The Day They Hanged My Best Friend Jimmy

My heart pounded the day the executioner put the thick ugly rope around Jimmys' neck. It was an awful sight to behold. As I watched in utter horror, the crowd around me threw stones at him. I was the only one in the eager crowd of towns people who cared for Jimmy. I cared dearly for my friend of only a few short years.

The sinister man of evil death wore a black hood. Two holes exposed his loathing maniacal eyes. I just knew the man who hid behind the mask relished horror and violence. No ordinary human would have been up to the task at hand. As he checked the rope to make good and sure that it was properly looped around Jimmys' throat, I had visions of attacking the executioner and saving Jimmy from ultimate destruction.

As the last rites were read to my best friend, I could feel the adrenaline flowing crazily through my tortured veins. The visions were not just mere fantasy... they were very real. I was going to save Jimmy from the hangman's' vile noose. I had my handgun ready and I waited and waited for just the right moment to make my move. I had heard countless tales about the old American West, where just at the precise time... A doomed individual was saved by a friend or group. I had a plan and in my heart I knew that if anyone was to save Jimmy... that it would be me. No other person in the crowd of thousands was about to do what I was going to do.

Jimmys' hopes were as dimmer than a dead horsefly at night. Only I could spare his life. If I died trying than so be it!

Jimmy and I grew up together. We used to throw stones across the water. We would skip stones until our hands were weak. We used to make bets. We always wondered who could skip a stone through the waves and make it glide the furthest. Jimmy had a low I.Q. His intelligence was much lesser than mine. He was deaf and dumb, as they called it in those days. I was the only one who hung around little Jimmy. His parents abandoned him when he was eight, and thorugh fate, I met him at a home for delinquent boys.

Our friendship was now ending the way it had begun... with stones. The stones we hurled as young children were for toying around with and bouncing off the water. On the day of the scheduled execution they took on an entire new meaning, as they bounced off of his head. Some of the stones were of horrendous size. I feared the mob of peasants were going to kill him before I could make my heroic move to spare his life.

Jimmy had no reason to be at the home for delinquent boys, other than the fact that his parents could no longer control him. He stayed out late at nights as his mother had stated in a letter she sent to Mr. Burl, the head of the home for bad boys.

I had read the letter and it was very saddening. We were in the home because we were bad apples. We were thieves. We wrecked peoples properties. We hated society. All of us deserved to be there, with the exception of little Jimmy. He was a good kid.

I myself was in the home because I had put another child my age in the hospital. I was 12 when I was sent to the boys home, for putting Keagan Mills in a coma. I would have been in deeper trouble if he had died when I had hit him over and over again with a softball bat. Fortunately he lived. The last report I heard however, was that he is still in a coma on a life support system. His extremely wealthy family awaits his miraculous awakening. If the Mills family had been dirt poor, it is a definite possibility that I would have faced murder charges.

Anyhow, my point is that Jimmy was not like us guys. He was sent to the bad boys home because his family did not want him. The letter was the final time that Jimmy had heard from his mother and father. They sent a family photo to Jimmy, and Mr. Burl had showed Jimmy the photo, and read him the letter. Mr. Burl tried to explain that his family wanted him no more. He had told me in confidence that he figured Jimmy did not understand the significance of the letter from home. So he had asked me to try to explain it to Jimmy. I asked him for the letter and photo of the family and assured him that I could get through to Jimmy.

Jimmy and I had our own gestures and sign language. For some reason Jimmy always understood me, as he understood no other person. I brought the letter to Jimmy, along with the picture. I cut Jimmy out of the picture with a pair of sharp scissors and I burned the photo of the rest of his family to a crisp. As the picture burned into flames, Jimmy wept. I then lit the letter on fire and both Jimmy and I watched it burn to a crisp as well. I went back to Mr. Burl and told him that Jimmy now understood the situation.

As time went on Jimmy began to realize that I was his best friend, and he mine. While in the home for bad boys, I had showed Jimmy pictures of naked women. (that I had taken out of Mr. Burls' desk) I assured him in our animal type language that I would set him up with a woman whenever we got out of the home and went out on our own.

I showed him a map of Ontario as well. It took me quite some time to get through to him, but finally I did. Using grunting noises and finger pointing gestures, I pinpointed various spots on the map. I explained to him that we were going to move to Toronto as soon as we were released. I growled and grunted in our peculiar way of communicating, and he had assured me that he fully understood. I still recall him making a hole with one hand, while sticking the pointing finger of his other hand in and out to let me know that he comprehended having sex with a female. He always snickered and smiled when he moved his left hand finger in and out of the opening in his right hand. Like a squeaking spider monkey, I would giggle back at him. He was so happy to have a friend like me who was going to get him a female.

On my16th birthday I was finally released into regular society. There were no more curfews or rules, with the exception of the rules of the bigger world. It was June 17th, 1923, when they let me go out on my own. The general idea was that I would get a job right away. Then I was to contact Mr. Burl when I got firmly planted on my feet. He would then release Jimmy into my sole custody. I went to Toronto and found it easy to land a job. However, I also found it easy to drown my sorrows in a bottle after bottle of whisky.

My first job was at a factory making knives. I found I could make more money stealing the knives and selling them on the street, than slaving over a machine for 14 hours. Increasingly I was late for work and wasn't showing up most of the time. I was on a constant drunk. Finally the boss fired me.

I sent Mr. Burl a forged letter from a fake company. He figured I was working, when in actuality I was not. I was breaking into homes and taking everything that I could possibly get my hands on. I was also robbing stores with a gun and mask. Mr. Burl sent a letter back, asking me to come to Sudbury to pick Jimmy up. I stole a car out of a downtown parking lot and was on my way.

Jimmy was glad to see me and I was glad to see him. (We were so overjoyed to see each other.) For 8 long years we were together everyday at the home. It had been many months since we had barked, grunted, and made animalistic noises together.

Little Jimmy even made the sex sign I had showed him using both of his hands. He snarled, smiled, burped, and even laughed like a circus clown when he made the sex sign. He knew his best friend in the whole world was going to get him a woman... as soon as we arrived in Toronto.

Mr. Burl asked about the car I was driving. I told him my job could afford me a loan at the bank, and that the car although expensive would be paid off soon. Jimmy and I drove off into the sunset as Mr. Burl waved goodbye. Mr. Burl appeared to be relieved to get rid of little Jimmy. I am quite positive that he was more than overjoyed to see what other kids called "the dumb-dumb" leave.

We made it to Toronto in fifteen days, after leaving Sudbury. The trip could have been done in less time. However, I was robbing stores of all their cash on our way to Toronto. When we made it to my rundown room, I told Jimmy that this was his home, as well as mine. Jimmy liked it very much and he never once complained about sleeping on the rat infested floor. It became tough at times fending for ourselves, but I had taught Jimmy how to catch rats in a trap, as well as skin them and eat them.

I never ate a long tailed creature in my life, but Jimmy ate all kinds. He actually liked them. I also taught him to go to the park and feed the hungry pigeons. Then nab them really fast and fire them in a bag. Jimmy learned how to skin and cook pigeons as well. He learned so well how to fend for himself that he was bringing home cats and dogs. Soon he was even cooking up cockroach stew. He enjoyed the food. Yet, found it hard to believe that I did not have the same taste as him when it came to eating. If poor little Jimmy had only known, that I just could not afford to feed him. Especially with my drinking and drug habit.

One day while I was looking at a dirty magazine, Jimmy informed me of my promise to get him a girl. He became overly upset with me that day and decided to sleep in the alleyway below our window for three days. I would open the old wooden window and yell in our special language to come back up to the dingy small room. He would give me the thumbs up sign, which in our language meant no. After three days in the bitter frozen cold sleeping only on a bed of ice, he half heartedly returned. I assured him that I would get him a beautiful female soon, just like in the photographs.

He bothered me and bothered me for months. I was blowing all my money on liquor and opium... and my promise though genuine, was never granted. Every time I looked at him and thought about getting him a prostitute, I quickly thought about my own needs for opium and liquor. The girls I was screwing would not touch Jimmy no matter how much I pleaded with them. They told me he was not a handsome man and that his face was ugly. They always added the fact that he smelled like a sewer dweller. I tended to agree with the females. However, I really did try to persuade them more than enough times to take Jimmy on. We had sex under, as well as above the covers so that Jimmy could at least watch and see how it was done, and perform miracles on himself.

Jimmy bothered me for what seemed forever with his prick in the pussy hand gestures. It was beginning to eat at my conscience. It was becoming a living nightmare for me. I even began to loathe the promise I had made to him. However, a promise is a promise and after months and months of ongoing nagging, I finally gave in. I knew that the time had arrived for me to fulfill the promise I had made to him so many years previous.

I still remember the day I decided to get little Jimmy a female to love and cherish. I was in a drunken and opium state of mind. Jimmy had come to me with a mud splattered girlie magazine and grunted that he wanted one. He was going wild with his hand gestures. The burden I carried everyday had to cease. I could not stand the snorting noises and hand movements anymore. It was all too much for me. If I did not get him a women, I would have had to sign myself into the nuthouse. I had to get the baby... a candy... so to speak... or it would whine forever, and ever within the confines of my hallucinigenetic brain.

I had no money whatsoever. However, I came up with a splendid idea. Jimmy and I would go out of town in the stolen car and I would find him a women. Finally he was happy. Finally I was regaining some of my sanity.

We went to the town of New Market, which was north of Toronto and not much of a distance away. I lured a beauty queen into the car for Jimmy. She was 19 years old and liked the idea of going for a drive in the car.

I told her I owned the car and that my parents were very well to do. When she asked me my age I lied and told her I was 21... as I did look 21... even though I had just turned 18.

I told her that Jimmy was my younger brother and that I would pay her some money to take him for a walk as I was terribly tired. I told her that Jimmy really liked the woods and wanted to go hiking, but I was just too tired to bring him on a venture into the woods. Despite the lies and bullshit... this hot blonde with perfect teeth and a perfect body to match fell for the ploy. I'm not sure if she was a dumb blonde or just a stupid one, however I do know that she was a very naive one.

We drove to a wooded area in New Market. It was a lonely rocky road. I pulled over to the side of the road and it wasn't long after the dust settled that I pretended to be dozing off. The kind 19 year old started into the woods with Jimmy. There was still some daylight, even though the sun was starting to slip away from the horizon. I watched through the corner of my wicked eye as she brought Jimmy into the bushes.

There was a trail that went around a mucky swamp. I could hear the girl giggling as she invited him to follow her through the labyrinth of twisted tree branches, sky high green grass and other obstacles in their path. When they were out of view, I jumped out of the car and started following them through the woods. I hurried up behind them, and soon they both came into full view.

Everything was happening at speeds which seemed faster than light... I heard the terrible screams of the girl. Jimmy was tearing her clothes off... (as I had taught him.) It was a lonely wooded area where the perverse could take place without anyone hearing the hideous screams of the girl. Soon he was fondling her... (as I had instructed him.) She tried her best to slither away from his monster sized frame, but to no avail.

Little Jimmy, (as we called him for fun) was a big boy. He was 6 feet 8 inches in height and weighed 455 pounds. It was a disgustingly horrid scene on the one hand and a pathetic scene on the other. However, more than anything, I was overjoyed to see Jimmy finally have his way with a woman.

I watched and watched as little Jimmy raped and abused the girl. I wished that it would have never had to come down to this, but little Jimmy was always pestering me and I just did not have the money to get him a prostitute. Then he did something that he should not have done... (EEEEEeechAH, OH, NO GOD)

Jimmy put both of his giant sized hands around her neck and began strangling her. I hurried towards both of them. I tried to take his monster sized hands off of her neck by grabbing his elbows. It was impossible to stop Jimmy. I watched his unsightly sharp fingernails pierce her skin. Just like a lion claws its' prey. The blood squirted from ten different holes in her neck. I knew in my heart of hearts that she was ready to die, even though a few nerves in her legs were twitching. Jimmy had brutally mutilated and mangled the girl so terribly bad, that it was just a matter of time... She never stood a chance of surviving the pure brute force of a man the size and strength of Jimmy. I'll never forget it. It was so frightening. It was fierce, and all of a sudden. His grotesque personality just took over. A dark side of him that I had never seen before was unleashed within the blink of rattlesnakes bite. I guess he had alot of pent up anger inside of him that I never knew about...

Whatever prompted him to murder her, I'll never know. He had always been a gentle giant. Indeed he killed animals, but he was always such a good hearted fellow towards other human beings. As the memories flow back, I can picture Jimmy starting to skin her with his knife. Oh, it just makes me quiver to the bone. What a dreadful sickening scene. It has haunted me for a lifetime.

I recall pointing towards the road and he grunted through his massive hairy nostrils in his bulging nose. He knew that I would meet him at the car. When I approached the car, I noticed a police vehicle nearby in the distance. I hoped beyond hope that they would pass by, as they came towards my parked Ford. However, my luck had finally come to an abrupt and bygone conclusion. The cops stopped and both officers got out of the police car. They asked me for my license and registration. I had neither. I knew the jig was up.

It was almost totally pitch dark. The cooing of owls could be heard on the shadow filled road. The summertime crickets could also be heard. The relaxing slurping sounds of a nearby brook were wonderful music to the ears as well. I even vividly recall frogs beautifully groaning from the bog.

It was a strange sensation to know that Jimmy was in the woods and the cops were in the vicinity of an extremely horrific slaying. I prayed that they would take me away before they saw Jimmy emerge all blood drenched.

Then, out of what seemed to be the definite vibrations of hell, I could hear Jimmy screaming horribly. It was a strange scream... but never the less... a loud scream of triumph and slaughter. Again... and again... the earsplitting hellish echoes overwhelmed natures pleasant sounds. The noises did not seem to be coming from Jimmys' lungs... but rather from the innermost insides of a possessed demon. Was Satan within Jimmys' soul? I'll never know... but the sounds were surely something I had never heard in any of our primitive conversations or rituals.

Both police officers turned on their flashlights and aimed their lights towards the woods. What we all saw that day, is almost beyond words. Jimmy was walking out of the woods with the nude dead body of the girl. He was smiling a pleasant smile. I am not sure if my heart rate increased or decreased, but I know I almost fainted...

Her entire skin had been removed. The skin was later retrieved amongst the branches of the highest trees. Pieces of skin and flesh were so far up into the braches of the many trees, that two sorry saps somehow stumbled from the highest branches and were found dead on the ground. Both sported many injuries and awful lacerations.

I was charged and found guilty of stealing a car and was sent to prison for 4 months. Jimmy was tried for murder, and sentenced to hang...

As I watched the noose tighten upon little Jimmys' neck, I said a prayer for him. I'll never forget that rainy, cold, and windy day in New Market Ontario. 1926 is numerous memories away from today, but I can still see the reality of it all within my mind. I was frozen with grief and inner turmoil.

I grasped the gun which was hidden in my jacket pocket, but for whatever reason which I am ashamed to admit, yet still without words to explain... I could not force myself to try and save him from certain death. I wanted to save him from the devils grasp. I desperately wanted to save him from the clutches of hell, but I just stood there... feeling like an invisible man.

The defense had tried everything to save little Jimmys' life. All appeals failed. The entire trial and everything was totally exhausting to go through. I was a star witness for the crown. I still remember telling the court how little Jimmy said he had to go take a pee in the woods and how I was horrified to see him coming out of the woods with the murdered girl. I made sure the jury also knew that I had never seen her before.

I even told the court the story about why we were going to New Market... which was to look for work on a potato farm. I told the court everything they wanted to know and answered all questions to the best of my ability. Worst of all... it was me who convinced the judge that Jimmy was sane enough to face a trial, as long as he had me translating for him...

Geez, as much as I hated too, I even fired muddy stones at little Jimmy, before he was finally hung to his death. I had no other choice. I had to throw a few stones just to make sure that the maddening crowds would not harm me. (They were terribly angry)

It was revolting as well as haunting to see him hang there by an executioners knot with a broken neck. It was even more haunting to join in with the vibrant crowd and spit in his pale dead face while his eyes swelled far out of their gruesome sockets...

...And as I sit here writing, 40 years after the extinction of my best friend; I await my own piece of twisted thick rope. The chair is waiting for me to stand on... the rope is tied just right... for me to gently put around my neck...

I hear unheard symphonies of disorder... and fragments of musical imagination... As well as... Twisting melody chords of contagion... Dramatically forging their way through... Like shrieking whistles of steamships, Bubbling forever... In a prehistorical stew...

The trumpets, pianos and saxophones remind me of days once gone... To be back communicating with Jimmy, is where I drastically belong...

I know that these creepy sounds are just hopeless cries of ancient sorrows reverberating within my imaginative taciturn mind.

Because, there are real sounds louder than thunder in this mental institution...

Here amongst the futile shrieking of this slum I call home... Inside of this insane asylum with billions of secrets untold...

There is plenty of unrest...

...And too many peculiar activities and somber rituals to even begin mentioning,

As I prepare to die...

Without self protest...
I begin to stand as I write these final words... My limelight future is ready to unfold...

It is time to see little Jimmy again in the afterlife... it is time to apologize to little Jimmy... I must stop writing now and proceed to my death...

The rope is waiting for my neck to arrive...

Goodbye wicked world

Signed Wendalas Morton August 19th, 1966 2:05am

© Copyright 2004 Barry J. Gillis

www.barryjgillis.com