somber.

“Are we going to have another day like yesterday?” his wife wanted to know.

Yesterday had been a bad day too. He had been oppressed by the knowledge that it was Starling’s last. In the evening he had gone out for a drink-the first in months-and it had led to many more. He had come home late, and Julia had been angry. She was still angry.

He picked up the morning paper, and the first item he read-his glance was drawn to it as if by a magnet-was a small announcement that Starling would be executed at Farways Prison that morning. He threw the paper down.

He looked at the clock. Five minutes to nine. Five minutes to go. He found that he had no appetite. Pushing away his plate, he reached for the coffeepot. Julia frowned.

At two minutes to nine he closed his eyes and prayed silently. It was a prayer for Don Starling, but Martineau did not mention any names even to God, because he did not know what to ask God to do about Starling. He simply repeated the Lord’s Prayer in his mind until the minute hand of the clock was well past the hour. Julia watched him with an enigmatic gaze. No one could have told whether there was amusement, scorn, or sympathy for him in her expression. Normally, neither of them was religious.

Julia may have wondered why her husband allowed himself to be distressed by this matter of Don Starling. It was not the first time he had helped to send a man to the gallows, and never before had such an occurrence made him miss a meal or lose a wink of sleep. He had detested Starling, and Starling had deserved to be hanged, so what was all the fuss about? Certainly she could not see why there was any need for him to go out last night and get a lot of drink. She failed to understand why a man could not be sorry in a decent way, without going out and hitting the bottle. She did not agree with that at all, and she was determined not to tolerate any more of it in silence.

Martineau did not notice her expression. He was thinking about Starling. Queer, he reflected, how a man could feel the loss of an old enemy almost as much as if he had been a friend. Starling had had a place in his life. Now there was an emptiness.

He guessed it was time he went back to work. There were plenty more thieves and fiddlers in the world. Enough to keep a man busy, leaving him no time to think about what had happened to a murderer.

The other three still had a chance of escaping the hangman. Roach, Jakes and Laurie Lovett had appealed, and it was possible that for them the death sentence would be commuted to life imprisonment. Starling had not appealed. If he could have escaped death for the murder of Cicely Wainwright he would have been hanged for the murder of Silver Steele.

A bad do, that, Martineau thought. A lovely young life snuffed out like a candle flame. And to no purpose. Starling had lost his head on that occasion. He had muffed it. His nerves must have been getting pretty worn.

Young Devery had taken it very badly. Martineau had asked his wife to send a note of sympathy from him to the younger man. He had received in return a civil acknowledgment and the hope of a quick recovery. But the young fellow had not been to see him in the hospital. Well, there could be a very good reason for that. Besides his own troubles, Devery may have thought that it would look rather like lickspittling for a P.C. to go sick-visiting an inspector. Anyway, somebody would have been sure to say that it was lickspittling.

Old Furnisher Steele seemed to have taken it badly too. He had shut up his shop and never opened it since. Those broken windows on the top floor had never been repaired. Poor old boy.

Julia interrupted the unhappy train of thought. “What are you doing this morning?” she asked.

“I think I’ll go down to Headquarters and see what’s stirring,” he said. “I’ll get ready for starting tomorrow.”

She nodded her approval. Two weeks ago the Watch Committee had promoted him. He was a Chief Inspector now. He would have a lot of administrative work to do. He would he able to do it, but it was a good idea to have a preliminary look at it.

“You’ll be back for lunch?” she asked.

He thought about that. He did not expect to be at Headquarters for more than an hour or two.

“Sure,” he said. “I’ll be back.”

“Be sure you’re not later than one o’clock,” she said, but not aggressively, because she was still pleased with him for having been made a Chief Inspector.

He nodded. He was a good husband in one respect; his intentions were usually good.

He went to Headquarters. Julia went to the fishmonger for a piece of halibut, because Martineau liked halibut. She hoped he would be at home to eat it. If he were detained in town-she could see no reason why he should be-he could phone in time to save the halibut from the frying pan.

But if he started his old larks-if he didn’t come home or phone-there would be trouble. She wasn’t going to let him start pub-crawling again as soon as he went back to duty. He might be a big man in the police, but at home he was just another husband. An absent husband. Out all day and coming home last thing at night and playing that damned piano. No, Julia wasn’t having any more of that. She was determined to make a firm stand against it right at the beginning of this new stage of his career.

At Headquarters Martineau talked with Superintendent Clay about his new duties. Then he gossiped for a while in the main C.I.D. office. Then he looked at his own new office and decided what small changes he would make when he had settled in. He began to feel more cheerful.