"Afraid so. I took a copy of it to Sam about an hour ago, so he's in a foul mood."
"Four weeks," Adam repeated, almost to himself. He glanced at the court's opinion. The case was styled State of Mississippi v. Sam Cayhall. "I guess I'd better go see him, don't you think?" he said without thinking.
"Yeah. Look, Adam, I'm not one of the bad guys, okay?" Lucas slowly eased to his feet and walked to the edge of his desk where he gently placed his rear. He folded his arms and looked down at Adam. "I'm just doing my job, okay. I'll be involved because I have to watch this place and make sure things are done legally, by the book. I won't enjoy it, but it'll get crazy and quite stressful, and everybody will be ringing my phone - the warden, his assistants, the Attorney General's office, the governor, you, and a hundred others. So I'll be in the middle of it, though I don't want to. It's the most unpleasant thing about this job. I just want you to realize that I'm here if you need me, okay? I'll always be fair and truthful with you."
"You're assuming Sam will allow me to represent him."
"Yes. I'm assuming this."
"What are the chances of the execution taking place in four weeks?"
"Fifty-fifty. You never know what the courts will do at the last minute. We'll start preparing in a week or so. We have a rather long checklist of things to do to get ready for it."
"Sort of a blueprint for death."
"Something like that. Don't think we enjoy it.
"I guess everybody here is just doing their job, right?"
"It's the law of this state. If our society wants to kill criminals, then someone has to do it."
Adam placed the court opinion in his briefcase and stood in front of Lucas. "Thanks, I guess, for the hospitality."
"Don't mention it. After you visit with Sam, I'll need to know what happened."
"I'll send you a copy of our representation agreement, if he signs it."
"That's all I need."
They shook hands and Adam headed for the door.
"One other thing," Lucas said. "When they bring Sam into the visiting room, ask the guards to remove the handcuffs. I'll make sure they do. It'll mean a lot to Sam."
"Thanks."
"Good luck."
Chapter 9
THE temperature had risen at least ten degrees when Adam left the building and walked past the same two trustees sweeping the same dirt in the same languid motions. He stopped on the front steps, and for a moment watched a gang of inmates gather litter along the highway less than a hundred yards away. An armed guard on a horse in a ditch watched them. Traffic zipped along without slowing. Adam wondered what manner of criminals were these who were allowed to work outside the fences and so close to a highway. No one seemed to care about it but him.
He walked the short distance to his car, and was sweating by the time he opened the door and started the engine. He followed the drive through the parking lot behind Mann's office, then turned left onto the main prison road. Again, he was passing neat little white homes with flowers and trees in the front yard. What a civilized little community. An arrow on a road sign pointed left to Unit 17. He turned, very slowly, and within seconds was on a dirt road that led quickly to some serious fencing and razor wire.
The Row at Parchman had been built in 1954, and officially labeled the Maximum Security Unit, or simply MSU. An obligatory plaque on a wall inside listed the date, the name of the governor then, the names of various important and long-forgotten officials who were instrumental in its construction, and, of course, the names of the architect and contractor. It was state of the art for that period - a single-story flat roof building of red brick stretching in two long rectangles from the center.
Adam parked in the dirt lot between two other cars and stared at it. No bars were visible from the outside. No guards patrolled around it. If not for the fences and barbed wire, it could almost pass for an elementary school in the suburbs. Inside a caged yard at the end of one wing, a solitary inmate dribbled a basketball on a grassless court and flipped it against a crooked backboard.
The fence in front of Adam was at least twelve feet high, and crowned at the top with thick strands of barbed wire and a menacing roll of shiny razor wire. It ran straight and true to the corner where it joined a watchtower where guards looked down. The fence encompassed the Row on all four sides with remarkable symmetry, and in each corner an identical tower stood high above with a glass-enclosed guard station at the top. Just beyond the fence the crops started and seemed to run forever. The Row was literally in the middle of a cotton field.
Adam stepped from his car, felt suddenly claustrophobic, and squeezed the handle of his thin briefcase as he glared through the chain link at the hot, flat little building where they killed people. He slowly removed his jacket, and noticed his shirt was already spotted and sticking to his chest.
The knot in his stomach had returned with a vengeance. His first few steps toward the guard station were slow and awkward, primarily because his legs were unsteady and his knees were shivering. His fancy tasseled loafers were dusty by the time he stopped under the watchtower and looked up. A red bucket, the type one might use to wash a car, was being lowered on a rope by an earnest woman in a uniform. "Put your keys in the bucket," she explained efficiently, leaning over the railing. The barbed wire on the top of the fence was five feet below her.
Adam quickly did as she instructed. He carefully laid his keys in the bucket where they joined a dozen other key rings. She jerked it back and he watched it rise for a few seconds, then stop. She tied the rope somehow, and the little red bucket hung innocently in the air. A nice breeze would have moved it gently, but at the moment, in this stifling vacuum, there was scarcely enough air to breathe. The winds had died years ago.
The guard was finished with him. Someone somewhere pushed a button or pulled a lever, Adam had no idea who did it, but a humming noise kicked in, and the first of two bulky, chain-link gates began to slide a few feet so he could enter. He walked fifteen feet along the dirt drive, then stopped as the first gate closed behind him. He was in the process of learning the first basic rule of prison security - every protected entrance has either two locked doors or gates.
When the first gate stopped behind him and locked itself into place, the second one dutifully snatched itself free and rolled along the fence. As this was happening, a very stocky guard with arms as big as Adam's legs appeared at the main door of the unit and began to amble along the brick path to the entrance. He had a hard belly and a thick neck, and he sort of waited for Adam as Adam waited for the gates to secure everything.
He eased forward an enormous black hand, and said, "Sergeant Packer." Adam shook it and immediately noticed the shiny black cowboy boots on Sergeant Packer's feet.
"Adam Hall," he said, trying to manage the hand.
"Here to see Sam," Packer stated as a fact.
"Yes sir," Adam said, wondering if everyone here referred to him simply as Sam.
"Your first visit here?" They began a slow walk toward the front of the building.
"Yeah," Adam said, looking at the open windows along the nearest tier. "Are all death row inmates here?" he asked.
"Yep. Got forty-seven as of today. Lost one last week."
They were almost to the main door. "Lost one?"
"Yeah. The Big Court reversed. Had to move him in with the general population. I have to frisk you." They were at the door, and Adam glanced around nervously to see just exactly where it was that Packer wished to conduct the frisk.