Executioner's Song, The - Norman Mailer [134]
Gilmore sure kept trying. A little later, he wanted to get ahold of his attorney. Said he was going to sue the jail for not giving attention to his hand. He was really in sympathy with himself over that hand.
After it all failed, Gary said, "I know Utah County is poor in spirit, and full of hard feelings toward me, but Sheriff, you can let me go home now. I'm not mad anymore."
That was a pretty good sense of humor, Cahoon decided.
It made it easier for him to put up with Gilmore decorating the walls. Cahoon liked to eliminate any drawing of obscenity pictures but Gary was not doing that. Pictures he drew were nice pictures.
They were also something you could erase. One day he'd do a drawing, and next day wipe it out, do another, so Cahoon never made an issue of it.
They really got along all right until Gilmore learned that they wouldn't allow him to see Nicole on visits. It seemed she wasn't family. That left Gary not speaking to anybody.
About the second time that Brenda went down to the jail, which was on Sunday, a week and a half after his arrest, Nicole had also shown up. When Gary heard she was outside, the expression on his face, Brenda had to admit, was beautiful. "Oh, God," he said, "she promised to come back and she did."
However, he explained, it didn't mean he could visit with her. She wasn't allowed on his list just yet. Brenda said, "Let me see what I can do." She went up to a big tough Indian guard at the door, a confident-looking fellow, and said, "Alex, could you put Nicole Barrett in for the last five minutes of my time?" "Well, now," he said, "we really shouldn't break the rules." "Bullshit," said Brenda, "what's the difference if it's me or Nicole? He ain't going to go nowhere! Why, Alex Hunt, you mean to tell me," she asked, "you can't take care of this poor man with a busted-up hand? What's he going to do with one hand? Tear you apart?" "Well," said Alex, "I think we can handle Gilmore."
While Nicole was visiting, Brenda walked over to Nicole's sister-in-law, who had also come. It was hot that day, and Sue Baker was holding her newborn baby and perspiring in volumes, "How is Nicole doing?" asked Brenda.
The sun didn't stir on the black cinder gravel back of the jail.
"She's pretty broke up," said Sue.
Brenda said, "Gary's not going to get out of this one. If Nicole gets all hung up, it's going to ruin her."
"She won't quit," said Sue, "we already tried."
"Well," said Brenda, "she's in for a lot of hurt."
When Nicole came out, she was weeping. Brenda put her arms around her and said, "Nicole, we both love him."
Then Brenda said, "Nicole, why don't you think a little about giving up the ship? Gary is never going to get out. You'll spend the rest of your life visiting this guy. That's all the future you're going to have." Now Brenda began to cry. "Tuck those beautiful memories in your heart," she said, "tuck them away."
Nicole muttered, "I'll stick."
She was feeling an animosity toward Brenda she didn't even understand. Nicole heard herself thinking, "As if I owe her a million dollars for giving me five minutes of her visiting time."
6
There was a Preliminary Hearing on August 3 in Provo and Noah Wootton was determined to ram it through as hard and fast as he could. He had a lot of witnesses so his problem was to keep the case intact. When the defense asked for delay, Wootton objected.
He was reasonably confident of the conviction, or to put it more precisely, he was confident that if he did not get a conviction, it would be his own fault. He was, however, not at all sure of getting the death penalty. So he was feeling the usual tension he had before a case began. His stomach was right with him that morning.
At the Preliminary Hearing, Gilmore didn't take the stand, but Wootton did talk face to face with him in the