Executioner's Song, The - Norman Mailer [109]
Of course, he hardly looked like a teetotaler now. His goatee was on the way to becoming a beard and his clothing looked sloppy.
It was the nearest they had ever come to a real talk. Gilmore sat there forlornly, saying in a flat sad voice that he thought he had problems as a lover. That carried their relationship a step forward, Court thought.
Gary spent the next few hours looking for Nicole around Orem and Provo, then in Springville and Spanish Fork. While he was driving on one road, Nicole and Roger Eaton were moving along another.
Nicole was in a state. Before long, Roger Eaton was in the state. The Tuesday afternoon he had been looking forward to turning out well.
First, she told him about seeing Gary on Sunday in Spanish Fork. Showed Roger the little Derringer. Seeing the way Nicole pulled it out of her pocketbook, Roger was pretty sure she could use it. He said, "Put that away." He never knew anybody who began to live the way Nicole had to live.
While driving around, Roger told her about the murder last night at the gas station. That was the first she had heard of it. If she had known, she wouldn't have left her house, she told him. "I'm scared," said Nicole.
After a little while, she murmured, "I think Gary did that murder." "Are you kidding me?" he asked. "No, I think so," she repeated. "But you don't know for sure?" Roger asked. She wouldn't answer.
He took her to the Utah Valley Mall and bought her a pair of jeans that ran around $25 and a shirt that cost $35. Then he took her back to her apartment in Springville quickly as he could and let her off about a block away. Before she got out of the car, she warned Roger that Gary had seen the letter he sent.
Roger began to think that Gary might find Nicole, and beat her up until she gave away his name. Then Gary would come over to the Mall to look for him. When that thought went through Roger's mind, he said to himself, "My ass is grass."
As they were saying goodbye, Roger couldn't help himself. He said, "Nicole, I'm afraid Gary might find me." She said, "He'll kill you if he does."
"What did you do to him?" Roger asked.
She said, "Nothing. He just wants me."
Roger said, "He must want you a lot worse than I do, because I don't want to get killed over you."
She said, "I can understand that."
He said, "I want this thing to end if it's going to mean my damned life or yours. Let's just forget this crap."
It was getting dark when he said goodbye to her.
That evening over the newspaper, Johnny said to Brenda, "Hey, they had a shooting over here." He waited for her to read the account, and then said, "It has all the earmarks of Gary Gilmore."
Brenda said, "I know he's an asshole, Johnny, but he's not a killer,"
Johnny said, "I'm afraid he is."
5
All day at the motel, Debbie Bushnell had been nervous. All afternoon, she kept calling her friend Chris Caffee. That was most unusual. She and Chris usually talked to each other about once every two weeks, and Chris would drop in at the motel now and again. Chris had used to work for her at the Busy Bee, and they got along well, but they weren't exactly close friends. Debbie was so restless this Tuesday afternoon, however, that she kept calling. Chris finally said, "Debbie, I have five hundred things to do. I don't have anything more to say." Debbie couldn't help herself, she phoned two hours later. "What are you doing?" she asked. Chris said, "Nothing. Why are you calling?"
Debbie had been having a strange feeling from Sunday on. It continued all day Monday and was worse on Tuesday afternoon. Same with Ben. They had gone to visit his best friend, Porter Dudson, up in Wyoming on Sunday, a rare Sunday off from the motel and Ben couldn't sit still all day. Rushed poor Porter and his wife Pam, through the meal and everything. Now, he was over whatever was bothering him. He had spent part of Tuesday afternoon working on his weights and then he took a nap. It was Debbie at this point who didn't know what to do with herself.
When Ben got