The Choiring of the Trees - Donald Harington [154]
“This is awful sudden,” Nail observed. “One day you’re treatin us like human beings, and bein decent and kind to us, and then the next day you’re puttin us right back where we were.”
The warden lifted a folder from his desk. “You ought to read the report of the governor’s commission of inspectors for the prison system.”
Nail held out his hand. “Could I read it?”
“It don’t mention you hee hee. Not by name, anyhow. It just says we’ve been coddling our prisoners and treating them like citizens, which they aint, not after conviction, and it says the governor—let me find it…” The warden opened the folder and ran his finger down several pages until he came to the words: “‘Governor Hays has been required to yield to extraordinary outside pressures in order to stay executions, and this interference with justice works to the detriment of the whole system.’ That’s what it says, Chism hee hee. You can probably read most of it yourself in tomorrow’s Gazette, along with the announcement of this Saturday evening’s executions.” The warden waited a full minute for Nail to comment, and when Nail did not, the warden said, “If you got nothing to say, you can get out,” and waved him to the door.
Back in his cell, Nail still surprised himself by feeling no emotion. He was neither frightened nor disappointed, frustrated nor angry. He had been sent to the chair so many times, and nothing had happened. Maybe it was dangerous, he thought, to get to the point where you don’t feel anything.
Ernest and Sam Bell apparently hadn’t been told, not yet. But the next morning’s Gazette was delivered not by a trusty but by the chaplain himself, or rather the ex-chaplain making his farewell appearance. Lee Tomme first visited the cell of Sam Bell and gave him the newspaper, and Nail listened to Sam Bell reading the item aloud for the benefit of the others. Then Lee visited awhile with Ernest, and Nail could not hear what they were saying. Finally Lee gave Nail his own copy of the newspaper. The report of the governor’s commission was on the front page. The announcement of the executions was back on page 4, in a small item all out of proportion to the newsworthiness of the event: Arkansas’s first triple execution since the days of Hanging Judge Parker of Fort Smith. It was almost as if there wasn’t room for it on the front page, which was taken up with the commission’s report.
“I’m sorry they sacked you,” Nail told Lee.
“Who told you that?” Lee asked. Indeed, it wasn’t mentioned in this issue of the Gazette.
“Yeager,” Nail said, wondering if there was any chance that Lee himself hadn’t been told. “Yesterday,” he added.
“Then he had already told you about Saturday night?”
Nail nodded. “Yeah, he told me.”
“The bastard,” Lee said. “He promised to wait and let me tell you. How did you take it?”
Nail shrugged. “I’m an old hand at this now, ye know. It didn’t trouble me.”
Lee looked at him oddly, then moved closer and lowered his voice to say, “But the Saturday night movie is scheduled for after the executions.”
“You think they’d go ahead and show a movie with the same juice they jist used to cook three fellers?” Nail asked.
“The men want that movie,” Lee said. “They haven’t been talking about anything else this week. All they’re waiting for is that movie, and they’re on their best behavior in order to see it.”
“But the warden is cuttin back on all the privileges and improvements that you brought in,” Nail pointed out. “Don’t you reckon it’s likely he’ll do away with the picture shows too?”
Lee shook his head. “Not right away. If he tried to do it for this movie this Saturday, the men would go on strike or stage a riot. Sure, he’ll abolish movies soon, but not this week. I went to a lot of trouble to persuade the theater people in Little Rock to loan us that first-run film.”
“Well,” Nail said. He didn’t know much else to say. Out of genuine concern as