He was a cadaverously thin man, not tall, with purple-red tattoos crawling up the bleached white skin of each forearm and a shock of black hair streaked with gray. He had dark eyes that flickered about rapidly, taking in the cage, the guards, and Matthew Cowart. One eyelid seemed to twitch mildly as if each eye worked independently of the other. There was a flush looseness about his grin, about the languid way he stood while the sergeant cautiously undid the handcuff chain from where it was connected to his feet, almost as if he was able to disconnect the manacles from his mind. The corrections officers that flanked him stood at port arms with riot batons. The prisoner smiled at them, mock-friendly. The sergeant then ran the chain through the metal ring on the table and refastened it to a large leather belt that encircled the man's waist.

'All right. Sit down,' Rogers ordered brusquely.

The three guards stood back quickly from the prisoner, who eased himself into the steel seat. He had locked his eyes onto Cowart's. The light grin still wandered about the prisoner's lips, but his eyes were narrowed and probing.

'All right,' the sergeant said again. 'Have at it.'

He led the corrections officers from the cage, pausing to lock it securely.

'They don't like me,' Blair Sullivan said with a sigh.

'Why not?'

'Dietary reasons,' he replied, laughing abruptly. The laugh degenerated within seconds into a wheeze, followed by a hacking cough. Sullivan produced a pack of cigarettes from his shirt pocket, along with a box of wooden matches. He had to stoop toward the table to manage this, half-bending in his seat as he lit the cigarette, the range of his arms limited by the chain that fastened his wrists to the table.

'Of course, they don't have to like me to kill me. You mind if I smoke?' he asked Cowart.

'No, go ahead.'

'It's sort of funny, don't you think?'

'What?'

'The condemned man smoking a cigarette. While everybody in the world is trying so damn hard to quit smoking, folks here living on the Row just naturally chain-smoke. Hell, we're probably R.J. Reynolds' best customers. I suspect we'd engage in every bad or dangerous vice we could if they'd let us. As it is, we just smoke. It's not like any of us are terribly worried about contracting lung cancer, although I suspect that if you managed to get damn sick enough, I mean really sick like unto death, then the state would be reluctant to drop your tail into the chair. The state gets squeamish about such things, Cowart. They don't want to execute somebody who's sick of mind or body. No, sir. They want the men they juice to be physically fit and mentally sound. There was a big uproar in Texas a couple of years back when that state tried to kill some poor sucker who had suffered a heart attack when his warrant was signed. It postponed the execution until the man was well enough to walk to his death. Didn't want to wheel him into the chamber on some hospital gurney, no way. That would offend the sensibilities of the do-gooders and the bleeding hearts. And there's a great story, back from the thirties, about some gangster in New York. Man, soon as he got to the Row, he started eating and eating. He was a big man getting bigger, you see. Got fatter and fatter and fatter and fatter and fatter. Ate bread and potatoes and spaghetti until it was coming out his ears. Starches, you see. You know what he figured? He figured he could beat the chair by getting so big that they couldn't fit him into it! I love it. Trouble was, he didn't quite make it. It was a tight squeeze, but damn, he still fit. Joke was on him, then, wasn't it? He must have looked like a pig roast by the time they got through with him. You tell me where's the logic in all that? Huh?'

He laughed again. 'There's no place like Death Row for letting you see all the little ironies of life.' He stared over at Cowart, his one eyelid twitching quickly.

'Tell me, Cowart, you a killer, too?'

'What?'

'I mean, you ever take a life? In the army, maybe? You're old enough for Vietnam, you go there? No, probably not. You ain't got that faraway look that vets get when they start in to remembering. But maybe you smashed a car up as a teenager or something. Kill your best buddy or your main squeeze on a Saturday night? Or maybe you told the doctors at some damn hospital to pull the plug on your old mom or dad when they got so decrepit a respirator had to keep them alive. Did you do that, Cowart? You ever tell your wife or girlfriend to get an abortion? Didn't want any little ones crawling in the way of success? Maybe you're a bit more upscale, Cowart, huh? Take a little toot or two of cocaine at some party down in Miami, maybe? Know how many lives were lost over that shipment? Just guessing, mind you. Come on, Cowart, tell me, you a killer, too?'

'No, I don't think so.'

Blair Sullivan snorted. 'You're wrong. Everybody's a killer. You just got to look hard enough. Take a broad enough definition of the word. Haven't you ever been in a shopping mall and seen some ragged mean momma just light into her kid, wallop 'em good right there in front of everybody? What you think's going on there? Look at that child's eyes, you'll see them go icy cold, sir. A killer in the making. So, why don't you look inside yourself as well. You got those icy eyes, too, Cowart. You got it in you. I know. I can tell just by looking at you.'

'That's quite a trick.'

'Not a trick. A special ability, I guess. You know, takes one to know one, that sort of thing. You get thick enough with death and dying, Cowart, and you can spot the signs.'

'Well, you're mistaken this time.'

'Am I? We'll see. We'll see about that.'

Sullivan lounged about in the hard metal chair, striking a relaxed pose but all the time letting his eyes burrow deeper into Cowart's heart. 'It gets easy, you know.'

'What does?'

'Killing.'

'How?'

'Familiarity. You learn real quick how people die. Some die hard, some die soft. Some fight like the devil, others just go along quietly. Some plead for their lives, some spit in your eye. Some cry, some laugh. Some call out for their mommas, others tell you they'll see you in hell. Some folks'll hang on to life real strong, others just give it up easy. But in the end, everybody's just the same. Getting stiff and cold. You. Me. Everybody's the same at the end.'

'Maybe at the end. But people get there in a lot of different ways.'

Sullivan laughed. 'That's true enough. That's a real Death Row observation, Cowart. That's exactly what some fellow on the Row would say, after about eight years and a hundred appeals and time running out quick. A lot of different ways.'

He drew hard on the cigarette and blew smoke up into the still prison air. For a moment Blair Sullivan's eyes followed the trail of smoke as it slowly dissipated. 'We're all smoke, aren't we? When it comes right down to it. That's what I told those shrinks, but I don't think they wanted to hear that too much.'

'What shrinks?'

'From the FBI. They got this special Behavioral Sciences section that's trying like crazy to figure out what makes mass murderers, so they can do something about this particular American pastime…' He grinned. 'Of course, they ain't having a whole helluva lot of success, 'cause each and every one of us has our own little reasons. Couple of real nice guys, though. They like to come down here, give me Minnesota Multiphasic Personality tests and Thematic Apperception tests and Rorschach tests and I.Q. tests and, Christ knows, they'll probably want to give me the fucking college board exams next time. They like it when I talk about my momma a lot, and when I tell them how much I hated that old bat and especially my stepdaddy. He beat me, you know. Beat me real bad every time I opened my mouth. Used his fists, used his belt, used his prick. Beat me and fucked me, fucked me and beat me. Day in, day out, regular as Sundays. Man, I hated them. Sure do. Still do, yes sir. They're in their seventies now, still living in a little cinder-block bungalow in the Upper Keys with a crucifix on the wall and a full-color picture of Jesus, still thinking that their savior's gonna come right through the door and lift them up into heaven. They cross themselves when they hear my name and say things like, "Well, the boy was always in the devil's thrall," and stuff like that. Those boys from the FBI are sure interested in all that. You interested in that stuff, too, Cowart? Or do you just want to know why I killed all those folks, including some I hardly even knew?'