Executioner's Song, The - Norman Mailer [226]
Then another sight!
A rear-mirror view of a second truck driver running toward the first truck. Dennis didn't stop. There were too many cars behind. But just before it happened, he had been thinking of the date, November 2nd. In his mind, he was writing it as 11/2. That, of course, added up to thirteen. In the major arcana of the tarot, thirteen was the card for death.
So the word had been running through his mind even as he saw the dead man. He thought, "Wow! God! I bet the next road sign will be another indication." When the exit came up on the shoulder, it said: Star Valley and Deeth. That had to be as much synchronicity as anybody's synapses could take.
On the evening of the second, he got to Salt Lake early enough to vote for Carter on the Independent line. Then, on the morning of the third, he woke up thinking about Gilmore. "God, here I am," Dennis thought, "right in the juncture of something really important." He could see the possibilities extending out. "It's a tremendous opportunity for a writer," he thought, "and I ought to send Gilmore a letter!"
Boaz did. A few years ago when he had been a young prosecutor, Dennis had actually been against capital punishment, but now he had come to believe that even in an ideal society, we might still need the death penalty. Capital punishment, properly applied, could say a lot about being responsible for one's actions, and the thing was to get back to responsibility. Boaz didn't put all this in his letter, but did say he supported Gilmore in his right to die.
On those evenings that Timber Oaks Mental Health would let April out, Kathryne would take her to Nicole's apartment for a couple of hours. Sometimes April would say, "Sissy, are they really going to shoot Gary? Why doesn't Gary want to live, Sissy?" Nicole would be real calm about it. "Oh, I don't know," she'd say. Real calm. Like it didn't even bother her. It bothered Kathryne so bad, she'd bawl at night. Couldn't stand seeing the announcer on TV talking about it.
There, right in the middle of the commercials. It made everybody on TV look crazy.
Sometimes, Nicole would come to Kathryne's with the kids and sleep over. She would never talk. Not even to her aunt Kathy. She would put Sunny and Jeremy to bed and then write poetry. That was all. Writing and writing at poetry. She was never abusive to the kids, just didn't pay much attention.
Right in the first week of November, Kip died. Killed in a fall down a mountain. Rock-climbing. Kathryne was getting ready for work on November 4, when she heard a name on the radio, Alfred Eberhardt, and said to herself, "Oh, my God, that must be Kip." All day at work, she worried how Sissy might be taking it. In fact, she went straight over to Springville from her job, and there was Nicole with her little lamp off, writing, writing. Kathryne went in and said, "What are you doing in the dark?" Nicole said, "Oh, I hadn't noticed." She turned on the light, got coffee, was laughing and joking around. Kathryne didn't know how to ask her if Alfred Eberhardt was Kip. Finally had to pop it. Nicole just said, "Yeah, yeah." Kathryne said, "That's what I was afraid of." Nicole said, "Yeah." Kathryne didn't think Nicole was showing what she ought.
A little later, however, Nicole looked up and said she'd like to call Kip's folks. Soon as Kathryne was all for it, Nicole said, "I don't know. What would I say to them?"
It did hurt, Kathryne said to herself. She does care.
Nicole was remembering back to that day years ago when she left Barrett and went out with all she owned in a pack on her back, and Sunny, an infant, on her arm. When Kip picked her up hitchhiking, their romance started right that night. He