The Ballad of Frankie Silver (26 page)

The jury filed in, properly subdued and solemn, taking their places without meeting the eyes of anyone present.

“Gentlemen of the jury, have you reached a verdict?” He said. The words
at last
hung in the air unspoken.

“Reckon we have, sir,” said the foreman. A glare from the judge sent him scrambling to his feet as he answered, “She done it.”

Only the solemnity of the occasion kept Judge Donnell from uttering a blistering rebuke to this stammering yokel who was so heedless of court procedure. He continued to glare at the foreman several seconds during which a shocked silence prevailed in the courtroom. A few heartbeats later the gallery burst into a clamoring babble, with even a few whoops of triumph thrown in by some callous drunkards.

Frankie Silver seemed to sway for an instant, steadied by the arm of Nicholas Woodfin. He looked like a man who has steeled himself for a blow and has finally felt it delivered: it was as bad as expected, but at least it was over. He took a deep breath and murmured something to calm his client.

I looked for the Stewarts among the seething crowd, half fearing violence toward them or from them in reaction to the verdict, but they stood still. Isaiah Stewart had bowed his head, whether in prayer or submission I could not tell. His son Jackson stood with clenched fists, red-faced and breathing hard, as if the fight were just beginning, not ending. Neither of them made any move toward the defendant, and I felt a twinge of sorrow for her. She would be alone regardless, though, I thought. In this terrible moment when she has come face-to-face with her own death, she would be alone even if ten thousand hands were reaching out to comfort her. She did not spare a glance for her father and brother. She was looking up at Nicholas Woodfin with a face so full of trust that it made me ashamed of the powerlessness of all professional men. We doctors and lawyers and preachers and judges act as if we hold the power of life and death over those who pass before us, as if nothing frightens or dismays us, but really we are so many pawns in the game. Too often Death brushes past us to claim his prize without even sparing a glance for those of us who have set ourselves up as humanity’s defenders. People trust us so much; yet we can do so little.

“Your Honor, counsel for the defense wishes to move for a rule upon the state for a new trial!” Nicholas Woodfin was shouting to make himself heard above the crowd.

Judge Donnell nodded. He had expected some objection. “On what grounds, Mr. Woodfin?”

“That the witnesses were not sequestered.”

“Rule granted.” Judge Donnell turned to me, indicating that I should take down his words. I took up my pen and began to make notes.

William Alexander was on his feet, erupting in protest. “A new trial! Your Honor, we have wasted too much time already on this patently guilty prisoner. The witnesses testified under oath. Twice. There is no need to prolong their inconvenience further so that this woman may be convicted yet again.”

“She deserves a fair trial,” said Woodfin.

“She had one.”

“The testimony changed.”

“It was lengthened, but not substantially altered. Frankie Silver lied about her husband’s disappearance, and all the witnesses have said so from the very beginning.”

“That will do, gentlemen.”

“The state objects to the waste of time and public money that would be incurred in a new trial. The evidence for the defendant’s guilt is overwhelming. Counsel for the defense is quibbling over details.”

“Objection sustained,” said Judge Donnell, seeing the inarguable point. “Mr. Woodfin, rule for a new trial is denied.”

“Prayer for judgment, Your Honor,” said the prosecutor, before his opponent could object further.

“The prisoner will rise.”

Nicholas Woodfin helped Mrs. Silver to her feet and kept a protective hand at her elbow as they faced the bench.

The judge intoned the sentence in the sonorous voice of a benediction, with nothing in his tone to suggest any emotion on his part toward the defendant or her fate. “Frances Silver,” he said, “you have been found guilty of the crime of murder by a jury of your peers. Sentence of the court is that the prisoner, Frances Silver, be taken back to the prison from whence she came and thereby to remain until the Fay-day of the July court next of Burke County, and then to be taken from thence to the place of execution and then and there hung by the neck until she is dead. This sentence to be carried into execution by the sheriff of Burke County.”

The pronouncement of death was a familiar formula, never varied, and my hand flew across the page as I noted it down. When I looked up again, Frankie Silver was being led out of the court by Mr. Presnell, with two other constables flanking him as guards in case of trouble. Her cheeks glistened with tears, but she never made a sound.

Woodfin motioned for the officers to stop. “Your Honor,” he said, “the prisoner wishes to appeal the judgment of this court to the Supreme Court of North Carolina.”

Judge Donnell frowned, and I fancied I knew the cause of his annoyance. It cost money to make an appeal to a higher court, and the defendant did not impress that worthy jurist as a person of means. “And whom does the prisoner give as security for the bond?” he asked.

I think that Nicholas Woodfin would have paid the costs out of his own pocket, for I saw a glint in his eye that spoke of foolhardiness to come, but before he could encumber himself with that reckless pledge, Isaiah Stewart’s voice ran out from behind him.

“I’ll stand her bond, Judge. Her brother Jackson and I will answer for it.”

“Who are you, sir?”

“I’m her daddy,” said the grizzled old hunter, looking at his daughter, not at His Honor. I knew that the words had been directed at her.

“Very well, then,” said the judge. “If you will guarantee the bond, the verdict shall be appealed.” He turned to me. “Mr. Gaither, you will have the goodness to write a summary of the trial to be sent on to the Supreme Court in Raleigh, and have it ready for my inspection before the departure time of tomorrow’s stagecoach.”

Traditionally the presiding judge wrote a précis of the trial for the appellate court, but in practice they often delegated this task to underlings—that is, to me. Lowly clerks of Superior Court often found themselves wielding the pen and burning the midnight oil to complete the task of summarizing the case for the appeal. “I will do it gladly, sir,” I said with careful politeness, but my heart was heavy as I thought of the evening of drudgery that lay before me, when I had hoped to forget about the cares of my office at one of the Erwins’ dinner parties.

I lingered over my papers, for I wanted to make sure that I had all the information that I would need to write the trial summary. A few feet away from my table, Nicholas Woodfin was taking his leave of the condemned prisoner.

“We have appealed the conviction,” he told her. “Do you know what that means?”

She shook her head. She looked like a poleaxed calf, I thought, for she stood quite pale and still beside him, staring numbly at the ground as if she could envision it rushing up to meet her dangling feet. I put the thought from my mind. It would not come to pass. Nicholas Woodfin is her champion, and he is not without connections.

“An appeal is a request for a higher court to review the trial procedure.” He stopped, trying to find simpler words. “We must get the court in Raleigh to say that they cannot hang you.”

She nodded wearily, and I thought that she held out no hope, but that she had no strength left to argue about it. Will Butler told me once that after a trial is over, the prisoner sleeps soundly for the first time in weeks, for even if the worst has befallen him, at least the uncertainty is over. Frankie Silver was finished with us now. She had gone to some other place, where we could not follow.

“I haven’t given up on you, Frankie,” said Nicholas Woodfin. His voice was tinged with urgency, and I was gratified to know that honor as well as skill had comprised the defense of this poor young woman. “We will get you a new trial, and then we will carry the day!”

She nodded once more, and when the bailiff took hold of her arm to lead her away, she went willingly, and with downcast eyes. She did not look back, though Nicholas Woodfin stood and watched until the oak doors of the courtroom swung shut behind her.

She never saw him again.

CHAPTER FIVE

Deputy Spencer Arrowood was spending another late night working at his desk when the call came in. The hamburger, seeping grease through its waxed-paper covering and onto the paperwork beneath it, was supposed to be his dinner, but it had long since congealed into a sodden lump, and he could not bring himself to touch it, even to throw it away.

When the phone rang, he was so groggy from lack of sleep that he picked it up to reinstate the silence rather than to talk to anyone.

“Uh—Wake County Sheriff’s Department.”

“Mr. Miller?”

“No. This is his deputy.”

“Oh. Spencer. It’s Harmon here, out to the truck stop and all. How you been?”

“Fine, Harmon. What can I do for you?” They had been in high school together, nodding acquaintances now, not much more than that then.

“Well, Spencer, the radio station was talking about those murders out on the trail. Terrible thing. I hated to hear that—a pretty young girl and all. And, you know, they said that you wanted people to report anything suspicious.”

“Yes?”

“There’s been a kid down here at the truck stop. Probably nothing, but I thought I’d better call you.”

“A child? How old?”

“Not a child. A
kid.
Well, seventeen or so. Not somebody you’d sell a beer to without having a mighty long look at his driver’s license.”

Spencer tried to keep the impatience out of his voice. He didn’t have time for liquor-law violations. “So what about him?”

“He’s been going around trying to sell jewelry to one or two of the truck drivers in here.”

“What kind of jewelry?”

“A gold chain, a woman’s watch with a band of gold and silver intertwined, and a ring.”

“Wedding ring?”

“Looked like a high school class ring to me. Big silver-colored one with a blue stone, and some carving on the side. I didn’t get much of a look at it. He shoved it in his pocket when he saw me coming down to that end of the counter.”

It was probably nothing, Spencer thought. At best, it would turn out to be evidence of an unreported burglary. Some vacationing couple would call soon to report their hotel room robbed, or their home burgled. Still, he had to check it out. There weren’t any other leads to follow.

“Is he still there?”

“Yeah, he’s playing pool with a couple of the truckers. I think he’s betting on the game. He’s putting up the jewelry, and the truckers are betting cash. You’d better get here before he loses it all, and your evidence rolls out of here six ways from Sunday.”

“Keep an eye on him. I’m on my way.”

Sometimes you get lucky, Nelse Miller had said. In the small hours of the morning, Nelse had been apt to find philosophy at the bottom of a shot glass, or in the glow of his last cigarette. He maintained that for every case that stays unsolved by chance—no one happened to see anything, no one happened to find the weapon—there is another case that is solved by the same random luck. “This time the coin came up your way,” he’d said when he got back to find the suspect already in custody and the evidence tagged for trial.

Now Spencer wondered whose luck it had been—his windfall or Fate Harkryder’s misfortune? He found the kid at the truck stop, still shooting pool with a couple of truckers. Harmon pointed him out. Spencer recognized the scraggly youth with the peach-fuzz mustache as one of the Harkryders, and he’d asked to see the jewelry the kid had been trying to sell. The kid had made a move, as if to put his hand into the pocket of his jacket, but instead he had shoved the player with the cue stick against Spencer Arrowood and made a run for the door. He’d been about three truckers short of a getaway, and instead of making it to his car, he found himself facedown on the sticky floor of the truck stop, while the deputy cuffed his hands behind his back.

*   *   *

“It’s your move,” Alton Banner told his patient, tapping the chessboard with a black pawn.

Spencer blinked and the carved wooden pieces came back into focus, but he had forgotten now what maneuver he had been setting up. “Did we miss anything?” he asked his opponent.

The old doctor shrugged. “Are you referring to my designs on your king’s bishop, or are you over there wool-gathering again?”

“I was thinking about the night of the Trail Murders,” said Spencer. “When you and I were at the crime scene. Is there anything we overlooked? Anything you’d do differently now—with more experience, I mean.”

“Speak for yourself, boy. I was fifty-one back in those days, and I can’t say that experience has improved me much since then. As for technology, maybe there’s something we could have gained if we’d had Luminol and DNA testing, and all the rest of the new tools, but there’s no use worrying about that now. The evidence has long since degraded. It went into the trash the decade before last. What good will it do to dwell on that now?”

“I want to be sure. I’ve never had anybody executed before—and it’s on my say-so. The evidence was circumstantial.”

“Circumstantial. Would you listen to yourself? Most of the people in prison are there on circumstantial evidence, aren’t they? Even felons are smart enough not to commit the crime in front of a bunch of eyewitnesses. Excepting John Wilkes Booth, that is.”

Spencer smiled. “I know that. And most killers are not inclined to think that confession is good for the soul, either. We had a solid case. He had Emily Stanton’s jewelry in his possession and was attempting to sell it, which gave us a motive of robbery. His blood—type A-negative—was found at the crime scene. He had no alibi.”

“Are you trying to convince me or yourself? Because if you’re saying all this for my benefit, let me say now that I never had one moment’s doubt from that day until this that you had the killer. He had A-negative blood, Spencer. That’s rare enough so that if you walk into a blood bank and offer to give them some, they start dancing for joy and offering you refills on the orange juice.”