The Chamber (71 page)

The Reverend Ralph Griffin entered and closed the door. He’d met with Sam twice during the day, and was obviously taking this hard. It was his first execution, and he’d already decided it would be his last. His cousin in the state senate would have to find him another job. He nodded at Adam and sat by Sam on the desk. It was almost nine o’clock.

“Colonel Nugent’s out there, Sam. He said he’s waiting on you.”

“Well, then, let’s not go out. Let’s just sit here.”

“Suits me.”

“You know, preacher, my heart has been touched these past few days in ways I never dreamed possible. But, for the life of me, I hate that jerk out there. And I can’t overcome it.”

“Hate’s an awful thing, Sam.”

“I know. But I can’t help it.”

“I don’t particularly like him either, to be honest.”

Sam grinned at the minister and put his arm around him. The voices outside grew louder, and Nugent barged into the room. “Sam, it’s time to go back to the Observation Cell,” he said.

Adam stood, his knees weak with fear, his stomach in knots, his heart racing wildly. Sam, however, was unruffled. He jumped from the desk. “Let’s go,” he said.

They followed Nugent from the front office into the narrow hallway where some of the largest guards at Parchman were waiting along the wall. Sam took Adam by the hand, and they walked slowly together with the reverend trailing behind.

Adam squeezed his grandfather’s hand, and ignored the faces as they walked by. They went through the center of the Row, through two sets of doors, then through the bars at the end of Tier A. The tier door closed behind them, and they followed Nugent past the cells.

Sam glanced at the faces of the men he’d known so well. He winked at Hank Henshaw, nodded bravely at J. B. Gullitt who had tears in his eyes, smiled at Stock Turner. They were all leaning through the bars, heads hung low, fear stamped all over their faces. Sam gave them his bravest look.

Nugent stopped at the last cell and waited for the door to be opened from the end of the tier. It clicked loudly, then rolled open. Sam, Adam, and Ralph entered, and Nugent gave the signal to close the door.

The cell was dark, the solitary light and television both off. Sam sat on the bed between Adam and the reverend. He leaned on his elbows with his head hanging low.

Nugent watched them for a moment, but could think of nothing to say. He’d be back in a couple of hours, at eleven, to take Sam to the Isolation Room. They all knew he was coming back. It seemed too cruel at this moment to tell Sam he was leaving, but that he would return. So he stepped away and left through the tier door where his guards were waiting and watching in the semidarkness. Nugent walked to the Isolation Room where a foldaway cot had been installed for the prisoner’s last hour. He walked through the small room, and stepped into the Chamber Room where final preparations were being made.

The state executioner was busy and very much in control. He was a short, wiry man named Bill Monday. He had nine fingers and would earn five hundred dollars for his services if the execution took place. By statute, he was appointed by the governor. He was in a tiny closet known simply as the chemical room, less than five feet from the gas chamber. He was studying a checklist on a clipboard. Before him on the counter was a one-pound can of sodium cyanide pellets, a nine-pound bottle of sulfuric acid, a one-pound container of caustic soda, a fifty-pound steel bottle of anhydrous ammonia, and a five-gallon container of distilled water. To his side on another, smaller counter were three gas masks, three pair of rubber gloves, a funnel, hand soap, hand towels, and a mop. Between the two counters was an acid mixing pot mounted on a two-inch pipe that ran into the floor, under the wall, and resurfaced next to the chamber near the levers.

Monday had three checklists, actually. One contained instructions for mixing the chemicals: the sulfuric acid and distilled water would be mixed to obtain approximately a 41 percent concentration; the caustic soda solution was made by dissolving one pound of caustic soda in two and a half gallons of water; and
there were a couple of other brews that had to be mixed to clean the chamber after the execution. One list included all the necessary chemicals and supplies. The third list was the procedure to follow during an actual execution.

Nugent spoke to Monday; all was proceeding as planned. One of Monday’s assistants was smearing petroleum jelly around the edges of the chamber’s windows. A plainclothed member of the execution team was checking the belts and straps on the wooden chair. The doctor was fiddling with his EKG monitor. The door was open to the outside, where an ambulance was already parked.

Nugent glanced at the checklists once more, though he’d memorized them long ago. In fact, he’d even rewritten one other checklist, a suggested chart to record the execution. The chart would be used by Nugent, Monday, and Monday’s assistant. It was a numbered, chronological list of the events of the execution: water and acid mixed, prisoner enters chamber, chamber door locked, sodium cyanide enters acid, gas strikes prisoner’s face, prisoner apparently unconscious, prisoner certainly unconscious, movements of prisoner’s body, last visible movement, heart stopped, respiration stopped, exhaust valve opened, drain valves opened, air valve opened, chamber door opened, prisoner removed from chamber, prisoner pronounced dead. Beside each was a blank line to record the time elapsed from the prior event.

And there was an execution list, a chart of the twenty-nine steps to be taken to begin and complete the task. Of course, the execution list had an appendix, a list of the fifteen things to do in the step-down, the last of which was to place the prisoner in the ambulance.

Nugent knew every step on every list. He knew how
to mix the chemicals, how to open the valves, how long to leave them open, and how to close them. He knew it all.

He stepped outside to speak to the ambulance driver and get some air, then he walked back through the Isolation Room to Tier A. Like everyone else, he was waiting for the damned Supreme Court to rule one way or the other.

He sent the two tallest guards onto the tier to close the windows along the top of the outside wall. Like the building, the windows had been there for thirty-six years and they did not shut quietly. The guards pushed them up until they slammed, each one echoing along the tier. Thirty-five windows in all, every inmate knew the exact number, and with each closing the tier became darker and quieter.

The guards finally finished and left. The Row was now locked down—every inmate in his cell, all doors secured, all windows closed.

Sam had begun shaking with the closing of the windows. His head dropped even lower. Adam placed an arm around his frail shoulders.

“I always liked those windows,” Sam said, his voice low and hoarse. A squad of guards stood less than fifteen feet away, peering through the tier door like kids at the zoo, and Sam didn’t want his words to be heard. It was hard to imagine Sam liking anything about this place. “Used to, when it came a big rain the water would splash on the windows, and some of it would make it inside and trickle down to the floor. I always liked the rain. And the moon. Sometimes, if the clouds were gone, I could stand just right in my cell and catch a glimpse of the moon through those windows. I always wondered why they didn’t have more windows around here. I mean, hell, sorry preacher, but if they’re determined to keep you in a cell all day, why
shouldn’t you be able to see outdoors? I never understood that. I guess I never understood a lot of things. Oh well.” His voice trailed off, and he didn’t speak again for a while.

From the darkness came the mellow tenor of Preacher Boy singing “Just a Closer Walk with Thee.” It was quite pretty.

“Just a closer walk with Thee,

Grant it, Jesus, is my plea,

Daily walking close to Thee …”

“Quiet!” a guard yelled.

“Leave him alone!” Sam yelled back, startling both Adam and Ralph. “Sing it, Randy,” Sam said just loud enough to be heard next door. Preacher Boy took his time, his feelings obviously wounded, then began again.

A door slammed somewhere, and Sam jumped. Adam squeezed his shoulder, and he settled down. His eyes were lost somewhere in the darkness of the floor.

“I take it Lee wouldn’t come,” he said, his words haunted.

Adam thought for a second, and decided to tell the truth. “I don’t know where she is. I haven’t talked to her in ten days.”

“Thought she was in a rehab clinic.”

“I think she is too, but I just don’t know where. I’m sorry. I tried everything to find her.”

“I’ve thought about her a lot these past days. Please tell her.”

“I will.” If Adam saw her again, he would struggle to keep from choking her.

“And I’ve thought a lot about Eddie.”

“Look, Sam, we don’t have long. Let’s talk about pleasant things, okay?”

“I want you to forgive me for what I did to Eddie.”

“I’ve already forgiven you, Sam. It’s taken care of. Carmen and I both forgive you.”

Ralph lowered his head next to Sam’s, and said, “Perhaps there are some others we should think about too, Sam.”

“Maybe later,” Sam said.

The tier door opened at the far end of the hallway, and footsteps hurried toward them. Lucas Mann, with a guard behind him, stopped at the last cell and looked at the three shadowy figures huddled together on the bed. “Adam, you have a phone call,” he said nervously. “In the front office.”

The three shadowy figures stiffened together. Adam jumped to his feet, and without a word stepped from the cell as the door opened. His belly churned violently as he half-ran down the tier. “Give ’em hell, Adam,” J. B. Gullitt said as he raced by.

“Who is it?” Adam asked Lucas Mann, who was beside him, step for step.

“Garner Goodman.”

They weaved through the center of MSU and hurried to the front office. The receiver was lying on the desk. Adam grabbed it and sat on the desk. “Garner, this is Adam.”

“I’m at the capitol, Adam, in the rotunda outside the governor’s office. The Supreme Court just denied all of our cert petitions. There’s nothing left up there.”

Adam closed his eyes and paused. “Well, I guess that’s the end of that,” he said, and looked at Lucas Mann. Lucas frowned and dropped his head.

“Sit tight. The governor’s about to make an announcement. I’ll call you in five minutes.” Goodman was gone.

Adam hung up the phone and stared at it. “The Supreme Court turned down everything,” he reported to
Mann. “The governor’s making a statement. He’ll call back in a minute.”

Mann sat down. “I’m sorry, Adam. Very sorry. How’s Sam holding up?”

“Sam is taking this much better than I am, I think.”

“It’s strange, isn’t it? This is my fifth one, and I’m always amazed at how calmly they go. They give up when it gets dark. They have their last meal, say good-bye to their families, and become oddly placid about the whole thing. Me, I’d be kicking and screaming and crying. It would take twenty men to drag me out of the Observation Cell.”

Adam managed a quick smile, then noticed an open shoe box on the desk. It was lined with aluminum foil with a few broken cookies in the bottom. It had not been there when they left an hour earlier. “What’s that?” he asked, not really curious.

“Those are the execution cookies.”

“The execution cookies?”

“Yeah, this sweet little lady who lives down the road bakes them every time there’s an execution.”

“Why?”

“I don’t know. In fact, I have no idea why she does it.”

“Who eats them?” Adam asked, looking at the remaining cookies and crumbs as if they were poison.

“The guards and trustees.”

Adam shook his head. He had too much on his mind to analyze the purpose of a batch of execution cookies.

______

For the occasion David McAllister changed into a dark navy suit, freshly starched white shirt, and dark burgundy tie. He combed and sprayed his hair, brushed his teeth, then walked into his office from a side door. Mona Stark was crunching numbers.

“The calls finally stopped,” she said, somewhat relieved.

“I don’t want to hear it,” McAllister said, checking his tie and teeth in a mirror. “Let’s go.”

He opened the door and stepped into the foyer where two bodyguards met him. They flanked him as he walked into the rotunda where bright lights were waiting. A throng of reporters and cameras pressed forward to hear the announcement. He stepped to a makeshift stand with a dozen microphones wedged together. He grimaced at the lights, waited for quiet, then spoke.

“The Supreme Court of the United States has just denied the last appeals from Sam Cayhall,” he said dramatically, as if the reporters hadn’t already heard this. Another pause as the cameras clicked and the microphones waited. “And so, after three jury trials, after nine years of appeals through every court available under our Constitution, after having the case reviewed by no less than forty-seven judges, justice has finally arrived for Sam Cayhall. His crime was committed twenty-three years ago. Justice may be slow, but it still works. I have been called upon by many people to pardon Mr. Cayhall, but I cannot do so. I cannot overrule the wisdom of the jury that sentenced him, nor can I impose my judgment upon that of our distinguished courts. Neither am I willing to go against the wishes of my friends the Kramers.” Another pause. He spoke without notes, and it was immediately obvious he’d worked on these remarks for a long time. “It is my fervent hope that the execution of Sam Cayhall will help erase a painful chapter in our state’s tortured history. I call upon all Mississippians to come together from this sad night forward, and work for equality. May God have mercy on his soul.”

He backed away as the questions flew. The bodyguards
opened a side door, and he was gone. They darted down the stairs and out the north entrance where a car was waiting. A mile away, a helicopter was also waiting.

Goodman walked outside and stood by an old cannon, aimed for some reason at the tall buildings downtown. Below him, at the foot of the front steps, a large group of protestors held candles. He called Adam with the news, then he walked through the people and the candles and left the capitol grounds. A hymn started as he crossed the street, and for two blocks it slowly faded away. He drifted for a while, then walked toward Hez Kerry’s office.