Four Blind Mice

sixties or even earlier. Three or four held up signs condemning capital punishment.
    We hurried inside the prison and could still hear the mournful hymns beyond the heavy stone and mortar walls.
    The deathwatch area at Central had four cells lined up side by side and opened to a dayroom with a TV and shower. Ellis Cooper was the only prisoner on deathwatch at that time. Two corrections officers were stationed outside his cell twenty-four hours a day. They were respectful and courteous when we arrived.
    Ellis Cooper looked up as we entered the area and seemed glad to see us. He smiled and raised his hand in greeting.
    “Hello, Ellis,” Sampson said in a quiet voice as we took chairs outside the cell. “Well, we’re back. Empty-handed, but we’re back.”
    Cooper sat on a small stool on the other side of the bars. The legs of the stool were screwed into the floor. The cell itself was immaculately clean and was sparsely furnished with a bed, sink, toilet, and a wall-mounted writing table. The scene was depressing and desperate.
    “Thank you for coming, John and Alex. Thanks for everything that you’ve done for me.”
    “Tried to do,” said Sampson. “Tried and failed. Fucked up is all we did.”
    Cooper shook his head. “Just wasn’t in the cards this time. Deck was stacked against us. Not your fault. Not anybody’s,” he muttered. “Anyway, it’s good to see the two of you. I was praying you’d come. Yeah, I’m praying now.”
    Sampson and I knew that vigorous legal efforts were still proceeding to try to stop the execution, but there didn’t seem much reason to talk about them. Not unless Cooper chose to bring the matter up, and he didn’t. He seemed strangely at peace to me, the most relaxed I’d seen him. His salt-and-pepper hair was cut short, and his prison coveralls were neat and looked freshly pressed.
    He smiled again. “Like a nice hotel in here, y’know.
Luxury
hotel. Four stars, five diamonds, whatever signifies the finest. These two gentlemen take good care of me. Best I could expect under the circumstances. They think I’m guilty of the three murders, but they’re pleasant all the same.”
    Then Cooper leaned into the steel bars and got as close as he could to Sampson. “This is important for me to say, John. I know you did your best, and I hope you know that too. But like I said, the deck against me was stacked so goddamn high. I don’t know who wanted me to die, but somebody sure did.”
    He looked directly at Sampson. “John, I have no reason in the world to lie to you. Not now, not here on deathwatch. I didn’t murder those women.”

Chapter 31
    TWENTY-FOUR HOURS earlier, Sampson and I had signed an agreement to be searched before we entered the execution room. Now, at one o’clock in the morning, sixteen men and three women were led into the small viewing room inside the prison. One of the men was General Stephen Bowen from Bragg. He’d kept his promise to be there. The U.S. Army’s only representative.
    At twenty minutes past one in the morning, the black drapes to the execution chamber were opened for the witnesses. I didn’t want to be there; I didn’t need to see another execution to know how I felt about them. On the order of the prison warden, the lethal-injection executioner approached Cooper. I heard Sampson suck in a breath beside me. I couldn’t imagine what it would be like for him to watch his friend die like that.
    The movement of the technician seemed to startle Ellis Cooper. He turned his head and looked into the viewing room for the first time. The warden asked him if he’d like to make a statement.
    Cooper’s eyes found us, and he held contact. The eye contact was incredibly powerful, as if he were about to lose us as he fell into the deepest chasm.
    Then Ellis Cooper spoke.
    His voice was reedy at first, but it got stronger.
    “I
did not
murder Tanya Jackson, Barbara Green, or Maureen Bruno. I would say so if I did, take this final injection like the man I was trained to be. I didn’t kill the three women outside Fort Bragg. Someone else did. God bless you all. Thank you, John and Alex. I forgive the United States Army, which has been a good father to me.”
    Ellis Cooper held his head up. Proudly. Like a soldier on parade.
    The executioner stepped forward. He injected a dose of Pavulon, which is a total muscle relaxer and would stop Cooper’s breathing.
    Very soon Ellis Cooper’s heart, lungs, and brain stopped functioning.
    Sergeant Cooper