The Ballad of Frankie Silver - By Sharyn McCrumb Page 0,168

Tom. He saw a bright flashing speck among the stars far up overhead. “Is that it?”

Tom laughed, and ruffled his hair with an ungentle shove. “Naw,” he sneered. “You’ll know.”

“But what will it—”

A roar. A thunderclap.

Suddenly the sky exploded into a burst of red streaks and white stars, like a fiery dandelion blown apart by the night wind, and for that instant the field was as bright as day. He was so startled that he jerked away from Ewell and struggled to his feet, but then he heard his brothers laugh, and a strong arm pulled him down again to the grass, and he snuggled against the warmth of Ewell’s musky sweatshirt, and watched the stars wink out and the red streaks fade to black.

An instant later the second charge began.

Spencer looked away. He saw that the warden’s gaze was fixed on the clock high on the cinder-block wall at the back of the room. He was watching the second hand with the careful attention of a man who does not want to see what else is happening around him. Spencer heard one of the witnesses groan, but he did not turn around to look at the man. He knew that it was not Charles Stanton. He had just begun to reflect on the unreality of the scene before him, so familiar from films that it seemed to be merely a staged illusion, but before he could reflect further on the meaning of his own detachment, the people in the death chamber began to move around again, and he realized that it was over.

The people in the observation room stood up, avoiding one another’s eyes.

The doctor examined the body and nodded to the guards that it was indeed all over. There had been a wisp of smoke where the leather helmet met flesh, but no flames about the face mask, no smell of burning flesh that he could detect, no malfunction of the equipment. Tennessee’s first execution in three decades had gone off without a hitch, Spencer thought. Unless you count the fact that the prisoner was innocent.

“Gentlemen, you may leave whenever you’re ready.” The guard was opening the rear door of the observation room, allowing the witnesses to pass through the visitors’ lounge, and then back through the sally port to the administration building. To freedom. They filed out as silently as they had come, still careful not to make eye contact with one another. Even the two young reporters were silent. Spencer was walking directly behind Colonel Stanton, who was still clutching the picture of his daughter, but he could think of nothing to say to the man except, “Was it worth it?” There could be no answer, and he left the question unsaid.

The other witnesses filed out of the building and into the parking lot full of lights and cameras. Spencer was told to wait.

After a few minutes, an assistant warden came out and shook his hand. “I’m glad it’s over,” he said.

“Yes.”

“You’ve agreed to take Mr. Harkryder’s remains back to the mountains?”

Spencer nodded. “He asked me to. He said he didn’t have anybody else.”

The assistant warden looked away. “The family was contacted. They expressed a desire not to be involved.” He sighed. “A sad life, Mr. Arrowood. A waste.” After a moment of silence, he went on, “The body has been taken for autopsy now. A strange formality, I always thought.” He shrugged.

Spencer did not reply.

“Anyhow, then we have arranged for the crematorium to receive the body and to process it at once. If you could come back here tomorrow morning . . . Around ten?”

The sheriff looked uneasy. “Are you sure I should do this? Maybe his family—”

The assistant warden shook his head.

“Or one of his lawyers—”

“Well, we asked them. They hadn’t been on the case very long, you know. One of them is stuck in Washington, and the other has to be in court tomorrow. They said as long as it isn’t out of your way . . .”

Spencer nodded. “Tomorrow. Ten o’clock.”

He went out into the starless dark of a city night, walking past the waiting reporters without sparing them a glance, and sat for long minutes in the parking lot, his head resting on the steering wheel. It was midnight. He had made reservations at a Nashville motel, so that he could rest before he began the long drive back to east Tennessee, but now he wished that he did not have to spend another hour in the breathless heat of a