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'He's been in school, studying. He gives some speeches to church groups…'

'Cowart,' Sullivan burst in, 'you know how silly that sounds? Don't you think Bobby Earl didn't learn nothing in his little experience in our great criminal justice system? You think that boy got no sense at all?'

I don't know…'

'That's right. You don't know. But you better find out. 'Cause I wager there's been a lot of tears shed over what old Bobby Earl's been up to. You just gotta go find out.'

Cowart reeled beneath the assault of words. He struggled, wrestling with unnameable horrors. I need proof,' he repeated lamely.

Sullivan whistled and let his eyes roll up toward the roof of the cell. 'You know, Cowart, you're like one of those old, crazy medieval monks, sitting around all day working out proofs for the existence of God. Can't you tell the truth when you hear it, boy?'

Cowart shook his head.

Sullivan smiled. I didn't think so.'

He paused a moment, savoring, before continuing. 'Well, you see, I ain't dumb, so when we were working out this little arrangement, me and Bobby Earl, I found out a bit more than I used already. I had to have a little extra, just to guarantee that Bobby Earl'd do his part of the bargain. And also just so's I could help you along the path to understanding.'

'What?'

'Well, let's make it an adventure, Cowart. You listen carefully. It weren't only that knife that got hid. Some other things got hid, too…'

He thought for a moment before grinning at the reporter. 'Well, suppose those things are in a real nasty place, yes sir. But you can see them, Cowart. If you got eyes in your ass.' He burst out in a raucous laugh.

I don't understand.'

'You just remember my words exactly when you go back to Pachoula. The route to understanding can be a pretty dirty one.' The harsh sound of the prisoner's voice echoed around Matthew Cowart. He remained frozen, speechless.

'How about it, Cowart? Have I managed to kill Bobby Earl, too?' He leaned forward. 'And what about you, Cowart? Have I killed you?'

Blair Sullivan leaned back sharply. 'That's it,' he said. 'End of story. End of talk. Goodbye, Cowart. It's dying time, and I'll see you in hell.'

The condemned man rose and slowly turned his back on the reporter, folding his arms and staring at the back of the cell, his shoulders shaking with an awful mingling of mirth and terror. Matthew Cowart remained rooted for a few moments, unable to will his limbs to move. He felt suddenly like an old man, as if the weight of what he'd heard was pressing down on his shoulders. His mind was throbbing. His throat was dry. He saw his hand shake slightly as he reached out to pick up his notepad and tape recorder. When he rose, he was unsteady. He took one step, then another, finally stumbling away from the lone man gazing at the wall. At the end of the corridor, he stopped and tried to catch his breath. He felt fevered, nauseous, and fought to contain himself, lifting his head when he heard footsteps. He saw a grim-faced Sergeant Rogers and a squad of strong men at the end of the corridor. They were forming into a tight group. There was a white-collared priest with a line of sweat on his forehead and several prison officials nervously glancing at wristwatches. He looked up and noticed a large electric clock high on the wall. He watched the sweep hand circle inexorably. It read ten minutes before midnight.

11. Panic

He felt himself falling. Tumbling down, head over heels, out of control, into a black hole.

'Mr. Cowart?'

He breathed in hard.

'Mr. Cowart, you okay, boy?'

He crashed and felt his body shatter into pieces.

'Hey, Mr. Cowart, you all there?'

Cowart opened his eyes and saw the sturdy, pale visage of Sergeant Rogers.

'You got to take your place now, Mr. Cowart. We ain't waiting on anybody, and all the official witnesses got to be seated before midnight.'

The sergeant paused, running his big hand through the short brush of his crew cut, a gesture of exhaustion and tension. 'It ain't like some movie show you can come in late on. You okay now?'

Cowart nodded his head.

'It's a tough night for everyone,' the sergeant said. 'You go on in. Right through that door. You'll see a seat in front, right next to a detective from Escambia County. That's where Sully said to put you. He was real specific about that. Can you move? You sure you're okay?'

'I'll make it, Cowart croaked.

'It ain't as bad as you think,' the hulking prison guard said. Then he shook his head. 'Nah, that's not true. It's as bad as can be. If it don't sorta turn your stomach, then you ain't a person. But you'll get through it okay. Right?'

Cowart swallowed. 'I'm okay.'

The prison guard eyed him carefully. 'Sully musta bent your ear something fierce. What'd he tell you all those hours? You look like a man who's seen a ghost.'

I have, thought Cowart. But he replied, 'About death.'

The sergeant snorted. 'He's the one who knows. Gonna see for himself, firsthand, now. You got to move right ahead, Mr. Cowart. Dying time don't wait for no man.'

Cowart knew what he was talking about and shook his head.

'Oh yes, it does,' he said. 'It bides its time.'

Sergeant Rogers looked at the reporter closely. 'Well, you ain't the one about to take the final walk. You sure you're okay? I don't want nobody passing out in there or making a scene. We got to have our decorum when we juice someone.'

The prison guard tried to smile with his irony.

Cowart took a single, unsteady step toward the execution chamber, then turned and said, 'I'll be okay.'

He wanted to burst into laughter at the depth of the lie he'd just spoken. Okay, he said to himself. I'll be okay. It was as if some foreign voice were speaking inside of him. Sure, no problem. No big deal.

All I've done is set a killer free.

He had a sudden, awful vision of Robert Earl Ferguson standing outside the small house in the Keys, laughing at him, before entering to fulfill his part of the bargain. The sound of the murderer's voice echoed in his head. Then he remembered the eighty-by-ten glossy photographs taken of Joanie Shriver at the swamp where her body had been discovered. He remembered how slick they had felt in his sweaty grasp, as if coated with blood.

I'm dead, he thought again.

But he forced his feet to drag forward. He went through the door at two minutes to twelve.

The first eyes he saw belonged to Bruce Wilcox. The bantam detective was seated in the front row wearing a brightly checked sportcoat that seemed a sick, hilarious contradiction to the dirty business at hand. He smiled grudgingly and nodded his head toward an empty seat beside him. Cowart spun his eyes about rapidly, glancing over the other two dozen or so witnesses sitting on folding chairs in two rows, gazing straight ahead as if trying to fix every detail of the event in their memories. They all seemed waxen, like figurines. No one moved.

A glass partition separated them from the execution chamber, so that it seemed as if they were watching the action on a stage or some oddly three-dimensional television set. Four men were in the chamber: two correction officers in uniform; a third man, the doctor, carrying a small black medical bag; another man in a suit – someone whispered "from the state attorney general's office" – waiting beneath a large electric clock.

He looked at the second hand as it scythed through time.

'Siddown, Cowart, the detective hissed. 'The show's about to start.'

Cowart saw two other reporters from the Tampa Tribune and the St… Petersburg Times. They looked grim but mimicked the detective by motioning him toward his seat, before continuing to scribble details in small notepads. Behind them was a woman from a Miami television station. Her eyes were staring straight ahead at the still-empty chair in the execution chamber. He saw her wind a simple white handkerchief tightly around her fist.