“What did you ever farm, besides rocks?”
“It don’t matter.”
“I know it doesn’t,” I said. “I think I’ll put in with you.”
He looked at me close, making sure I wasn’t just having some sport with him, then nodded as if it was a settled thing. The wind gusted again, strong enough this time to make the beams creak and settle, and we both looked around uneasily at the padded walls. I think for a moment we could hear William Wharton—not Billy the Kid, not him, he had been “Wild Bill” to us from his first day on the block—screaming and laughing, telling us we were going to be damned glad to be rid of him, telling us we would never forget him. About those things he was right.
As for what Brutal and I agreed on that night in the restraint room, it turned out just that way. It was almost as if we had taken a solemn oath on those tiny bits of colored wood. Neither of us ever took part in another execution. John Coffey was the last.
The Green Mile
The volumes of the serial novel
Volume I: The Two Dead Girls
Volume II: The Mouse on the Mile
Volume III: Coffey’s Hands
Volume IV: The Bad Death of Eduard Delacroix
Volume V: Night Journey
Volume VI: Coffey on the Mile
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Stephen King is the author of more than fifty books, all of them worldwide bestsellers. His recent work includes Mr. Mercedes, winner of the 2015 Edgar Award for Best Novel; Doctor Sleep; and Under the Dome, a major TV miniseries on CBS. His novel 11/22/63—now a Hulu original television series event—was named a top ten book of 2011 by The New York Times Book Review and won the Los Angeles Times Book Prize for best Mystery/Thriller. He is the recipient of the 2003 National Book Foundation Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters and a 2014 National Medal of Arts. He lives in Bangor, Maine, with his wife, novelist Tabitha King.
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Copyright
An imprint of Simon & Schuster, Inc.
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This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real places are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and events are products of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or places or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 1996 by Stephen King
Illustrations copyright © 1996 by Mark Geyer
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First Scribner ebook edition April 2016
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ISBN 978-1-5011-3828-7 (ebook)