The Red Scream

by Mary Willis Walker

  He let out a stream of air through his lips; all the way across the table she felt it on her face and smelled the Scotch.

  “David, I’m doing an article about the execution, sort of an update on Louie Bronk, for Lone Star Monthly. I wonder if you’d talk to me about this, on the record? About your religious scruples as a witness. I’d like to record what we say, if it’s all right with you.”

  He ran his tongue over his lips and looked around the room. “Now?”

  She smiled at him. “Why not? No time like the present.” She leaned over and pulled her little recorder and her notebook from her bag.

  He leaned back in his chair and looked down into his drink. “Not tonight. I’m tired. Let me think about it.”

  Push, her instinct told her. “We could take twenty minutes now and get it done. It could be helpful in changing people’s minds about capital punishment, David. Showing the difficulty a religious man has after he does his duty and testifies in court.”

  He shook his head slowly and held up his empty glass as explanation. “I can’t even think straight now. I don’t usually drink like this. I’ll call you tomorrow. Maybe we could talk after you check the autopsy stuff.”

  Molly sighed, took a card out of her purse, and handed it to him. “What time will you call?”

  He slid the card into his breast pocket and folded his hands again on the table, as though they might escape if he didn’t hold on to them. “In the afternoon,” he murmured.

  “Where are you staying if I should need to get in touch with you? There’s always the chance I might get some information about the execution.”

  “I’m staying with my cousin, Reuben Serrano, on South Fifth. 1802 South Fifth.”

  Molly jotted it down. “What’s the phone number there?”

  David put a ten-dollar bill on the table. “He’s got no phone.”

  She decided to try once more to get him to talk, but just as she was about to speak, he stood and slid his chair into the table. “I’ve got to go,” he said, reaching out to shake her hand. “Got a date.” When she put her hand in his, he shook it with a firm, professional grasp and then made a slight bow from the waist.

  “Talk to you tomorrow,” Molly said.

  She watched him walk away in his dark suit and his dignified posture. A funeral director—he had certainly mastered the body language.

  Molly could see from all the way across the room that Jo Beth’s eyes were sparkling with anticipation. As she slid into the booth and picked up her sandwich, Jo Beth said, “He was the guy who worked for the McFarlands, wasn’t he?”

  Molly nodded and took a bite of the sandwich.

  “Don’t get coy on me, Mother. What did he want that was so private?”

  “Not coy,” Molly said with her mouth full, “just eating.” After she swallowed, she said, “I’ll tell you after I eat.” She started to take another bite, then stopped. “Something’s going on. First Charlie McFarland trying to talk me out of the story, then this stuff from the master poet, and now David Serrano. It’s like out in the oil fields when the rigs start drilling and all the snakes for miles around are set into motion. I just want to go on the record here as predicting that things are on the move.”

  Jo Beth shook her head. “If you want to get credit for being a prophet, Mother, I think you need to be a little more specific than that.”

  chapter 4

  Here on death row

  All set to go.

  Ain’t scared,

  All prepared.

  Got no fear, they say,

  Ready anyday.

  All set to die,

  Easy as pie—

  What a fucking lie!

  LOUIE BRONK

  Death Row, Ellis I Unit,

  Huntsville, Texas

  Molly Cates looked down at the familiar photos spread out on the desk—eleven-year-old photos of a dead woman whose body was probably reduced to dust by now. The oval face, with its small even features, was appealing even in death and even without hair to soften it. The body stretched out on the stainless-steel autopsy table could have been that of a ten-year-old girl, except for the swelling of small breasts and the wispy hair growth in the groin. Tiny McFarland had been one of those women who pass from child to adult with only a minimum of external physical change.

  Barbara Gruber, assistant to Travis County Medical Examiner Robert Perez, looked over Molly’s shoulder and demanded, “What on earth are you looking for, Moll, that you didn’t see the first hundred times?”

  “I’d rather not say, so you can be impartial here,” Molly told her. “Let’s have a closer look at this head shot, Barb.”

  A sturdy, middle-aged blonde in horn-rimmed glasses, Barbara Gruber was an old friend. Over the years the two women had pored over a great many autopsy pictures together. They had recently collaborated on an article for the Law Enforcement Bulletin. Barbara had contributed her expertise on body fluids, which was her old specialty, and blood splatter, which was a new passion. Molly had organized it and translated it into words regular people could comprehend.

  Barbara picked up the photo and carried it to the long table next to the wall where she switched on a high-intensity goose-necked lamp, and positioned the photo under a large magnifier. Then she stood aside to let Molly look.

  As she bent and looked through the lens, Molly felt a fluttering in her chest, like hundreds of furry moth wings. It was incipient panic—her usual reaction to having made a mistake. She moved the photo down slightly so the top of the head was right in the center of the lens and studied it. Yes, there they were, goddammit—some faint lines just a little darker than the mauve-toned skin of the scalp. She closed her eyes for a moment and looked again to see if they were really there. Then she stood back and said, “Look at her scalp, Barb, and tell me what you see, if anything.”

  Barbara bent over and put her practiced eyes to the magnifier. She looked in silence for what seemed to Molly a long time, moving the photo around continuously. Then she stood back from the table. “Hard as hell to see them, but looks like some tiny hairline cuts, probably made postmortem, maybe when he shaved her head.”

  “Sure does,” Molly said, crossing her arms across her chest. “You don’t have pics for any of the other Bronk victims, do you?”

  “No. But if it’s important to you, we could call and have the other counties check. Let’s see, they did the post on Greta Huff in San Antone, and Rosa Morales—that was Corpus, right?”

  Molly nodded. “And Candice Hargrave in McLennan County. And Lizette Pachullo in Denton. Could you call them, Barb?”

  “You bet.”

  “Could I talk to the good doc for a minute?” Molly asked.

  “No way. He’s out of town for the week. First vacation in fifteen years. Hope it improves his temper some. Even if he was here, he probably wouldn’t talk to you after what you said about him in your book. Calling him dour and irascible in print is not going to improve your relationship with him.”

  Molly nodded. Robert Perez had been the overworked and underpaid Travis County ME for thirty years and Molly had often endured his vile temper and hostility toward the press, first when she was a police reporter, then as staffer for Lone Star Monthly, and finally when she was researching the book. “When he calls in, will you tell him I need to talk to him—urgently.”

  Barbara shook her head. “You kidding? There’s no way I’d tell him that. He’d bust a blood vessel. Uh-uh. When he gets back I’ll tell him. Maybe. If I find a good moment.”

  Molly didn’t really care; she knew what she had come to find out. She had a powerful hunch that when she reported this back to David Serrano, he would have some more to say.

  “Barb, I hate to ask this, but would you do something else for me—as a reality check? Would you read through the McFarland file today and see if your boss made any mention of those cuts? I sure didn’t see any. I just want to make sure I’m not losing it.”

  Barbara squeezed her eyebrows together and pretende
d to be thinking it over. Then she draped an arm across Molly’s shoulders and hugged her. “For you, Molly Cates, anything. I’ve been meaning to call you. I read the book and especially enjoyed the acknowledgments.” She closed her eyes and recited: “ ‘And special thanks to Barbara Gruber who knows more about body fluids than anyone in the state of Texas. Her eagerness to share her knowledge makes her one of the best teachers I have ever run across, and her cheer and efficiency make her the heart and soul of the Travis County Medical Examiner’s office.’ ” She opened her eyes. “You didn’t have to say that, but I’m glad you did; my mom thinks I’m famous now.”

  Before she left, Molly borrowed Barbara’s phone and called the DA’s office to make an appointment with Stan Heffernan. His secretary, someone new whom Molly didn’t know, said Heffernan was in court all morning and booked in meetings all afternoon so he couldn’t possibly see her today.

  “Who is this I’m talking to?” Molly asked.

  After a pause, the voice said, “Ella Sue Jenkins, ma’am.”

  “Well, Ms. Jenkins, I’m Molly Cates and I got a real urgent problem that only your boss can help me with. Now I know you can get him on his pager, so please tell Stan that I’ve received an anonymous letter concerning the Bronk case and that it sounds threatening. I need his help in deciding what to do and I need it today. I can come in anytime he’s got five minutes.”

  “Okay, I’ll try, Mrs. Cates, but—”

  “Honey, if he doesn’t get that message, he’ll be all horns and rattles when he hears he missed it.”

  “Well, I—”

  “I know what,” Molly said, talking fast. “Stan usually comes back to the office at twelve-thirty to read and eat his lunch in peace. Why don’t I come over and catch him then? Yes, that’s a good idea. You go ahead and tell him that when you buzz him. Thanks, Miz Jenkins.” She hung up quickly so the secretary couldn’t get another word in.

  She looked at her watch and decided to spend the three hours until her appointment over at her Lone Star Monthly office. These days she usually worked in her home office and sent things in over a modem, but it was good to appear in person occasionally, remind them she was still around. Maybe a change in working environment would help her discover an ending for the Abilene Angel story. At least it would give her a chance to fill Richard Dutton in on what was going on.

  Richard Dutton looked up after less than thirty seconds. His fine long nose with the dent in the tip wrinkled in distaste. “Forget it, Molly. This is just the usual nonsense.” He dropped the copy of the poem and the twelve pages on his desk.

  Molly reclaimed them. “You’re probably right, but I’m going to show Stan Heffernan—just in case.”

  Richard shrugged under his loose fawn-colored jacket. “Didn’t I tell you the Bronk book would bring out the squirrels? I’m surprised this is all you’ve gotten. Of course it’s only been out for a month.”

  “But, Richard, doesn’t this poem read like a threat to you?”

  He sat back on the edge of his desk and crossed his arms over his narrow chest. “If you want to call that dreck a poem. I think ‘verse’ or ‘doggerel’ is more appropriate for something so dreary.”

  “Compared to Louie Bronk’s stuff, it sounds like Shakespeare. Anyway, things are heating up as the execution approaches. I’m going to—”

  “Give it a rest, Molly. Enough’s enough.” He uncrossed his arms and slapped his hands down on his thighs. “How’s the Abilene piece going? We need it tomorrow, first thing, so the fact-checkers can get going on it.”

  “Richard, have you ever known me to miss a deadline?”

  He tilted his long bony head to the side. “Not once. That’s one reason I like to hire old reporters—you work like coolies and you always meet your deadlines. Listen, tomorrow after you sign off on that, I want you to plan on going to Houston right away to cover the defenestration of that banker—what’s his name?”

  “Griswold. Banker Griswold,” Molly muttered.

  Richard chuckled low in his throat. “How could I have forgotten? Absolutely Dickensian, isn’t it?” In spite of having grown up in Fort Worth, the son of an oil executive, Richard Dutton spoke with a slightly British accent—an affectation Molly had always considered amusing and eccentric. But now, for the first time in the eight years she had worked for him, she found it irritating.

  “Listen, Richard. That’s going to have to wait. The Bronk execution’s next Monday, well Tuesday really, just after midnight. I need all the time I can get to cover it right—interviews with families of victims and some of the original investigators like the old sheriff down in Hays County and the Rangers who were involved early on. You know—where’s the old gang and how do they feel now that the execution is finally about to take place.”

  She got increasingly excited as she talked about it; it would be the best of the series she’d done on Louie Bronk, the final word. “I want to cover the actual execution in detail, Richard. His last day, what goes on in the death chamber—I think people are fascinated by that—last visitors, last meals, last words—all that. Then I’ll go outside and talk with the protesters—the Amnesty International faithfuls, the candlelight chanters, and all the usual prison groupies. And here’s something else I’ve been thinking about—how an execution affects the other inmates on death row. I want to talk to them, find out what they thought of him, whether they stay awake for it. You could call the warden to arrange that, couldn’t you?”

  She stopped to gauge his reaction, but his face was blank. He just shrugged in answer to her question. She was surprised. Usually she could rev him up when she tried to sell an idea.

  She just needed to do a harder sell, she decided. “And this is the perfect chance for me to do an update on capital punishment now that Texas is gearing up for an unprecedented surge in executions. After all, we lead the nation; we’ve executed fourteen already this year, two of them last week. We can do a sidebar on the executions this year to date and compare it with Florida and some other states that are executing aggressively. And, now, with the Supreme Court decisions limiting habeas corpus, there’s no telling what sort of records our great state might set this year.”

  He looked bored. “Hell, Richard,” Molly said, “Banker Griswold’s just a stain on that Westheimer sidewalk; he ain’t going nowhere. I can do him next month.”

  Richard looked down the length of his legs to his shiny tasseled loafers. “Molly, with the indictment of Griswold and his partner and the other Resolution Trust Corp bribery cases, Griswold is hot stuff. And we haven’t done zip on it. And anyway”—he looked up and grinned, revealing some of the charm for which he was notorious—“it’s worth doing the piece just so you can revive the use of the word ‘defenestration.’ Trust me, this is much better than trotting out your moldy old Bronk thing. You’ve had a good run with it. Now lay it to rest.”

  “But, Richard, I’ll come up with new angles; you know how just rooting around in an old case like this can stir up something new. David Serrano, the McFarlands’ old live-in baby-sitter, is back in town, and he’s going to attend the execution as one of Bronk’s witnesses. Now that’s an interesting wrinkle—asking for someone who testified against you to come watch you die. And David’s a devout Catholic fretting over his role in sending Bronk to the death chamber. There’s juice there. And Charley McFarland is willing to talk for the first time. And surely,” she said, holding her hands out, palms up, “you haven’t forgotten the two Bronk issues outsold everything we’ve ever done.”

  Richard crossed his arms over his chest again in a way that made her heart sink. “Molly, the Bronk case is all over but the needle prick. I’m sick of that animal cracker. If you feel you have to do something, make it a brief piece on the execution itself, his last words, how long it took for the injection to work, blah-blah—you know, three pages at most. We’ll put a blurb at the end plugging your book, sell a few copies maybe.”

  Molly felt like wailing in frustration, but she forced her voice to
stay low and spoke slowly. “Richard, we talked about this last month when the court set his execution date. We agreed a story would be a good idea. I’ve already made plans, set up some interviews.”

  “Cancel them.”

  Because she felt like squealing, she lowered her voice even more. “Why have you changed your mind?”

  “I don’t remember ever thinking it was a good idea. Anyway, I don’t think so now and we’ve got better stories waiting for your attention. At the last staff meeting, which you missed, Molly, there was general agreement that we should do something on the S & L indictments.” His mouth was set in a hard, thin line she didn’t like the looks of.

  Molly took a deep breath to push the anger down. Usually they saw eye to eye on what made a good story. When they disagreed, it was over the best approach or angle to take. And on those rare occasions, he usually turned out to be right, so she trusted his instincts. She was willing to acknowledge that she sometimes got carried away with something. Yes, sometimes she did go too far. But now she knew he was wrong, knew it for certain.

  “Richard, Lone Star Monthly has covered the Bronk case intensively. We need to finish it with a flourish; our readers expect it.” She tried to stop her voice from rising, but it defied her control. “Just give me one good reason, Richard.”

  “I already have. It’s a vein we’ve mined out. Ancient history. Everyone’s tired of it. Except you.”

  She looked at the smug set of his mouth and felt her anger surge; she couldn’t contain it another second. “I just can’t believe this, Richard! There’s more to this than you’re saying. It has something to do with Charlie McFarland, I bet. Yeah, that’s it. He says the two of you are real good friends. McFarland’s gotten to you, hasn’t he?”

  Richard rolled his eyes upward. “What is this, Molly?” he asked the ceiling. “You know these good ol’ bubba types who talk like they just dropped off the back of a turnip truck. Sound dumb as dog shit. But everything Charlie says is calculated. He knows I’m your boss, so he tells you we’re great friends to impress you.”