excerpt of CLEARWATER (serial killer of the old west
TWO
He lay still on the cold hard bunk and laced his fingers behind his head so they rested on his dirty black curls. The prisoner stared at the four gray walls that separated him from freedom. A six-by-six foot adobe cell that had barren walls. Solitary confinement was his dungeon. He was segregated from the others.
"A condemned man needed no visitors or other contact with people," he was told by his jailers. The convicted felon had seen no one since his incarceration. But he remembered everyone; the prosecutor, his poor excuse for a public defender, the solemn jury and especially the small, grave, pompous and self-righteous judge.
The judge with a flowing black robe was perched behind a tall bench, like Zeus gazing down from his lofty perch on Mount Olympus at the feeble humans below. And like Zeus, the judge seemed to pierce him with a fiery look, as he brought the gavel down with such a force that a water glass tipped over to the side. The spilled water slowly meandered off the side of the high bench to drip on the hard wooden floor, as the glass continued to slowly spin on top of the bench. His Honor’s imposing figure frowned at the guilty man and sentenced him with a single and final bang of the gavel. The magistrate’s hair and eyebrows were white with age and his mouth seemed forever turned down. It was like being in the mere presence of the condemned was distasteful for him. The judge was a diminutive man and seemed delighted that he could wield his power. Because of his Lilliputian size, he thought it fitting to sit in judgment on anyone of bigger dimensions. Like Gulliver, only this time with the roles reversed. A panel of fellow lawgivers in the Indian Territory appointed the magistrate, on the simple account that no one else wanted the job.
The jurist was a disappointed man doing a disheartened duty. He was last in his class at a college back East.
“At least, there had to be someone last,” he thought. By being last, he did not have the opportunity afforded him by any prestigious law firms. Thus, he was a back-woodsy type doing a back-woodsy type of job in a back-woodsy way. Of such was the law on the frontier in 1879.
The state’s prosecutor was dressed in a fine broadcloth green suit with a vest from which a gold colored watch fob dangled in the front. The short, young and already starting to being bald strutted around in front of the jury box like a feisty bantam game rooster. This barrister had combed over what was left of his hair to cover his balding spot, making it look like a cobweb was placed on his balding pate. He was an up and coming lawyer, who would stop occasionally to take a quick snort of the pungent powder from his silver-looking snuffbox. A new celluloid collar, maroon tie, shiny black boots and an off-white cotton shirt finished out his ensemble. The one thing that stood out was his delicate-looking hands.
These anemic looking hands and his stage voice seemed to mesmerize the jury as he told the exploits of the criminal. He would list the crimes of the defendant in a singsong voice. Then he would shout them louder to reemphasize them. His voice went up and down the scale. One minute, it would be high like a woman’s, the next minute he would drop its volume to a low rumble. Like a violinist, he played on the hearts of the jury. The prosecutor knew just when to pluck the strings and when to slide the bow in a long glide across the stretched catgut. He considered himself a maestro, raising his pasty hands in a crescendo, holding these appendages high and then suddenly dropping them in a climax of some long forgotten piece of music known only to him. 9
The hands were also used to the utmost at his effort of being somewhat an actor. They seemed to flutter in front of the jury, as a bird fluttered in front of a rattlesnake. Constantly moving, never resting, they hovered near the jury box. He would wave them up and down and side to side. Then with a flourish, he would pivot on his feet and as the viper was poised to strike, stand up on his tiptoe and then bring his finger to point at the defendant with finality.
Seeing he had everyone’s attention, he held this poise for a moment. The courtroom was hushed. Quickly, he advanced on the defendant, stopping within paces of where the killer sat. Then the prosecutor, still gesturing with his hands, raised again up on his toes, gave the jury a piercing glance and in a demanding voice asked them for the most severe of punishments.
"Hang him!"
His lawyer seemed to him a poor whimpering fool, as he sat there with downcast eyes and never objected to the theatrics of the prosecutor. Once he started to raise his hand, only to let it fall down in futility. He was better defending a labor dispute or a land contract than to practice criminal law. This mild and meek servant of the law only looked sideways at him and gave a feeble smile.
A jury of twelve men, who were bored with the proceedings, seemed to take all of the prosecutor’s antics in stride as they ho-hummed. They used long fans, pieces of paper and one took swinging his hat to the flying pests. The men were as interested in justice as they were expected to be. All they wanted to do is to get this predetermined trial finished. That way they could hurry home to get on with their drab lives. So, not even retiring to another room, they nodded to their foreman. He, feeling his importance, hurriedly stood and announced the jury had reached a verdict. They had voted unanimously.
"Guilty!"
This is the second novel in Frank P Ryan's acclaimed fantasy series, The Three Powers. The first in the series, The Snowmelt River, is a top ten epic fantasy bestseller on amazon.
TWO
