The Red Scream

by Mary Willis Walker

“It sure did.” Molly realized for the first time how angry she really was.

  “Does it …” The girl hesitated, looking for the right words. “You know. Does it make you have any doubts?”

  The girl probably had a future as a crime reporter; she certainly knew how to ask the right questions. “None. Bronk’s a pathological liar. It’s hard to know whether you can believe anything he says. But I do believe he killed your mother and I believe the version he told me which I related in my book is essentially accurate.”

  “Have you talked to him today?” Alison said. “Asked him why all of a sudden he’s changed his story?”

  “No.”

  “Aren’t you going to?” Alison asked. “I think that’s a lot more interesting than talking to me.”

  Molly stopped breathing for a minute as she considered it. She hadn’t acknowledged it yet, but of course that’s what she was going to do. As soon as this interview was over. And if this was going to be an interview where she interviewed Alison rather than the reverse, she’d better take charge of it now.

  “Yes,” Molly said, “I’m going to drive to Huntsville this afternoon. Alison, why did you agree to be a witness at the execution?”

  “Oh. If I’m going to be a crime reporter, I guess I should get used to this sort of thing.” As if she couldn’t last too long without doing it, her thumb went up to her mouth and she ripped at what little bit remained of the nail.

  “What else?” Molly prompted.

  The girl put the hand in her lap and held on to it with the other hand. “Since I can remember I’ve been this poor little girl without a mother who everyone felt sorry for. I’m tired of that; it’s so passive and pathetic. Witnessing the execution sounded like a way to have a part in avenging my mother.” She shook her head. “I don’t know. I guess I’m trying to stop being a victim.”

  Molly nodded. “Being a victim is the pits. I agree.”

  “And this may sound snobbish, but to have your life devastated by someone like Louie Bronk, this filthy, subhuman, stupid drifter who barely lives in the same world. I mean, it’s humiliating in a way.” She looked directly into Molly’s eyes. “Isn’t it?”

  Molly felt like cringing from the sentiment, but she couldn’t help sharing it. “Yes, it is,” she admitted. “What about the death penalty, Alison. How do you feel about that?”

  “Oh,” the girl said fiercely, “anything less wouldn’t be enough. It has to be death. I know you’re opposed to it because I’ve read your things in Lone Star Monthly, but I think that’s a philosophical thing. I get the impression from reading your book that you won’t shed any tears when he dies.”

  Molly looked at the girl in wonder and said, “I think you’re very perceptive. Alison, tell me if this is something you’d rather not talk about, but I’d like to hear what you remember about the day your mother was killed.”

  Alison said slowly, “I was only eleven and it was so long ago so …” Automatically her hand went up to her mouth and she chewed on the side of her index finger, pulling at the skin. “I remember waking up from a nap, but you know how you tend to be all hazy for a while. It’s mostly a blur. Well, I heard this noise outside—probably it was a gunshot—and I looked around the house for someone—my mother or David. David was usually there in the afternoon. My mother wasn’t home much. But no one was in the house and I remember feeling scared. I guess that’s my main memory—the empty house and feeling scared and alone. I never liked being alone.”

  “When you were looking around, did you notice that some things had been stolen?”

  Alison shook her head. “But I wasn’t really looking. I was hot and sweaty and I wandered to the door and saw David. He was coming out of the garage and then he came running at me and made me go back in the house and I could see how upset he was. He could barely speak he was so upset. But he didn’t tell me my mother was dead. I didn’t find out until later.”

  “When?”

  “That night, I think. My father told me. And it’s hard to separate what I really remember from the day and what I heard at the trial.”

  “What about the car?”

  “Oh, when I was standing in the doorway, I saw it pulling away—that white car.” Alison stood up abruptly. “It’s so warm in here. Would you like some iced tea, Mrs. Cates? I’m really thirsty, after talking your ear off, and it’s cooler in the kitchen anyway.”

  Molly followed her through a narrow hall to the kitchen, which was a pleasant sunny room. A breeze wafted in through an open window, rustling the newspapers that lay open on the linoleum table.

  Alison took a pitcher of tea from the refrigerator and an ice tray from the tiny freezer. She poured two tall glasses and plopped a few ice cubes in afterward.

  As she handed the glass to Molly she said, “When you said in there how much you loved your father, it reminded me of me. This is not part of the interview—just between us. I adore my father, too. He can be pretty overprotective, but I love him lots, maybe too much.” She let out a big sigh. “When he and Georgia got married it seemed like a good time for me to leave.”

  Alison sat down across the table from Molly, wrapping her hands around the cold glass. Her nails were all chewed down to nubs. The skin around some of them was bloody.

  “Of course, I can see why he’s the way he is,” she said. “All he’s been through. Now that he’s alone again, I suppose I’ll spend more time with him. It’s really tragic about Georgia because I think he’d finally found the right mate. They were so happy together they really didn’t need anyone else.”

  “Your mother wasn’t the right mate for him?” Molly remembered Stuart saying yesterday that both Tiny’s life and her death made Charlie miserable.

  “Oh, God, no. That wasn’t his fault, though. She shouldn’t have been anybody’s mate.”

  “Why not?”

  “Oh, even as a young child I knew it. I mean not exactly but—” She stopped and looked down into her tea.

  “What did you know?”

  “That she wasn’t cut out to be married. It just wasn’t in her. She didn’t even try to hide it.”

  Molly felt the familiar tingling in her fingers. “Why wasn’t she cut out for marriage?”

  “Oh, she liked men too much. You know.”

  “You mean she had affairs?”

  “Screwed around is more like it,” Alison said, her mouth grim.

  Only long practice in not showing surprise kept Molly’s voice level. “Alison, when I was researching the book, I talked at length with several people who knew your mother well. To get some background on her. None of them ever mentioned that.”

  “Well, why would they?” Alison took a sip of her tea. “She was dead. They wouldn’t want you to write stuff like that about her. And Daddy would be furious, and I mean furious, at anybody who told you that.” She wrapped her arms around herself.

  Molly thought of the childlike, pure-looking body in the autopsy pictures and reminded herself for the millionth time that you couldn’t tell anything about people from appearances. It looked like she’d stopped asking questions about Tiny McFarland too soon—the cardinal sin for a reporter.

  “Who did she have affairs with?” Molly asked.

  “I don’t know. Friends of my father, anyone. She was hardly ever home. That’s why we needed a live-in baby-sitter.”

  Alison stopped to listen to the sound of a motorcycle outside. The roar stopped and in a few seconds the side door opened. There in the doorway stood Mark Redinger wearing neon pink running shorts and a white T-shirt. He had a knapsack slung over one broad shoulder.

  “Hello, Mrs. Cates,” he said, leaning over to shake Molly’s hand. He dumped his knapsack on the table and gave Alison a kiss on the cheek. Then he went to the refrigerator and took out the iced tea pitcher. He refilled Alison’s glass and Molly’s before pouring himself one. He sat down next to Alison.

  “You heard about David Serrano?” he asked, leveling his eyes at Molly.

  “Yes, I did,”
Molly said.

  “I’ve just been to the police station. I knew they’d want to hear about us seeing him Monday night and him breaking the date for Tuesday.”

  Molly nodded. “Did you know him well, Mark?” she asked, admiring the way his short thick black lashes made fringed shadows of deep blue on his irises.

  “Not well. Not like Alison knew him. But I remember him from back when he lived at the McFarlands’. And then of course we got reacquainted Monday.” He glanced at Alison, as if for confirmation.

  “How did he seem to you?”

  “Nervous,” Mark said.

  Alison said, “David was upset about the execution. He was a Catholic. The idea of even somebody as awful as Louie Bronk being put to death was hard for him to accept.”

  Mark nodded. “Yeah. He was real upset that he played a role in it. I got the idea he was hoping the courts might call it off again.”

  “How did he cancel for Tuesday night?” Molly asked.

  “He called and left a message on the machine. The police wanted to know that, too. I wish we hadn’t recorded over it because they wanted to hear it. But it just said something important had come up and he’d call to reschedule.” Mark shrugged. “Of course, he never did.”

  Molly lifted the recorder to show him. “Mark, I was just getting some of Alison’s memories about the day her mother was killed and I wondered if you’d tell me what yours are.”

  “Mine?” His voice was squeaky with surprise, as though he had just reverted to adolescence. “I was at my house all day, so I don’t know anything you’d be really interested in.” He wrapped his hands tight around his glass.

  “I always wondered,” Molly said, “the day Alison’s mother was killed, when Stuart was over at your house, he was planning to stay all day, wasn’t he? He’d even brought things to spend the night.”

  “Yeah. We were going to shoot skeet at the range and then go to a movie. I’d just acquired my first vehicle, an old pickup.” He clasped his hands behind his head. “God, I loved that truck! We were going to do the town in it.”

  “In court Stuart said he changed his mind and decided to go home,” Molly said. “I was wondering why?”

  “Oh”—Mark shrugged—“just what he said. He decided he wanted to go home.”

  “Why?”

  “Oh, you know Stu.” He glanced over at Alison and shot her a grin. “He’s always getting ticked off at something silly. You might say he’s kind of prickly.”

  “You had an argument?” Molly said.

  “You could say that, but really it was just Stu being touchy.”

  “What about?”

  “Are you kidding? It was eleven years ago.”

  “Yes,” Molly said, “but on a very significant day, which you have surely gone over in your head many times.”

  “Sure, but that was an issue that never came up,” Mark said, decisively forcing his voice back to its adult baritone.

  Molly nodded. “Well, it was just one of those little things I was wondering about, trying to reconstruct that day.” She sipped her tea and then said, as if it were an afterthought, “Oh, why didn’t you drive him home? It was four or five miles between your houses, wasn’t it?”

  “He had his bike,” Mark said.

  Molly took another sip of tea. “But you could have put it in the back of the pickup. As I recall, a teenager with a new vehicle takes every opportunity to drive it.”

  “We could have,” Mark answered. “But we didn’t. I told you he was pissed. It was good for him to make the ride. Old Stu does better when he gets his exercise. Works off his frustrations.”

  “What frustrations?” Molly inquired.

  “Oh, you name it. Frustration’s his middle name. A girlfriend would do him wonders, but he says he’s too busy. Of course, that’s what he’s been saying for years.” He smiled at Alison, but she was gazing out the window and didn’t see it. “But,” he said, “there is one thing I regret about my behavior that morning.”

  “What’s that?”

  “I regret that we didn’t let Alison come with us. Then she would have been out of it. It was such a bummer for her being there and having to testify, her being so young.”

  “Yes,” Molly agreed. “Why didn’t she go with you?”

  Mark laughed and reached across the table to mess up Alison’s hair, but she just continued looking out the window with no change of expression. “Oh, you know. She was just this dippy kid sister. We didn’t want her along ’cause she’d crimp our style.” He lowered his head and tried to catch her eye, get her to look at him. “But now we do,” he said in an ingratiating voice.

  Alison finally looked at him. Her smile was distant and cool.

  Molly switched off her recorder and dropped it into her pocket. “Thanks for the tea and your time,” she said, standing up.

  Alison and Mark both walked her to the front door. Alison said, “I guess I’ll see you Monday night in Huntsville, Mrs. Cates. They told me to come around eleven-thirty.”

  Mark looked down at Molly and said, “Oh, I meant to ask you. I’m planning to drive her to Huntsville and I hate to have her do this alone. Is there some way I could get on the list for the execution? The guest list?” He gave a little laugh.

  Molly looked into his dark blue eyes and wondered what was really inside there. “I think you’d need to talk to the attorney general’s office about that, Mark. He’s in charge of execution protocol.”

  “I’ll do that. Thanks,” he said.

  Molly took a card out of her purse and handed it to Alison. “Give me a call if you think of anything else you want to say.” She took hold of the girl’s hand and squeezed it. “And please remember to lock that door.”

  “Mrs. Cates?”

  She turned around.

  “It’s a good thing I didn’t drive Stu home that day, isn’t it?” Mark said. “We would have gotten there sooner and we might have met up with the killer. We could have been killed ourselves.”

  “Yes. You could have,” Molly said, looking at Alison who was furiously chewing on her left thumb.

  As she got in her truck she watched through the screen door as Mark wrapped his arms around the girl, who, with her thin awkward limbs and translucent skin, reminded Molly of a young bird fallen from the nest too soon, unfeathered and not quite fully formed.

  chapter 13

  Years on death row

  Nowhere to go

  Nine by twelve cell

  Hotter’n hell.

  Nothing to do

  But one more tattoo.

  To work off a debt.

  Am I paid up yet?

  LOUIE BRONK

  Death Row, Ellis I Unit,

  Huntsville, Texas

  It was ten o’clock when Molly Cates drove away from Alison McFarland’s house and it was fast heating up to one of those end-of-September scorchers.

  Of course she’d go see Louie—for the final interview. Of course. She was already feeling the old pre-Louie jitters of bats flitting around her chest cavity. She knew from experience it would subside during the drive to Huntsville. By the time she got to the prison she would have achieved an icy hardness that would allow her to talk to Louie about the things that, with Louie Bronk, were inevitable.

  She headed up South Congress toward the Lake and downtown Austin. First she would stop in at the Texas Assistance Center. Maybe she could surprise Tanya Klein, catch her in her office. Nothing else had worked. She hadn’t been able to reach her by phone, and for the past week, Tanya had not returned her calls although Molly had left many messages. Among other things, she wanted to know why Tanya was avoiding her.

  Molly parked in front of the old gray stucco house on San Antonio Street and put a quarter in the meter. A tiny sign to the left of the door said “Texas Assistance Center.” A fine generic name, Molly thought, sure to confuse anyone who didn’t know that the Center was an organization of lawyers formed in 1988 to provide legal representation to Texas inmates facing the death penalt
y. In a neighborhood of old houses now converted into offices for lawyers and architects and real estate agents, the house was not far from the county courthouse and the main branch of the public library.

  At the desk just inside the front door sat a very young woman reading a Mad magazine.

  “Good morning,” Molly said, breezing right past, walking fast and businesslike. “I’m here to see Tanya Klein. I know my way up,” she tossed over her shoulder.

  “Wait … I’m supposed to buzz first.…”

  But Molly was halfway up the stairs. She ran up the rest of the flight and then another to the third floor. The door to the office was open. She stuck her head around the corner and caught Tanya sitting at the desk with her feet up and the phone to her ear. “It’s all right, Beth,” Tanya was saying. “It’s not your fault.”

  Molly knocked on the door frame—her one concession to courtesy.

  Tanya put the phone down and lowered her feet. She swiveled her chair around and faced Molly with a tight mouth and narrowed eyes. Molly could not imagine what she’d done to deserve that hostility.

  Louie’s lawyer, Tanya Klein, wore black bicycle pants with magenta stripes down the outside of each skinny leg, a shiny magenta jog bra that matched the stripes, and black high-top aerobic shoes. Her black frizzy hair obscured a great deal of her deeply tanned narrow face. “Mrs. Cates.” She clipped the words off in her curt New Jersey accent. “I just do not have a spare minute today. You can see we are swamped.” She spread her arms out.

  Molly stepped in and looked around at the boxes of files and the piles of paper all over the floor. “I can see you’re real busy here and I sure hate to interrupt. But five minutes would satisfy me, stop me from bugging you all the time so you don’t have to worry over all those unreturned phone calls.” Molly moved a few steps farther into the room. “Mainly I just want an update on Louie Bronk’s appeals and I wondered what you know about this new development.”

  “You mean the statement in today’s paper?”

  “Yes.”

  “Well. All I know is I had a call yesterday morning from this person—Sister Adeline Dodgin, if you can believe it—from some religious group that visits inmates. She’s been visiting Louie and he gave her this statement yesterday and asked if she could get it in the paper.”