“Can’t take this in, Reverend.”
“How’s he supposed to cut the lamb?”
“We’ll give you a plastic knife.”
“Plastic? That will just shred the meat and make a mess. Can’t I just cut it for him?”
“Nope. State reg.”
“It’s not like I’m gonna try to kill him or anything.”
The captain shrugs. “But he might try.”
At last I’m allowed into the dining cell. Puff is wearing all white, smiling like an angel. “I could smell it cooking all week,” he says, pining over the warm bins. He catches himself, embarrassed, then shuts his eyes and prays. While he recites obscure scriptures even I can’t recall, I cover the table with plastic utensils and paper plates and a rainbow assortment of Tupperware bowls.
I join Puff in grace. We bow our heads together, for a moment, brothers.
“First, an aperitif,” I begin when he is ready. I pass him a plastic shot glass filled with brown liquid. “Kombucha, a mushroom- infused tea to cleanse your palette, best served cold. Compliments of the chef.”
“Yum. Tastes like apple cider.”
I take the empty cup and slide Puff a small plate.
“Next, a wild duck and mushroom pâte served on a fresh bed of baby greens and arugula…
One by one I present each course. Puff eats like a horse, bare-toothed. His appetite is unstoppable. Between bites he chants: “Puff in heaven. Puff in heaven.” I worry that there won’t be leftovers for the guards’ party.
At last maple sweetness fills the air and he’s shoveling his way through the candy cap mushroom dessert. That’s when I make my confession: “Mr. Perkins, I tried to stay your execution. I have friends in Austin and I thought they could get a clemency granted. But they couldn’t. I’m sorry.”
Puff drops his spoon. “Why the hell you do that?”
“So you wouldn’t die, of course.”
“But I wanna die! Been waiting eight years to see Joe Bryd! And this is exactly how I want to go, too, with a belly full of the best food ever cooked!”
I don’t know what to say. I ask Puff if he wants to join me in prayer.
He says no.
“Preacher, you don’t make no sense. I don’t know why you wanted to cook for me like this, and I don’t know why you’d stop my injection after what I did to you. All I can figure is that the good Lord is deep inside you.”
“What you did to me?” I ask.
“Well, not you. Your woman.”
“You know who I am?”
Puff wipes a dab of pots de crème from his charcoal lips. “Won’t never forget. I’m sorry about your Mary. I pray for that woman every night. Heard she was with child, too. Damn shame. I could never be the man you are, Preacher… a forgiving man, a man that don’t take revenge. I had to kill that Turk bastard for taking my son from me, but you, you’re strong. I’m twice your size, but I could never be as strong as you.”
The silence that follows isn’t awkward, it’s music. As I stack the discarded plates and Tupperware back in the bins, Puff rubs his belly, grinning and burping like a sleepy child.
“Good-bye, Puff. God be with you.”
I’m not hungry after watching a man eat like that. I drive home, exhausted. Five messages are waiting for me on my answering machine, all from Peter.
“Where the hell have you been?” Peter shouts when I call him back.
“At Huntsville, had my phone off. What’s up?”
“I got your clemency, that’s what’s up! Two parts expert politicking and one part Miracle of God but the governor signed it. Your boy Judd Perkins is off Death Row. State won’t be killing that one.”
“Thank you, Peter. Can’t tell you how grateful I am.”
I go straight to bed. Funny thing about that night: I don’t recall sleeping that well in years. Slept right through dawn, right through breakfast. If the phone hadn’t rung, I might have slept all the way through lunch.
“Reverend? You coming in today?”
It was the warden at Huntsville calling.
“Thought I’d take a day off after last night,” I reply, my voice all gravel.
“Damn bizarre night, I agree. We got your dishes all cleaned up. Your fancy knife, too.”
“I’ll pick it all up next week, thanks.”
“You got a minute? Dr. Klausner needs to ask you a couple of questions.”
I heard the warden whisper, place his hand over the receiver. Dr. Klausner was the medical examiner for Huntsville. I sat up in bed.
“Morning, Reverend. This is John Klausner, the ME over here. Need to ask you a couple things, procedural stuff.”
“Fire away.”
“I’m trying to nail down the cause of death of one Judd Perkins. From what I can gather-”
“Puff is dead?”
“That’s right.”
“That’s not possible,” I interject. “The attorney general called me last night, the governor granted clemency.”
“That’s right, he did. Perkins never went to the gurney; he didn’t die from injection. He just, well, near as I can figure, he just up and died in his cell last night.”
“Died? How?”
“Not sure. I’m thinking it was the stress of the execution, that and maybe some overeating-”
“You’re not suggesting that my dinner caused him to-”
“No, not at all. The guards ate your leftovers and not one had so much as a bellyache. There was nothing wrong with your food. I heard what you did, pulling strings to try to get the governor to stay the execution.”
“So what happened?”
“Reverend, this inmate had a history of kidney problems. He was a diabetic. I’m just wondering if I should pull a full autopsy and order extra blood work.”
“Maybe you should.”
“Was Perkins complaining of any stomach pains last night?”
“No, nothing. He ate like there was no tomorrow.”
A pause. “For him, there wasn’t.”
“So you gonna run a full autopsy?”
“Not if it’s just kidney failure, which I suspect it is. It’s the warden’s call. It’s his budget.”
I clear my throat. “Doctor, for what it’s worth, Perkins was looking forward to the execution. Speaking strictly as a spiritual counselor, I knew he was prepared, even willing, to die.”
“Thank you, reverend. Can I call you if I have more questions?”
“Sure.”
I hang up the phone and roll back to bed. The sun fills my bedroom with light. I imagine Mary lying next to me, the honeyed taste of her lips, the toasty softness of her body, the smell of her sweet blond hair.
And I can’t help smiling.
Dr. Klausner would never perform a full autopsy. Would cost too much, and nobody cared about old Puff. Even if he ordered advanced blood work, he wouldn’t dream of testing for alpha-amatoxin, not for someone with a preexisting kidney condition.
So he would never conclude that Puff died from mycetism.
That’s what Amanita bisporigera did to you. The destroying angel mushroom was such a gorgeous fungus: plump, round volva for a base, pure white gills, a smooth porcelain cap… truly angelic, sent down from heaven.
Just one bite and within hours came the cramps, then the nausea and delirium, and then death by kidney failure. Not even a bite was required: the destroying angel could easily kill as an emulsified blend in Kombucha mushroom tea.
The empty plastic shot glass is still in my black jacket pocket. I need to dispose of that.
Honey, the soup is ready.
I can picture Mary inventing her quirky phrases… a cleric who kills… a monk who murders. Now I have one, too.
An angel that assassinates.
Doesn’t have the same alliteration, but I know she’ll love it. Funny how angel mushrooms look just like meadows, just like buttons.
I could never tell those damn things apart.
RIP GERBER’S first thriller, Pharma (Random House), was a bestseller in Germany in 2007. His second thriller featuring the Food and Drug Administration will be released by Random House in October 2010. Rip received his biochemical degree from the University of Virginia and his master’s from Harvard Business School. Rip lives in San Francisco, California, and does make a run to the market when asked. Over forty varieties of mushrooms and one hundred cooking terms are mentioned in his story. Happy Hunting!