Candlemoth (50 page)

    I
turned and kicked the bottom of the cage.

    'Out,'
I said.

    Duty
Second nodded at Mr. Timmons, and then he unlocked the cage door and let me out.

    Mr.
Timmons took me back to my cell.

    He
didn't ask me what was happening, didn't ask me anything at all.

    He
took the ankle shackles off, walked me into my cell, went out and locked the
door behind me. He reached through the bars, unlocked each cuff in turn and
waited until I handed him the belt before he opened his mouth.

    'It'll
be fast,' he said, which seemed the most idiotic and insensitive thing to say.
'I shouldn't think you'll feel a thing, Daniel -'

    I
turned, angered. 'Is that so, Mister Timmons? Is that so?'

    I
took a step towards the bars and glared through at him.

    'Tell
me the last time you spoke to someone who's done it.'

    He
lowered his eyes. He looked tired and defeated.

    Maybe
he wanted me to apologize, to understand that he was merely doing his job, that
he didn't mean to upset me further.

    I
didn't apologize. Didn't say a thing. Didn't want to let him off the hook.

    Fuck
him too.

    Fuck
each and every one of them.

    October
27th came and went.

    Rousseau
had told me the 27th would be the last day he could see me before November
11th.

    My
special day.

    Most
important day of my life.

    But
Rousseau didn't come. Told myself that if he came on the tenth he could turn
round and go right back wherever he'd come from.

    Hell,
the guy would probably get some reporter to write a story about the time he'd
spent with me. Make a few thousand. Donate some to the church so he didn't feel
so guilty.

    In a
week I would move to Death Watch and begin the last seven days of my life.

    I
came in alone, I'd go out alone.

    So be
it.

    There
doesn't seem to be any way to prepare yourself for dying.

    Dying
is the great unknown, the one thing we all do that we can never tell anyone
about. Perhaps here's the reason why we slow and rubberneck towards the scene
of some highway smash. Perhaps we will see something; perhaps there will be
some indication of what will happen to us when we go. And even those who deal
with such things - the undertakers, the morticians, the coroners and
executioners - know as little of this subject as everyone else. And despite
their own familiarity with this closing chapter, they are no less afraid it
seems.

    No
less afraid.

    I am
ready, I feel. As ready as I will ever be.

    I
will wait out the days until I am transferred to Death Watch, and then I will
wait out the final hours before they tie me down and sedate me, before they cut
loose the juice, so to speak.

    Seems
that before too long I will understand what happens when the lights go down for
the last time. One last thing to share with Nathan Verney.

    Lyman
Greeve got his harmonica today.

    Within
an hour I wanted to snatch it from him and hurl it out of the window and across
the exercise yard.

    Lyman
was happy, however.

    I let
it be.

    Didn't
say a thing.

    Mr.
West walked down here.

    He
paused near the door of my cell. He paused just for a moment but I saw his
face. He smiled, smiled with something dark and twisted in his eyes.

    He
was looking forward to November 4th. Transfer to Death Watch brought such a
sense of finality. If there was an appeal, if there was to be word from the
Governor or the District Attorney it usually came before the final week.

    No
such word had come.

    I
knew it wouldn't.

    So
did Mr. West.

    And
that's why he smiled.

    The
night of November 3rd I did not sleep. I tried, oh Lord how I tried, but sleep
deserted me for someone else.

    I
could hear Lyman Greeve snoring. At least he wasn't blowing his harmonica. To
have Lyman Greeve's harmonica be the last sound you heard before your final
week on earth would have been too much.

    Grateful
for small mercies.

    I
heard them coming as the sun rose.

    I
knew they would come before the bell.

    They
would come quietly, so as not to wake the other inmates.

    I
knew Mr. Timmons' footsteps, and Duty Second - whoever that was - would be
behind him.

    I
counted those footsteps, all thirty-eight of them, and when I turned and opened
my eyes and saw them looking at me through the bars I felt the wave of grief
and desperation.

    'Come
on now, Daniel,' Mr. Timmons said. 'It's time to go.'

    I lay
there without moving.

    Hardly
dared even to breathe.

    'We don't
wanna come in there, Ford,' Duty Second said.

    Mr.
Timmons raised his hand and shook his head.

    
Back
off,
that gesture said.

    Mr.
Timmons squatted down on his haunches and looked through the bars at me.

    Our
heads were level.

    'I
gotta take you,' he said. 'You gotta come now or they're gonna have a medic
come down here and sedate you, and then they're gonna shackle you and carry you
down there… and that just ain't dignified, Daniel, it just ain't dignified.'

    Terror
gripped every atom of my being.

    I was
screaming inside, screaming louder than ever, but when I opened my mouth I just
said
Let's do it.

    Duty
Second stepped forward and passed the belt between the bars.

    My
hands were sweating and I struggled with it.

    Mr.
Timmons told Duty Second to go down and open the door.

    Duty
Second protested, said it was a violation of procedure, that they'd all regret
it if something happened.

    'Just
go down and open the door,' Mr. Timmons said curtly, and Duty Second hesitated.

    'Now,'
Mr. Timmons said.

    Duty
Second went.

    The
buzzer sounded.

    Mr.
Timmons yanked the door back and stepped into my cell.

    He
helped me with the belt, tightened it around my waist, and then enclosed my
wrists in the cuffs.

    Duty
Second appeared behind him and held out the ankle shackles.

    'Step
out,' Mr. Timmons said.

    I
followed him out of the cell onto the gantry.

    Duty
Second watched me while Mr. Timmons put on the ankle shackles.

    We
went side by side, Mr. Timmons to my right, Duty Second to my left.

    At
the end of the gantry we turned right, and as we approached the stairwell Duty
Second stepped behind me as the well was too narrow for three abreast.

    We
went down slowly.

    A
funeral march.

    At
the bottom of the stairwell I started right, and Mr. Timmons was there ahead of
me calling for the door to be unlocked.

    The
sounds… all those sounds - the buzzers, the grating of metal against metal, the
clang of a door slamming into its socket, the turning of keys.

    The
sounds of my life it seemed.

    I
could feel my heart hammering in my chest, a swollen and angry fist, and yet
beneath that such a sense of abject terror.

    More
than a decade I had waited for this point to arrive, and in all that time I had
never been able to imagine the sheer horror of what I now felt.

    The
door came to behind me.

    I
turned instinctively and my view was blocked by Duty Second.

    A
long corridor stretched out before us.

    The
sound of footsteps, that was all, and the echo that came back, louder as we
approached the door at the far end.

    And
yet, in that moment, despite everything, I knew this was nothing compared to
what I would feel in seven days' time.

    The
door opened at the end and we passed through - Mr. Timmons first, Duty Second
behind, myself in the middle.

    We
stood in a small office. To the right was a desk behind which sat the
Administrative Officer, a small careful-looking man with an impeccably pressed
uniform and shoes like black glass. Behind him and slightly to his right was
the end of a narrow corridor, and down that corridor I could see the near side
of the Death Watch cell.

    Mr.
Timmons stepped forward.

    'Daniel
John Ford, prisoner number 090987690.'

    The
Administrative Officer checked a box on a clipboard on his desk and then walked
around the desk to stand near us.

    He
nodded at Timmons, at the Duty Second, and then stepped closer to me.

    'My
name is Frank Tilley,' he said. 'You call me Frank. That's the way it is down
here, son. We run things slightly different from D-Block and General Populace.
We run a twenty-four-hour watch, and that watch will be carried out by Mister
Timmons and myself. There will never be a point during the next week when there
won't be someone here to speak with you or to attend to what you need. You
understand me so far?'

    I
said nothing.

    
My mind
was blank.

    
Frank Tilley leaned
forward and looked right Into my eyes.

    'You
understanding me there, son?' he asked.

    'Daniel?'
Mr. Timmons prompted.

    I
nodded my head… I
think
I nodded my head.

    They
evidently perceived something because Frank Tilley said, 'Okay, son, good
enough.'

    He
walked around to the other side of his desk.

    'So
we're gonna be here for a week, and each day at noon someone's gonna come down
and take your temperature and do some basic physical checks on you. You're
gonna eat a little better than you did upstairs, but nothing fancy. You need
anything you let me or Mister Timmons know, and if it's within reason we'll see
what we can do. You can smoke down here, and you'll get cigarettes provided.'

    Frank
Tilley stepped out from behind his desk again.

    He
leaned closer still and almost whispered to me.

    'We
expect there's gonna be a little difficulty here, Daniel. It's a rare man that
doesn't get upset every once in a while during this last week, but I wanna let
you know that there's nothing to be ashamed about; you wanna break down a
little, you wanna pray out loud, something such as this, then you go ahead,
son. We ain't gonna be judgin' anyone down here, 'cause we figure you've been
judged already and we're here just to ensure that the letter of the law is met.
Nevertheless, we don't forget you're a human being too, and you just strayed
off of the line a little… okay?'

    I
nodded.

    Twice.

    My
head was down then, didn't feel I had the strength to raise it again.