The Executioner's Song (103 page)

                On hearing the decision, Gilmore ended a 25 day hunger strike.

Coming into the prison, Moody and Stanger noticed that the guards in the front lobby looked happy. The mood permeated right out to the gate. There was a lot of pressure lifted now that Gary was done with his strike.

When Bob and Ron saw him, they just said, "We understand you came off," and he gave a nod of his head, said, "It was my decision."

                It was as if he had been the one controlling the situation. They were careful not to mention that he never did get his telephone call to Nicole. Since they had failed to get it through, they were in no hurry to tease him. Besides, he was in an awful good mood about the Supreme Court.

                Actually, it was a relief to the attorneys as well.

                Talking about the end of the hunger strike, Stanger said to Schiller, "Gary proved his point." Schiller couldn't resist saying, "What point?"

                "Everybody knows he was serious now," said Stanger. It all struck Schiller as a little fuzzy. The truth, obviously, was that nothing was working. Gilmore had expected a lot of results from his hunger strike, got none, and had enough sense of public relations to go back to eating on a day when there was a bigger story to interest the public.

What made Schiller's day, however, was that Gary informed Stanger he would answer the second batch of written questions and was willing to look at a new set that Larry had prepared.

                The second set of answers proved, however, disappointing. It was as if the longer the hunger strike had gone on, the more Gary had had to play the con. So many questions were left blank. Invariably, the best ones.

WHY DID YOU TAKE THINGS WITHOUT PAYING FOR THEM—BEER—GUNS—GRAND CENTRAL, ETC.?

                Didn't always have time to stand in those long checkout counter lines.

DO YOU WANT TO KNOW WHAT YOUR SUBCONSCIOUS MIND WAS DOING WHEN YOU KILLED?

                I probably wouldn't mind knowing if I could know the truth, exactly.

                I don't want it explained to me by some idiot headshrinker who's full of bullshit conjecture

WHAT DID YOU AND NICOLE FIGHT ABOUT? GIVE ME DIFFERENT KINDS OF FIGHTS.

                Ask her.

WHY AND WHAT TOOK PLACE ON JULY 13, 1976, THAT CAUSED NICOLE TO LEAVE YOU? PLEASE ELABORATE.

                Ask her.

BEFORE THE PROVO KILLINGS HAVE YOU EVER ATTEMPTED TO TAKE YOUR LIFE? IF YES ARE YOU UPSET THAT YOU FAILED AND WHY?

                . . .

PLEASE TELL ME EVERYTHING THAT TOOK PLACE AT THE MOTEL FOR THE TIME YOU WERE THERE WITH APRIL.

                . . .

WHY DID YOU STOP AT THE GAS STATION AND WHAT TOOK PLACE? WHAT WERE YOU AND APRIL    TALKING ABOUT BEFORE THE GAS STATION?

                . . .

WHY DID YOU ROB BEFORE YOU KILLED—WHY NOT JUST KILL OR JUST ROB?

                Habit, I guess.

                My lifestyle.

                We're all creatures of habit.

                Somebody else from a different background might do it different.

                That's a good question. A valid question. I may as well have just killed—but I'm a thief. An ex-con, a robber. I was reverting to habit—perhaps so that it made some sense to me.

                Hope I've answered this one.

                Now Larry, I have a question for you and I'd appreciate a prompt honest answer.

                Have you read the letters I wrote to Nicole?

                Tell me.

It threw a scare into Schiller. He would have to move quickly on getting Vern and the lawyers to agree to sell the letters overseas. If he waited much longer, Gary might begin to make a large issue of these letters.

                Schiller put the problem out of mind and went on to the next batch of answers. Gary had done those on the day he began to eat again and thankfully, there was more to his replies.

DID YOU REALLY WANT TO "START OVER" WHEN YOU CAME OUT ON PAROLE THIS TIME? DO YOU THINK THINGS JUST STARTED SNOWBALLING AND YOU GAVE UP TRYING? YOU WERE FUCKING UP ANYWAY SO WHAT THE HELL . . .

                Yeah, what the hell! Wish I could talk to you, Schiller. I don't like to write. Just ain't the same as talking. You'd get more spontaneity in verbal exchange and, hence, better answers. I'm very concerned that you understand me correctly.

                I can tell by your questions that you really don't know what I want to tell you. You're about 35 degrees off the mark. This is a piss poor way to communicate.

WHAT DO YOU THINK ABOUT BEING IN JAIL?

                —You could easily do away with a lot of jails.

                They're shit. They breed, they don't deter, crime.

                Right now, I'm a prisoner of my body—

                I'm trapped in myself—

                Worse than jail!

DID YOU EVER THINK ABOUT DEATH BEFORE YOU WERE FACED WITH THE DEATH SENTENCE?

                A lot.

                In depth.

                A very lot.

                Oh, yes.

HOW DID YOU FIRST MEET NICOLE? HOW DID YOUR RELATIONSHIP START?

                It was, to each of us, like finding a part of us that had been lost and missing for a while. I can't prove it, but I know.

                Want to know something else! I've been famous before—not infamous like now, but famous and rich too. Maybe that's why this don't mean a whole lot to me right now. This is all happening as it was meant to. Inward—in that quiet place that counsels—I always knew. It's no surprise. Nothing to get choked up about.

IT MAY SEEM LUDICROUS, TERRIBLY PSYCHOANALYTICAL, INANE, WHATEVER, BUT WHAT DO YOU THINK OF YOUR MOTHER AND HER ROLE IN YOUR EARLY LIFE?

                I love my mother. She's a beautiful strong woman. Has always been consistent in her love for me. My mother and I have always had a good relationship. Besides being mother and son we're also friends.

                She's a good mother of pioneer Mormon stock. A good woman. What do you think of your mother?

DO YOU GENERALLY CARE WHAT PEOPLE THINK ABOUT YOU?

                Yes.

                Everybody does.

Yes, he did care, thought Schiller. It gave one more reason the letters should be sold and printed. The public would be less completely hostile to Gilmore.

As a sign of friendship, or was it an indication of Gilmore's own interest in presenting some better picture of himself, he had also sent along a poem he had written several years back. Schiller wasn't sure what to make of it, but thought he could pull some lines to give Time or Newsweek when they got desperate for copy.

The Land Lord

an introspection by Gary Gilmore

Feeling a beckoning wind blow thru

The chambers of my soul I knew

It was time I entered in

I climbed within and stared about—

I was home indeed my very seed

A mirror of me reflecting myself

From every curve and line and shelf

Every surface there

Every texture bare

Every color tone and value

Each sound

Pride Hate Vanity

Sloth Waste Insanity Lust Envy Want

Ignorance black and green

I felt myself at every turning

Set my very mind to burning

Face to face no way to dodge

Headlong I tumbled thru this lodge

I felt and met alone myself

A red scream rushed forth

But I caught it back and checked its force

It crescendoed into a hopeless heavy weight

in the blood and fell . . .

A beat of wing I felt and heard

Not at all like any bird

Overhead I saw myself contorted black

and brown and twisted mean—borne aloft

by a gray bat wing—growing from

my shoulders there . . .

One thing was peculiar clear

There was no scorn to menace here

This is just the way it is

Laid bare to the bone

And I built this house I alone

I am the Land Lord here

PART FOUR

The Holiday Season

Chapter 18

PENITENTIAL DAYS

One of the jurors from Gary's trial wrote a letter to the Provo Herald.

                The Utah Supreme Court hadn't found any error, he said, so why had Gilmore's case gone to the U.S. Supreme Court?

Judge Bullock started to think about the juror. From the tenor of his letter, Bullock got the impression that some Jury members were wondering if they had done their job properly. There had been so many appeals. The Judge thought: "I'm going to ask that Jury to come back in. Maybe I'm sticking my neck out, but I want to explain the legal procedures."

He had his clerk make each contact. Didn't want the jurors to feel there was pressure from Judge J. Robert Bullock himself, so the clerk merely announced that the Judge, strictly unofficially, would be willing to meet with them and go over any legal questions they might have. Every juror accepted. They all came in.

He met them in Court when nobody was around one evening, and put them in the Jury box. He sat down in front, and explained the right of appeal, and how this case was likely to go on for several more years. In fact, it would be unusual if it was brought to conclusion in less time. He pointed out that people had a right to go to Court to fight for legal principles in which they believed, and said the law on capital punishment had not been settled. People hadn't been executed since 1967, so it was highly appropriate that delays take place. But he wanted the Jury to understand that they had not done their part of the job incorrectly.

There was the sore spot. Judge Bullock told them that their verdict could not be impeached under any circumstances. "I," he said, "could have made errors in telling you what the law is, but you have not made errors. You have done your job." He could feel these words helped them. They now felt better about it all.

                He also repeated it might take a few years, and said, "That's the way it is, let's not fight the system." To his surprise, shortly after this meeting the Supreme Court lifted their Stay. In consequence, Gilmore was now scheduled to be brought back to his Court for resentencing on December 15. Judge Bullock had to start agonizing again.

He knew Judges who were ready to take their own lives before they would pronounce the death sentence. Judge Bullock didn't see himself as a conscientious objector, but he still didn't like capital punishment.

                Before Gilmore, he had never even had a capital case. He had tried all kinds of second degree, five years to life, but never Murder One. It proved harder than he expected. The Jury had found Gilmore guilty, so he had only had to express the sentence. Yet, on that October day, he shook within, he agonized. Outwardly, Judge Bullock hoped he maintained composure and dignity. Inside, he felt more emotion than he would ever have expected.

                Now, he'd have to sentence him once more. It would be the same sentence, but a different date. He would nonetheless have to utter the words. That tearing and churning at the pit of the stomach, that long emotional drain over a few words, would begin again. And all the public clamor. If the guy wants to die, give it to him right now.

                No, said Bullock to himself, I will not rush it. The processes have to be followed. Those who will want to appeal are entitled to have the time to go to Court properly.

                When he heard therefore that Moody and Stanger, on Gilmore's instructions, would move for an early date, he did not feel disposed toward the idea.

Coming down the courthouse corridor, Gilmore looked like a man coming in with hope. To Schiller's eye, Gary didn't seem nearly so frail as during the hunger strike. He might be just two days off his fast, but he was carrying himself well. Had a little cadence to his walk, as if even with the shackles, he could take small, prancing steps that were a little faster, a little more stylish, than the plodding pace of the guards next to him. Something nice about the way he moved, as if hearing an inner beat.