The Executioner's Song by Norman Mailer

Author:Norman Mailer [Mailer, Norman]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi, azw3, pdf
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 3

THE SOB SISTER

About the time that all the reporters were finding out they couldn't get an interview with Gary because of those darn prison requirements, Tamera Smith, of the Deseret News, noticed a lot of interest beginning to focus on Nicole Barrett. The word was out that Nicole was seeing Gary every day, so everybody was trying to get to her.

Nobody had been successful, except for a fellow on Channel 5 who talked with Gilmore's sweetheart for a few minutes one night on the air. Tamera thought Nicole was not at her best there. In fact, she looked peaked and worried, like a drenched little bird.

Anyway, a fellow reporter on the Deseret News named Dale Van Atta happened to be complaining how hard it was to get to Nicole, and Tamera said, "I've met her before. Would you like me to try?"

Van Atta looked at her for what she was, girl reporter out of college, and said, "I don't think it will do you any good," but she called the prison, and Nicole happened to be in the Maximum Security visiting room. Tamera wasn't expecting to talk that quickly, and hardly knew what to say, except that Nicole remembered right off who she was, so Tamera said, "I wonder if you'd like to get together and talk a little."

Even on the telephone, Tamera felt the thought go in. Nicole always received things you said very seriously. Even the most casual remark she would take all of the way into herself. It was as if she only trusted herself to give the right answer if she got all of what you laid on her. Now, after a pause, Nicole said she really wouldn't want to talk, but there was something about the way she answered that was encouraging, so Tamera asked if they could do it off the record.

Again, there was the pause, and then Nicole said, off the record, that would be okay, like a hand was taking the record off the turntable.

Tamera said she'd pick her up at the prison.

Out in the parking lot, Tamera was stomping around in the early November snow and shivering, when Nicole came down the walk from Maximum, saw her, gave a nice smile and came over. On the drive, however, Nicole started looking sad again. Soon she mentioned that her grandfather had died, and his funeral was going to be in two days, and then there was this ex-boy friend Kip who had also died just a day or two ago. Now Gary was excited because just this morning he had won in front of the Utah Supreme Court and was probably going to face a firing squad on Monday. It surprised Tamera that Nicole didn't appear upset. She just sat, still and calm, smoking away quietly, one of those people who looked like they really enjoyed a cigarette.

Tamera stopped in Provo to buy Nicole lunch, and they must have talked for a good two hours there at J.B.'s on Center Street, eating Big Boys, and milkshakes.

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