Hung

Story by Ceeb on SoFurry

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Go figure that my first upload after getting my dog repaired is some really dark, niche shit that 10 people will read, 2 people will enjoy, and 15 people will unwatch me over. <:3 This is the writer thug life!

A commission for anonymous, who wanted a story of a mare getting executed and having a good ol' wank before her big day. Anon couldn't decide between a hanging or a beheading; I said por que no los dos? because you can actually be decapitated by a rope if you're too heavy. I knew my useless, edgy trivia would come in handy one day!

I have some normal, not-snuff dickgirl smut coming in the next day or two. :V

Thumbnail background is from Textures.com.

Writing (C) me


--December 17th, 1908

Fire crackled in the fireplace. On its mantle were a series of certifications in gilded frames. Honorable Judge Irene Blake is hereby appointed Judge of Small Pond, Montana began one particularly fancy-looking piece of parchment. Another one was the judge's diploma from a prestigious law school. Others were equally dry documents, dull as the cobwebs flapping in the warmth above the fire, and Melissa "Mel" Thatcher wanted to throw every single one of them into the fireplace - and then shove the judge in head-first.

"...and as per the unanimous guilty verdict of the jury, I sentence Melissa Thatcher to be hung until dead the day following Christmas." Irene Blake, the dour skunk judge with her hair pulled into a tight and respectful bun, banged her gavel sharply. "Bailiff Hubert, please see that Miss Thatcher is moved to the town jail."

"Can't prove I was cattle rustlin'!" Mel called, defiant in her words but moving compliantly in the urging grasp of Hubert, a tired and aged mutt-dog whom she could have overpowered with ease. "All you just got a big ol' stick up your behinds at me for bein' a city girl!"

Irene Blake, the fifty-something skunk in her well-earned robe, pushed her reading glasses up her snout and addressed the mare without a hint of irony. "Miss Thatcher, I would be glad to add contempt of court to your charges if you wish to keep digging yourself deeper."

Like a class awed by a student back-talking the teacher, a hushed but intrigued murmur passed through the small courtroom. This was what passed for drama in Small Pond.

"Contempt of court!" cried the mare, who then began to howl with laughter. "Please do, Your Honor! Oughta look great on my headstone! Melissa Thatcher, cattle rustler, heinously annoyed stinkdog Judge Blake. I like that!"

The murmur waved through the courtroom again. The seeds of gossip were being planted; this one would keep them talking until at least April.

Judge Blake, flustered and showing her teeth, banged the gavel like a toddler, once missing its hardwood plate so her strike produced only a dull clap. "Order in this courtroom!" she snapped. "Very well, Miss Thatcher. As well as contempt of court," the mare scoffed sharply, hoping but failing to incite further unrest, "you shall hang until dead tomorrow morning!"

Mel expected and even hoped for some more chatter in the courtroom, but there was none. Dead stillness and penetrating gazes marked her march out of the courtroom and into the snowy wastes of Small Pond's main drag. The jail, a squat and boring building compared to the lavishly constructed courthouse, stood just across the pitted and snow-packed dirt road.

In the jail, Hubert handed off the large mare and informed the sharp-eyed jailer, "Last day for her. Good meal for her, good meal."

The jailer was a dog like Hubert, but a purebred one, specifically a Saint Bernard. She took a close look at Melissa Thatcher. The jailer was a very tall woman, and stout as a fortress under all her blubber and hairlike fur. Even then, Melissa was a giant by comparison. The fetlocks gave her away as a Clydesdale if the sheer size didn't clue one in.

"We-e-ell," the jailer said, conspicuously adjusting her crotch which bulged in her slacks, "cattle rustler or no, we'll give this misguided woman her last meal proper-like. You have yourself a good night, now, Hube."

From having to duck her head under the doorways to the fact that the jail cell's bars felt flimsy enough to bend apart, Melissa came to realize that Small Pond was not a place built for women of her size. As she sat on the bench in her cell, shivering from the bitter cold radiating through the outer wall but too prideful to remark on it, she wondered how she could have made herself more of a nuisance at the court. Sumbitches had me dead to rights anyway, she thought. Shoulda showed my ass for real. Raped the judge or somethin', shoved it right up that dried-up slit of hers. Gonna hang me no matter what.

The hours rolled by and her stomach began to grumble and grouse, but Mel's thoughts never drifted to food. One thing nagged at her, biting at her heels like a farm dog due for a fatal kick in the head: she had never gotten her cherry popped, not giving or receiving. It had simply never happened. The boys were too afraid of an eight foot tall woman with a dick as big as their thighs. As for the other women, well, it was understandable that they wouldn't want something so big tickling their cervices, if not simply gouging them open like a spike. Even getting a mutual handy from another dicklady like herself had been impossible to achieve. As she saw it, her ongoing virginity was an even greater crime than cattle rustling.

Eventually the Saint Bernard came by, her wide ass jiggling in her slacks, cock and balls bouncing tightly in what had to be briefs, given the snugness of the testes. In her large paws was a tray supporting a fresh-looking salad, a dish of soup with large chunks of vegetables bobbing in its broth, and a mug of beer with a big, frothy head on it. Bracing the tray against her large breasts, she unlocked the cell and brought in the mare's final meal. "Here ya' go, girl," said the dog with no conceit or cruelty. "Made this for you with my own two hands. Hope it's good."

Mel dabbed her calloused finger in the soup and tasted it, finding it delicious but not saying so. She said to the Bernard as she locked the door again from the other side, "Don't suppose I could talk to you a little bit."

A wan smile crossed the dog's pudgy face. "Honestly, honey, I try not to get attached when I know what's coming. I might really like ya' a'fore the sun comes up, if you catch my meaning."

The Clydesdale smiled sadly. "Suppose I know what you mean, yeah..." She began to eat, beginning with the salad. The soup was tasty, but too hot to eat first.

Despite her reservations on the matter, the Saint Bernard returned minutes later with a milking stool to park herself on. Its width was so much less than her own that Mel briefly and vividly imagined the jailer getting the seat stuck in her ass. It inspired a dry chuckle in her before she resumed eating.

"Sorry about the path your life took," the dog said. "Oh - Clarice Michaels," she noted smartly.

"Pretty name," Melissa said around the last bite of her salad. "I would've made this with more radishes, y'know."

"Ya' got the last of the supply," Clarice said, grinning. "Be happy with that."

Melissa sighed. "Not gonna matter a whole lot in, what, twelve're so hours, right?"

Uncomfortable silence. The crackle from the potbelly stove in the lobby and the rush of the bitter wind outside had long since faded to the mare and especially the dog.

The mare had a spoonful of her soup. "Hey. Miss - Missus? - Michaels?"

"Miss," Clarice clarified. "Not a whole lotta boys in the Pond want a girl with a thing bigger'n their own. A problem I imagine you're familiar with."

Melissa enjoyed a good laugh at that. "And here I didn't think any of you small-town folk could relate. I was actually gonna ask if-, ya' know, if it's all right if I were to..."

The Saint Bernard glanced surreptitiously at the entrance, then back at Melissa. Her eyelids lowered, thick brows nearly colliding like a pair of freight cars. Her tail began to wag. "You wanna have a tug before the big day? Can't say I'd blame you. Or stop you. Might watch, though."

Melissa smiled ruefully. She lifted her bottom and slid down her trail-worn pants, the ankles of which were still damp from the snow.

The Saint Bernard took a look at the mare's crotch, held barely decent by threadbare long underwear. "Lookin' pretty tight in there," said the dog.

"Take what you can get," the mare replied, easing the buttons out of their gouged holes. Clarice got a peek of the mare's thick brown crotch before she tugged apart the flaps. Melissa's sheath visibly decompressed, bulging out into the cold air of the cell like rising yeast. "Good goddamn, these things're a real trouble to get into," she groused.

At first the dog only ogled the mare's sheath, and then she began to laugh, slowly to begin with but gaining traction. Mel only stared at her, a smile quirked on her pretty face. "Somethin' funny about long underwear?" the horse asked dully.

"Aw... hell." Clarice wiped a tear from her eye and giggled. "I was just thinking how you're not gonna be sufferin' those much longer, now are you?"

Try as she might to seem resigned to the fact, Melissa was shaken by the joke. She leaned heavily on the cold wall and loosed a sigh. "Yeah, I do suppose that's true, innit?"

Clarice smiled apologetically. "Sorry, girl. You know what I said earlier about being attached? The jokes help a little with that." She drew her tongue along her jowly lips and recessed into thought. Finally she stood and said, "Be back in a jiffy."

Not like I can up and go somewhere else, thought Mel less with sarcasm than sorrow. She slid her hooves across the floor, spreading her hard, fine legs. Her balls, thick as plums, breathed easier in the gap, seemingly resistant to the biting cold of the room. Though her interest in self-abuse had sunken to an all-time low with the fear of death perched on her shoulder like a stone gargoyle, she fondled herself instinctively, feeling across the nestled head of her penis like the flesh was a worry stone. Bet that fat dog ain't even comin' back.

But Clarice did come waddling back into view, now with something clutched protectively to her breast. "Got started without me?"

The Bernard leaned against the bars, then reached through them as far as she could go, offering the mare a few yellowed pieces of what looked like parchment. They were small, about the size of a post card each, and Melissa only had to glance at the topmost item to see that they were photographs. Despite the poor exposure and sepia tone, the subject was obviously pornographic. It showed a creature resembling a deer, but not any kind Melissa had ever seen, sitting beneath a tree with her legs spread, her narrow but lengthy penis on full display and a coquettish smile on her face.

When Melissa began to thumb through the photographs, all of which showed the deer in some capacity, the Saint Bernard enjoyed a hearty laugh. The mare was so involved in the photographs that she did not notice Clarice slipping down her pants. "Got those from a traveler, traded them for... we-e-ell, a little something. Suppose he liked women with that sorta equipment, like you and me."

Now Melissa's swelling sheath was in one hand, and the photographs in the other. She focused intently on the final image in the stack, which showed the deer girl with a friend of the same species but of a much more plump build. Their penises frotted together and their lips were locked. "Hell, I'd say so... if'n I had somethin' like this, I'd have been too busy to make off with any cattle."

Clarice smiled, seating herself on the stool again. She palmed her thick, furry balls and thumbed the tip of her cock, which protruded from her sheath like lipstick. "Know whatcha mean. S'why I keep 'em hidden the way I do. You can use 'em, though."

"Better than nothin'," said the mare, the worries of her imminent demise sinking back behind her lust. She loved that bottommost picture, the two deer making their dicks and their lips kiss. "Never did anything like that in all my life."

"What? The sex-shoo'l stuff?" the dog asked, squeezing her sheath back. More of her stiff, veiny cock emerged. Precum dripped from its tip.

A sad smile crossed Mel's muzzle. She groped her balls and huffed. "Yessum. Never got close to anybody, always too busy lookin' for somethin' to steal." She glanced at the Bernard and her fine red cock. "Pretty nice there," she said with a nod. "Got one of those bulby things at the bottom too?"

With a smile, the Bernard nodded. "Not to kiss-n-tell, but that's what that traveler happened to be all about... traded me them pictures there for my pizzle in his behind."

Inches of the mare's thick brown cock pulsed in the cold air. The head hadn't begun to flare, but precum drizzled from her piss slit just as copiously as it did from Clarice's. She squeezed behind the head, groping tight on her malleable cockflesh. When she let go, a thick wad of pre was spat from it. The dog licked her lips and palmed her own balls indulgently.

"Wouldn't mind hearin' about that," said Melissa, her eyes back on the picture. "Ain't like I'm gonna be able to tell anybody."

The dog laughed. She squeezed and rubbed her bared cock, but the knot was wedged in the sheath, making its furry flesh snug. She let it be and fondled herself gladly. "Well, hell, I gave ya' my pit'chers and you still want a story on top of that."

"Last request?" Melissa pleaded, grinning almost playfully. Her cock stood proudly now, a fat phallus befitting a horse with its thickness and length. Its own precum oozed down its underbelly and her stroking smeared it on like jelly, grinding it in until the dark flesh glimmered in the low light of the jail. "These here pictures are good... I just figure there's prolly a better tale in how ya' got hold of 'em."

"You're a real whore," Clarice said, laughing. The words came across sweetly, like a grandmother admonishing her grandchild for taking a cookie off the tray. "You're just lucky you remind me of me when I was young as you are now. I was never no cattle rustler, but, uh," she smiled ruefully, "sure did my share of no-good things."

Mel leaned back, pressing her shoulder blades into the frigid wall again. It sent a shiver through her body and she squeezed her penis firmly, milking another fat wad of precum from it. She began to masturbate freely, her slicked hand gliding up and down the flesh with galling ease. Veins rose and receded in the meat as she squeezed and groped, changing its bloodflow as she went. "If you feel some sympathy for me," she said between strokes, "could always spring me... say I pick-pocketed the key and-."

"Not happening, filly," Clarice said firmly, but a playful smile was still on her face. In full view of the mare, she tugged back her sheath until at last it popped back, leaving it slack behind the thick and beautiful bulge of her knot. "Mm, gosh, always hurts a lil' bit when that slips back... kind of a good hurt, though - you get me?"

The mare, who enjoyed some true self-abuse at times, nodded soberly.

Clarice stroked her dogcock slowly, not making any attempt to outpace the mare, who seemed to be getting along well with the pictures. "Mmm, we-e-ell... that traveler, he was a man of the world, y'see. Said he'd been everywhere. Tried everything. Even gotten a little bored with what he'd done and seen and all that. Jaded, that's the word. College word, there."

"Sure is," Melissa said amicably.

"But he told me," the Saint Bernard shifted her tubby ass on the seat, then gave her knot a grope, "ah, he told me he'd never gotten it in the-, ya' know, the rear, from a lady with a pecker. Or, was it a dog lady with a pecker? Aw, heck, been so long. I was a bit slimmer then, too."

The horse finally put away the bottommost picture, switching for one of the deer girl in what seemed like repose, her penis flaccid and laying on her belly as she laid back in the snow. "Mhm," she said politely, urging the dog along as she tugged and squeezed. The head of her cock had begun to flare; her legs curled slightly inward.

Clarice's eyes lingered on Mel's crotch. She licked her jowls and thought about what being a horse must feel like. Of all the critters she'd been with, a horse was surprisingly not among them. "Well, uh, where was I?"

"You were slimmer," Melissa said. Her voice was mildly strained, and the wads of pre from her cock had grown both thicker and more frequent. A spotty puddle gleamed between her hooves, blending in with melting snow.

"Right! So I was a lil' smaller then... ah, I forgot some of it," she muttered, smiling sheepishly. "But, uh, the main point of my little epistle is this: he sat in my lap, just like a little kid with his momma or some such, and he went and ridden me like I was some kinda beast!"

"Gawddamn," Mel huffed, setting aside the photos, treating them delicately. She slid down her freed hand to her balls, giving them a gentle squeeze. "And that-, that did it for him?"

"Like you wouldn't believe, filly," the jailer said warmly. Her paw began to quicken, smearing her pads and cockflesh with precum. Her cock throbbed, impervious to the cool air. "All he had on my pecker was some slobber, but it sure seemed to me like his behind was made for that kinda thing. He just bounced and bounced and bounced on me 'til he-, well, I guess it was like his rear just kinda gobbled up my whole pecker. Just buried it in his'self."

Mel shuddered audibly. Her eyes were shut, her expression appearing contemplative except for her bitten lower lip - the mark of lewd strain. The head of her cock had flared greatly and the squirts of precum had become thick and full enough to be mistaken for orgasms, at least had she been a smaller creature.

Clarice grinned, leaning toward the bars. She quickened the pace of her own self-abuse, but she knew she was nowhere near as close as the mare. "'Bout to make a mess in there?" she asked quietly. "Ooh, sure looks like ya' are... let me tell you, girl, when I was stuck inside that traveling man, it was the finest feeling. Finer than silk."

"Nnh, gawd," muttered Melissa, and that was it for Melissa Thatcher. The overbearing pleasure of climax took hold and she stiffened, muscles galvanized into steel by the onset of delight and hormones she would feel for the final time now, never again after this, but that thought was for later. It encroached on her current state of mind but she rejected it just as she had rejected the fit of conscience she'd had just before her last cattle rustle; a fit of conscience which might have spared her the rope, in fact. That could-have-been thought was pushed back too, buried deep.

Her hand slid up to the flare and down again. She groped upwards following that to the middle of her shaft, and her hand settled there, gripping fast. A thick, sloppy rope of semen squirted free, cutting a truncated U-shape in the air before it slopped onto the tile. The second burst was far more impressive, shooting a stream of thick, white shemale slop across the floor, between the bars, and nearly to the far wall where the bulletins were posted. Melissa had gasped with that squirt, as if it had taken a great deal of energy just to propel something so far. Her third spurt was smaller, even more lame than the first, but her volume was still incredible.

"Hoo, damn," tutted Mel, letting her cock sag, spent and tired. "Just the kinda thing a girl needs before-, ya' know."

Clarice thumbed her cock's pointed tip. "Yessum," she replied. "But now's you mention it, I don't suppose I'm gonna finish up with you right now."

Melissa looked at the dog with an unreadable expression. She began to smirk, though that did nothing to clarify her mood. "Right," she said mildly, and picked up the photographs. She stood up, hiked up her long underwear and her trousers, and stepped carefully over the mess she had left in her cell. "Here. Figure you want them back."

"Mmhmm. I do." The Bernard masturbated idly, just a moment longer, before she gave up and let her penis recede into its sheath. The knot was much less troublesome going back in than popping out.

The dog took the pictures and waddled off, presumably to stash her pictures. When she came back, she did so with a bucket and a mop. The water in the bucket was already black with grime, and Mel wondered if anybody actually used it with any frequency.

Clarice mopped up the mare's semen in dreadful silence. When it came time to clean up inside the cell, Clarice said with firm professionalism, "Back up against the wall. No tryna bum-rush me, filly, not unless you wanna die tonight from a bullet in the back."

"Guessin' you still don't trust me, huh?" the Clydesdale asked, sounding pensive.

"I trust ya' not to do somethin' so foolish," the dog said, sliding the mop across the grimy floor. She elected to do the whole cell, not just the mare's puddle. "Told you I'm not gonna let ya' loose. I mean it. Sorry, but this is what I meant when I said I don't like gettin' too close."

Melissa sighed. "I get it. Think I do, anyway. No point gettin' a pet when you know it's gonna die, eh?"

"You're no pet," the Saint Bernard clucked. She carried the bucket out and relocked the door. The floor of Melissa Thatcher's cell was still one of ugly, cracked stone, but it was clean, ugly cracked stone now.

"He-e-ey. Tell me something," the dog said, as she set about mopping the rest of the corridor. Might as well while I got the apparatus out, she thought.

"Go for it."

"Hmm. Kinda hard to ask it... but hell, you ain't gonna be around to tell nobody if I embarrassed myself anyhow!" Clarice laughed jovially. "Y'mind if I come tomorrow? As, uh-, as a friend. Not professionally."

Melissa detected something genuine in the request. So much for that detachment. It pleased her in some small, girly way to know the dog cared, at least in whatever strange way would compel her to witness an execution. "I think I'd like that quite a lot," said Melissa. "So long's you got the stomach for it. Don't feel obliged if not."

"I want to come," Clarice said. "I think you're still a thievin' girl who's gettin' justice dealt to her right soon. But I also believe nobody should have to die truly alone. I'll see you then, filly. Oughta get some sleep. Don't wanna greet the reaper with one eye open."

--December 18th, 1908

The inhospitable, howling night gave over to a sunny day. The open air was painfully cold, but the sunlight and its glare on the snow warmed faces and windows alike, giving some comfort, but not to Mel Thatcher.

The condemned was marched from the jail to the gallows, taken neither by Clarice nor Hubert, but an elk and a stallion, both deputies who ignored Mel's feeble attempts at conversation. They walked her, hooves cutting ruts in the snow, moving her inexorably to the fate she had earned herself.

Every step made her heart flutter and leap. She thought she would be ready for the sight of the noose, but this was different than the idle thoughts, this was real. "Oh, my god," Melissa bleated, tugging at her escorts. She managed to free a stout arm from the elk's grasp temporarily, but the stallion held on tightly.

"Make this easier on yourself," the stallion said coldly. "It's happening no matter how much you beg. Have a little dignity."

Mel thrashed, but the deputies held her fast. She gazed balefully at the noose. "Hell with dignity," she muttered, her voice tiny, a whimper. "Gawddamn you all."

Three sets of hooves clomped on the boards of the deck as Melissa was brought to the gallows. Snow clung to her untamed fetlocks and chilled her legs. "Here. C'mon, don't make this so difficult," the elk said, sounding mildly sympathetic, at least to Mel.

Bolt for it, girl. Let 'em shoot you in the back if they gotta. Just don't give up. Don't give in like this, you can make it tough on 'em anyhow, you can-.

The Saint Bernard nudged her way to the front of the spectators. She wasn't dressed in the brown dues of the law this morning, but she was unmistakable even in her furry parka. She looked at Mel and smiled sadly.

Mel was unsure if the look was one of disappointment or remorse, but simply seeing that her friend (no, that screw isn't my friend, no way) had shown up after all filled her with ambivalence. Clarice's presence was touching, and at the same time insulting. Melissa let herself be slipped through the noose, going with the two deputies in an obedient, trancelike manner.

Even with the mare's cooperation, slipping the noose around her was not an easy affair. The stallion had to loosen it twice before it would fit the towering Clydesdale's dense neck. The trap door beneath creaked tiredly and had begun to bow slightly.

The elk, recognizing trouble, moved briskly to the executioner. He was a short, middle-aged hare who was bundled up in a fine down-filled coat, yet he still seemed to be very cold. He regarded the elk with annoyance. "What is it?"

Outside of Mel's earshot, the elk said, "Something about this seems wrong. I don't think-."

"You don't think, deputy Wallace," the hare replied, irritably. "Not your place to think, young man. Leave the thinking to those of us who own suits."

"Listen to me, that girl is too big for this," the elk urged. "You figure that rope's gonna-?"

"That rope will hold out just fine," the hare said, waving the elk off. "Shoo, now. You smell like you're ready for the rut and it offends me."

Wallace, who was very self-conscious of his rutting-time musk, crept away with a dour look on his face. He stepped around to the mare's side and took a look up at her impassive, pretty face. Mel looked back, just a glance. She thought the elk was cute.

"Melissa Thatcher," the stallion said, reading now from a parchment, "you have been found guilty of the crime of stealing cattle. You are sentenced to hang until dead." He spoke loudly enough for the spectators to hear, facing Mel at an angle. "Do you have any last words?"

Mel dragged her tongue across her cracked lips. Winter was always too dry for her. "Yeah, sure. I got some last words." Her eyes fell on Clarice. "Wanna reconsider? You can still wrap your lips around me," she said to the Saint Bernard alone, her lips curling into a savage grin.

Clarice grimaced and tried to sink back into the crowd. Mel thought her expression was a hurt one. That was good.

"All right, boys, do me! Do me good'n hard!" Mel jovially cried. "Do it a'fore I change my mind!"

The hare threw the wooden lever and the trap door dropped with a heavy, dull thud. Melissa's hooves dropped out from under her and the noose pulled taut. The beam overhead creaked and cracked, but held despite its splintering. Melissa's neck broke instantaneously with a wet crunch and the dense, muscular flesh bunched around the noose's loop. Her eyes bulged from their sockets, turning her pretty face into a nightmare mask. A dead-man's erection swelled in her ragged trousers, drawing up an obscene tent which offended the spectators far more than the execution itself.

The executioner in his fine coat over his finer suit waddled near to proclaim the mare dead when the second and far more memorable event happened. A low, damp ripping sound issued from her strangled neck, and then her body separated from her head. Muscles and tendons tore apart, ripping in ragged streaks like jerky. A jet of arterial blood shot from her breached jugular, pushed by the dying throes of her mighty Clydesdale heart.

Gore splattered across the hare, drenching his face, fanning across the breast of his suit. He cried out in shock, staggered back, and fell off the platform, crashing head-first into the thin layer of frigid slush below. The frozen earth broke his fall, and he suffered an immediately fatal cervical fracture.

Both deputies backpedaled in horror and surprise, the stallion more quickly then the elk. The former avoided the mess, but the latter wound up with a second spurt of blood on his jacket and pantlegs, leaving him looking more like the town butcher than one of its lawmen.

Melissa Thatcher's great, heavy body came free with one final rip as the spinal cord and cartilage shredded together, unable to bear the stress of a nearly three-hundred pound body. Her trunk crashed into the trap door's hole chest-first before slithering briskly through the gap, landing in an ungainly heap in spitting distance of the gawping, scandalized spectators. Her erection stood up proudly, yet it fell away quickly in time with the heaves of blood from her neck. The muddy slush gained a hellish burgundy hue.

As her body fell away, Melissa's head tumbled back. Already lifeless, it smashed snout-first into the planks, posthumously breaking her nose. The force of the impact ejected one of her eyeballs from its socket, leaving it dangling by its nerve, and in her hysterical shock, Clarice thought that that dismembered eye was looking at her, accusing her of letting this happen - and of not making the mare a real woman before her time came.

It took years and the death of Judge Irene Blake before it could be ratified, but the busy street on which the botched execution had occurred would come to be known as M. Thatcher Street, a way of apologizing for and commemorating the most fascinatingly grisly event ever to befall Small Pond, Montana.