One Second After Read online

  Bruce finally fell silent.

  “Ira?” Charlie asked. “How much morphine in liquid form was taken?”

  “We keep individual vials for each patient using it, since dosage and strength vary. I think about forty or so.”

  “We confiscated thirty-two,” Tom interjected.

  “Not much of a cut between your friend here and his buddy,” Charlie said. “You mean the other guy walked off with eight vials and Larry kept over thirty?”

  “Yeah, that must have been it. No one argues with Larry.”

  “Or eight vials would be one hell of a party,” Tom interjected. “It’s a wonder they didn’t kill themselves.”

  “You bastards.” It was Ira, her voice breaking. “I got seven patients dying of cancer. Two are dead now, thank God, but the others are in agony and all I have for them is what was in their daily trays and then aspirin. I hope they shoot both of you.”

  She fell silent, eyes burning with rage.

  “Larry?” Charlie said, motioning to the Bible.

  “Why bother?”

  Charlie nodded and then looked back at John.

  “John, I want to keep this formal. I’m appointing you to speak on behalf of these two men.”

  “What?”

  “You heard me.”

  “My father-in-law is tied into this.”

  “John, just do me the favor.”

  “Go get Norm Schaich; he’s a lawyer. He can do this better than me.”

  “Norm’s house is miles from here.”

  “I can drive it.”

  “John, I want this done now.”

  “I want a fucking lawyer,” Larry stated yet again. “Yeah, go get Norm.”

  John looked at him, then to Bruce and over to Ira, and then out through the half-closed blinds to the crowd gathered outside. John finally nodded and stood up.

  “I’ll say this for them. The world we knew, maybe it’s finished, finished forever. Maybe not, but I doubt that. All that holds us together now are the things we believed in, the traditions of who we were, who we still want to be.

  “Charlie, I guess you’ll make the decision. Guide yourself with that thought, of what this country is supposed to be, even in these dark times. I know what you are thinking. I know what our neighbors outside are thinking. But whatever your decision, know it is a foundation point for what follows, but if we make a mistake here, Charlie, then we’ve lost that foundation….” He paused. “We are no longer Americans.”

  He stepped back to the corner of the room.

  Charlie stood silent, head lowered. Bruce started to cry.

  Charlie finally raised his head.

  “I dread this,” he said quietly. “I never thought I would ever do something like this. But I must think of the community.”

  He stepped to the center of the room, behind the chair Kate was sitting in.

  “Larry, Bruce—” he hesitated, “Randall and Wilson,” Tom interjected.

  “Larry Randall and Bruce Wilson,” Charlie continued, “I sentence you to death by firing squad, for the crime of looting precious medical supplies, not only from this community, but from a facility where people were in desperate need of those supplies to ease their final pain. Execution to be carried out immediately.”

  “You bastard,” Larry hissed.

  “Son, you are about to go before God; I’m giving you ten minutes to make your peace. Someone go find a minister for them,” Charlie said, and walked out.

  John followed him as he went into his office and Charlie did not object as John closed the door. He pulled out the last cigarette in his pocket and lit it. Charlie looked at it longingly for a few seconds and John was ready to offer it over, but Charlie then shook his head.

  “Did I do the right thing, John? Frankly, I’m so damn mad at those two animals, especially that Larry, that I’d do it myself without hesitation. But still, did I do the right thing?”

  John sat down and didn’t speak for a moment. He was torn as well. Again memory of his own temptation with Liz at the pharmacy, to snatch the medicine he needed for Jennifer.

  “John, it’s like we’re back a hundred and fifty years. The Wild West. I kept thinking of that movie, Oxbow Incident. Remember they hang three guys in that movie but then find out they’re innocent.”

  “Yeah, same thought here. It was just on TV last week. One of Henry Fonda’s best.”

  “A week ago,” Charlie sighed. “Just that short a time?”

  “They are not innocent, though,” John said.

  “But still. A week ago we didn’t kill screwed-up punks for stealing drugs. That Bruce kid, right guidance, he might have straightened out.” John shook his head.

  “Look, Charlie, might have beens are finished. Charlie, we got six thousand, maybe seven thousand people in this town now. How much food? How much medicine? Water still works for downtown, as long as the pipe to the reservoir holds, but up on the sides of the hills we’re out. Charlie, we don’t keep order, in a month people will be killing each other for a bag of chips.”

  John felt the heat of the cigarette burning his fingers and he looked around, then dropped it into an empty coffee cup. “Or a pack of smokes. I’m sorry for that one, boy, but you did the right thing.

  “Just keep in mind what I said on their behalf back in there.”

  Charlie nodded.

  There was a knock on the door; it was Tom and Kate. Charlie motioned them in.

  “Reverend Black is in there with them. Time is just about up,” Tom said. “Tom, you will not do the execution,” John said. Tom looked over at him.

  “You are the police authority in this town. If someone must do the execution, it cannot be you or any other officer or official of this town. That terrible task has always been kept separate from the hands of those out in the field who directly enforce the law. If not, well…” He thought of Stalin, of the Gestapo. “It has to be someone else.”

  Tom nodded, and John was glad to see that in spite of his angry talk earlier, Tom was relieved.

  John looked over at Charlie.

  “Not me, John.”

  “No, it can’t be you, either, Charlie. You’re the emergency government; and Kate, the traditional government. No, not you.”

  “Then who?” Charlie asked. No one spoke.

  “You, John,” Kate said quietly.

  Startled, he looked at her. He had simply been advising as a historian; he never imagined it would come back on him like this.

  “Damn all, I was not volunteering myself.” John said, “I was just trying to keep us in touch with who we once were as a country.”

  “I’m not going out there to ask for volunteers,” Charlie said. “I will not let this turn into a circus with some sick bastards mobbing in to take a shot. I want you to do it. You’re the historian, John; you understand it, the meaning of it. You’re a respected professor in the town. Everyone knows you, or knows your kin here.”

  “Oh Jesus,” John whispered, knowing he was trapped.

  Reluctantly he nodded his head.

  “Where?” Tom asked.

  John couldn’t think.

  “The town park,” Charlie said. “It’s the public gathering place. I don’t want it here.”

  “Fine then,” Tom replied. “We take them down to the park now and do it. We load them into Jim’s van. The tennis courts have a concrete practice wall. I’ll go outside and announce it for one half hour from now.”

  The mention of the tennis courts chilled John. It made him think of the Taliban and the infamous soccer stadium in Kabul. Is that what we have now, tennis courts?

  “Maybe in private,” Kate ventured. “Maybe in private. I don’t like the thought of public execution.”

  “I don’t either,” John said slowly, “but we have to do it. There’s fear in this town. I’m hearing people say that the refugees from the highway are ‘outsiders.’ We’re already beginning to divide ourselves off from each other. We do private executions and I guarantee you, within a day the
re’ll be rumors flying from those who don’t live here that we are doing Stalinist courts and executing people in the basement of the police station. If we are forced to do this, we do it in public.”

  “Besides,” Tom interjected, “it’s a statement to anyone else who might be thinking about stealing.”

  “Wait a minute, Tom,” John said. “I pray we aren’t down to killing people for stealing a piece of bread.”

  Tom shook his head angrily.

  “John, don’t misread me. You might not believe this, but I don’t like it any more than you.”

  John stared into his eyes and then finally nodded.

  “Ok, Tom, sorry.”

  “I’ll go make the announcement.”

  “Tom,” Kate said. “Adults only. I don’t want kids down there.”

  Tom left the room and seconds later there was the crackling hiss of an old handheld megaphone and Tom began to speak.

  There was a scattering of applause, even a few cheers, someone shouting a rope would be better.

  Damn, it did feel like an old western, John thought, the crowd all but crying, “Lynch ’em!”

  The crowd immediately broke up, many setting off for the park, some, especially those with children, staying behind. Long minutes passed, John silent, looking out the window.

  He heard cursing from out in the corridor and crying. The two were being led out.

  “We better go,” Charlie said, and opened the door.

  John felt as if he were being led to his own execution. Could he do it? All those years in the army, the training, but never a shot in anger or even in detached professionalism, as they were told they should act. During Desert Storm he was XO of a battalion, but even there, he was in a command vehicle a couple miles behind the main line of advance, never on the actual firing line pulling the trigger.

  He thought of the taunting rednecks back when he was in college, the frightful moment when rage drove him to the point that he might very well have shot one, and the shock of it afterwards… and then the shaking of hands with one of them only days later and a shared drink.

  He was outside. The two were in the back of Jim Bartlett’s Volkswagen van, handcuffed, feet chained. The back of the van door was slammed shut, Tom up in the front seat with a drawn pistol, Reverend Richard Black crouched down between Jim and Tom.

  John looked at the two as the door closed and realized when he made eye contact with Bruce, barely remembered but still a former student, there was one thing he could not do.

  He saw Washington with Jeremiah and Phil and walked up to them.

  “Washington, I need your help. God, do I need it,” and John told him.

  Washington nodded, saying nothing, and got into the car with John, Kate, Phil, and Jeremiah squeezing into the backseat, Charlie up front with Washington and John.

  The two vehicles set off and as they turned onto Montreat Road and then the side street over to the park, he saw people walking fast, heading for the park, others just standing there, staring.

  “Killing is a sin!” someone shouted as he drove slowly, following the van that was dragging along at not more than five miles an hour.

  It was like a damn procession out of the French Revolution, he thought.

  They rolled down the steep hill to the corner of the park, a large crowd already gathered by the tennis courts and the concrete practice wall painted white, bits of paint flecking off.

  The two were led out of the back of the van and all fell silent.

  Swallowing hard, John stopped the car. He looked over at Washington.

  “Just aim straight at the chest, sir,” Washington said. “You try for the head and you’re shaking at all you’ll miss. First shot to the chest, he’ll collapse. They don’t go flying around like in the movies; usually they just fall over or sag down to the ground. Once he’s on the ground, then empty the clip; just empty it. If you have your wits about you put the last shot into the head. Do you understand me, sir?”

  Washington handed the Glock to him.

  “A round is chambered.”

  John nodded.

  He got out of the car and the crowd separated back, opening a lane, the two prisoners ahead of them. Bruce was crying, begging, Larry silent, Reverend Black holding Bruce’s arm while Tom had Larry in a tight grip.

  “This is wrong, Charlie!” someone shouted.

  And there was an angry mutter, shouts back, arguments breaking out.

  The condemned were led to the wall and placed against it.

  More shouts from the crowd, some against, most for, a few yelling to string the guilty up rather than shoot them.

  Sickened, John looked around, and before he even realized what he was doing he raised the gun straight up in the air and fired.

  Bruce let out a scream of terror and collapsed to his knees. There were cries from the crowd and then silence, all eyes on John.

  “I have been appointed to do something I never dreamed of in my worst nightmares!” John shouted.

  No one spoke now.

  “I will confess to you, one of these men I cannot bring myself to shoot; he was once a student of mine. I have asked Mr. Parker, a former marine sergeant major, to do that task for me and he will do it.”

  “Our world has changed…” and John’s voice trailed off, but then he raised his head. “But this is still America. I want to believe this is still America.

  “We are at war. Mr. Fuller will hold a town meeting this evening in the elementary school gym and share with you the latest news and information. This is a meeting for all of you, those born here, those who moved here like me, those whom circumstances now place here.”

  He paused again.

  “All of you are citizens of our country. Mr. Fuller, who was director of public safety prior to this war and is thus now,” he looked for the right word, “our temporary leader in Black Mountain, under martial law, will share with you the news we have from Asheville about what has happened, is happening, will happen.

  “We are at war, and martial law has been proclaimed in this town. These two men have been condemned to death under the rules of martial law. They have been convicted and condemned for stealing vital medication, painkillers from Miller’s Nursing Home, leaving the residents there to suffer in agony. Of that crime and the general crime of looting they have been found guilty beyond all reasonable doubt at a fair and open hearing.”

  “Fuck your trial!” Larry screamed. “This is a lynch mob!”

  John was silent and no one from the crowd replied. There were no shouts or taunts.

  “I am a citizen of this town,” he said, his voice now softer. “By tradition, even in times of martial law, our police who directly enforce the law will not participate in what will now happen, nor our governing body. I want all of you to understand that. This is not a police state and it never will be. The condemned were found guilty at a fair hearing, and the sentence will now be carried out, not by those who are temporarily in charge of law and order, but by two duly appointed citizens who have volunteered for this task.”

  He lowered his head and swallowed, knowing he could not let a tremor get into his voice.

  “I do not want this task. I did not seek it. I loathe doing it.” He paused. “But it must be done.”

  He paused again for a moment, realizing something more still had to be said.

  “We are all Americans here. There are hundreds of you, perhaps thousands, who did not live here but five days ago,” again a brief pause, “but you do now. All of us are equal under the eyes of the law here. All of us. We must work together as neighbors if we wish to survive. The tragic justice to be dealt out here is the same for all of us, whether born here, moved here as I did some years ago, or arrived just yesterday. It must be the same for all of us….”

  His voice trailed off. Nervously he looked back at the two guilty men, Reverend Black holding Bruce up with one hand, open Bible in the other; Larry still held by Tom, his eyes glazed from the drugs, and with a boiling hatred.
/>   John wondered now just how legal, how close to law in the tradition of Western civilization, his act and his words truly were, but he felt they were right, right for here, this moment, if the people of Black Mountain were to survive as a community.

  He fell silent and looked over at Charlie. There was a pause until Charlie realized that ritual demanded that he say something.

  He stepped in front of the group.

  “By the power vested in me by emergency decree by the civilian government of this community, the town of Black Mountain, now under local martial law, I have found Larry Randall and Bruce Wilson guilty of looting of medical supplies and, in so doing, causing pain, suffering, and death. Their sentence is death by firing squad, to now be carried out by Dr. John Matherson and Mr. Washington Parker, appointed by me to perform this task.”

  Charlie looked over at John, nodding. John turned to face the condemned, his hand shaking.

  “Remember what I said: first shot to the chest, let him drop, then empty the rest of the clip, last one in the head,” Washington whispered.

  The two walked the few dozen feet to the prisoners. Tom stepped back and away from Larry, who glared at him with cold hatred. But Reverend Black did not move, holding Bruce up.

  “I think we should pray,” Reverend Black said, and John nodded in agreement, embarrassed that he had not thought to do so.

  Still holding Bruce, Reverend Black looked to the crowd.

  “I ask God, in his divine mercy, to grant forgiveness to these two. But we must now render unto Caesar the law of Caesar. Forgiveness and redemption now rest between Bruce, Larry, and their Creator.

  “Bruce, do you ask God for forgiveness?”

  “Yes, please, God, please forgive me.”

  “Larry?”

  He was silent.

  “Our Father, who art in heaven…”

  John repeated the prayer, hoping that the trembling of his hands would stop. He looked at Larry, making eye contact.

  There was nothing but rage there, blind animal rage, and John almost felt pity.

  “For thine is the kingdom, the power, the glory, forever and ever. Amen.” The last word, “Amen,” echoed from the crowd.