by Bill Myers
Finally Murkoski made his decision. Ever so slowly he shook his head. The answer was no.
Hendricks stared in disbelief.
“Gentlemen?” the associate warden called softly from the doorway.
Hendricks did not move.
“Gentlemen?” the associate warden repeated.
Murkoski turned to Hendricks. Clearly and firmly he whispered, “Keep it as is.”
Hendricks scowled, reached for the black rheostat knob, then hesitated.
“Do we have a problem?” the associate warden asked.
“Keep it as is,” Murkoski repeated.
Hendricks’s grip on the rheostat tightened as he held Murkoski’s gaze. Both men were perspiring.
“Come on, boys,” Pederson warned, “let’s do something here.”
At last Hendricks obeyed. Refusing to take his eyes from Murkoski, he turned the knob.
The machine made a dull thud as the electricity surged.
Coleman’s body jerked violently, but the straps held him in place. His hands clenched into fists, and his feet pulled back out of his slippers.
Murkoski heard the tiny beep as Pederson set his stop watch. He glanced at his own. It read 12:18.
The first jolt of electricity ended and Coleman’s body slumped. There was no movement except for a few drops of sweat falling from his face.
He had stopped breathing.
Thirty seconds later, Hendricks fired a tiny fraction of the first voltage through the body. Another thirty-second pause, followed by another weak charge. And one final pause followed by one last charge.
Murkoski glanced at his watch. 12:20. The process had taken just under two minutes. They had four and a half left.
According to the schedule, the prison doctor was now supposed to move into the chamber, take Coleman’s pulse, and declare him dead. Murkoski looked out into the hallway. The doctor stood by the chamber door but was not opening it. “What’s the holdup?” Murkoski called.
“I’m not going in yet,” the doctor said, waving his hand in front of his nose, indicating that he expected to find the acrid smell of burning flesh inside.
Murkoski threw Pederson a look, and the phony assistant moved to action. “If you’re not, I am,” he said heading out of the control room and toward the chamber.
“What do you think you’re doing?” the doctor complained. “That’s my job.”
“Then do it.”
“What’s the hurry? He’s not going anywhere.”
“I am,” Pederson said. He had arrived at the chamber door and was reaching for the handle. “I’ve got work to do, and I don’t plan to be up all night.”
“All right, all right,” the doctor grumbled. He reached for the stethoscope in his pocket. “You’re new, aren’t you? With that attitude you won’t be making many points around here, I can tell you that.” Pederson gave no answer as the doctor pushed past him and opened the door.
Murkoski glanced at his watch: 12:21.
Three-and-a-half minutes left. Time was running out, and they hadn’t even unstrapped Coleman. He looked back out through the glass. The doctor had entered the chamber and hovered over the body, taking his own sweet time. Putting on a show, no doubt, for the reporters in the witness room. After listening to the chest, he pulled the stethoscope from his ears and nodded to the witnesses. Michael Hutton Coleman was dead.
Murkoski looked to his watch. Another minute and a half had slipped by. That left two.
The doctor stepped out of the room and the two guards moved in, closing the curtain and unstrapping Coleman’s dead body. Pederson was right behind, urging them to hurry as they lifted the body, hustled it out of the room, and laid it on the gurney in the hallway.
Fifty-five seconds.
“This is unprecedented!”
Murkoski glanced up. It was the doctor again.
“There’s no need for this reckless haste. This is how mistakes are made.” He had stopped the gurney, blocking its path with his body. “I don’t understand what’s going on. What is the hurry? The man is dead.”
Murkoski was grateful to see Pederson move into action. The man knew how to take advantage of his considerable Norwegian bulk. He shoved the doctor against the wall. “You did your job,” he growled, “now let me do mine.” Then, taking the gurney himself, he shoved it onto the elevator, pressed the button, and stood glowering as the doors lumbered shut.
Murkoski glanced at his watch. Twenty seconds.
“Did you see that?” The doctor turned to the others. “Did you see what he did? That was completely unprofessional. There is no excuse for that type of behavior. What is his name? It’ll be in my report, I guarantee you that. This sort of thing cannot go unreported. What is his name?”
Murkoski watched and listened — realizing that he would have to invite the good doctor out to a special dinner as well.
Harold Steiner walked the dirt road alongside the prison as he headed toward the Sutherland Lumber parking lot where he and most of the demonstrators had left their cars.
It was over. Finally. All of it. But, unlike the others, he didn’t cheer, light firecrackers, or pray. Instead, he was struck by a peculiar emptiness that he didn’t understand. Everything he had worked and sweated over for so many years had finally come to pass. He had won. Justice had been served. And yet he felt so hollow, so empty. Probably just exhaustion. Yet, somehow, he suspected that it was more.
An ambulance bounced out of a side gate, spitting gravel as it turned, then raced past him. He watched, puzzled. No doubt, this was the ambulance taking Coleman’s body to the mortuary. But what was the hurry? Steiner slowed to a stop and watched as the vehicle slid around another corner and sped out of sight.
Something wasn’t right. In a few days, after he’d rested, he’d have to ask. In the meantime, he stuffed his hands back into his overcoat and continued down the road.
PART TWO
CHAPTER 8
“DO YOU NEED A hand with that?”
Katherine’s response was swift and accurate. Before she had even finished her startled scream, she swung around the garbage can she’d been emptying into the dumpster and struck her assailant hard in the face. His sunglasses flew off, and he staggered backward until he hit the wall of the building. His head struck the bricks with a melon-like thud, and he crumpled unconscious to the alley.
Eric raced out the back entrance of the computer store. “Mom! Mom, are you okay?”
Katherine nodded to reassure him as she tried to catch her breath. The unconscious man wore a crisp white shirt and a designer tie. At the moment, he didn’t look much like the mugger she had taken him for.
Eric kept his distance from the motionless form. “Do you …” He swallowed hard. “Do you think you killed him?”
Katherine cautiously walked toward the body. “Go to the bathroom and get me some wet paper towels.”
Eric didn’t move.
“Now.”
He backed through the door, unwilling to take his eyes off the man.
Cautiously, she knelt down to investigate. He was a handsome man. Rugged, closely cut dark hair, late thirties. And the way he filled out his shirt and slacks indicated that he definitely knew how to take care of himself. In fact, except for the faint trickle of blood escaping out of the corner of his mouth, he was an excellent specimen of manhood. Another reason for Katherine to mistrust him.
He stirred slightly. She waited and watched. His face was weathered, with a trace of acne scars across the cheekbones. But it was the bruises around both of his eyes that confirmed her suspicions. Either this man was a prizefighter, or he had just undergone plastic surgery. She suspected the latter, and with that suspicion came the dull realization that she had just decked her new employee. The Witness Protection Agency had said that he would arrive around 4:00 that afternoon. She glanced at her watch. It was 3:59.
She swore to herself and shouted back into the store. “What’s the holdup? Where are the towels?”
“We�
�re all out.”
“Try under the sink.”
She had been told his name was William Michaels — an alias, of course— and that she would have no other obligation to him than providing work. Other than that, he was on his own. She hoped so. The less involvement with somebody like this, the better.
Eric raced out the door and handed her several dry paper towels. “Here.”
“You didn’t soak them?”
“I forgot.”
Katherine sighed and took them. She began dabbing the blood off the man’s face.
Eric scooted in closer and watched with awe. “You really clobbered him, didn’t you?”
“People shouldn’t sneak up on other people,” she answered. “It’s not polite.”
At last the man’s eyes began to move under his lids. Finally they opened. They were good eyes, so brown they almost looked black. And even in their state of confusion, Katherine could see a gentle sensitivity in them.
“Are you okay?” she asked.
He winced, trying to move. “Yeah.” Raising his hand to explore his cheek, he asked, “Was that aluminum or plastic?”
“What?”
“The garbage can. Felt like aluminum.”
Katherine almost smiled but was quick to cover with an admonition: “You shouldn’t go sneaking up on people like that.”
He nodded and rose to one elbow, again wincing in pain. “I think you made that pretty clear.” He struggled to sit. Katherine started to help, but caught herself. He glanced around the alley, still trying to get his bearings.
“Are you William Michaels?” she asked.
He frowned, then smiled, remembering. “Right, right, William Michaels. I’m not crazy about the name. And I hate Bill. But Will’s okay.” With some effort he extended his hand. “Call me Will.”
She shook his hand. It was warm and strong. “I’m Katherine Lyon, Mr. Michaels.”
“And I’m Eric.”
The man looked to his right and managed to smile. “Hi, Eric.”
The boy stared at him.
“Giving your mom a hand at the store today?”
“I’m here every day. You know anything about computers?”
“No. I’ve, uh, I’ve been out of circulation for a while, but I’m willing to learn.”
The boy sounded disappointed. “Oh.”
“Maybe you can teach me.”
“Sure.” Eric shrugged, then rose and quietly headed for the door.
Katherine watched the man watching her son. Again she noticed the eyes. Not only were they sensitive, they were also vulnerable. Just a little too open, just a little too wide. Poor guy. Obviously he hadn’t yet experienced the uglier sides of life, the struggling, the taking, the abusing. But he would. No one could escape it forever. The knowledge seemed to sadden her just a little.
“Listen, do you want a glass of water or something?” she asked.
“No, I’ll be fine.”
“Well,” she said, rising to her feet, “if you’re sure you’re okay.”
He took his cue and started to rise.
“It was good of you to stop by. But you’re not scheduled to start work till Monday, so go get yourself settled in, and we’ll see you then.”
He nodded, locking his eyes firmly onto hers. It was an unnerving sensation, almost like he was trying to read her thoughts. She accepted the look as a challenge and rose to the occasion. “I’m your employer, you’re my employee. That’s it. If you’ve got personal problems, I don’t want to hear about them. As you’ve probably been told, I’m not crazy about this setup, but the money’s good, so there you have it.”
“I understand.”
She shifted uneasily. What was he looking at? What did he see? “All right, then. You’re welcome to come in and clean up, but if you’ll excuse me, I’ve got work to do.” She turned and headed toward the door.
“Do you need a hand?”
She turned and faced him.
“I mean for the rest of the day — do you need some help with anything?”
“No, Mr. Michaels, I don’t need any help. We have everything under control.” With that she headed back into the store. She wasn’t sure what about him flustered and irritated her. It didn’t matter. She had established the boundaries. And if he had any doubts about the consequences of crossing them, the newly acquired cut on his mouth should serve as a reminder.
“Julie, how come your knapsack is moving?” O’Brien stood in the open doorway of their two-story colonial home, blinking at the knapsack that lay on the entry hall tile. Something was inside it, and by the looks of things it wanted to be outside in the worst possible way. “Julie?”
But Julie didn’t hear. She was upstairs with her mother and sister, making frantic, last-minute preparations for the trip. The family’s flight to Mazatlán was scheduled to leave Sea-Tac at seven that evening, and at the moment it would be nip and tuck whether they could make the seventy-minute drive to the airport in time.
“Who took my Barbie car?” Julie’s voice cried from upstairs. “Where’s my Barbie car?”
“You’re not taking your Barbie car,” Beth called. “There’s no room. Sarah, did you brush your teeth? Sarah?”
“They’re just going to get dirty again.”
“But Sarah’s taking her ant farm,” Julie whined.
“She’s what?”
“You little snitch!”
“You’re taking what?”
O’Brien looked back at the knapsack. It was growing more frisky. “Uh, guys,” he called. “Guys, what’s in this backpack?”
By now Julie had broken into tears and Sarah was in her best preteen, nobody’s-taking-me-seriously form. “Why can’t I take my ant farm? It’s science. I need to see if ants act differently in different countries.”
O’Brien thought of calling again but knew it would be futile. As with most of these family outings, he was pretty much along just for the ride. Beth was the one in charge. And that was fine with him. Both of them knew that he would never give the family one hundred percent of his attention. Oh, he tried — but his absentmindedness made it clear that part of him was always back at the lab somewhere. It was another sacrifice Beth had made in their marriage; another crack in the widening rift of their relationship.
The knapsack gave a desperate lunge. That was enough. O’Brien reached down and carefully unlaced the string tie. The neighbor’s kitten, the one Julie had been adoring for the past week, hopped out of the bag and made a mad dash past him and out the door. O’Brien watched, realizing that it would probably be good to have another talk with his youngest about honesty.
The phone rang. He hesitated. The car was nearly loaded and already warming up in the driveway. In just a few minutes they’d be gone. Three weeks of rest and relaxation and some much-needed time with his family. Better to let the service pick up.
It rang a second time. Julie continued crying, Sarah continued demanding, and Beth was doing her best to deal with both. “Philip, will you answer that?”
“Let it go,” he called.
“Mother, are you listening to me?”
A third ring.
“It might be the Wilson boy,” Beth shouted. “He’s taking care of the animals while we’re gone. He was supposed to call back.”
It rang a fourth time. Against his better judgment, O’Brien walked to the end table and picked up the receiver.
The answering machine had already kicked in with Beth’s cheery and concise message: “Sorry. We’re out, but you’re on.” The machine beeped, and O’Brien heard a voice cough slightly on the other end.
“Dr. O’Brien.” It was Wolff. O’Brien listened silently. “I’m sorry to call you at home like this, but I wanted to flag you before you left.”
“Hi, Wolff.”
“Dr. O’Brien, thank God you’re still there.”
“We’re just heading out the door. What’s up?”
“I think we’ve got a problem.”
O’Brien closed his e
yes. “More dead mice?”
“No. Worse.”
“Wolff, I’m on vacation. Murkoski is back. His man Coleman is in the area now. If you have a problem, talk to Murkoski.”
There was a pause.
“Wolff?”
“Yeah, uh, I did. About forty-eight hours ago.”
“And?”
“I think that’s part of our problem. Look, can you come to the lab?”
“Wolff —”
Beth and the kids had clambered down the stairs and were dragging the last of their suitcases past him toward the door when she asked, “Who is it?”
O’Brien rolled his eyes, indicating that he was trying to get rid of the caller.
“I’ve run some new gels,” Wolff was saying. “I’ve run them several times.”
“Who?” she whispered.
“Work,” he mouthed.
She sighed heavily, then turned to children. “All right, you two, get in the car, I’ll be right there.”
Wolff continued. “And I’m getting some bizarre results.”
O’Brien covered his free ear to hear over the commotion. “What do you mean, bizarre?”
“I’m not certain, but things aren’t as they appear.”
“And you can’t tell Murkoski, because…”
“Because I think he’s the reason.”
O’Brien said nothing. He saw Beth watching, anticipating the worst. Wolff’s silence was articulate, insisting there was a crisis that only O’Brien could solve. The back of his neck started to ache. He turned slightly, cutting Beth from his sight.
“Dr. O’Brien? Are you there?”
He could feel Beth’s presence, silent, critical.
He closed his eyes.
“Dr. O’Brien?”
“All right.” He sighed. “Listen, I’m going to run my family down to the airport and get them on the plane. Then I’m going to come back up. But so help me, Wolff, if this is something Murkoski or someone else could have handled —”
“I don’t think it is, Dr. O’Brien. Not this time.”
O’Brien rubbed his neck. “All right. I’ll see you later this evening. Oh, and call my office, have Debra book me on the next available flight to Mazatlán.”
