* * *
“What the hell are you doing here?” Detective Burr said, planting his hand in Danny’s chest. “Thought you and brother were splitsville.”
Danny cast his eyes down, pup to alpha. “I don’t have a choice, sir,” he said. “My mother intended to be Earl’s family witness, but she came down with pneumonia last night.”
“Pneumonia?”
“That’s what she says. But it’s probably just worry,” Danny said. “Long and short is my mother can’t be here for her son, and begged me to do it instead. What choice did I have?”
Burr searched his face.
Danny shrugged, hoping “her son” instead of “my brother” reinforced his expression of helplessness, duty, and anger at having this odious chore dumped in his lap. He’d practiced on the drive here, and hoped it would be enough.
Burr looked at Rogan.
Rogan nodded.
Burr lifted his hand.
“Thank you for understanding, sir,” Danny said. “It’s not that I want to be here, but . . .”
“Hey. Family. Whaddaya gonna do, huh?” Burr said. He patted Danny’s shoulder and pointed to the main door. “Through there.”
A guard frisked Danny twice, then escorted him to the witness room set aside for relatives of the condemned. Danny looked around. A scatter of empty chairs, a window, and him.
He sat in the second row, shaking so hard he thought he’d vibrate apart.
Earl wrinkled his nose at the continuing assault of Hai Karate. Prison electricians bustled about, checking power lines and connections. He’d tried chatting up the first one, but the guy only blinked, like a hoot owl. The second one turned away after mumbling he wasn’t allowed to talk to condemned prisoners.
He gave up.
The biggest annoyance wasn’t death, he decided. It was his freshly shaved skull. It itched like lice bites, and he couldn’t scratch it - his head, chest, waist, thighs, shins, forearms, and biceps were cinched to the oak with leather straps. Even if he managed to free a hand, his head was covered by the skullcap that contained the entry electrode. All he could do was rub the arms of the chair real hard and hope it fooled his skull.
“Danny’s a good kid,” Burr said, lighting another Camel. “Sucking it up to help his ma.”
“Yeah,” Rogan said. “I guess we all got our crosses to bear. His is Earl.”
Kit Covington danced an imaginary partner through her bedroom, swirling and twirling, happier than she’d been in six years. Her man would be in her arms tonight, his tour of duty over. As soon as Wayne cleared the driveway, she dropped the kids at her mother’s, stopped for a manicure and wax, then shopped for the perfect lace negligee. In every war, the victor got the spoils. She was his.
“Finally,” the court clerk muttered.
He grabbed the damp purple mimeos, hustled to the press room, and threw them on the release table. The milling news hawks snatched them like free pretzels.
The UPI bureau chief whistled, then pounced for his phone.
* * *
Earl hummed tonelessly, gazing at the curtains that separated him from the carton of eggs who’d watch him sizzle like Oscar Mayer’s bacon. You want me to die because you think I did it. What the hell do you know?
The thought held no rancor, though. Earl stopped being angry the moment he decided to keep his mouth shut about who’d really killed those cops.
He wasn’t nearly as scared as he thought he’d be. He knew why - he’d kept Danny safe. That’s why he took without complaint the food, the beatings, the humiliations, the bullshit solitary, and now the 2,000 volts. So his brother would live. He smiled, proud of himself. Even though I’m sitting, I’ll die on my feet. Not a bad way for a man to go out.
A crew-cut sauntered into the death chamber and pulled the restraints even tighter. He knuckle-clanked the skullcap twice, whisper-cursing Earl in richly creative shades of blue mixed with the names of the dead cops. Earl didn’t respond. What was left to say?
The crew-cut left.
He glanced at the clock over the curtains. It was twice the size of the one outside his cell. Had three hands instead of two. The extra, fire-engine red against the black of the others, hopped a precise distance every second. It made no noise, but he heard every tick.
He tried to swallow when it landed on six. Couldn’t.
No spit.
Ding-ding-ding-ding-ding-ding-ding-ding-ding-ding.
Flash.
The copyboy raced over. The quarter-mile of presses in the basement were already spitting out Red Streaks.
“It’s Furman!” he bayed across the newsroom.
* * *
The curtains drew back like it was movie night. Earl peered through the glass. Twenty-four eyeballs stared back. None was familiar.