The Executioner's Song - The Executioner's Song Part 56
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The Executioner's Song Part 56

Hey, I'm allowed to invite five witnesses to my execution, Would like to invite you so I can tell you goodbye in person. Let me know . . .

Gibbs thought: That has got to be a first. I have been invited to Weddings, Birthdays, and Graduations, but I never heard of being invited to an execution.

He wrote back: "If you want me there, I'll be there."

Moody and Stanger were preparing the way for Schiller. To the authorities at the prison, they explained that they were dealing in technical matters out of their own ball field. Tax planning had to be done on Gary's potential earnings from his life story, and incorporated into a will, which made for many complicated factors in the contract.

They were bringing a man named Schiller from California to discuss this with Gary. "He's going in as your consultant?" Moody and Stanger were asked. "Yes," they said, "our consultant." They were telling the truth. Just couching it carefully.

Schiller flew to Salt Lake and drove out to Point of the Mountain early Saturday afternoon. He was full of adrenalin, and scared of blowing it.

The guard picked up a phone and was on it for ten minutes before he let Larry in. To his astonishment, Schiller did no more than pass through two sets of sliding barred doors and there on the other side, not twenty feet down the hallway, in a locked room on the right, was Gilmore looking out a small window. Across the hall, on the other side, in a room with an open door, were Vern and Moody and Stanger, all grinning at him. Now, he could see that Gilmore was smiling, too. They had brought it off.

Vern made the introductions, and Larry sat down with his overcoat on, in the chair Vern had been using, and let the door stay open.

He looked across the ten-foot width of the hall to the room where Gary stood behind a small window, and their eyes locked. Schiller recognized immediately that this man loved to stare into your head.

You had to talk as if he were the only force that existed.

Schiller didn't mind such contests. He always felt a subtle advantage.

He had vision only in one eye. The other person would stare into a flatness of expression in the other eye and wear himself out.

Gilmore, however, had positioned himself behind the small window in such a way that if Schiller leaned to the left, he, in his turn, could also lean to the left and thereby keep the window frame in the same relation to both of them. It was as if he were looking through a pair of sights. Being farther away from the glass, Schiller began to have the feeling that he was in the prison, while Gilmore was outside and free and peering in.

Anyway, Schiller started his rap. He said, in a formal tone, "You obviously know the reason I'm here," indicating by a slight shift of his eye that for all they both knew, the phones were tapped. "Bob and Vern have no doubt told you I am here to consult," he said with a little smile, getting all the benefit out of the word, "here to broach matters concerning your estate and assets and things like that, you know:" Now they each gave a little smile. About that time, a guard came and sat on a bench in the hallway not far away, and Gary said, "No need to worry about him," just as the guard picked up a magazine and started reading. "He," said Gilmore, "is one of the two guys who are with me all the time whether I'm in my cell or outside. Pretty good guys." He said it like the leader of a team who knew the other players are proud to be associated with him. Schiller was surprised to see how ordinary he looked. It was more than a week since he had seen him leave the hospital, and he certainly had a different appearance today. Vern had told Schiller that Gary was on a hunger strike, but there was no way of seeing it. He looked a lot healthier than the last time. And kind of calm.

From what Vern and Moody and Stanger and Boaz had said, Larry was expecting a man replete with intelligence and wit. Instead, here was this fellow who looked like he wouldn't be comfortable in a restaurant with a tablecloth.

Schiller guessed he had fifteen or twenty minutes to get the message across so he talked in a fast, hard rap, never taking his eyes off Gilmore, and not a question was asked that first fifteen minutes, until finally Schiller had to say, "If you want to interrupt me, please do," but Gilmore said, "No, no, I'm listening." Then Schiller branched off into the speech he had given Kathryne Baker and Vern, except he used the word "shit" a lot, and "fuck-up" and "con me," and occasionally, would say, "I had a line run on me." All the while, he watched Gilmore and was wondering where's this guy with the high I.Q.? Schiller had gone completely through the fifteen prepared minutes and had been traveling on improvisation for quite a while before Gilmore finally took his first real cut at the ball and said, "Who's going to play me in the movie?"

Half an hour in. "Who's going to play me in the movie?" To Schiller, it meant: Your wits against mine. "You see," Gary drawled, "there's an actor I like. I can't remember his name, but he was in this movie called Bring Me the Head of Alfredo Garcia and he also did another flick with Sam Peckinpah." "I think," said Schiller, "It's Warren Oates you're talking about."

"Well," said Gilmore, "I really like that guy. I want him to play me." He nodded, still looking right at Schiller and said, "I want, as part of our agreement, that this actor do me in the movie."

Schiller took time to reconnoiter. "Gary," he said, "you've been listening to me, but I don't know much yet about you. There may not be a story here. Let's get a good screenplay before we talk about anything else."

"I think," said Gilmore, "that I would like Warren Oates to play me and I want that as part of the agreement."

"I can't," said Schiller, "make that a part of the agreement. I can't get us involved in a condition that could put us in a straitjacket. Warren Oates might not be available. I might not want Warren Oates. There might be more suitable actors around. Or it might be that a big block of money could be obtained only if we were to take another actor. You are getting into my part of the business now. I have to say 'no' to the idea that Warren Oates is a condition of our agreement!"

Gilmore gave a smile. "Larry, I hate Warren Oates," he said.

"All right," said Schiller, with a big grin. "who do you really want?"

"Gary Cooper," said Gary Gilmore, "I was named after him."

That cracked the freeze. Gilmore looked ready to speak about himself now.

"When you were a kid," asked Schiller, "what did you want to be?"

"A gangster," Gilmore said, "one of the mob." He started talking about how he'd been a little hood as a kid, lifting things here, breaking in there. He and a friend had been in a wild car chase. Took the cops half an hour to catch them. His face lit up as he spoke. He was like a fellow telling you about attractive chicks he'd made it with.

After they had been going about forty-five minutes, Schiller said, "I've told you about myself, and you've told me something about yourself, and I guess we'll have a chance to talk again and make a decision as to whether I can be of service to you."

Gilmore said, "You have a place to go?"

"No," said Schiller," but they won't let me sit here forever."

"Why not?" asked Gilmore. "Stay all night."

"Really?"

"Oh, yeah, Vern and I talk six hours long if we want."

Now, Schiller began to feel how much Gilmore was in control.

From time to time, he would turn to the guard and say, Where's my pills? or, Get me my coffee, and do it in a tone that had no question he was going to get what he wanted. Bring me my coffee, like, Bring me the head of Alfredo Garcia.

When more time went by, however, and the coffee had not arrived, Gilmore abruptly, screamed out: "WHERE'S THE COFFEE?"

Schiller had been able to see a little irritation building, but this really came without warning, a shrill and screeching sound, that showed, so far as Schiller could see, Gilmore's absolute insensitivity to any ugly impression he might leave with Vern or the lawyers. It was like talking to a woman who suddenly starts caterwauling at her kids.

Finally, an attendant in a white uniform brought in some pills, and Gary really cussed the guy out. "You've been keeping me waiting an hour and fifteen minutes," he said. "Don't you know that when I ask for medicine, I am supposed to have it? It's a rule. You people make the rules, then you don't fulfill them." He was so rude, in fact, that Schiller was surprised they did not manhandle him back to his cell. It was amazing how far Gilmore was willing to push it.

His coffee soon followed in a cardboard cup, and he began to rave that he was not supposed to eat out of paper utensils. The regulations called for real crockery. Then, he said to Schiller, "These guys expect me to live by the rules, serve my time by the rules, go to bed by the rules, get executed by the rules, but they bend them all over the place. They break them whenever they want." He went on for a ten-minute tirade, and suddenly, Schiller knew who Gilmore reminded him of: it was Muhammad Ali off on a rant, that same hard, implacable, inhuman voice that Muhammad could turn on and off.

Once Schiller had been in Ali's room in the Hilton Hotel in Manila and had had to sit there for an hour and listen to Muhammad All in a temper, and Gilmore had the same tone. Didn't care what you thought of him. So Schiller said: "You really did kill those two guys, didn't you?" "Of course I did," said Gilmore, almost looking hurt, "you know that." And then Schiller said, "You killed them," as if to say there was a difference between killing somebody in a rage, and being a cold-blooded killer who only had to throw a little switch in himself. Gilmore was in the second category. He could kill you because you gave him coffee in a paper cup.

That took a lot of warmth out of the conversation. Schiller knew it was time to back off, so he said, "Vern, anything you want to say?" and Vern got on the phone for a couple of minutes. When Schiller figured it was cool again, he said, "Look, Gary, it's dinnertime. Want me to come back afterwards?" And Gilmore said, "Yeah, oh yeah. We'll sit here all night and talk." He had gotten over his chill. Schiller went out thinking, Boy, what I'll be able to do with this guy. He's a great subject for an interview.

As the interview went on and on, Moody and Stanger began to worry over being discovered and professionally embarrassed. They weren't above a little prodding to get Schiller out, but Gary wanted to keep talking. Obviously was enjoying himself. Since the lawyers could only hear Schiller's end of it, they had no real idea what Gary was saying.

Then they began to worry that he might be spilling his guts and giving Schiller the story without a contract or anything. Gary had certainly lit up. It was the first time Moody had ever seen him enthused about anything. It confirmed his feeling that Schiller was a good choice, but they were also wide open for an end run. If Schiller was getting tons of material, he might want to double-cross them.

In the restaurant, Schiller kept asking if this is the way Gary acted all the time. Everybody started saying, "Man, he's never talked to anybody the way he talked to you." Schiller didn't know if they were saying that to stroke him, but Vern said quietly, "I think he really likes you." So, Schiller's confidence was building. When they went back he started talking to Gary about a number of subjects, only the conversation hadn't gone fifteen minutes when there was an interruption on the phone, and a long conversation between Moody and somebody at the other end. The Warden or the Assistant Warden.

Schiller was terminated.

Gary was very upset. Kept asking, "Who said that? Who gave the order? He's on my lawyer's team. He's allowed to be here." Schiller said, "Don't worry about it, Gary, we'll have plenty of time." Then Moody got up and said, "Here, Gary, is the contract we've discussed."

They held up this long piece of paper and started reading the money figures over the telephone, and Gary said, "Yes, have the thing typed up. I'll look it over again and sign it."

After the lawyers and Schiller had left, Gary asked Vern, "In your opinion, is he the right fellow?" Vern said, "I don't know just exactly yet, but I think he is."

"What about Susskind?" asked Gary, and answered himself. "I feel like Mr. Schiller is the one. I like his way of doing business."

That Saturday night and Sunday morning, Schiller worked with Moody and Stanger doing the contracts, making the changes, bringing in secretaries, working the goddamn computer typewriters. The lawyers didn't go to church, and there was a lot of kidding about that.

But by Sunday afternoon, the contracts were drawn, and Schiller went back in his motel to wait for the signing.

About then, Boaz called Susskind collect. He always called collect.

Susskind said, "Don't you even have a phone?" Dennis giggled.

"No, look," said Susskind, "you've gone too far. I don't know what you've done, but you're out and other men are in. You have no more rights in this matter." "Oh, yes," said Boaz, "it can't be done without me."

"Oh," said Susskind, "it can, and it will. But it isn't going to be done by me." "Listen," said Dennis, "maybe I'm no longer the lawyer in the case, but I have a few documents and I got . . ." Susskind decided he was raving. "You are a poseur," he said, "and a liar and a flaky man. I think you're a very nasty person. Don't ever call me again, collect or otherwise." Things had certainly ended up on an extremely sour note, rancid.

Moody and Stanger got a little rest, and then went up to the prison late Sunday afternoon. Talking on the telephone across the hall, they went through the terms of the contract. Gary didn't want many changes and it was only when they discussed access to his letters that he became angry. He scratched out the clause with his pen and wrote on the contract that no such access was granted until he had spoken to Nicole. The attorneys tried to argue. "You don't have anything to say about it," Moody told him, "they're Nicole's letters now."

"Well, goddammit," said Gary, "they are not going to be read until I give my consent."

All the while, Schiller was waiting in his room. He sat in that motel until 3 A.M. Monday morning, waiting for them to call. Even phoned the prison to discover they were not there. So, he called Moody's home and woke him up. They'd been back for hours. Back, in fact, since eight-thirty in the evening. It just never occurred to them that he was waiting. All the while he'd been going through desperate scenarios in his head.

Big Jake came back to the tank with a large jar of instant coffee, a large jar of Tang, and a carton of Gibbs's brand of cigarettes, Viceroy Super Longs. He told Gibbs that Gary had asked Vern Damico to drop them off at the jail. Also a message: Geebs, all of a sudden, i've become rather rich if you need anything, you just have to ask. Gibbs figured Gary had sold his life story to somebody. He sat down and made a cup of Tang.

Boaz called Susskind one last time. It wasn't collect. "I told you," said Susskind, "I don't want to talk to you." Boaz said, "I got a whole new angle, I want to do my story." "Boaz," said Susskind, "you're crazy." "No," said Dennis, "the real great story is my own. It's a great story," Dennis repeated. "I've kept notes." "Please, please," said Susskind, "go see Mr. Schiller. I'm sure he'd love to do it."

Next day, Gibbs received an index card in an envelope.

On it, Gary had written an invitation: BANG!.

BANG!.

A real live Shoot'em up!

Mrs. Bessie Gilmore of Milwaukie, Ore cordially invites you to the execution of her son: Gary Mark Gilmore, 36 Place: Utah State Prison. Draper, Utah Time: Sunrise EARPLUGS AND BULLETS WILL BE FURNISHED.

With the card, came a letter.

I'm going to be giving away a lot of money shortly. Would like to give you about (2000) two thousand. Please don't say no. Accept it in the manner I give it to you, as a friend. I might as well give some of my money to you, cause if I don't, I'll just give it to someone else.

PART THREE.

The Hunger Strike

Chapter 11.

THE PARDON.

Earl Dorius was into an awfully tricky matter. The prison wanted to know whether they could break Gilmore's hunger strike and make him eat. These days, force-feeding was considered equal, legally, to forced medication, and there had been a Supreme Court decision in 1973 that said you had to have the consent of the prisoner.

There were, however, recognized exceptions. Earl wrote a letter to Warden Smith which emphasized that prisons had to preserve order and could not be a part of any suicide attempt. "It would be a serious abuse of discretion to allow an inmate to starve to death" Earl concluded that the prison physician had "legal authority to order the force-feeding."

Earl contacted the press and some of the local news stations to tell them he was issuing the opinion. Fully expected it would be the big Gilmore story of the day and was frankly looking forward to it. His letter to Sam Smith had involved considerable research which he felt had good reasoning attached, but it all got swallowed. Holbrook, from the Salt Lake Tribune, called on this same afternoon to give an hour's notice: the Trib was going back to Judge Ritter to try again for a temporary restraining order against the no-interview rule for Gilmore.

Earl was frustrated. He had fully intended to find fresher material than good old Pell v. Procunier. However, the force-feeding issue had taken up his working hours. Whereas, the Trib came in well prepared. Judge Ritter granted the temporary restraining order. The Tribune would be able to send a journalist out to talk to Gilmore this very day.

Schiller was at the prison when the reporter got there, and it all came as a surprise. He was in the middle of interviewing Gary, and had just started to talk about the cover story in Newsweek. By that route, Schiller figured he could learn whether Gilmore had a real interest in publicity. So he mentioned a couple of verses Newsweek had quoted Gary as writing, and remarked that the poetry was pretty good. Gary laughed. "It's a poem by Shelley called 'The Sensitive Plant,' " he said. "Dammit, Schiller, that's real stupidity on the part of Newsweek. Anyone who recognizes the poem is going to think I was pretending to write it myself."

Later, Schiller thought he must have sensed he would not be able to talk to Gary much longer, because he brought up a touchy subject even though it was his principle to save hardnosed matters for last. No use cutting off an interview by an impertinent question.

Schiller's temper, however, was not always to be controlled and so he found himself saying, "Why did you stipulate in the contract that I can't have your letters to Nicole? She's in the hospital. You know I can't reach her."

"Schiller," said Gary, "that goddamned Dr. Woods is keeping me from calling her. Won't even let me write a letter. I've gone on a hunger strike to dramatize that I am being kept away from the one person in the world who I truly care about. So I put that clause into our contract." He looked right at Schiller. "I can see you're a go-getter. You are going to get Woods to allow me to communicate with Nicole. I don't care if you bribe him, but, man, until I talk to her, you get no letters, okay? Let's say I'm putting the hook into you."

It wasn't altogether surprising to Schiller. He had thought from the beginning that Gilmore's hunger strike was not begun in despair, but as a way to make Gilmore the dealer. He had been adept, Schiller had heard, at getting convicts to riot over at Oregon State Penitentiary, and did it on more than one occasion. Of course, he had been in that joint for twelve years, more than long enough to belong to one or another convict clique. Whereas here he might be a celebrity, but the question was whether he could extend his strike from himself to ten men or fifty. Gary could be a killer, and even considered crazy, but who would fear him on Death Row when he had no contacts or loyal friends in the place? Schiller wondered if money and publicity were spoiling Gary's judgment. So far, nobody had joined the strike.

Just then the guards came in with the news. Gus Sorensen of the Salt Lake Tribune was outside, holding Judge Ritter's order. The prison had to let him in. Sorensen could interview Gary Gilmore.

A rocket went off in Schiller's head but he never blinked. "All right," he said to Moody and Stanger, "let Gary talk. Maybe it can help our public posture. Our stance is that we are not here to watch a man die, but to come to understand him." He walked down the hall and met Sorensen as soon as the man emerged from the gate, introduced himself, said, "Mr. Sorensen, I can tell Gilmore not to talk to you, but that's not my interest." It certainly wasn't. Schiller was not looking to alienate the Salt Lake Tribune. A pipeline into the biggest local paper could enable him to affect the output on the AP and UP stories. Besides, Sorensen was considered the leading crime reporter in the State of Utah. He could be useful for background on the prison.

Still, Schiller wanted to avoid certain hazards. How could he know what Gilmore would choose to give away? If the fellow decided to commit suicide, any casual interview could end up being Gary Gilmore's last words. So it was a matter of setting up some ground rules.

He could hear Sorensen on the phone saying, "The guy bought Gilmore's rights. He's not letting me talk unless he's there." All the while, Schiller was sweating. That morning he had delivered a check for $52,000 to Vern. If Gary felt like double-crossing him this afternoon and telling all to Sorensen, there would not be much he could do. Schiller was gambling that Gilmore would not throw over the situation for the sheer pleasure of it. Meanwhile, he could hear Sorensen saying, "Well, I don't know. Heard good things and bad about Schiller." Larry got on the phone and said to Sorensen's editor, "Look, I'm not interested in stopping the press. I have no objection to Mr. Sorensen speaking to Gary. I just want, since we hold the rights, to make sure your copyright to Mr. Sorensen's interview reverts back to us." That meant the editor had to call the Tribune's lawyer. While that was going on, Schiller spoke to Gary, and said, "This can work to our advantage. When you talk to Sorensen, don't get into the murder. Talk about the prison the way it is now, day to day, or the reasons for your hunger strike. If I think you're giving away something of great value to you, I'll rub my chin. So long as I don't, it's okay to answer the question. Mainly, don't give a lot about your personal life. That's what the world is interested in, Gary."

Schiller sat next to Sorensen during the interview, but there was only one phone. He couldn't hear what Gilmore was saying. After Sorensen asked his first few questions, however, Schiller decided the man was a classic newspaper reporter. Not looking for insight about Gary's inner life. Just a few paragraphs that the headline writer in the newsroom could clap intriguing words on. Besides, you could probably trust Gary. The fellow was looking for his cues.

After Sorensen finished, he and Schiller went out through the barred gates from Medium Security to the administration foyer, and there, in the small cramped dirty lobby, under the fluorescent lights, it seemed as if every fucking journalist in Salt Lake had crammed into the place. They were all screaming at once. Sorensen, they knew, Sorensen had just interviewed Gilmore. But Schiller was giving them a hard-on. "Who are you, who are you?" they kept asking, and Gus Sorensen-Schiller could bless him-didn't say a word, payment of loyalty right on the spot. Schiller understood, however, that he was in real trouble. There had to be people in the crowd who knew him. He could feel whispers circulating. Finally, one reporter said, "Come on, Larry, you bought Gilmore's story, didn't you?"

Schiller was trying to figure the angles. If he kept denying it, by tomorrow, he would be nailed. Don't get journalists cocked like hunting dogs. In twenty-four hours, they would have the story, and never forgive him. It looked like a toe dance of pure evasion was called for.

Dumbo the elephant, high on his toes, said Schiller to himself, and side-stepped to the left, side-stepped to the right. "What are you here for?" they asked, and he said, "I'm a consultant for estate affairs." Journalists who knew him hooted.

He'd have to give some version of the truth, Schiller decided.

Something vague and dull, not eminently printable. "Oh," he said finally, "I've acquired the rights for a potential four-wall motion picture production." Maybe that was far enough over the horizon so they wouldn't see him as the man getting exclusive stories from Gilmore.

But the voice in his head remarked, "Should have told them 'No comment,' "The computer back of his eyes was ringing every alarm bell.

Moody and Stanger were aghast. "Well," whispered Moody, "Schiller just blew us out of the saddle." "Estate Consultant" next to "Hollywood producer" was going to baste their goose right here at the prison. Stanger said, "That son of a bitch double-crossed us. He wants to get his own story across."

DESERET NEWS.

Carnival Atmosphere Surrounds Gilmore Movie Deal Weighed Nov, 29-In a circus-like atmosphere at the Utah State Prison, Monday, night, the news media, lawyers, literary agents and movie producers milled about discussing interviews, and movie and story deals.

When he saw Schiller on the TV news that night, Dorius was outraged. He called Utah State and gave one of the Deputy Wardens hell. "I've been working my fanny off to keep the Tribune out: Here," he said, "you let a Hollywood producer in."

Earl saw nothing but endless cases ahead. One newspaper after another, TV stations, radio stations all bringing lawsuits. Ritter would probably open the prison to everybody. Even if Dorius appealed each of his decisions to the Tenth Circuit in Denver, it was time-consuming to get litigation up to the next tier. Could take as long as a year. All the while, reporters would be running rife through the prison. There was no telling what Gilmore would say once he found himself able to talk to the press.