The Watchman (2 page)

That's so. That's so, said Jibbons, smiling softly, content enough that the woman would be hearing aU this.

I have had, said Matthew Hood, a lot of time to think about the way things were up there—the way I used to do things—the way they do them now. A lot of time, Jibbons.

The clock struck quarter till nine and in the inch of stillness after Hood last spoke they heard the faintest shifting of the woman's heavy shoes.

They told me up yonder, she said suddenly in a whisper brittle as the breaking of a straw. They said any time before two-minutes-of wasn't too late. They said the governor he might telephone the reprieve even if it was as late as that. Even as late as two-minutes-of.

Since she had not spoken for them to hear; inasmuch as her words were an apostrophe addressed to some self-of-her exiled out there in the fog, none of the men pretended to have heard. And Hood himself when he spoke again seemed, like her, dreamlike: to be speaking to himself and to none of them; perhaps petitioning some vainglorious and fallen figure of himself lost yonder in the mists with the woman.

Progress, he said. Efficiency. Mercy. Painlessness. It had to do with nary one of them damned hollow words, gentlemen. No, by the Almighty, I've had long, quiet years to think it out—to ponder it plumb to its heart. No, it was none of them fine words that caused the State Board to vote the Change. I have sat up yonder in my room many's

the night with a length of rope on my knees, in my hands a-feeling of it—in the dark. Just feeling that rope from one end to the other and trying to think it out, to ponder it, like a fisherman playing out his line and wondering what's hooked down yonder at the end of it, in the deeps. And I paid Jake Martin thirty-five dollars and twenty-three cents to have a gas line run up to all my lights, and Welsbach mantles and glass chimbleys put in each and every one, so's I wouldn't have any part of that—of the electric—not even light to help me see, to think, to ponder it out, and by-and-by it come clear to me, Trader.

Hood clasped his fingers gently and then slowly let them disengage and fall loose in the cracked leather of the cushion where they lay on either side of him, invalid and memory-less of their once cunning. He looked like an old child, about to cry, stuffed unwilling into a dilapidated baby carriage, chafing and sour in its juices.

Trader, it's on the noose-end of the rope that a man finds revelation. It's there the truth hangs. Trader, and it's the only end that any man—even a hangman—ever finds it out. By God, I know, for I've spent enough years on the other end and that's for sure, my Christian friends. So one night I got myself fortified sufficient with prayer and whiskey, tore the lath and plaster loose from a place in the ceiling where the rains had come in and done half the job already, and I lashed my rope to the bare beam, made the good old noose I'd made so many times before, fetched it around my head just so, with the knot beneath the chin—and, gentlemen, I hanged myself a little.

A little?

Well, Christ Jesus, man, I am here am I not?

WeU, but still—

A little I said. Not the whole job, damn it. I charge for that. Trader, and who'd be there to pay? You see what I was after was the Point of View—the Philosophy, so to speak. Not the drop. Not death. God knows I'm not yet that forlorn nor cowardly. You might say I just leaned into the noose a little—just let myself sag enough at the knees to let the feel of the hemp bite into my gullet. Well, by the time the gaslights began to go dim I had the truth by the neck as firm as the noose had mine. And I knew, at last, why it was the State Board voted the Change. It's all Philosophy, Trader, all Philosophy!

Well now, 1 have heard all the pros and cons.

And nary one of them knows the truth of it but me! Trader, I got the feel of that rope up there in my room that snowy night for the first time. All those years of hanging men and I had never known that my days were numbered, that some morning would come when my skills would be as useless and old-fashioned as if I was a blacksmith or a carriage-striper. Trader, I could feel that rope for the whole length of it and I knew suddenly that it ended right up there at the beemi. Now, says I to myself directly, how is the folks in the town to share in a killing like that? When a town like Adena kills a man—

Objection, Hood. Now you sound like those fanatics with their letters to Bonner and letters to the Governor. It's the State that will put Bonner to death in twelve minutes and not this town.

Trader, you know that's a pure technicality. It's the town that's going to kill him. Can't you feel it?

No. By God, that's—No.

A kind of tingle in the air. Even them that's dead set against the killing can feel that tingle, Trader. And it's just here—just in Adena. You don't reckon the folks up at Wheeling or down at Parkersburgh feel any thing tonight, do you. Trader? They'll read about it tomorrow and go wash up for breakfast. But here it's different. Why, it thrums in the air, Trader, hke the rope whirs after the drop. Every man, woman and child in this town knows that he's about to lend his hand to a just and terrible retribution.

Matthew Hood, you drink too much.

And so would you, Trader, if you'd given twenty years in the perfection of a highly skilled and delicate trade only to have the State Board vote you out in favor of a God damned gadget! So would you drink! So would you fortify yourself, Trader, just as I was fortifying myself that night in my room, in the noose, when I knew why I'd been thrown aside. As I was saying when you took issue with me—when the people of Adena kill a man they like to know, they like to feel that they're part of the Justice! That night I knew for the first time that rope ended right there—at the beam, at the frayed end beyond the knot. Now, suppose that rope didn't end at the beam—suppose it went crawling out through the town and into every home. Suppose every time I'd dropped a man up there in the Chamber that every clothesline in Adena—every window-blind cord—every length of butcher's twine on every kitchen table— quivered. Suppose

every rope or cord or string of every imaginable description everywhere in this town hummed and vibrated when I dropped the trap. You see? It would personalize it somehow, Trader. It would make the town know in six minutes—

Five minutes, Hood.

—in five minutes that they all are taking part in a Justice. A Christian, ordered Justice, Trader! It would make what was happening up there in the Chamber reach out and connect with every kitchen and parlor and nursery. Tonight at nine a child can reach for a switch and turn on the toaster and consider the good lesson that bread and bad boys can both end up nicely browned at the edges. And that, my good friend, is why the State Board voted the Change. That is the reason—the one and only reason! Let art and skill be thrown on the junk heap. Well, maybe in the long run it's fair. It had to come—I know that now. The electric was inevitable, gentlemen. The people of the town had to enjoy their share of that business up in the green chamber. For that's all it is now—a business. And that's a bitter cup, gentlemen, to a man such as me. A bitter cup, indeed. And I know if it wasn't for my religion I'd long ago have fetched that noose up over the beam and done my last and neatest job upon myself.

He leaned forward an inch, with a profound sigh, cupping his stubbly, prideless jowl in the magnificent arc of an alabaster thumb and finger, staring deep into the thickening wool of night beyond the window and perhaps finding there among the ambiguous shapes of traJB&c meters and telephone posts, blurred into imprecision, some makeshift resemblance to the proud crossed sticks of his past. Jibbons covered the mischievous smile which struggled at his lips. He almost felt pity for Matthew Hood; it was the shameless woman of the doomed man he had meant to badger in the hearing of all this. It was for her that he had unstoppered the old hangman's thoughts. As for Hood he had been heedless that she was there, he had spoken as unaware that any of them were there: as the woman herself, in the merciful illusion of a solitude, had spoken. The horse trader lifted his eyes to the woman's reflection in the glass and saw her old-young face now gray as soup meat, her lean, lye-scarred hands clutched together in her lap like the embrace of crippled lovers. Jibbons yawned loudly, elaborately, exposing in the dull, yellow lobby fight the cavernous glittering motherlode of his bridgework. He fetched out his dollar

watch and compared its hands with those of the wall clock.

One minute to live, he observed. Tom, is that clock right on the button?

Peace the Undertaker, silent and abiding throughout all, stirred his lean limbs and blinked irritably.

My clocks, Mister Jibbons, he said, are always right.

And the more he thought of it the more the suggestion piqued him. He shot the horse trader an offended, sidelong glance.

I've got two hundred clocks set round and about Mound County, Mister Jibbons, and you can check any one of them against the other one-hundred-and-ninety-and-nine. My wall clocks are the best and they're always right. For more than forty years the people of this county have known they can count on Peace when it comes to the Time, Mister Jibbons.

He subsided again into the buttoned, black leather, the lid of his left eye drooped a little, wearily, as if it and its mate had seen enough of death in their time to jade even the taste of Old Mortality himself. And hardly had his sloganly observation finished when the clock began its strike of nine, like a sound of distant chopping. With a lean hand Peace stroked the dyed black hair above his aged but fittingly ageless face. Barely perceptibly his lower lip thrust out as if, for an instant, he sincerely deplored the ceaseless prosperity of his art. The eyes of the cashiered hangman were shut tight as if he were deep in the drugged throes of some hempen dream. The horse trader's face had stopped smiling: flushed and strained it was, as if he were suddenly and profoundly preoccupied with certain climactic reflexes deep within his body and outside it, as well: a quiver, a spasm of shameless pleasure, perhaps only a flaccid stirring among the folds of his dirty underclothing. The woman fetched up her cardboard suitcase by the clothesline handle and moved toward the side door. She would stand in the fog on the corner till the southbound Greyhound came by at ten to fetch her home to Hundred. By the threshold she paused, turning, looking at the men almost as in afterthought.

I most kindly thank you, gentlemen, for letting me set here till it was done and over, she said softly. And I want you to know I bear nary one of you mahce for them killing him up yonder in the chair tonight

Jibbons grunted and struck a kitchen match to light his cold stogie.

Why should you, lady? he fairly shouted to her reflection

in the glass. He was guilty, wasn't he? He killed that cop, didn't he?

Oh, yes, she said. He done that. He was a murderer. Yes, he was that. I know it. For I seen him when he come in the kitchen afterwards and I could read it writ plain across his face. It's just that I had to thank you all kindly for letting me set here till it was over and done and to tell you all I bear you no malice.

She paused and laid her hand on the china door knob, opening the door an inch, feeling the autumn fog against her cheek.

No malice, she said in a yet softer voice. Only pity. I surely feel pity for you all and this here town.

We don't need your pity, widow-woman, Jibbons said loudly.

Oh, now, yes, she said. Yes, you do. For whilst I was setting yonder in that very chair it just come across my eyes like a vision.

Jibbons chuckled till he choked amid his blue cloud of smoke.

Well now you tell us about that vision, widow-woman, he said. Wouldn't you like to hear, Tom Peace? How about you. Matt? Go on. Tell us about your vision, widow-woman.

One of your own, she said, almost sorrowfully. Yes, one of your own, misters. I seen it as plain as I see you now. There'll be the blood shed of one of your town's own before the rising of the sun.

You fixing to get even for something, widow-woman? said the horse trader.

I'll be long gone, she said. Gone on the bus to Hundred when it comes to pass. And there's nothing I could do to stop it if I was here or I'd stay. For I wish nary one of you nor yours to come to harm and I'd raise my arm to no one in malice nor murder. I just tell you what I seen and what I know. I reckon it's the working out of the rule again. Lord, I've sawn it all my life. Love breeding love. Hate breeding hate. Murder breeding murder. Don't never end, misters. They killed him up at the pen tonight—someone will kill one of your own before the rising of the sun tomorrow. I seen it plain, misters. I thought you oughter know.

Jibbons had not counted on this extension of the evening's amusements; he could not resist playing the grief-crazed woman further out.

Well now, he said. You mean to say ever' time we burn a

man up yonder in the chair we can count on a murder here in Adena? Is that what you trying to put over, widow-woman?

Somewheres, she said. Not ever' time here. But some-wheres. Tonight 'twill be here. I know for I seen it plain as yonder clock face on the wall. I was setting there and it come across my eyes. And I thought it not fitting to leave 'gainst I told you. God knows might one of you be there to stay the murderer's hand. And now I bid you one and all good night, misters. And Christ's mercies on you all.

Jibbons, inspired, took a deep drag on his rank stump of stogie, pulled his tieless collar out from the greasy roll of his throat and with a giggle blew a white smoke cloud down into his shirt front and then settled back, shaking with mischievous hysteria, while blue wraiths rose from the folds of his clothes in curhng wisps and he stiffened in the leather chair, jiggling.

That's how he'll look, too! cried the horse trader. The one that does it—that's how he'll look when they throw the switch on him up there. Did you see it, widow-woman?

Btit he had heard the door close softly while in the very middle of his pantomime; it was a minor disappointment among the evening's divertissements. The woman, in fog and night and the madness of her grief, had gone.