“Why not?” Stockman asked calmly.
“Well, because,” Martin spread his hands impatiently, “there are always people around: guards, doctors, priests, lawyers, reporters—”
“But suppose there weren’t?” Isaac Stockman said. “Suppose the entire procedure could be carried out with just a very select few people in attendance? And none of them knowing your identity?”
“But how could that possibly be arranged? What about the press? They’ll be all over the place, a story like this.”
“The press will simply be told that you have been hired to come in from another state on the condition that your identity not be released. The warden will cooperate fully in this, as will a few carefully selected high-ranking officers in the corrections service. All of these individuals will have many years of seniority in the state’s civil service ranks; they won’t risk losing that. Believe me, Martin, I have the governor’s personal assurance that this can be done.”
Martin locked eyes with Isaac Stockman. “Are you saying you want me to do this, sir?”
“I’m saying I don’t think you have a choice, Martin. Do it this way, keep your name and the company’s name out of it, and put the matter behind you.”
“And it won’t affect my job here?” Martin forced himself to ask.
“Certainly not,” Stockman replied with a smile. “As a matter of fact, I’ve been thinking about creating a new executive position: senior vice-president over manufacturing and marketing.” He winked at Martin. “How does that sound to you?”
Martin felt his heart skip a beat. “That sounds fantastic, sir,” he managed to say.
All at once, he felt like a heavy weight had been lifted from his shoulders. It looked as if everything was going to turn out all right, after all. His future suddenly was rosy.
All he had to do was hang this guy.
Piece of cake.
Martin’s ex, Vivian, prepared a nice little lunch for the two of them in her apartment the next day, and he stayed on an extra hour for what they had once called “playtime” back in the early days of their marriage, before an appendectomy had put him in the hospital and he had met a busty charge nurse named Hazel. During lunch, and before sex, Martin told her about his meeting with Isaac Stockman.
“It looks like I’ll be going through with this thing,” he said, “but no one will know my identity, so it should work out all right.”
“How are you going to keep it from Hazel?” Vivian asked.
“I’ll find a way,” he said confidently. “Vi, this tuna salad is terrific. Did you make this when we were together?”
“No, not that way. I strain the relish now, and chop up a hard-boiled egg in it.”
“Where’d you learn that?”
“A guy I dated for a while. He owns a deli. What makes you so sure you can keep all this from Hazel?”
“Won’t be hard. She’s so wrapped up in that kid of hers’ wedding, she hardly has the time of day for me anymore.”
“Hon, are you happy with Hazel?” Vivian asked quietly, as if the question were confidential in some way. Martin shrugged. “I don’t know that I’m actually happy,” he told her. “But I’m not aware of being unhappy.”
After they finished at the table, and in the bedroom, Vivian asked, “Do you think we could work in a dinner some night? In some romantic little place? Like in the old days?”
“I’ll try,” he said. Then he made up a quick lie. “Actually, I’m going to be working nights for a while to make up for the time I’ll have to spend up at the prison.”
He got dressed a little faster than usual, hoping that Vivian would not notice.
As he straightened his necktie, she put her arms around his neck and rubbed noses with him. “Do you think we might be working toward getting back together, Marty?”
“Wouldn’t surprise me,” he told her with a wink.
On his way back to the office, he stopped at the pharmacy for a Viagra refill, and began to plan where he would take Barbara for dinner that night.
Isaac Stockman gave Martin a week off to attend to business at the prison. Martin, in turn, gave Barbara a week off, and asked if she would like to take a little trip with him.
There was a lodge in the woods up near the town of Barnaby, he told her, where he was being sent to investigate some newly discovered plant fibers that could possibly be used for cordage manufacture. Barbara thought the whole thing was just too, too exciting: a free tryst trip with her boss, staying at some romantic lodge, walks in the woods together, entire nights together. Somehow she just knew that poor Martin did not have a happy home life. With that as a start, who knew what the future might bring?
They checked in at the lodge as Mr. and Mrs., which made Barbara giggle a little. The lodge was south of the town of Barnaby, and the prison was north of it. Martin explained that he had daily meetings planned with some botanists to conduct experiments on the plant fibers, but assured her that their evenings would be spent together. He stayed in touch with both Hazel and Vivian by cell phone. Vivian knew the real reason for his trip to Barnaby; Hazel had been told the plant-fiber story.
The morning of their second day at the lodge, Martin left for a meeting with the “botanists,” and drove to Barnaby Prison. Warden Ben Lawson welcomed him cordially.
“I hope there’s no hard feelings on your part about this thing, Mr. Sloan.”
“None at all, Warden,” Martin assured him. “I just want to get the whole thing over with. You on board about the anonymity business?”
“Entirely. The governor’s chief of staff briefed me thoroughly. I’ve got a captain, two lieutenants, and two sergeants picked out for your escorts. None of them know your real name, and all of them think you’re from back in Delaware, the last state besides us to quit using the rope. I’ll keep the media, lawyers, and chaplains under tight control. I believe this thing is going to work out just fine.”
“I hope so.”
“What do you want to do first?”
“See the gallows.”
Warden Lawson escorted Martin to an old two-story stone building in a far corner of the prison compound.
“This used to be the tag plant, back when cars got new license plates every year. Now that the motor vehicle department issues them little stickers, why, we’ve cut back to just making plates for new cars. We do that with a couple of punch-presses over in the shoe fac’try. Since this here old building’s not used for nothing, we thought it’d be a good place for the gallows.”
When they got inside, Martin saw, in the center near the back wall, a scaffold that looked for all the world like the bottom section of an oil derrick, with a trapdoor in its floor. As they approached it, Martin smelled the clean scent of newly sawn lumber. Putting a hand on one supporting beam of the framework, he found it to be solid, sturdy.
“I had our inmate carpenters copy it from one of our archive photos,” the warden said, rather proudly. “Even got thirteen steps, just like the original.”