The curtains closed; the death chamber vanished.

Reeva hugged Wallis and Wallis hugged Reeva, and they hugged their children. The door to their witness room opened, and a prison official hurried them through it. Two minutes after the announcement of death, Reeva and her family were back in the van, whisked away with an amazing efficiency. After they left, the Drumm family was escorted through a different door, but along the same route.

Robbie and Keith were alone for a few seconds in the witness room. Robbie's eyes were wet, his face pale. He was thoroughly defeated, drained, but at the same time looking for someone to fight. "Are you glad you watched it?" he asked.

"No, I am not."

"Neither am I."

At the train station, news of Donte's death was received without a word. They were too stunned to speak. In the conference room, they stared at the television, heard the words, but still couldn't believe that the miracle had somehow slipped away. Only three hours earlier, they had been frantically working on the Boyette petition and the Gamble petition, two eleventh-hour gifts from above that seemed so hopeful. But the TCCA rejected Boyette and literally slammed the door on Gamble.

Now Donte was dead.

Sammie Thomas cried softly in one corner. Carlos and Bonnie stared at the television, as if the story might change to a happier ending. Travis Boyette sat hunched over, rubbing his head, while Fred Pryor watched him. They worried about Robbie.

Boyette suddenly stood and said, "I don't understand. What happened? Those people didn't listen to me. I'm telling the truth."

"You're too late, Boyette," Carlos snapped.

"Nine years too late," Sammie said. "You sit on your ass for nine years, perfectly willing to let someone else serve your time, and then you pop in here with five hours to go and expect everyone to listen to you."

Carlos was walking toward Boyette, pointing a finger. "All we needed was twenty-four hours, Boyette. If you had shown up yesterday, we could've searched for the body. We find the body, there's no execution. There's no execution because they got the wrong guy. They got the wrong guy because they're stupid, but also because you're too much of a coward to come forward. Donte is dead, Boyette, because of you."

Boyette's face turned crimson and he reached for his cane. Fred Pryor, though, was quicker. He grabbed Boyette's hand, looked at Carlos, and said, "Let's cool it. Everybody calm down."

Sammie's cell phone buzzed. She glanced at it and said, "It's Robbie." Carlos turned away and Boyette sat down, with Pryor close by. Sammie listened for a few minutes, then laid down the phone. She wiped a tear and said, "The press got it right for a change. He's dead. He said Donte was strong to the bitter end, proclaimed his innocence, did so very convincingly. Robbie's leaving the prison now. They'll fly back and be here around 8:00. He would like for us to wait." She paused and wiped her face again.

The National Guardsmen had just fanned out through the streets around Civitan Park in the white section and Washington Park in the black section when the news hit that Donte had been executed. The crowd in Civitan Park had grown steadily throughout the afternoon, in both size and volume, and it immediately pressed outward toward the guardsmen. The soldiers were taunted, cursed, insulted, a few rocks were thrown, but the violence, seething just under the surface, was suppressed. It was near dark, and there was little doubt that nighttime would see the situation deteriorate. In Washington Park, the crowd was older and made up primarily of neighbors. The younger, rowdier ones headed across town, where trouble was more likely.

Homes were locked, vigils commenced on front porches, and weapons were at the ready. The sentries stepped up their patrols at every church in Slone.

Ten miles to the south, the mood was much merrier at the cabin. Huddled around the television, fresh drinks in hand, they grinned smugly when death was confirmed. Paul Koffee toasted Drew Kerber, then Drew Kerber toasted Paul Koffee. Glasses clinked together. The discomforting hesitation they had felt with that Boyette thing was quickly forgotten. At least for the moment.

Justice had finally prevailed.

Warden Jeter walked Robbie and Keith back to the front of the prison, shook their hands, said good-bye. Robbie thanked him for his thoughtfulness. Keith wasn't sure if he wanted to thank him or insult him--his last-second approval of Keith as a witness had led to a horrific experience--but he was gracious anyway, as was his nature. When they stepped through the front door, they saw where the noise was coming from. To the right, three blocks away, and on the other side of a wall of police and state troopers, students were yelling and waving homemade banners and placards. They were packed together in the middle of a street that had been cordoned off. Beyond them, traffic was backed up. A wave of cars had tried to reach the prison, and when they were blocked, their drivers simply got out and joined the crowd. Operation Detour had planned to choke the prison with people and vehicles, and the plan was working. The goal of preventing the execution had not been reached, but Donte's supporters had at least been mobilized, and they had been heard.

Aaron Rey was waiting on the sidewalk, waving Keith and Robbie over. "We've found an escape route," he said. "This place is ready to blow up." They hurried to the minivan and took off. The driver began darting through side streets, dodging parked cars and angry students. Martha Handler studied Robbie's face, but he did not make eye contact.

"Can we talk?" she asked.

He shook his head no. Keith did the same. Both closed their eyes.

A Huntsville funeral home had the contract. One of its black hearses was inside the Walls Unit, out of sight, and when the last of the witnesses and officials left the death house, it backed to the same gate where the vans had come and gone. A collapsible gurney was pulled out, extended, and rolled inside to the death chamber, where it was wedged tightly next to the bed where Donte lay motionless and unrestrained. The tubes had been removed and recoiled into the dark room where the chemist, still unseen, was filling out his paperwork. On the count of three, four guards lifted the corpse gently and placed it on the gurney, where it was once again strapped, but not as tightly this time. A blanket, owned by the funeral home, was tucked over him, and when all was in place, the gurney was rolled back to the hearse. Twenty minutes after the pronouncement of death, the body was leaving the Walls Unit, through a different route, to avoid the protesters and cameras.

At the funeral home, the body was taken to a prep room. Mr. Hubert Lamb and his son Alvin, owners of Lamb & Son Funeral Home, Slone, Texas, were waiting. They would embalm the body at their place in Slone, on the same table where they had prepared Riley Drumm five years earlier. But Riley had been an old man of fifty-five when he passed, his body shrunken and decayed, and his death had been anticipated. It could be explained. His son's could not. As men who dealt in death, constantly handling corpses, the Lambs figured they had seen it all. But they were taken aback by the sight of Donte lying peacefully on the gurney, his face content, his body undisturbed, a young man of twenty-seven. They had known him since he was a boy. They had cheered for him on the football field and, like all of Slone, expected a long, glorious career. They had whispered and gossiped with the rest of the town when he was arrested. They were stunned by the confession, and quick to believe Donte when he immediately recanted. The Slone police, and Detective Kerber in particular, were not trusted on their side of town. The boy was tricked; they beat a confession out of him, just like in the old days. They watched with frustration as he was tried and convicted by a white jury, and after he was sent away, they, like the rest of the town, half expected the girl's body to show up, or maybe even the girl herself.

With the help of two others, they lifted Donte from the gurney and gently placed him in a handsome oak casket selected by his mother on Monday. Roberta had paid a small deposit--she had burial insurance--and the Lambs were quick to agree to a full refund if the casket became unnecessary. They would have happily forgone the use of it. They had prayed they would not be where they were at that moment--collecting the body, then driving it home, then preparing for a painful wake, memorial, and funeral.

The four men wrestled the casket into the Lamb & Son hearse, and at 7:02 Donte left Huntsville and headed home.

The Fordyce--Hitting Hard! set was in a small "ballroom" in a cheap chain motel on the fringe of Huntsville. Reeva and Wallis were perched on director's chairs and made up for the cameras while Sean Fordyce stomped around in his usual manic mode. He'd just "jetted" in from an execution in Florida, barely made it to Huntsville, but so glad he did because the Nicole Yarber case had become one of his best ever. In preliminary chitchat, as the technicians worked frantically on the sound, the lighting, the makeup, the script, Fordyce realized that Reeva had not yet heard about the appearance of Travis Boyette. She had been inside the prison, preparing for the big event, when the story broke. Instinctively, he decided not to tell her. He would save it for later.

The post-execution interview was the most dramatic segment of his show. Catch 'em just minutes after they've watched the bastard die and they might say anything. He snapped at a technician, cursed a cameraman, yelled that he was ready to go. A final dusting of powder on his forehead, then an instant change of demeanor as he looked at the camera, smiled, and became a man of great compassion. With tape running, he explained where he was, gave the time, the hour, the gravity of the moment, then he walked to Reeva and said, "Reeva, it's over. Tell us what you saw."

Reeva, a Kleenex in each hand--she'd gone through a box since............