Ascension Day

40

Larry couldn’t take his eyes off Joshua. Not, he liked to think, because it was the last time he’d see the boy; but because he hadn’t seen him now for eleven months, and the boy had changed so much in that time.

He looked a good two inches taller, his voice a shade deeper, the look in his eye more thoughtful. Larry thought he could see the first shadow of the man that Joshua would become: kind, thoughtful, caring, but hopefully nobody’s fool. And maybe much of that had come about, that transformation starting so early, because he’d had to shoulder so much more than other boys of his age. The taunts, the different surrogate fathers, careful what he said between and about his real father and them in case it looked like favouritism; difficult, if not impossible, Larry thought, to get that balance right from what he’d read in Josh’s e-mails.

Or maybe that was all just wishful thinking, Larry projecting his thoughts because he knew now that he wouldn’t actually see how Josh turned out.

‘Come here!’ Trying to project too every ounce of love he’d missed giving the boy these past long years, and now the years to come, as he hugged him tight. Not wishing to smother Josh or make him feel too awkward, so letting him go sooner than he’d have liked; he could have stayed hugging Josh all day.

Francine looking on, her eyes glassy with emotion, her voice breaking slightly, ‘Oh, Larry… Larry,’ as she took Josh’s place and they embraced; though this time it was more her hugging Larry, patting his back a couple of times as if he were the child that needed consoling.

Then silence for a moment. Tense, uneasy silence. He’d covered most of the day-to-day, regular stuff by e-mail with Josh over the past few months — though Franny wasn’t to know that — and he and Franny hadn’t spoken for so long now, they hardly knew what to say to each other any more: casual, light stuff seemed too trivial given what he was facing, and the heavier stuff which might remind him of that or, worse still, tackled it directly, seemed just as bad. So they just sat there for a moment, in that silent gap in the middle.

They’d been allowed a cell near Haveling’s office for their final meeting so that they weren’t forced to just clasp fingers through the holes in a glass screen, and semi-privacy: the back of a guard’s head was just visible through the door’s open inspection hatch.

‘I appreciate you coming here today,’ Larry said finally. ‘I understand from Josh’s e-mail it wasn’t that easy. You had to lay it on the line with Frank.’

She nodded. ‘Yeah. Had to tell him straight-out: that’s it, we’re going… no point in arguing. It might be our…’ She broke off then, bit at her lip, realizing the minefield this conversation was going to be, but no other word that she could think of that wouldn’t sound pathetic or contrived. ‘Our last chance to see you.’ Her eyes glistening heavier, she closed them for a second, as if in apology for having said it.

‘That’s okay.’ Larry reached out and touched her shoulder. ‘Whatever the reasoning, I’m just glad to see you both here now.’

She nodded, and after a second finally thought of a subject that was weighty and worthy enough for discussion, Joshua’s schooling, talking about how well he was doing. ‘Straight As in most of his subject, a couple of Bs, and nothing… nothing below that. We both got good reason to be proud of him there, Larry.’

Joshua beamed awkwardly, flushing slightly.

Larry nodded, looking away from the boy, back to Francine. ‘Yeah, you’ve done a good job with him there, Franny. Even though often it hasn’t been easy.’ Last chance for him to tell Franny how proud he was of her, keeping a stable home wrapped around Joshua, despite the odds.

Larry talked directly with Joshua for a moment about school, asking him which subjects he preferred, even though he already half-knew from their e-mails back and forth: preferred English and History to Maths and Science. Liked languages too, particularly French. Preferred Tolkein to Rowling, though of recent he’d turned more to some of the older classics: Dumas, Dickens, Lord of the Flies and Tom Sawyer. ‘Fantasy is okay, but they tell me a bit more about how real life is. Or was.’

‘That’s good…. that’s good.’ Larry nodded sagely. Practically retelling his own words when he’d first recommended the books in e-mails months back. Josh’s way of telling him that he’d taken the advice and was reading them. Telling him before it was too late.

That trivia barrier broken without them hardly realizing it, Francine talked about her work in the shoe shop, that if she could find another job with the same friendly hours that paid better, she’d take it like a shot. Larry appreciating that in fact it wasn’t that trivial, because the hours were linked to her being able to meet Josh from school. Sacrifice. Larry deciding then to lighten things by telling her about Roddy’s last Crosby routine, Franny holding one hand by her mouth as she laughed, as if she shouldn’t be laughing in a place like this, and especially not at this time; an anxious glance towards the guard outside through the open viewing hatch, worried what he would think. But Larry thinking, it was so good to see her laughing. So good. Hardly in fact able to remember the last time he’d seen her smile or laugh; brief, fragmented flashes of their wedding day and Joshua being born making the years since seem all the more lost, wasted.

Larry hastily pushed the thought away. ‘Though I told Roddy straight that it wasn’t half as funny as seeing him struggle to save the day in front of that crab-faced woman at the BOP hearing. He was back-paddling faster than a duck facing ten Chinese chefs… until that Ayliss guy turned up to save his neck. Or mine, as it so happens.’ Larry shook his head, grimacing. ‘If I miss anything from this place, then it’d be Roddy. And maybe the library a bit, too.’

Ayliss. Saving neck. But as much as they’d all desperately tip-toed around the subject, talking about anything but, suddenly it was back before them. Larry’s death. Only thirty-two hours away now. The shadow of it hanging so close that it was stifling, suffocating. Inescapable. With the mention of Ayliss, Franny’s eyes darting rapidly as if unwilling to accept the inevitability of that shadow, she leapt for what she saw as a possible escape route.

‘I heard that new lawyer of yours, Ayliss, on a radio phone-in a few days back after Candaret turned down your pardon… and he said he wasn’t giving up yet. Not by a long shot. Said that he truly believed you were innocent and in fact had someone visiting the prison over the next few days that would hopefully, once and for all, prove it.’

‘Yeah.’ Larry nodded, smiling dryly. Jac hamming it up as Ayliss, trying to get a doubt bandwagon rolling. Never say die. ‘A psychiatrist.’ Larry explained about Ormdern’s two sessions and what they’d hoped to find either with his old pool game or lack of detail recalled about the Roche house. He shook his head as he finished. ‘But in the end, they didn’t hit on anything. Not enough, anyway.’ He shrugged. ‘Though apparently Ayliss is still out there, chasing down, from what he tells me, “some vital final leads uncovered from the sessions”.’

Francine reached out and gently clasped one of his hands. ‘So there’s still some hope left. Still someone out there fighting for you.’

He clasped back at her hand, realizing in that moment that, like her smile and laugh, she’d touched him more in this past half hour than she had in eleven years. He grimaced tightly. ‘Franny, I don’t think it’s right to fool ourselves that he’ll suddenly pull a rabbit out the hat. He’s probably saying all that just to make me feel good, keep my hopes up. Candaret said no, and in the end those sessions didn’t dig up anything. I might just have to accept that that’s it.’

‘But surely, Larry, if he’s still out there trying, then — ’

Larry squeezed tighter at her hand. ‘It’s okay, Franny… it’s okay. I’ve accepted it. Because, you know, at…’ He looked down awkwardly, the right words suddenly elusive. ‘At some stage… I’ve got to. It’s just not right clinging on till the last moment with false hope, when I should be trying to make peace with — ’ He was about to say “my God”, but changed tack at the last second; it de-personalized too much from Fran and Josh. ‘With myself in my own mind. And that inner peace is real important to me right now, so I can say the things to you and Josh that need to be said.’ He kept hold of her hand, though more gently now. ‘I want to thank you first off for bringing Josh up straight and true when, like I said before, God knows often it couldn’t have been easy with me not there through all the years. And I don’t even have to ask you to promise me to keep doing that good job, because I know you will. And to say that… that I always loved you… even though I often had a strange way of showing it back then.’ Francine, eyes glistening heavier with tears, shaking her head as if to say, No, no… you don’t need to say this to me now, or perhaps feeling awkward at hearing it, not wishing it to be the last thing she heard from him, remembered him by; and him eager to get the words out before his resolve went, say what he should have said years ago, but never did because he was too blind or proud or foolish or stubborn, knowing that if he didn’t say it now, he never would. ‘And I… I probably never did stop loving you. And to say that… that…’ But as hard as it had been to say everything so far, this was by far the hardest. ‘I’m… I’m sorry. So sorry for having done what I did. Let you and Josh down.’

Francine crumbled then, the tears flowing freely down her cheeks. Joshua’s eyes too were glassy, both of them still clinging to that hope mentioned of Ayliss still trying to save him, not wanting to accept what was happening, not wanting to hear from Larry what sounded now like a goodbye speech, their pleading eyes screaming at him, ‘You might have accepted what’s happening, found peace with yourself, but we haven’t. We haven’t! And as much as one part of Larry was glad that he’d said what he had — in fact what he should have said eleven or twelve years ago — another part of him cursed ever having met Jac McElroy. For filling him with hope, caring again.

Before that, he’d had it all pretty well worked out: his family had all but given up on him, so in turn him giving up on them and what little there was left in this life for him wasn’t that difficult. Seemed almost the next natural progressive step, as did turning to God. Though he did truly believe, it wasn’t just a second option, a crutch because God was the only person left in this world who he felt hadn’t deserted him.

But one effect it had, though it hadn’t dawned on him until later, was that when he turned more to God and away from worldly life, love and caring — most of it already stripped from him in any case — when he made that final turn away, nobody really noticed. As if he was already a shadow, and so that final slipping away was barely visible. And at that moment he also half-died, and the daily grind and horrors and isolation of Libreville over the years steadily chipped away at that other half until there was practically nothing left.

At that final low moment, the only consolation was that death — the shadow of execution hanging over him — no longer held any threat, because there was so little of life left for him. So little would be taken.

But then this Jac McElroy had come along, talking about family and caring and hope, about life; and as he finally let himself be drawn into that, started to care once more, he’d become afraid of death again. Because there was suddenly much more of life, more that seemed worthwhile, that would be taken away. He wanted nothing more now than to see his son grow tall, go to college, get a girlfriend, avoid all the mistakes he’d made… rather than just have to imagine it all happening; but the last thing he wanted at this moment was his son to see that, see his fear of dying, the longing in his eyes.

And minutes later, as they said their final tearful goodbyes, and Larry hugged them tighter than ever before, while he felt his heart soar as they said they loved him too, Josh adding that he’d never forget him — ‘You’ll always be my pa,’ as if the others since had only half filled that role — Larry couldn’t bear to see the pain and unwillingness to accept his death in their eyes.

And so part of him wished it had been like before: him already half-forgotten, just a shadow, and then he could have just quietly slipped away without anyone hardly noticing. Not caused them any pain or trouble.

‘So there she is in this neck brace, her face like she’s gone five rounds with Tyson, and she says: I’ve been in an accident. Really? I say.’

Two vice detectives and another sergeant smiled as Brennan started with the story in the Eighth District canteen. This sounded like it was going to be good.

‘But she’s as sour-faced as a turkey’s ass, this one. I got more chance of raising a smile from a funeral director.’

The smiles lapsed into chuckles as Brennan got to the reason for her accident: slamming on her car brakes because she’d just seen her ex-husband of seven years, and then convinced that it wasn’t him. ‘And when I suggested to her that maybe, with her only seeing him for two seconds, she might have been mistaken — she looks ready to kill. Starts giving me a lecture about when you’ve been married to someone for a while, you recognize them in the first millisecond, and anyway, she says, there was no recognition on his face when he saw me. What, he didn’t slam on his brakes too? I’m about to say…’ More chuckling, Brennan in his element as he hammed up the story, saying by that stage he was worried for his own safety if he showed even the trace of a smile, starting to get lockjaw from holding it in check. ‘And at one point she goes to nod, but can’t with the neck-brace…’ Full-blown guffaws now. Brennan held out one palm. ‘Then it started to get even more interesting, because it turns out her ex is no less than Darrell Ayliss, Larry Durrant’s new lawyer…’

At the table behind them, Lieutenant Pyrford had only been half-listening to the story as he sipped at a coffee. He was waiting for robbery reports on four downtown stores for a suspect held over at the Fifth District, and had been told they’d be fifteen minutes or so. But as Darrell Ayliss and Durrant were mentioned, he looked over. And as the penny at the back of his brain dropped fully, he leant across and interrupted the conversation.

‘Excuse me… you said that this ex-wife of Ayliss’s claimed that the man she saw wasn’t her husband?’

‘That’s right.’

‘Pretty close look-alike — but not him?’

‘Yeah… yeah.’ Brennan slightly bemused by Pyrford’s sudden interest. ‘That’s about it.’

That single penny becoming a jackpot cascade as the rest of it fell into place. McElroy. Morvaun Jaspar. Ayliss. ‘Do you know who’s heading up the Jac McElroy investigation here?’

‘Lieutenant Derminget,’ one of the vice detectives answered.

‘Do you have a number?’

‘Yeah.’ The detective flipped open his cell-phone, scrolled down, read it out.

Pyrford dialled and drifted out of the canteen into the corridor as it answered — background traffic noise — and explained his thinking to Derminget. ‘It’s just that with McElroy having represented Jaspar, Jaspar’s past strong form with disguises… and now Ayliss’s ex-wife claiming that it isn’t him? I might be putting two and two together and coming up with six — but it would certainly explain why McElroy’s suddenly disappeared off the face of the map.’

‘Yeah… it certainly would.’ No sightings or trace of McElroy now for a full week. Broughlan had chewed his ass so hard, he hardly had anything left to sit on. And as Ayliss, Derminget reflected, McElroy would have been able to continue representing Durrant. ‘Thanks for that.’

‘Do you want us to haul Jaspar in again, see what we can find out?’

‘No. Not at this stage. I don’t want him alerted until I’ve worked out the best way to handle this. I’ll call you back if I need some help there. And again, thanks.’

By the time Derminget got back to his car, he’d worked out how to play everything: he didn’t want to alert Ayliss/McElroy either. He’d made that mistake once already. That ruled out politely asking Ayliss in under some spurious guise related to Durrant — he’d get suspicious — or putting out TV or news bulletins: if he saw them before the public pointed the finger, he’d go to ground again. The other problem was that they didn’t have a photo of the real Ayliss, and those available would probably be from seven years ago.

Derminget started up, but as he looked round to pull out, the thought suddenly hit him. He got Libreville’s number from 411, then phoned them and asked whether they might have some good security cam shots of lawyer Darrell Ayliss who’d recently visited them. ‘As close and clear as possible.’ He gave them the Eighth District e-mail to send them to, stressing the urgency. Then he phoned into Central Dispatch to put out an APB on Ayliss. ‘Photos should be with you shortly.’

Hopefully they’d get Ayliss under arrest before he knew they were even looking for him; before he knew what hit him. Then, if they’d made a big mistake, they could apologize later.

Fuck, fuck… fuck!

Nel-M was back to bashing his steering wheel as he returned to his car, having checked Truelle’s office and discovered that nobody was there, not even his secretary.

He drove over to Truelle’s Faubourg Marigny apartment, but Truelle wasn’t there either.

Fuck…. fuck! Two more steering wheel bashes, one leaving Truelle’s apartment, the other arriving back at his office. Still nobody there.

After the messy drama in Vancouver, he’d been hoping for an easy ride with this one: get Truelle out of his office on some ruse, two quick shots in a side alley, and done. Finito.

Years now he’d been looking forward to putting a bullet through Truelle’s head with impunity. No possible comebacks. And now that moment was finally here, Truelle was nowhere to be found. Sensing that everything was suddenly closing in on him, Truelle had no doubt decided to disappear until after Durrant’s death.

Truelle’s secretary obviously knew where he was; that’s why she’d hi-tailed it too. Didn’t want to stay front-line, facing all the flak.

Nel-M took out his cell-phone and called Vic Farrelia.

‘Truelle’s secretary, Cynthia? Do you have anything on tape with her full name or the district she lives in, so I could maybe track down her address?

‘I can do better than that,’ Farrelia said. ‘I picked up her full address somewhere, I’m sure. She gave it one day to a friend she hadn’t seen for a while. Give me a minute or two, I’ll try and find it.’

Twelve minutes after Farrelia’s return call, Nel-M was knocking on Cynthia’s 2^nd floor apartment door in Bywater.

‘Who is it?’ she called out.

Nel-M didn’t answer. Then, hearing her move close to the door the other side, probably looking through the spy-hole, he barged hard against it.

‘Western…’ Another hard barge… ‘Fucking… Union!’ The lock gave way on the last barge; obviously she didn’t have Truelle’s heavy dead-bolts.

Cynthia was wide-eyed, shrieking with each barge and backing a step away, then turned to run as Nel-M finally burst through. He slammed the door behind him and caught up with her at the end of her hallway, clamping one hand over her mouth to stifle her shrieks. Breathless, sweat beads popped on his forehead, he listened out for a second for whether anyone had heard: doors opening across the corridor, footsteps coming along to investigate? But there was nothing, no movement.

Half lifting Cynthia, her shrieks and groans heavily muffled by the hand across her mouth, he bundled her into a back bedroom, shut the door.

‘Okay,’ he said, taking his gun out. ‘We can do this one of a few ways. Either you tell me straight out where your boss Truelle has gone — or after we’ve played breaking fingers or Russian roulette?’

She shook her head, lips pressed stubbornly tight as she looked anxiously between him and the gun; hoping, praying that it was a bluff.

Nel-M reached out and grabbed one of her arms, placing her hand in his, her wrist gripped tight, but his touch against her hands and fingers curiously light, soothing. He arched an eyebrow. ‘Are you sure you wanna go through this? Be a lot easier just to tell me?’

She shook her head again, though less certainly this time. She writhed and tried to wrench her hand from his grip, but he was too firm, too strong. He gripped tighter and, pushing hard back on her index finger, snapped the bone as if it was a twig.

Her howling scream was quickly muffled by his hand back over her mouth. ‘Okay, let’s try again. Where’s Truelle gone?’

But again that wide-eyed defiant stare, tears rolling down her cheeks now from the pain and from fear. He broke one more finger, her still defiant, Nel-M deciding then that she was making too much noise and it was hard for him to cover quickly with his hand over her mouth.

He tipped the bullets out of his gun, holding one up as he put it back in, then, just before sliding the barrel into her mouth, asked her again where Truelle was. Still that wide-eyed, fuck-you stare, though scrunching tight at the last second as the empty click came, her whole body shuddering. And, to Nel-M’s amazement, she managed to brave out one more empty click before her resolve finally snapped and with a breathless, ‘Okay… okay,’ she agreed to tell him.

She’d brought the appointment book with her in case someone broke into the office to read it. He shuffled her through to the lounge, one arm clamped tight around her, as she got the book and pointed out the Cuba mail box address.

Nel-M wrote it down. ‘And that’s all you have?’

‘Yeah. That’s it.’

The truth, he sensed. ‘And have you given this to anyone else?’ She started to shake her head, but as his eyes narrowed, reading her hesitance, untruth, he moved his gun towards her again.

She changed to a hasty nod. ‘Yeah… yeah. A lawyer. Ayliss… I believe that was his name.’

‘How long ago?’

She shrugged. ‘Four, maybe five hours.’

Nel-M nodded thoughtfully, absently sliding the bullets back into his gun. Cuba, four or five hours jump on him?

Cynthia’s eyes were fixed on his gun, her breath catching slightly. ‘There… there weren’t any bullets in your gun all along.’

‘I know. I palmed it.’ Nel-M smiled slyly as he slid in the last two bullets. ‘When you were a little girl, didn’t you just love surprises?’

Yanking her hair back, Nel-M put the gun barrel back in her mouth and pulled the trigger.

‘Yep, I managed to dig up something,’ Stratton said. ‘Mercedes 300SL lifted from a driveway on 4^th Street, just two houses in from Coliseum, while a couple were away on holiday. They apparently already had a Jaguar and a Caddy in the garage, that’s why the car was out.’

‘Sounds promising.’ Jac had decided to use his time waiting for flight-boarding to make his follow-up calls. He’d tried Mack Elliott’s number to see if he’d recalled anything yet — no answer — then he’d called Stratton. ‘And it happened the same night as Jessica Roche’s murder?’

‘That’s the thing that can’t be said for sure. The couple, the Lapointes, were away for ten days, and from the police report the neighbours were vague on when the car went missing. Closest it can be nailed down to is two days before the night of the murder or three days after. But there’s at least a chance it went down that same night.’ Stratton sucked in his breath. ‘Thing is, that’s the only recorded crime close by that could have been that night. It’s either that, or nothing.’

4^th Street? From Jac’s pacing the district a few nights back, that’s where he’d worked out the murderer would have probably cut through to get back to his car. ‘Yeah, okay. Certainly it’s close enough for someone there to have seen the murderer leaving the Roche’s house. Anything else yet on it?’

Jac looked up as his flight was called. Echoing PA, clamour of other voices swirling around. He’d checked in for his flight as late as possible, was nervous being too long among crowds, knowing that Melanie Ayliss was on the prowl for him.

‘Still waiting on a list of possible MO matches from that time. Then fast-forwarding to those still active now before I can get some mug-shots in front of the staff at that Internet cafe.’

‘Yeah, right.’ Jac got up and headed towards the gate. Echoing footsteps among the voices, walking through Libreville… legs shaky, nerves biting as he viewed the passport officers ahead. First time Ayliss’s passport had been put to the test. ‘And timing?’ That clock-hand ticking hour-by-hour heavier in his head. Only thirty hours left, and half of that would now be eaten up getting to Truelle in Cuba.

‘Hopefully, I’ll get everything I want before the day’s out. And if that Internet cafe’s still open, get the photos in front of them tonight. But if not, it’s going to have to wait till first light tomorrow morning.’

‘Okay.’ Six people ahead in the queue, Jac’s stomach doing a quick turn as one of the passport officers ahead, surveying who was approaching, eyed him for the first time. Melanie Ayliss’s eyes locking on him. A rock had sunk through his stomach as Coultaine had told him about her notifying the police. Coultaine said he was sure that he’d put their minds to rest on that front, but what if he hadn’t? ‘I’ll be plane-hopping pretty much till the early hours, anyway. But I might get a chance to contact you between connections late tonight.’

‘Sure, if you can. Where are you going?’

‘Nassau, Bahamas.’ Because of US travel restrictions, Jac had been warned not to mention his destination was Cuba until he was actually in Nassau. The officers ahead were close enough to hear him now: the queue down to three, passing quickly through… two.

‘Nice.’

‘Wish it was. Like everything else right now — another last-ditch shot at saving Larry Durrant’s life.’ That officer ahead locking eyes on him again, Jac worried that with all the Ayliss padding he was sweating more than he should, looked more nervous than he should. Or perhaps part of his face had finally melted. Something in the officer’s eyes. Something. Jac swallowed hard. Forged passport, Melanie Ayliss’s police alert, travelling to Cuba when you shouldn’t, face melting off… take your pick on what might be wrong! One. ‘I’d… I’d better go now.’

‘Yeah, speak to you later. Good luck.’

‘Thanks. You too.’

The usual offhand reciprocation; but as Jac handed over his passport and saw again that look in the officer’s eyes, and he was then asked to step to one side as his passport was passed to a colleague behind to check on his computer — he was in little doubt which one of them needed luck the most at that moment.