Ascension Day

4

‘Whadya call that, fuckhead? I could cue a better shot with my dick.’

‘I didn’t see you do so well with that last yellow.’

‘That’s ’cause there were two other fuckin’ balls in the way, Stevie Wonder. This one, you had a clear shot.’

Nel-M had arranged to meet Raoul Ferrer in a bar in Algiers.

Ten years ago it was a no-go area day or night, but now, with a string of new bars and restaurants nestling in the shadows of the dockside warehouses, according to local city guides it was now inadvisable to walk around only aftermidnight.

They’d been perched up at the bar only a few minutes when the argument erupted at the pool table a couple of yards to their side. As the insults picked up steam and the two opponents moved closer, one of them raising his cue stick threateningly, Nel-M shifted from his bar stool.

‘Let’s get outta here.’

‘No, no. Wait a minute,’ Raoul said. ‘This is just gettin’ interesting.’

One thing Nel-M hadn’t considered, looking at the warped leer on Raoul’s face. The excitement of the fight.

‘Look, I haven’t come here to watch a bunch of goons fight. We got business to discuss.’ Nel-M turned and took a pace away.

Raoul got up and lightly tugged at his arm. ‘Come on, man. Won’t take a minute to kick-off, by the looks of it.’

Nel-M noticed the man with the raised cue stick, a biker with wild red hair, flinch and fleetingly gaze their way. He hoped Raoul hadn’t read anything into it.

‘You wanna watch that wise mouth.’ Red-hair waved the cue stick more threateningly at his opponent. ‘Otherwise one day someone will bust it wide open.’

‘Yeah. Yeah.’ His opponent stepped forward, taunting, challenging. ‘Will probably be the best fuckin’ shot you’ve had all night, too.’

They were running out of script. One more minute and Raoul would guess that something was wrong, that it was all staged.

‘I’m outta here,’ Nel-M said. ‘You want to waste time watching these assholes, then do it on your own time, not mine.’ He paced purposefully away, and by the time his hand reached for the door, Raoul had shuffled up quickly behind him. ‘The sort of business we need to talk about can’t be done here.’

‘Okay, man. Okay. I understand. Business. Business.’

Nel-M waited until they were a good dozen paces from the bar before he spoke again. He took a deep breath of the warm night air and slowly let it out.

‘You probably guessed why the meeting at this particular time. Larry Durrant’s coming up for his big day, and Roche wants to know if there might be any more surprises waiting in the wings. You know, as in another big pay-off.’

‘No, man. No. Of course not. That was a one-off deal, never to be repeated…’

‘Except that there were two pay-offs.’

Raoul shrugged awkwardly. ‘The second was only ten-G — just a top-up on the main deal. And only, ya know,’ Raoul grimaced, ‘cause I was in such a jam at the time. I’m okay now. Doin’ fine. No troubles, no problems. I got a good deal runnin’ now with Carmen, ya know.’

‘Yeah, I know.’ Carmen Malastra, Louisiana’s leading racketeer. But at Raoul’s pecking level in Malastra’s empire, one call from Roche would easily smooth over any move they had to make against Raoul. Although that might all change once Raoul was a ‘made’ man. ‘But what we wanna make sure is if that’s always going to be the case. I mean, what happens if you hit hard times later, fall out with Carmen, or business goes bad? Or he changes your deal or territory, so you’re just not pulling in the same?’ Nel-M shrugged. ‘You know, it happens. It happens all the time.’

‘No, no. It won’ happen. Don’t worry.’

But there was a heavy pause before Raoul answered that told Nel-M that Raoul was far from sure.

‘Maybe not now, this year, or next. But who knows what can happen in five or ten years.’ Nel-M shrugged again. ‘And if that was going to be the case… or even if there was a slim possibility that it might be the case, then Roche would prefer to make that payment now rather than later.’ Nel-M shuffled to a stop and fixed Raoul with a stony gaze. ‘Because once Durrant’s gone for the chop, Roche doesn’t want to hear mention of his name again, or anyone or anything to do with Durrant. Once the chapter closes in forty-five days time, it closes for good. Understand. So if there was ever again to be money involved, as Elvis once said — it’s now or never.’

Nel-M watched Raoul look thoughtfully, agitatedly at his shoes for a second — snakeskin with a maroon leather band — pursing his lips as he mulled it over. It looked like he was going to need a bit more push.

‘Roche has even thought of a figure for you. Forty grand. No arguments, no questions. But also, no come-backs or demands later. It’s a one-shot deal.’

Raoul looked up and blew a soft whistle into the night air. ‘Same as the first time, huh?’

‘Yeah. Same as.’ Nel-M held Raoul’s gaze for an instant; snake-eyes, snake-shoes. He could tell that Raoul was close, teetering on the edge. Behind them a ship’s horn sounded as it approached Algiers Point.

Raoul looked over his shoulder as a sudden babble of voices burst from a bar eighty yards up the road.

They were away from the main bar and restaurant area, but obviously still not far enough, thought Nel-M. And there was still a thread of uncertainty holding Raoul back.

‘I’ve got the money right over there, in my car. Should you decide to take it.’ Nel-M started pacing towards his car without looking back for Raoul’s reaction.

After five yards they came alongside a large warehouse, and, as they turned the corner to follow the flank of the building, the atmosphere changed completely. It was darker, the street-lighting sparser, the bars and restaurants a hundred yards away hidden from view by the two-storey corrugated warehouse walls. At the end of the warehouse and before the next was a small patch of waste-ground used as a makeshift car-park for twenty or so cars. At this time of night only three cars were there, one of which was Nel-M’s.

Nel-M knew that if he’d arranged to meet Raoul here initially, Raoul would have balked, or at least would have been suspicious and wary. That’s why he’d decided on the bar and the staged fight.

‘And you got the money right here, in your car?’

‘Yep.’ Nel-M could tell from the edge in Raoul’s voice that he’d taken the bait. The smell and immediacy of the money was just too tempting. ‘No point in delaying. One quick call to Roche for a final nod, and the money’s yours. Done deal. So, what do you think?’

One final appraisal of his shoes, lips pursing, before Raoul looked up again. ‘Okay, okay.’ The words rode a hushed exhalation, as if he was accepting the money reluctantly.

Equally, Nel-M kept his voice low as he took out his cell-phone and started speaking to Roche, holding one hand up towards Raoul as he took a couple of steps away.

‘So, you were right,’ Roche said on the back of a tired sigh. ‘He did want an extra payment.’

‘Yeah, yeah. Looks like it.’

‘Another forty grand, you say?’

‘Yeah.’

‘And do you think he’ll come back for more again later?’

‘Yeah, looks like it. At least, that’s how I read it.’

Another tired sigh. ‘I suppose we’re going to have to take the option you suggested, against my better judgement. Less possible problems later. Except, that is, for how we’re going to square things with Malastra.’

‘That too will be better dealt with now rather than later.’

‘You mean once he becomes “made”?’

‘Yeah.’

‘Okay.’ Roche exhaled as the silence lengthened. ‘I understand you can’t say too much your end.’ One final weary sigh. ‘Just take care of it the best way you see fit.’

‘Will do.’ Nel-M beamed widely as he looked back at Raoul. ‘Great. He’s given the okay.’

Raoul mirrored Nel-M’s smile; but then it quickly faltered, sinking, as, in the same motion of Nel-M putting away his cell-phone, he saw him slide a gun out, a 9mm with silencer already attached.

Raoul held one hand up defensively, his eyes darting in panic. ‘Roche said for you to gimme the money.’

Nel-M cocked an eyebrow. ‘Now, let me think. When he said to “let you have it” — could I have got the wrong meaning?’ Nel-M had wanted to kill Raoul from the outset. He might as well squeeze every bit of juice from it. ‘Maybe my poor grasp of English letting me down again? You know, us poor Southern “boys”, they didn’t let us near any books until much later in life.’

‘You… you can’t do this.’ Raoul’s eyes continued darting for possible options. Hoping that someone from the nearby bars might suddenly come around the corner, a verbal gem to stop Nel-M in his tracks; empty prayers on his breath falling into the night air. ‘You wouldn’t dare touch me. Carmen would tear your fuckin’ heart out.’

‘You’re just small potatoes in Carmen’s empire. And Roche could buy and sell Carmen ten times over. So in the scheme of things — you’re really small.’ Nel-M raised his gun and aimed. ‘And about to disappear completely.’

Raoul moved his hand higher in response, and Nel-M’s bullet took off Raoul’s index fingertip before slamming into his left cheekbone, leaving a gaping hole as it deflected and exited just below his temple. The impact threw Raoul Ferrer back a full yard and left him partly on one side, his body twitching as blood pumped up through the hole in his cheek.

Just in case it was Raoul’s nervous system and brain still intact, rather than death throes, Nel-M put the silencer barrel by Raoul’s left eye and squeezed off a second shot. It certainly wasn’t to put Raoul out of pain quickly.

Dougy Sawyer had decided to stop by their table on his way out. ‘I… I was wondering if you’ve had a chance to speak to Mike Coultaine yet?’

It was Sawyer who’d recommended to Langfranc that whoever took on the Durrant case should speak to Coultaine.

‘No, not yet,’ Jac said. ‘There’s been some initial — ’

‘Jac thought he should find his feet first,’ Langfranc cut in; the last thing Jac needed was news of problems with Durrant getting back to Beaton. ‘Get through his initial interviews with Durrant before seeing Coultaine.’

‘Well — you want to speak to Coultaine soon as you can,’ Sawyer said. ‘Except that now the hurricane season’s winding down he’s probably out on his boat fly-fishing every day. Harder to get hold of than when he was with the firm.’ Sawyer smiled meekly, but there was a faint gleam in his eye, as if he too might like to escape and fly-fish the rest of his days away. Or because he considered it pure folly, reserved only for the mad or brave, like Mike Coultaine. ‘I know that he was upset at losing the appeal. I think Durrant touched him deeper than any of us appreciated… along with a few other cases. Probably the reason that Mike retired so early. Still…’ Sawyer half-turned, distracted, as a noisy group took up seats a couple of tables away.

‘Yes… yes, it is.’ Jac exhaled heavily. ‘Haveling phoned me this morning to tell me that Marmont’s condition had worsened. The hospital give him less than twenty per cent chance of pulling through. Haveling said that the next forty-eight hours would be the most telling — but that, obviously, if Marmont died, all bets were off.’

Jac found himself on edge over the following days, fearful each time the phone rang that it would be Haveling calling to say that Marmont had died.

Late afternoon, with the help of the company’s IT man, he’d discovered more about the e-mail: signed up and sent from an internet cafe, Cybersurf on Prytania Street, and an anonymous, untraceable e-mail address: durransave4@ hotmail.com. He phoned Cybersurf — it had been paid cash and they didn’t recall who’d been on that computer then.

Just as the last people were leaving the office, Penny Vance calling out, ‘Have a nice weekend,’ Jac finally sent the reply he’d been turning over in his mind the past twenty-four hours. Equally brief, but hopefully it might draw them out and give him what he needed; if anything came back.

His phone started ringing only minutes after he got back to his apartment, his hand hovering a second before he picked up; Haveling? But it was Jeff Coombs, his squash and tennis partner and one of the few friends he’d made in his three years in New Orleans. He begged off a squash game Jeff was trying to organize for early Saturday evening.

‘Heading out to Hammond for the weekend to see Mum and Sis.’

‘I understand. Duty calls. Maybe we’ll get in a game in the week, Wednesday or Thursday night? I’ll phone you then.’

Part of that duty now included pressure to get him married off. He tried to relax in the shower, breathing long and slow with his eyes closed as he let the water run over his body, as if at the same time it was washing away the pressures of the week and some of the sticky heat and grime still there from Libreville.

Traffic was slow heading out of the city, probably because the weekend weather promised to be fine, and everyone had the same thing in mind: escape to the beaches or bayous. His phone rang again halfway along the Lake Pontchartrain Causeway: His mother, no doubt wondering where he was. He was twenty minutes later in leaving than he’d said, and the traffic had held him up still further. He let it go into message service.

The reason for the call he was confronted with as soon as he arrived.

‘Aunt Camille has arranged dinner for us all, and you know how fastidious she is.’ His mother looked anxiously at her watch. ‘Already it looks like we’re going to be ten minutes late. She’ll give us hell.’

A twenty-minute run to the far side of Amite, they decided to all go in his car.

‘If you’d called and told me, I’d have made sure to be on time,’ Jac said as he made the turn back onto the highway.

‘She didn’t tell me until very late.’

But as he glanced across, his mother looked slightly away. Either she had been told late — probably because his aunt’s last dinner invite he’d begged off with an excuse — or his mother had decided to delay telling him, for much the same reason. Either way, his lack of enthusiasm for his aunt’s company was now out in the open. Official.

Aunt Camille’s house was a sprawling Southern mansion complete with Doric columns on its front facade, straight out of Gone With the Wind. A servant with white tails and gloves greeted them and served them dinner. Perpetuation of the plantation-era image, except that he was white. Hired from an Atlanta-based agency that specialised in English servants, because she’d heard that they were the best.

That must have caused her weeks of mental anguish, thought Jac: choosing between what was considered traditionally ‘correct’ and what was best.

To her friends and those wishing to be kind to her, Camille was a colourful eccentric, a character. To nearly everyone else, including Jac, she was an impossible snob and social aspirant.

Camille waited until the second course before broaching the subject. Everything with a purpose, but also very much in order. Arranged liaisons with the Blanquette de Veau.

‘I suppose Catherine has talked to you about Jennifer, the Bromwell’s daughter?’

‘Yes… yes.’ He caught his mother’s eye fleetingly before, slightly flushed, she brought her concentration back to her plate. ‘She mentioned that she was very nice.’

‘Yes… nice.’ Camille aired the word as if it had scant relevance in her world. ‘She also happens to be the daughter of one of the richest men in the state, Tobias Bromwell. And I have to tell you, he was more than a little intrigued when I shared with him the noble line running through our family.’

‘Ooooh… right.’ As Jac let out the words with a tired exhalation, his eyes drifted to the coat of arms on the far wall. Soon after arriving in America, Camille had traced her family history back, she claimed, all the way to Louis XV. In fact, it had only been a distant cousin of Louis XV, a grand duke with an estate in Bourges. But she’d used that relentlessly as her ticket to every society gathering she could, as well as to attract her husband, one of Louisiana’s leading property realtors, dead these past eight years. When she’d previously pressed home the importance of their royal lineage, they’d argued, Jac pointing out that the relevance of royalty to most French people, including himself, had probably been best demonstrated by what they did to Marie Antoinette. Camille, though, was hopelessly blinkered and, having gone that route herself, she no doubt saw it as the way forward for everyone else: the use of their royal lineage, however tenuous, to snag a wealthy partner; money meets respectability. But as he went to answer, he caught his mother looking across anxiously, hoping that he wouldn’t make a scene. ‘Yes… I can see how that might intrigue him.’

The sarcasm was lost on Camille. Her knife and fork hovered only a second above her plate before she continued. ‘Of course, Jac. This isn’t France, you know, where there’s fallen royalty in practically every other hamlet. Here in America, such things are a rarity. You’ve got to make best use of it where you can.’

‘Yes, I appreciate that better now.’ Again, it went at a mile above Aunt Camille’s head, or didn’t penetrate her rhino skin. But as Jac pushed a tight smile, he caught his mother suppressing a smirk at the corner of her mouth. He’d handled it the best way.

‘So… good.’ Camille placed her cutlery in line on her plate as she finished. ‘I can take it then that you’re keen to see Jennifer for a date?’

‘Well, I don’t know, I…’ He was about to comment that he didn’t want to rush into it, but caught again his mother’s anxious look.

‘You know, opportunities like this with girls like Jennifer don’t come along every day,’ Camille said. ‘And if we snub her or dally around, the door will probably be closed straight in our faces — never to open again.’

Jac felt the pressure like a tight coil at the back of his neck. His aunt pushing, persuading, controlling, like she did with so much in her life — almost second nature now. And his mother subservient, living in her shadow, afraid to go against her. The way they’d lived practically since his father’s death. Over three years now, but at times it felt like a lifetime — probably because so much had changed. Their life now held no resemblance to their life before. Sun-glowed days at their Rochefort farmhouse or Isle de Rey beaches, his parents both carefree, relaxed, his mother smiling and laughing at his father’s comments and quips. Not a care in the world. And his mother now: her eyes dull and haunted, shoulders slumped as if holding the weight of the world, chewing at her bottom lip as she panicked over what he might say next.

‘I know, I… I…’ Jac felt terribly torn: his mother urging him to acquiesce, anything for an easy life, his father telling him to fight back, don’t stand for it anymore, break the cycle now or you might never be able to.

Perhaps his aunt had been right on one front, even if her comment had been intended as just another snipe: ‘Surely you can’t be serious, doing criminal instead of corporate law? Corporate is where the money is, and you’ve already got your feet under the table. You don’t want to end up a pipe-dreamer like your father. I mean, look where that got him.’

At least with the money from corporate law, he’d have been able to free his mother and sister from Camille’s clutch. And now, like his father, his life was becoming a series of diminishing options.

‘I… I think I should…’ A tingle ran up Jac’s spine. The vital element he’d missed earlier with Durrant suddenly hit him. He delved into his pocket for his cell-phone, holding one hand up in apology as he dialled. ‘One minute. Sorry… someone I remembered I have to call.’

As it rang, Aunt Camille contemplated him with rueful impatience, as if convinced the call was just a ruse, a diversionary tactic. His mother looked away awkwardly, her face flushed. On the third ring it went to an answerphone.

‘You’re through to the office of Thomas. J. Haveling, Chief Warden of Libreville prison. I’m either away from my office right now or unavailable, so please…’

Jac was about to ring off and try his assistant Pete Folley, but then had second thoughts: he didn’t know how far Bateson’s grapevine of influence went, whether Folley could be trusted. Any passing of information between them, and the game would be up.

He left a message asking Haveling to call him back urgently.

‘So. What do you want me to tell Jennifer Bromwell?’ Camille pressed.

‘Sorry — just one more minute.’ Haveling might not pick up the message for hours, or perhaps not until the next morning. Jac couldn’t risk the wait; he needed to put something in motion immediately. Every second could be vital. He dialled out to John Langfranc, who thankfully was there and answered quickly.

Jac explained the problem, looking away from his aunt as she held one hand out in exasperation and lifted her eyes heavenward.

‘The best guy I know for that sort of thing is a private eye and writ-server called Bob Stratton in Morgan City,’ Langfranc commented. ‘It could take him a couple of hours to get out to Libreville. And from the sound of it, you don’t want to lose even that time. Worth a try though, in case you’re stuck or he knows someone closer.’

Halfway through Jac scribbling a contact number on the back of a business card from his wallet, Camille silently mouthed, ‘Well?’ She whisked the air with her raised hand as she added voice. ‘What do I tell her?’

‘Thanks, John.’ Jac sighed as he rang off. ‘Okay. Okay. Tell her we’re on for a date. But not this coming week. Too much to sort out. Next weekend.’ What would it harm, one date, thought Jac. How bad could it be? At least the pressure was off for all concerned. His mother risked a faint smile, relieved that battle was done. But as he saw his aunt’s fuller, more satisfied smile, basking in the glory of yet another triumph — once again he heard his father’s voice telling him that he should have put up more of a stand, shouldn’t have given in so quickly.

Perhaps in one way his Aunt Camille was right. Like his father, he was a dreamer. Any chances of saving Lawrence Durrant’s life were fast ebbing away before he’d even started. Jac dialled Bob Stratton’s number. But with each extra ring with no answer, Jac felt any remaining hope slipping further away.