EQMM, June 2008

by Dell Magazine Authors

  "Look familiar?” Roy Dillard asked as he and McWade stepped into the anteroom.

  "Like a bad dream,” McWade said. He had not enjoyed being the button-pusher on the five men he had put to death.

  "Well, everything's the same as it's always been,” Dillard said matter-of-factly. “Yellow button flushes the line with saline, then injects the sodium thiopental to put the condemned person to sleep; green button flushes the line again and injects the pancuronium bromide to paralyze the diaphragm and lungs; red button flushes the line a third time and injects potassium chloride to stop the heart. Simple as A-B-C."

  "We still using the same chemical firm and technicians to set everything up?” McWade asked.

  "Same company,” Dillard confirmed. “Chemicals and techs approved by the state surgeon general. Incidentally, we got checked out on that brain monitor earlier today, so everything is go on that."

  "Okay, good.” McWade stared through the one-way window at the white padded table. For an odd moment he was transfixed, riveted, spellbound by the sight of the death table. An image of Roberta Rudd suddenly floated in the chamber between him and the table. The memory of her voice surfaced in his mind: I want to watch him die—and I hope he suffers terribly.

  "You okay?” Roy Dillard asked from the doorway.

  McWade stood motionless, staring.

  Retta.

  Dillard frowned. “Bobby—?"

  As suddenly as the spell had come over him, McWade snapped out of it. “What?” He looked at Dillard. “Yeah, sure, I'm okay.” He forced a half-smile. “Just thinking about it, is all."

  "Have a good stiff drink ahead of time. You'll be okay, boss."

  "Sure.” Authority crept back into McWade's voice. “Go into the chamber, Roy, and see if you can adjust the number four floodlight about an inch to the left; I seem to be getting a glare—"

  "Sure thing."

  As McWade watched Roy Dillard through the window, the spell came back again.

  Retta.

  With it this time came the memory of the photographs in the file in his office. Photos of a young woman as she had once been: pretty, smiling, alive. Photographs of Loretta Rudd Graham.

  Retta—

  McWade opened the yellow drawer under the shelf and removed one of the hypodermic needles used to inject the sedative that put the condemned person to sleep, so that death would be painless.

  Carefully he put the packaged needle into his pocket.

  * * * *

  At dinner that night at Nicolino's, McWade and Rose Fuller sat at a table for two tucked neatly in a cozy back corner.

  "This is nice, Rose,” McWade said. “Thanks for suggesting it."

  She smiled, a very slight smile. “I thought you might need a little moral support for tomorrow. I remembered how tense you used to get before an execution while you were warden."

  "Really?” That surprised McWade. “What made you remember a thing like that?"

  "I don't know. I just did.” The slight smile again. “I've always kind of liked you, Bobby."

  "I've always kind of liked you too, Rose."

  Their eyes met and held.

  "Maybe,” Rose said, “we would have gotten to know each other a lot better if Lucy Marlow had let us alone."

  McWade chuckled wryly. “Maybe so."

  Because Rose knew the restaurant, McWade let her order. She asked for a bottle of Barolo and one lasagna and one mostaccioli dinner. Plus an extra serving dish. “So we can share,” she explained.

  As they sipped their wine while the dinners were being prepared, they made small talk about their respective careers, and whether they would follow Grant Marlow if he won the Senate race and moved to Washington.

  "I'm kind of settled here,” Rose said. “I just redecorated my condo last year. Finally got it exactly the way I want it."

  "I'm in the same boat,” McWade told her. “Bought a little two-bedroom house. Got a great housekeeper to take care of it. Nice backyard for my garden—"

  "Your garden?"

  "Yeah.” For some reason, he suddenly felt a little self-conscious. “I, uh, grow tomatoes, lettuce, sweet potatoes—you seem surprised."

  "No, no,” she said, a little too quickly. But she was. Pleasantly so. Reaching across the table, she patted his hand fondly.

  The bottle of wine was almost empty by the time their dinners were served, so McWade ordered another. Gradually, as they ate, their conversation became more relaxed. From time to time, McWade reached down to feel the packaged hypodermic needle in his pocket, as if to reassure himself that it was still there. He had transferred it from the suit coat he had worn earlier to the sport coat he wore now. He had wondered in passing why he had done that, but could determine no reason for it. Somehow it had just seemed natural.

  "My ex-husband was a mean son of a bitch,” Rose told him when the wine began to spike. “I often wonder why I ever married him. I can't remember loving him, but I suppose I must have.” She tilted her head a bit. “And you've never married, Bobby?"

  "No."

  "Right woman never came along?"

  "There was one, a long time ago. But it didn't work out.” Now his head tilted. “You ever wish you'd had a child, Rose?"

  "Not with the bastard I was married to,” she said emphatically. Then she paused, pondering. “I've thought about it, of course. I guess all childless women secretly do."

  "If you'd had a daughter, she would be a young lady today,” McWade calculated, thinking of Roberta Rudd. “I think you'd probably be a perfect mother and a great friend to a young lady."

  "Why, thank you, Bobby. That's a very nice compliment.” She was touched.

  After dinner, they took a long stroll around several blocks, going the long way to her apartment building. “I want to thank you for tonight, Rose,” McWade told her as they walked. “I was getting pretty wound up about tomorrow. You've helped me to unwind a lot."

  At the entrance to her building, Rose asked, “Do you want to come up, Bobby?"

  "Are you sure you want me to?"

  She put a hand on his arm. “I'm sure."

  "Then I want to."

  * * * *

  The next morning, in his bathroom, Bobby McWade opened the cellophane package he had taken from the death-chamber anteroom, and removed the hypodermic needle. From his medicine cabinet, he took a pint bottle of isopropyl rubbing alcohol and carefully drew a quantity of it up into the needle's syringe.

  I don't know what this will do to him, Roberta, but I'm sure it won't be good.

  At his office, with the carefully rewrapped needle in a rolled-up handkerchief in his inside coat pocket, McWade waited until Edna, his secretary, went to lunch, then opened one of the office's filing cabinets and removed a folder labeled: graham, carter—execution witnesses. From it, he located the information form on Roberta Rudd. He was surprised to see that she lived right there in the city, not downstate in Nowers County as he had assumed. But then, he reminded himself, she had told him that her grandmother, who had raised her in the home provided by Loretta Rudd Graham, had passed away several months after Loretta's murder. Maybe she sold the house to get out of “Nowheres” County, McWade thought.

  He made a copy of Roberta Rudd's witness application and returned the original to the filing cabinet. Back at his desk, he opened the superior-court file on Carter Graham's conviction and commitment to the Department of Corrections. He removed the photos of Loretta Rudd Graham as she had looked when alive. Selecting one, he put it into his wallet. Then he initiated the direct line to Grant Marlow's office.

  "Hello, Bobby,” Rose Fuller answered, reading her caller ID.

  "Hello, Rose."

  It took them several seconds to get a dialogue on track.

  "Last night was very—very special for me, Rose—"

  "Me too, Bobby—” She paused, then asked, “Will you come over tonight after—you know—"

  "I'm not sure I'll be able to,” McWade said tentatively.

  "You want to, do
n't you?"

  "Very much—” Something in his voice was not right.

  "Bobby, is anything wrong?"

  "No. It's just that—” Careful, he warned himself. “—that I have a feeling the execution might not—not run as smoothly as it should—"

  "Bobby,” Rose said urgently, “if something's wrong, please tell me. Maybe I can help in some way—"

  He had to get out of this. “Rose, I'll come over as soon after the execution as I can."

  "Promise?"

  "Word of honor."

  "Okay, then. I'll be waiting."

  "Is Grant available?"

  "Yes. Hold on—"

  Seconds later, Grant Marlow said, “Bobby? Everything all right?"

  "Yes, everything's fine. We're right on schedule."

  "Good. I'll hold a press conference at five o'clock, in time for the evening news. Graham's lawyers have just delivered an appeal for clemency, which I will deny."

  "I'll be shutting down my office in a little while,” McWade told him. “All calls will be forwarded to the public information office."

  "Good.” There was a pause, as if, McWade thought, Marlow was trying to telephonically read his mind. “You okay with this, Bobby?” Had Grant Marlow heard something in his voice too, as Rose had?

  "Yeah, I'm good.” McWade felt the needle in his pocket. “I'm fine, Grant. Don't worry about anything."

  "All right. Let's have a drink later tonight."

  When his secretary returned, McWade said, “Edna, shut down the phones and have all calls relayed to the PIO. Then close the office and take the rest of the day off. I'll be down at Parmalee."

  "Yes, sir.” Edna added, “Good luck, Mr. McWade,” as he was walking out.

  * * * *

  It was just getting wintery dark when McWade walked into Roy Dillard's office. The television was already on. McWade drew himself a cup of coffee from the COY's private urn, and pulled up a chair.

  "Everything set?” he asked.

  "Locked and loaded, boss,” said Dillard. He handed McWade a small two-way hand radio to use. “Ready to go at six."

  "Witnesses all here?"

  "Most of them. Having coffee and cookies in the press room. Bus standing by to shuttle them over when we give the word—"

  "Here comes the word for us right now,” McWade said, as a NEWS ALERT graphic interrupted some basketball scores. Next, viewers were taken live to the office of Governor Grant Marlow.

  "My fellow citizens,” the governor said solemnly, “for the second time since his conviction for the brutal murder of his wife, I have just denied executive clemency for condemned killer Carter Graham, who is scheduled to be executed by lethal injection at six o'clock this evening at Parmalee State Prison—"

  "Okay,” McWade said, “let's roll."

  The two men left the COY office, exited the prison administration building, and followed the same path they had taken the previous day to the small death-chamber building adjacent to Death Row.

  Just inside the building, there sat on a long bench the execution team, four volunteer corrections officers who were paid a bonus for assisting in executions.

  "We're go,” Dillard told them without preliminary. “Move out."

  The four officers went about their practiced routine. One unlocked and opened the door to the execution chamber itself, entered, and raised the blinds on five windows through which the witnesses would watch. Another retrieved from a small cabinet just outside the chamber two red telephones and plugged one into a jack above the cabinet, and the second into a jack inside the anteroom where McWade would control the execution buttons.

  The two remaining officers moved into the death-watch cell where another officer sat at a small desk observing Carter Graham talking through the bars of his cell to two lawyers.

  "We're go,” one of the X-team officers told the death-watch guard. He immediately said to Carter Graham's visitors, “Five minutes, gentlemen."

  Back near the chamber door, Dillard unhooked a two-way radio from his Sam Browne uniform belt and said into it, “COY to press-room officer—” When the call was answered, he said, “We're go for six. Bring them over.” That done, he lifted the receiver of the first red telephone and spoke to the prison switchboard operator. “This is Dillard on the chamber phone. Open a line to the lieutenant governor's office, please.” Dillard knew, as a matter of protocol, that on execution nights, the governor would be unavailable after denying clemency. Any reprieve, in the unlikely event that one would be granted, would come through his lieutenant governor.

  Once the chamber line was open, Dillard stepped into the anteroom and went through the same procedure with the second red telephone. As regulations required, the warden, who in this case was McWade in a pro tem position, observed and verified each step of the preliminary activity required to legally execute a person. As McWade watched now, one hand occasionally reached inside his coat to feel the hypodermic needle he still carried.

  What would happen when it was all over? he wondered. Who would be blamed? Certainly not him. All he had done was push the buttons. No one would ever dream that he, the Director of Corrections, had switched needles to inject alcohol into the condemned man. What possible motive could he have to do such a thing? No, he silently told himself, the blame would fall on the chemical company and its technicians, who prepared everything in the anteroom. But nothing could be proven against them.

  Something else suddenly occurred to him. What he was doing, in addition to giving Roberta Rudd the agonizing death she wanted to see, would also make Ross Duval very happy, because the incident would undoubtedly cause a moratorium to be put on executions in the state, and might even cause the state legislators to ban capital punishment altogether.

  McWade blinked away these thoughts, and wondered: Am I trying to justify what I'm going to do? By using Roberta Rudd and Ross Duval as excuses?

  No, not at all, he told himself empathically.

  He knew exactly why he was doing it.

  "Visitors’ bus has arrived,” Dillard said, interrupting McWade's ruminations.

  "Already?” McWade looked at a big clock on the wall above the chamber telephone. Forty minutes had gone by since they had left Dillard's office.

  "Time flies when you're having fun,” Dillard quipped. But his dark face was somber. He did not like this any more than McWade did, or than Ross Duval had. “You want to go into the death-watch room with me?"

  "No, you handle that, Roy. I'll wait in the anteroom."

  "Okay. We'll bring him in at five of six."

  Dillard went into the death-watch room, where Carter Graham was now standing in clean white underwear. Under his shorts he wore an execution diaper fashioned from two extra-large child's diapers well taped together. The X-team didn't want to be doing any more post-execution cleaning up than was absolutely necessary. The odor alone would be bad enough, but at least they had surgical masks for that.

  * * * *

  In the anteroom, McWade put down the hand radio Dillard had given him. Taking a deep, nervous breath, he quickly removed the alcohol-filled hypodermic needle from his pocket and unwrapped it on the shelf under a yellow syringe placed there earlier by the chemical-company technicians who set up the execution device. Very quickly, with a single half turn he had learned as warden, he removed the syringe containing sodium thiopental and replaced it with the yellow syringe and needle he had brought in. Just as quickly, he wrapped the removed needle in the handkerchief and put it in his coat pocket. Another handkerchief from his trousers pocket he wet with saliva and carefully wiped his fingerprints from the plastic syringe of the needle he had attached.

  Stepping over to the back window, McWade watched as the execution witnesses filed into the viewing room. After several moments, they were all seated and one of the two officers assigned to the room closed and locked the outside door. Frowning, McWade scanned the faces once, quickly, then a second time, slowly, one by one. He did not see Roberta Rudd.

  Turning bac
k to the shelf, he activated the hand radio. “McWade to Dillard—"

  The COY came on at once. “Dillard here—"

  "Roy, have all the witnesses on the list arrived?"

  "All but one. Let's see here—okay, somebody named Roberta Rudd did not show up."

  "Have you checked around outside?"

  "She's not on the grounds; she didn't come in the main gate.” Dillard waited for a long moment, then said, “We've got the legally required number of witnesses already."

  There was nothing McWade could do. “Okay. Proceed without her."

  She's not here. Why? After the unrelenting determination she had shown in his office to see Carter Graham suffer, she wasn't here.

  Feeling perspiration break out on his forehead and upper lip, McWade used the pocket handkerchief again to blot his face.

  Why wasn't Roberta here?

  Pacing the anteroom, he glanced up at the clock above the shelf. Six minutes to go. Did it matter that Roberta wasn't there? It shouldn't. He wasn't doing this for her—not just for her, anyway. So did it make any difference that she wasn't part of it?

  No, it did not.

  At the shelf, McWade looked through the chamber window and saw Roy Dillard and the X-team bring Carter Graham in. They sat him up on the execution table and one officer removed the felt slippers he had worn to walk from the death-watch cell.

  Taking out his wallet, McWade retrieved the photograph of Loretta Rudd Graham he had removed from the file in his office. He stared at it. Perspiration now ran down the back of his hairline to the collar of his shirt. Loosening his necktie, he unbuttoned the collar.