A Covenant with Death (21 page)

“Oh, Jesus,” Alfred said. “Oh, dear God.”

Schilling entered the office and said, “Talbot is all right He's out cold but he'll be all right. That Morrison is with him.”

“Did Willie Waite have children?” That was Hochstadter.

“A couple,” Alfred said. He was seated at his desk. “My God. Who'd have believed he'd do that?”

“Emil,” Hochstadter said, “it would be the decent thing for you to tell Mrs. Waite. You were his boss, in a way. As soon as she's ready to look around again, you ought to tell her she can petition the state, and sue if she's turned down.”

Dietrich nodded.

“Next time we put the hood on first, and then do the praying,” Alfred said. “But who could've known? We never had a hanging here before. And there's no
rules
for it; just hang him by the neck until he is dead. And what do we do now? Tell me that, Judge.”

“We call the capital and ask for a new hangman. And we hang Talbot tomorrow morning. Ben will give you an order.”

“Oh, Jesus,” Alfred said. “Oh, dear God.”

The street door creaked open and slammed shut and we heard footsteps in the corridor. Then Edgar Musgrave marched in, bright-eyed, wattled: “Well,” he said cheerfully. “Is it all over? Can I view the remains? You sure don't look as if you enjoyed it. How did it go?”

“There is no proportion in life,” the Judge said a few minutes later. We were talking in the sunny, deserted square and it was six forty-five of a summer morning. “Do you know what I was thinking in there? I was thinking that I planned to leave tomorrow at about noon and I can still get away all right. Provided the new man gets here today, and I'm sure he will. Now isn't that a hell of a thing to be thinking? What do you suppose Bryan Talbot would say about that? And what do
you
say, my young friend? All this is happening in your term.”

“I haven't been able to think. I've been numb.”

“Poor Willie Waite. Poor Alfred. Alfred will always feel responsible.”

We walked on in silence.

At the courthouse we separated. “If you need me just call,” he said.

“Thanks.”

We shook hands. We were alone in the street. I felt like a young Roman parting from a senator before a temple. At least I was not worrying about women today. I entered my chambers and stood for a moment reading the sampler: D
ISCITE
J
USTITIAM
. My mother had fabricated it in a burst of domestic solemnity, and it hung like a warning, the capitals in red and the rest in black. Learn to do justice.

I sat down. I was still numb, and my mind was empty of all that I had so assiduously stuffed it with. I did not want to die, ever.

When John came in I was still sitting there.

“How did it go?” he asked.

I told him, and we sat looking at each other for a long time.

I went home for lunch. Doubtless they were waiting for me at the hotel and I did not want to talk. My mother's thoughts were for the widow. “Willie was no good,” she said, “but the woman has two little ones and shouldn't be left to starve.”

“Willie was a live human being,” I said. “She won't be left to starve.” It was seven hours since breakfast but I was not hungry. “Hochstadter thought of that right away. Willie wasn't even cold, and the Judge was telling Dietrich to be sure the widow got after the state.”

“What will they do for her?”

“They'll vote her a pension, I imagine. Because she could sue for a good sum. Simple negligence. Or maybe they'll just give her a lump of money. I don't know. Maybe Talbot will make her his beneficiary.”

“What happens to Talbot?”

“He hangs tomorrow morning.”

“This is a bad summer,” she said. “It's one of those years we'll date things from. Remember the Chinese curse? ‘May you live in interesting times.'”

“Mmm.” But I was not listening. I was remembering Talbot's eyes.

So it went all that day, with questions and answers and unsolicited advice. The Colonel said that discipline had become lax everywhere: there was one way, and one way only, to accomplish a hanging, and if it had been done properly … Geronimo said there was a curse on us all. “Burning for burning, wound for wound, stripe for stripe,” he intoned. “The land is full of bloody crimes, and the city is full of violence.”

“And the rabbis are loose among us. You're a great help. Get out of here now.” I was in my chambers, killing time; the courthouse was full of loiterers, and John was detouring them but a few were heedless and rude. I had signed the order for the next morning's work, and Hochstadter had called to say that we would meet at the same time and place, he and I, and the afternoon wore along and then Goldman deigned to visit. “I have it figured out,” he went on, settling lumpily into his chair and beaming behind his spatulate pink nose. “The new hangman will arrive this evening and will be Jewish, which means that he cannot work on Saturday.
You
cannot work on Sunday and there would be hell to pay if you hanged a man on Sunday anyway. We are already at Monday, by which time something else will come up. The new man will get the gripes or the glanders. Mark my words. Satan is abroad.”

“Get out of here.”

“I just came in.” He was grossly offended.

“It's been one of those days. I need a drink.”

“Why don't you go home? What are you accomplishing here?”

“I'm waiting for the new man.”

“Ah. The angel of death. Then I'll leave you. I don't want to be here when he walks in. Drop by the store on your way home. I'll give you a drink.”

“Goodbye.”

“You should be more gracious to an old man.”

“Goodbye.”

He waddled out, injured, pouting. Soon John came in and we played cribbage halfheartedly. At the knock we both looked up in sudden excitement, as though it might be Santa Claus or the Second Coming or President Harding. He came in. He stood about five feet four, and weighed about one hundred and twenty pounds, and wore glasses, and was at least sixty-five. He was wearing a brown linen suit with an unnecessary vest and a red bow tie, and with his straw suitcase he looked like a traveling salesman for Congress gaiters.

“Here I am,” he announced cheerfully.

I tried to read that night, but unsuccessfully. Gibbon offered his “register of the crimes, follies and misfortunes of mankind” and when I opened Calderón the first verse I saw was “Pues el delito mayor/del hombre es haber nacido”—man's greatest crime is having been born. I could not sleep; I could not read; there was no one to love; the heat was oppressive. I sat naked at the window, in the dark, and looked out over a silent city. I tried to remember the passage about alms for oblivion, and could not; my liege, I did deny no prisoners, and could not; oh happy dagger, and could not; the barge she sat in, and could not. I had rather be a kitten and cry mew than one of these same metre ballad-mongers; I remembered that; and to pluck bright honor from the palefaced moon.

It was no use. What I thought about was Rosemary and Rafaela, and I ached until the tears came. I felt quieter then, and slept until an evil dream shook me, and death was grinning at my shoulder as bells pealed. My eyes opened to darkness and the bells were still pealing; I flung on a robe and dashed downstairs, flipping light switches as I ran, blinking, waking, death's face still at my shoulder. My heart pounded, and I took the receiver from the wall with a shaky hand; was I awake or asleep? The clock in the hall: three-thirty.

“Ben? This is Alfred.”

“Yes. What is it?”

“Oh, Ben. Oh, my God, Ben.”

“Alfred! For the love of Christ, what is it?”

“It's Bruce Donnelley, Ben. He just killed himself. He left a note. It says he killed Louise Talbot.”

PART THREE

11

A man needs eight hours' sleep. Without it he can function but people and rooms and objects and conversations are off center, elusive. I remember dugouts where great decisions were made, whole companies sent to doom; but it is not the decisions that I remember. It is the hostile yellow light of a gas lantern at four in the morning, the lantern oscillating gently on its hook so that soon the dugout, the men, the chairs and tables also swayed; or the flat and watery taste of bad coffee; or the major blustering with his fly open; or the map I knew so well transformed before my eyes to a menacing and meaningless jumble of signs and symbols, a zodiac, a chart by Merlin with fate in every whorl and loop but indecipherable in the sickly light. Alfred's office was like that at four in the morning. The light was white and not yellow but Alfred was no longer real, or Doctor Schilling, or the lawyers when they arrived, or Hochstadter; or I. Wax dummies. Tableau.

Alfred reported in a hopeless monotone. “Mrs. Donnelley called at about three. I got dressed and hurried over. She had heard the shot and knew he was dead. It was an old forty-four and he had it at an angle so there was a sizable hole in the top of his head and some brains around.”

“He died immediately,” Doctor Schilling said.

“He dropped in a heap and the gun was under him. He wasn't holding it but his hand was jammed up against it. No question but it was suicide.”

“That's something,” Dietrich said.

“This is quite a community,” Doctor Schilling said. “I wish somebody would kill somebody during office hours.”

“The note,” Hochstadter said.

“Right here.” Alfred opened a drawer and extracted a sheet of paper with great care. Hochstadter read it, looked sick, and passed it to me.

July 7, 1923

3 oclock
A
.
M
.

To whom it may concern.

My name is Brace Donnelley of Soledad City and I am writing this letter. I have done terrible things and I do not want more killing.

I killed Louise Talbot and now Wm. Waite is dead too. I killed her because she laughed at me loving her. I knew it was a sin but I could not help it. But I had already sinned in my heart looking through the window. Matthew says that. Whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after her hath committed adultery with her already in his heart. Then I went into the house and said I loved her and I tried to hold her. I told her I would do anything for her. She said for me Bruce? For little me Bruce? She looked down and she could see how I was and she laughed at me and said I should not go around looking in windows. Then she opened up the bathrobe. How does it look close up, she said. What am I supposed to be? The town harlot? But she did not say harlot. Then she stopped laughing and told me to get out. I said no, I cant, and I took hold of her. She fought and said she would tell everybody. I had her neck in my hands and I only wanted to pull her close to me. I was not trying to kill her but I had to have her close to me. So help me God I was not trying to kill her. When I let go to touch her she fell down. I was afraid then and did not want to touch her again so I went out and went home. I did not know she was dead. I do not know why I did that but I am an animal and could not kill the devil in me. I have not slept right since then and I can not pray.

I do not want anyone else to die. And I am damned. I know that. So I must do this. It is the wages of sin. I hope my wife and sons will forgive me. Because I love them. I hope my sons will stay close to God and will not sin. Not ever. I hope God will have mercy on this sinful animal.

Tell Bryan Talbot I am sorry. Let him go.

I never did anything like that before but I know now the devil was in me all my life. My will is in the desk.

That is what happened.

Sincerely,

B
RUCE
D
ONNELLEY

We all read it and no one spoke. Soon Doctor Schilling picked up his black bag and went out. We just sat there, on Alfred's straight-backed chairs.

“It's cooler,” Hochstadter said after a time. “Maybe the heat's broken.”

We all looked up like dogs sniffing the wind.

“I think you're right,” Dietrich said. Parmelee was looking thoughtfully at me.

“How is Mrs. Donnelley?” Hochstadter asked.

“She seemed all right,” Alfred said. “Somebody's with her. Doctor Schilling gave her a pill and said he'd be back at seven. The boys never even woke up.”

“My God,” Parmelee breathed, and then he said it angrily, “my God.”

“What now?” Alfred asked. “What about tomorrow morning?”

“This morning, you mean,” Hochstadter said. “It's off. Ben will give you an order.”

“And what about Talbot?” Parmelee snapped. “What about him now, after all the fine justice you gave him? I need time to think, but I want him free tomorrow. Today, I mean.”

“He killed Willie Waite,” Hochstadter said.

“And suppose he hadn't?” Parmelee was working up to a fury.

“Well, now, just a minute,” Dietrich said.

I interrupted. They swung toward me as though I were a stranger; all but Parmelee, who subsided and watched me narrowly. “Alfred,” I said, “you have Talbot in court at ten o'clock. You gentlemen can be there then?” They nodded in some surprise. My voice was sharp but they did not know how angry I was. “I don't think we ought to try cases here, and I'm not sure you—any of us—realize what's involved. You'll forgive me for the impertinence. The issues aside, I doubt the propriety of a heated discussion right now.” Nor did they know
why
I was angry; nor did I. “There's nothing we can, or should, do here. I suggest we adjourn.”

“He's right,” Hochstadter said.

“Who sees Talbot first in the morning?” Parmelee asked.

“Old Whitey,” Alfred said. “With breakfast. He's out there now, probably asleep.”

“Well, I want you to talk to him before you leave, and tell him that he's to tell Talbot about Donnelley's letter; and the execution's off; and I'll be here about nine; and he's not to talk to anyone until I get here. I want him told all that the second he opens his eyes.”