Everyone was dead set on hanging the man.
He could hear them outside, gathered afore the jailhouse stoop, the lawyer-man exhorting them to give their verdicts, one by one. "Guilty", they said. "Guilty". And the lawyer-man called on the sheriff to open the door and let them in, to turn the man over to his peers so he could face justice in the shape of a noose.
"Come on out of there, Sheriff!" came the lawyer-man's barrack, and to the man in the cell it seemed impossible to resist such a force of will and convinced righteousness. So the man turned to the sheriff, who held his fate in her hands, the question unasked but dangled there, the silence marred only by the angry voices outside and the scratch of her pen upon the paper.
What was she a-thinkin' she might intend to do?
She sighed once. Looked up from the page at the man, wide-eyed in his cell, him wanting to know and yet not wanting to know. She put her pen down. Tapped the desk once. Twice. And then she spoke.
"Well this is a fine happy-birthday-to-you", she said.
The man blinked. He hadn't known.
"Happy birthday", he spluttered. "Uh... to you."
She held his gaze as outside the lawyer-man hectored on. The light from the torches carried by many of the townsmen flickered through the bars of the windows, and the man searched her stare for knowledge of his fate, for the knowin' of if'n he would he see the dawn or no.
Until she gave him a nod, a curt thank-you, lowered her eyes to the page, lifted up her pen, and began again to write.
"Happy birthday, dear Claire," he whispered, low so's not to disturb her, but loud enough to close the circle in his own mind, as it were. "Happy birthday to you."
He could hear them outside, gathered afore the jailhouse stoop, the lawyer-man exhorting them to give their verdicts, one by one. "Guilty", they said. "Guilty". And the lawyer-man called on the sheriff to open the door and let them in, to turn the man over to his peers so he could face justice in the shape of a noose.
"Come on out of there, Sheriff!" came the lawyer-man's barrack, and to the man in the cell it seemed impossible to resist such a force of will and convinced righteousness. So the man turned to the sheriff, who held his fate in her hands, the question unasked but dangled there, the silence marred only by the angry voices outside and the scratch of her pen upon the paper.
What was she a-thinkin' she might intend to do?
She sighed once. Looked up from the page at the man, wide-eyed in his cell, him wanting to know and yet not wanting to know. She put her pen down. Tapped the desk once. Twice. And then she spoke.
"Well this is a fine happy-birthday-to-you", she said.
The man blinked. He hadn't known.
"Happy birthday", he spluttered. "Uh... to you."
She held his gaze as outside the lawyer-man hectored on. The light from the torches carried by many of the townsmen flickered through the bars of the windows, and the man searched her stare for knowledge of his fate, for the knowin' of if'n he would he see the dawn or no.
Until she gave him a nod, a curt thank-you, lowered her eyes to the page, lifted up her pen, and began again to write.
"Happy birthday, dear Claire," he whispered, low so's not to disturb her, but loud enough to close the circle in his own mind, as it were. "Happy birthday to you."
