The Ballad of Frankie Silver (40 page)

“No exercise?”

“Not anymore. You’ll have someone to talk to, though. There’ll be two guards stationed outside the cell at all times. And you can have visitors.”

“Good. I want Milton to come over and play cards with me.”

“Sorry. No contact with other inmates. You can see your lawyers, your minister, a counselor, or members of your family. Family can go to the regular visitors’ lounge. Noncontact visitation.”

“Has anybody asked to see me?”

Berry turned away and began to take the posters and photographs off the wall. “Not that I know of,” he said. “Of course, that stuff goes through the front office. They might not have told me yet.”

“Sure.”

“I hear that a bunch of reporters want to interview you, though. Big shots from national TV, even.”

“I’ll pass.” He set the last of his possessions into a cardboard box. “Okay. That’s it. Do we move this to the new cell?”

Berry shook his head. “Most of it, no. You can take a couple of the legal pads with you,” he said. “And a Bible if you’ve got one.”

“What do I do with the rest of this stuff?” Fate pointed to the collection of letters, the documents concerning his case, a couple of books, and the signed photograph from one of the film stars who was sympathetic to his cause.

The guard shrugged. “Give them away, I guess. Your family? Your lawyers, maybe? If it was me, I think I’d give my belongings to someone that would want a keepsake to remember me by.”

Fate nodded. “That makes sense.” He began to place the objects into the remaining boxes.

“Well? What shall we do with these things?”

“Throw them away.”

BURGESS GAITHER

Execution

My day had come at last. Of all the days that I have lived on this earth—fewer than seven thousand of them, Miss Mary Erwin says, for I once asked her to do the sum for me—of all those days, there were only three that were altogether mine. I do not count the day that I was born, for that was mainly my mother’s time, and anyhow I remember nothing of it, so I cannot say if I was petted and made much of, or not. Perhaps they wished for another boy, and were disappointed when I arrived instead.

The first day that I can count as my very own was the day I married Charlie Silver. I suppose I should say that the day was half his, for Preacher said that being man and wife, we were to share our lives and all our worldly goods, but I don’t think Charlie wanted much to do with that day. He blushed and stammered, and tried to pretend he didn’t care a bit about all the foolishness of the celebration. A man is always a little shamefaced on his wedding day, like a fox caught in a baited trap, ensnared because his greed overcame his better judgment. The menfolk laughed at Charlie that spring day, and said he was caught for sure now. As the bride, I was praised and fussed over, as if I had won a prize or done something marvelous that no one ever did before, and I could not help feeling pleased and clever that I had managed to turn myself from an ordinary girl into a shining bride. Now I think it is a dirty lie. The man is the one who is winning the game that day, though they always pretend they are not, and the poor girl bride is led into a trap of hard work and harsh words, the ripping of childbirth and the drubbing of her man’s fists. It is the end of being young, but no one tells her so. Instead they make over her, and tell her how lucky she is. I wonder do slaves get dressed up in finery on the day they are sold.

The second day that was mine was when my baby Nancy came into the world, though that was one day Charlie claimed for his’n loud enough, as if I had nothing to do with it, laying there blood-soaked and spent on the straw pallet, while he strutted and crowed about how he was a daddy now. The way I saw it, she was five minutes his, and nine months mine, but I kept my peace on that, because in my joy I didn’t care at all that day who got the praise and the glad-handing. I had Nancy, and she was beautiful, and she was all mine, for I knew that after Charlie had done boasting about his firstborn, she’d see little enough of him. I wearied of her sometimes after that, when she wouldn’t leave off crying, or when she spit up on a dress I had scrubbed clean on a creek rock ’til my fingers bled, but for all the little bit of trouble she ever was, I long to hold her one last time, and I count the day that she came into the world as my greatest gift and glory.

The third of my days is now.

This day, the twelfth of July in the year of our Lord eighteen hundred and thirty-three, is well and truly all mine, and I share it with no one. It is my last. In some ways it will be like my wedding day, for I will wear white and put flowers in my hair. A solemn old man will escort me through the staring strangers, and a preacher will read words out of a book. Sarah Presnell has told me all of this about how it will be. She will not speak about what comes after, and it makes her cry when I press her for more, so I do not ask about it any longer. But I think about it. I wonder which is worse—the death, not knowing what comes after, or the wedding, when you think you know, but you’re wrong. Perhaps dying is most like childbirth: a terrible, rivening pain, and then a great joy that makes you forget all that came before.

*   *   *

It is Friday, an apt day for a public execution killing the innocent, as Miss Mary has remarked more than once. So far no one has rebuked her for the blasphemy of comparing the death of our Lord to the legally mandated execution of a convicted murderess. I think we are all a bit ashamed about what will take place, for we think that the sentence is unjust, and we know that Miss Mary speaks rashly because she feels powerless to stop it. There will be a good many harsh words said of what we do here before it is over.

I find it ironic that of all the wagonloads of people who have come to town from the outlying areas, from the mountain lands, and from Table Rock and Jonas Ridge to witness the spectacle, who will shove and jostle one another for the best view of the gallows, it is only I—the one person who does not want to watch it happen—whose presence is required to see that the execution takes place. I am the eyes of the state of North Carolina, and I must tell the governor that what he wanted done has been done quickly and soberly, and that the county officials accorded the victim the civility and compassion of a solemn ritual.

There was to be no building of a gallows for the hanging of Frankie Silver. Burke County has no permanent scaffold, for although we must put men to death from time to time, such an event is sufficiently infrequent as to need no lasting reminder. Damon’s Hill is the traditional site chosen for executions. Our Golgotha, Miss Mary calls it, blasphemous again. I wonder why executions are carried out in high places—Calvary, Tower Hill in England, Gallows Hill in Salem.… Is it some dim memory of the old custom of human sacrifice to the gods, or is it merely the state’s wish that government-mandated deaths should be as visible as possible, so that others might see the suffering of the offender and be themselves deterred from committing crimes? Whatever our unconscious motives for the choice, Damon’s Hill is the place where people are put to death in Burke County.

The hill is high enough to be seen from miles around, and it lies but a short distance from the jail and courthouse. On its summit is the place of execution: a broad, flat field, large enough to contain the great crowd of gawkers, and the dogs and horses and wagons that they would bring with them on gallows day. The field on Damon’s Hill is crowned by a towering oak tree whose girth is so vast that ten men hand in hand could not encircle its trunk. It is beautiful in its spreading limbs and luxuriant foliage. Perhaps the oak was already growing on Damon’s Hill when the colonists of Walter Raleigh’s expedition first set foot upon North Carolina soil three centuries ago. Trees seem to live forever. By comparison, the nineteen years of Frankie Silver’s little life seem no more than a flicker in time. That tree has outlived many a man in its long life span, and it has been the instrument of death for perhaps a score of others. That broad oak is the hanging tree.

It takes little enough to kill a convicted felon. A tree and a rope. John Boone procured the rope many days ago—before he could even bring himself to believe he would use it, I think, but he is a prudent man, and he knows that he must provide for every contingency. He has softened the gallows rope with mutton tallow and made sure that it is free of kinks, which would cause the rope to spin when a weight is attached to it. The thirty feet of hemp rope hangs now from a rafter in the barn behind the county jail. One end is looped tight around the rafter, and the other end is suspending a heavy sack of corn three feet above the barn’s dirt floor. Ropes stretch when a heavy weight pulls down on them. If they are not stretched beforehand, this may happen at the time of the execution, and the result is said to be terrible to behold.

“Boone has never hanged a prisoner before,” Squire Erwin told me when he returned from town one day in early July. “I had to go in and tell him a thing or two about the procedure, so that things will go smoothly when the time comes. Even when all goes well, a hanging is a brutal scene to watch, Burgess, but when something goes awry, it can be cruel beyond imagining. I was clerk of court for forty-four years, you know, and so I’ve seen my share of hangings, good and bad.”

“I know very little about it,” I said, with an inward shudder. Nor did I want to. “I believe I have heard that there is some skill required in gauging the length of the rope and the size of the victim.”

William Erwin nodded. “That’s it exactly,” he said. “The ratio is everything, and God help you if you get it wrong. We had a hanging once where the rope stretched out and the victim’s weight was not sufficient to the length of hemp. The poor devil landed on solid ground and had to be hoisted up again, crying piteously, while the onlookers moaned and wept to see his suffering.”

“That must not happen this time,” I said. “Though, of course, I hope that we may avoid the issue altogether with an eleventh-hour reprieve.”

“I had a word with John Boone. I think he knows what must be done if he is called upon to do it. He has no heart for it, poor soul, but he recognizes his duty.”

I shuddered again, mindful of my own obligation to be state’s witness. “Will it take long?”

The old man sighed. “I’ll warrant it will seem so to you, Burgess. It may feel like hours if you fix your eyes upon the condemned and watch the death throes, but you need not put yourself through that. Many a harder man than you has stared at the ground until the struggling ceased.”

“But how long?”

“A quarter of an hour, perhaps.”

“That much! Oh, surely not, sir! A rope around the neck cuts off the victim’s air supply, and no one can live so long without drawing breath.”

He sighed. “The rope is an imperfect instrument, son. It prevents most of the air from reaching the lungs—but not all of it. What follows is a sort of respiratory starvation—a slow stifling of the body, which fights for every morsel of air, even though the struggle prolongs the agony. We must hope that unconsciousness follows soon after the drop.”

“Does it, then?”

The squire looked away. “Often not.”

The ladies of the family were not present, of course, when we spoke of the process of hanging. Neither of us had any intention of discussing such an inappropriate subject in their presence, though I was certainly pressed for details about the matter by my wife and several of her sisters. The Carolina gentlewoman is not the delicate creature that society would have us believe.

“It is monstrous!” my wife announced to the gaggle of family in the hall one evening. “North Carolina actually means to hang a woman. I cannot believe it!”

Her father has little liking for bold talk from the ladies. “What would you have them do, Elizabeth?” he said harshly. “Should we give her a medal for butchering her husband? The state of Massachusetts once burnt a woman at the stake for murder. Would you prefer that?”

Elizabeth turned horrified eyes upon her father. “Burnt a woman? I do not believe that.”

I cleared my throat and said softly, “It was a slave woman, my dear. In colonial times.”

“Oh. Well. It is terrible nonetheless,” she said, stabbing at her embroidery with the needle until I feared for her fingers beneath the fabric. “And I am sure that hanging is no less cruel.”

“It will indeed be terrible to watch,” said her sister Catherine.

“We shall not go,” said Miss Mary Erwin, before her father could utter the same words.

We all turned to her in speechless wonder. Mary Erwin had been the champion of Mrs. Silver from the beginning. I could not believe that she would willingly abandon her cause at the last, although I was certain that the squire would have forbidden her to go in any case. “We shall not go,” she said again, and her voice was calm, but it brooked no argument.

“Why not?” asked Elizabeth.

“Mrs. Silver would not want us to see her die—shamed in front of a jeering crowd. The hanging will be her last violation, and then she will be at peace. We must remember her as she was in life. It is the last gift we can give her.”

The ladies all nodded in agreement, and the squire very wisely refrained from adding that he would not have permitted them to attend anyhow. It seemed that I was the only one of the immediate family who would be present at the death of Frankie Silver.

Miss Mary went back to her sewing. I watched her there, haloed in candlelight, making the tiny even stitches on the wool tapestry cloth, and I wondered what she was thinking behind that calm facade. Without looking up at me, she said, “Mr. Gaither, there is something I’d like you to take to the jail tomorrow.”

*   *   *

The governor had fixed the time of the hanging for Friday afternoon the twelfth of July, between the hours of one and four o’clock. I thought the actual time of the execution would be close to four: the late hour would allow the prisoner’s family time to make the journey if they wished, and it would enable most of the onlookers to travel to town from the farthest reaches of the county to view the spectacle. I arrived at the jail just before noon, to find the town streets already choked with people and horses, churning up great quantities of red dust in their wake.